Happy Birthday

As I write this post Charlotte is dancing around our family room, holding a handful of fake flowers, spinning this way and that. It's strange to think that four years ago she was in my belly, not yet a true part of our life. It seems like that time has gone so quick, and yet, at the same time, I can't really remember what it's like not having her around. She's such a good little girl - compassionate, smart, fiesty and full of joy. She shares and nurtures and loves on other kids. She cheers me up if I'm down, 'helps' in any way she can and sings all the time. She's got all the good parts of Mark and I, and none of the bad (although give it some time and I'm sure some of those will come popping out too). She's soooo much better than what I imagined she'd be when we spent two years trying to conceive. She's just perfect for our family.

Happy Birthday to my Chuckles!!!!!

P.S. The photos are from when we roadtriped down to Georgia and met up with Katie Bower for some photos. Sorry it took me so long to getting around to sharing any!

Family Photos

Mark's mum left for home yesterday evening and Miss Charlotte wasn't too happy about it. She's going to miss her nana for sure! We rarely seem to remember to do it, but I'm glad that we managed to get this photo taken during Brenda's visit. In case you didn't remember, it's on my 30 Before Thirty list to have family photos taken. The above isn't exactly what I had in mind, but is at least a good reminder that I need to work on scheduling an actual photographer soon. Hopefully I can find someone whose work I like that isn't too outrageously expensive. Do you have any recommendations in the Maryland (or even Pennsylvania/Virginia area - I'm willing to travel) area?

Charlotte, Meet Pavement

Charlotte had a pretty spectacular spill on Tuesday night. She and Mark were playing with her new bubble toy when she tripped over her own feet and face-planted into the asphalt. She cried a bit, but was comforted by two lollipops and a bag of frozen peas to keep the swelling down. And she later requested that I cook the peas so she could eat them. Weird kid! She's now sporting a skinned knee (that's a regular occurrence as of late) and a huge bump on her forehead.

She still looks cute (those adorable curls and beautiful eyes can't be denied), but roughed up for sure. Which is why I'm glad I snagged some photos of her undamaged mug the other day. It occurred to me as we were waiting in the car while Mark ran into the store that photographing her in her carseat was an awesome idea. She was contained and bound to actually look me the camera in the eye at some point. So I positioned myself (awkwardly) in the driver's seat and started snapping away.

Here are my first few photos, straight out of the camera:


They're cute, and I even managed to get some catchlights, but the lighting is weird. So I moved myself away from the center of the car and towards the window, so that she was facing the light more. The results were definitely better, but she was making some goofy faces!


So I got her calmed down a bit (after snacking on some pretzels) and took a few more. Her face looks great, but the first one is blown out and the second is a little out of focus.


One more photo and we have success!


All this to say, it pays to be patient, take a lot of pictures (there's over 30 from this little "photo session") and pay attention to the results you're getting. Something I need to remind myself of regularly.

Ten on Ten: April 2011

Rebekah is once again hosting her Ten on Ten Challenge. I participated last month and am shocked (and super pleased) to say I remembered to do it this month too. Here are ten photos from today:

10:00am hour - Mark driving us to church. On time for once.
11:00am hour - I was serving in the nursery today.

12:00pm hour - Whoever happens to drive on any given day gets Charlotte pressing on their back.
1:00pm hour - A stop at the store (ok, two stores).

2:00pm hour - Charlotte thought it was hilarious when I stood over her for a picture.
3:00pm hour - She pretends to sleep cartoon-style, with a whistling exhale. She can't do it without laughing.

4:00pm hour - Mark bought some new Lego people and Chuckles was very excited!
5:00pm hour - She was pretty happy to rediscover the bunny mask I bought the other day too.

6:00pm hour - Charlotte was hungry earlier than normal and tried to help herself.
7:00pm hour - She also tried to help me by "reading" from the cookbook.

Luck o' the Irish

We'll be celebrating today with some leprechaun trapping, just like we did last year. How will you go green?















Photo Credit: weheartit.com

Ten on Ten: March 2011

Rebekah over at A Bit of Sunshine has encouraged everyone to make time on the 10th of each month to take ten photos - one an hour over a ten hour period - as a way to find the beauty in every day. Reading all about the project has inspired me to take part. So here we go with today's photos:

1:00pm hour - Nursing a Coke at work.
2:00pm hour - View of the cube farm.

3:00pm hour - Some down time at work.
4:00pm hour - Touching up the lip gloss.

5:00pm hour - The rainy car ride home.
6:00pm hour - Charlotte getting ready to head out.

7:00pm hour - Aunt Mandy helps Chuckles get her coat on.
8:00pm hour - Dinner at Brian Boru.

9:00pm hour - Our version of March Madness (more on this next week).
10:00pm hour - Sweet dreams.

Photo Shoot

Mark and I spent a little time after church yesterday taking a few photos of Charlotte for our Christmas cards. I did the actual picture-taking and Mark did the Chuck-wrangling. He definitely had the harder job!

I was excited to snag what I think is the perfect Christmas card photo! Now I just have to pick out cards, which may be difficult since there are so many that I like. Maybe I'll show you some options tomorrow. For now, here are some (unedited) shots from our "photo shoot" that won't be gracing our cards, but are adorable nonetheless.


Want to see more of Charlotte's outdoor antics? Check out my mom's blog.

Walt Disney World in Pictures

So we're three weeks past our Disney trip (has it really only been that long?!) and it occurs to me that I've yet to go through my pictures. Which is especially sad because there's only 187 of them. Yup. There were over 1200 on Charlotte's first trip and a scant 187 from this one. And of those 187, this is the one I like best:


I know, I know. Pretty pathetic. Neither girl is looking at the camera. They're not doing anything especially exciting (although they occupied themselves with that little puddle for quite a while). And there's nothing that really shows that you're in Walt Disney World, unless you're well-versed in Disney trash cans. Which I am. (10 points to anyone who can identify the location!)

The only excuse I have for the lack of photos is that a Disney trip with a 2 year old is hard. I mean really hard. I majorly underestimated how difficult it'd be to wrangle her. That combined with the heat just made it too difficult to lug out the camera. Ah well, there's always next time.

But, since I've got nothing to show for this trip, check out this adorable video of Chuckles on her last Disney trip, when she was just 16 months old. So cute!!

30 Before Thirty

For the past several months I've been following along as Nicole over at Making It Lovely crosses item after item off her list of things to do before turning 30. Val (In the Meantime) did a similar list, having 28 goals to accomplish in her 28th year. Since I'm about to turn 29, I figured I'll need to make my list now if I'm ever going to be as successful as they've been! So, without further ado, here's my list of things to accomplish before I hit the big three-oh:

1. Decorate for holidays other than just Christmas.
2. Make a quilt.
3. Enroll Charlotte in gymnastics/dance.
4. Learn more about Photoshop Elements.
5. Watch all the year's Oscar Best Picture nominees.
6. Learn to crochet.
7. Sew a costume for Charlotte.
8. Learn to cook a good steak.
9. Have family photos taken.
10. Teach Charlotte to swim.
11. Get a shared room (i.e. not a bedroom) decorated the way I like.
12. Organize all our bills and important documents.
13. Make dessert more often.
14. Vacation somewhere other than Disney World.
15. Learn to style my hair in different ways.
16. Complete a craft with Charlotte at least monthly.
17. Attend church regularly.
18. Improve my photography.
19. Lose at least 30 pounds.
20. Have a date night with Mark at least once a month.
21. Take Charlotte to Sesame Place.
22. Reduce my reliance on paper towels.
23. Build something from scratch.
24. Host a party at our new house.
25. Take walks as a family.
26. Read every book club book.
27. Revamp a piece of furniture with paint.
28. Organize my photos.
29. Prepare dinners regularly.
30. Use produce from my own garden.

I'll be crossing items of the list as this accomplished in this same post, and may (or may not) create separate posts about how I'm faring with each goal. I encourage you to make a similar list for whatever age you're approaching!

To Do This October

Sheesh! Almost a week into the month and I'd forgotten all about posting my to do list. To update you on last month, I'm an epic fail. Well, moderately epic anyway. My goals were to exercise (I used the Just Dance game on the Wii once), make some crafty projects (I did make two dresses for Charlotte, hence the "moderately" part), and majorly crapped out of taking more photos. But enough looking back... let's see the plan for this month:

Get moving. We're scheduled to close on our current house in mid-November and need to get cracking on packing things up to be stored. We likely won't rent the storage pod until early November, but I want to make major headway on putting things in boxes before then. While I tend to do my best work at the last minute, I don't want to be stressing on our last few nights here.

Get crafty. I did fairly well on this last month and want to keep it up. I already have plans to make a stroller bag that turns into a messenger bag (I'll share the great tutorial I found with you once I try it out myself). And we'll need to make t-shirts for our upcoming Disney trip. I mean, topping what we did last year will be no easy feat:


We went to Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party as the cast of the Imagination Movers, for anyone who isn't current on their kids tv programming.

Get snap-happy. I failed ridiculously in this area last month. And I mean ridiculously. I save my photos on the computer with a folder for each month and day. September has two measly folders in it. Pathetic I know. But with fall colors, Disney World and Halloween, there's bound to be tons of good photo-taking opportunities!

And that's the plan. Don't you like how I stacked the deck? I mean, two of the three things will be impossible not to do with our vacation plans. Feel free to do the same with your to do list!

To Do This September

August has really flown by! It feels like the summer has just started, but already it's gone with fall right around the corner. I for one am super excited about the change in seasons and am hopeful that September will bring as much accomplishment as August did. My last to do list had just four things on it and I can proudly, with a big, black Sharpie, cross three things off the list, and have my marker hovering over the fourth.

We managed to get the house on the market and in just five days time have already had three showings. We're hopeful this means good news is on the way soon! And since the house is on the market, it means the basement is done. It's still got way more boxes in it than I'd like, but they're relegated to one corner and the other side of the space is staged nicely. We also had a doozy of a yard sale and I walked away with nearly $500 and a lot less stuff to show for it. Go me!!

Now for this month's goals:

Exercise. The one area that I didn't measure up on for August was starting an exercise routine. I did discover the awesomeness that is the Just Dance game for the Wii (I've always said I wanted an MC Hammer workout video) and plan to do that at least every other day. And I have a feeling that Charlotte, Mark and I will be taking lots of afternoon walks while we wait for potential buyers to take a look at the place.


Work on some crafty projects. I find that I'm a much happier person when I spend a little time making things (go figure that claims adjusting isn't enough of a creative outlet!!). I've gathered a long list of things I want to do (that I'm slowly but surely adding to my Potential Projects blog) and just need to settle on where to begin. I may start by signing up for the Small Crafts class I mentioned yesterday. We'll see!


Take more pictures. I'd been on a hot streak of breaking out the camera and documenting mine, and more specifically, Charlotte's life. But this past month was a total blur and I don't have any photos (at least not that I took) to show for it. So that will be rectified this month as I plan to get back into my snap-happy ways.


So, this month's goals are a lot more along the lines of getting myself into the normal routine of life than previous months have been, for which I'm very excited. How are your month's goals shaping up?