A few favorite moments of the holiday....

(I think any photos can be enlarged by clicking on them.)


Andrea and McKenna helped me put up the tree. I love how they work together to solve problems. They really are a good team.

I got to make presents for ALL of the girl's teachers. Since McKenna is in 1st grade, that included teacher assistants and of course all her special area teachers! Andrea is in 8th grade so that added up to about 11 teachers including any aftercare favorites. These were recycled crystal light containers, covered and filled with holiday mints. They were a hit.

We put together a very special basket of gifts for McKenna's very special 1st grade teacher. I called it a "pamper you favorite teacher" basket. I filled it with all those nice teacher gifts that we teachers never seem to buy ourselves. (Such as dry erase markers with erasers on the tips - have you ever seen those? Cool!)

Since there were so many teachers at the middle school to give to and since money was so little, we put holiday mints in bags but added very nice handmade holiday tags. They seemed to be a hit as well.

This year we baked for two and a half days. Scott took over the operations....he had a primary objective in mind. The Japanese Steakhouse, Kotobuki's is part of many of our family traditions. At Christmas time, over the years we bring a few trays of cookies for the staff to enjoy; this year we brought 11 trays of goodies and containers of fudge. Scott had every hope that the owner would cook for us.

Scott's wish was granted. It truly was an honor to have Ishi cook for us and the dinner was the best ever. He said he was so nervous and that he hadn't cooked at the grill in many years.

The girls helped me bake an apple pie for daddy.

We have this cool apple peeler/slicer. It only gets used once a year!

I loved this photo of Andrea.

And I loved this photo of McKenna! This hat was the cutest thing :o)

Santa brought McKenna her first bike. She couldn't wait to try it out on Christmas day.

It's been a wonderful holiday and the past two days we have all relaxed, watched movies, ate left overs and played on the new Wii. We have visited with good friends, played games with family and stayed in bed way past our usually 5:00am wake up call.

It's days like these we hate to see come to an end. It's days like these that we remember to count our blessings.

Happy Holidays everyone and best wishes for a wonderful New Year!

Here I am! Here I am!

OMG, I do remember how to enter a post :o) I thought it might be awhile before I got to add a new post....guess I was right.

Well, I've posted other photos of family portraits, now I can finally post our holiday family portrait.

(Thank you Michele!)

It was a wonderful holiday with friends and family and we still have more friends visiting tonight for dinner. I always worry so much, before the "big day", but I think I pulled it off this year. I also always go through a post Christmas day depression, but I'm holding up pretty well. The inspiration from Ali Edwards and her advice about enjoying the little things in everyday life really has helped me.

Sorry this entry is so short, but I will be back....much more to share....

a weekend full of rewards...

McKenna celebrates with friends her 7th birthday!

My "photo business" is growing! Thanks Michele for your faith in me and Kurt, the golf course is absolutely amazing!

Kendra, also has a lot of faith in me, and provided me with this chance to photograph another beautiful family today, thanks Nina!

And finally, I couldn't resist this chance for Michele to take a snapshot of me an my sidekick today. (We missed Andrea today. She stayed home to work on, what else, homework.)

My dear, dear friends, thank you :o)

Calm before the storm....

I've told friends when I've mentioned this blog, that I don't use it to run on about my feelings, but on this rainy Sunday, eve before I go back to work and just on the edge of the next three weeks, I can't help but admit, this time of year always make me feel a little depressed. I'm making a great effort not to get caught up in all the stress this year and to enjoy the memories that make this time of year (and everyday) so special. I've been inspired by the blogs I follow daily, especially Ali Edwards who creates something called a "December Daily" for this time of year. Well, it's too late for me to keep one probably for this year, but if I did, I'd say ours actually starts just before the 1st of December. Here are some photos I might keep in a DD that capture just a moment or two of our busy days during this crazy, wonderful, hectic and beautiful time of year.

Wednesday, November 26th:the day before Thanksgiving, the girls helped me make the traditional pumpkin pie. Also keeping to tradition, the girls never had a bite. Good! More for Scott and I.

Thursday, Thanksgiving Day! McKenna's place was set and she said the blessing for us. No photos available, but guests at our table were my mom and her husband :)


Thursday, we also got to visit with many other loved ones at Aunt Ellen's house. (Skip to here for other family photos. ) Jeremy was able to visit after just returning home from his 3rd tour in Iraq. Here is a photo op with his two sisters. I loved this picture.

Friday, November 28th, meant another tradition - shopping! It was about 4 years ago that Andrea joined our shopping tradition, and this year McKenna did as well. Here she assumes the proper "shopper's walk"!

Friday, McKenna also got to have the all too brief, but oh so important visit with Santa!

Saturday, November 29th, I had to be back at work by 7:00 am, for what I hope doesn't become tradition, to hang a student art show. Just as we were leaving the newspaper photographer asked if there was a student present with their art in this show....what, are you kidding? I just happen to have her right here! Hopefully, her picture will make the paper.

Saturday evening, we made it to EPCOT for a revisited favorite tradition to see and hear the Candlelight Processional, beautiful.

And finally, Sunday, November 30th, we got to put the tree up complete with our traditional Disney's monorail instead of a train!

Photos compliments of McKenna!

Okay, three weeks to go until Christmas break, 6 days until Christmas day after that....it's gonna be busy, and I probably won't get to post much. I'll continue to try to enjoy the moments and not stress about money, cleaning, what has to be wrapped and if my kids are happy. It's like that song says, "you're gonna miss this", so I'm going to do my best to enjoy it before it's gone.

Peace.

more blessings....

Yay, I finally have pictures to post that aren't just my family!

I had the fortunate opportunity to photograph these beautiful children and wonderful family today - thank you Kendra :o)

Sneak Peak...

I finally had an entire weekend off and I did nothing but loads and loads of laundry and sat at the computer working on photo stuff. (I did also do the grocery shopping, which I hate, on a sunday, with all the after church crowd and on the last weekend before thanksgiving.) It was wonderful, so why do I feel guilty? Well, in order to curb that feeling, I have created 12 layouts for next year's calendar, I'll give these as gifts to a few loved ones.
Here's a "sneak peak" of one or two....

Blessings

Last night we celebrated Dad's 65th birthday with a "surprise" party! He says we might have pulled it off, except he got suspicious when no one called him all day to wish him a happy birthday!
I titled this "Blessings", because all my blessings are right here in this photo. I fortunately have many, many more, but right here, in this photo, is all I ever prayed for as a child; a wonderful family and beautiful children.
Happy Birthday Dad. Last night Scott said you were is friend and mentor...thanks for being mine too.

Halloween Revisited...

I never got to take pictures of Andrea on "all hallo's eve", long story - not important now, but she did dress up for me again the next day for her own "photo shoot". Here are a few, I thought they were pretty spooky!

It's not the quantity but the quality....

We had a chance to head down to disney today and after a fun morning on a few new attractions at Hollywood Studios, a picnic lunch in our Santa Fe with the sunroof open (the weather was perfect today), we were off to complete my "prime directive" of visiting the "Disney's Festival of Masters" Art Show. I totally thought is was an art show either by disney artisits or of disney art - no, just a regular (huge) art show. A place I'd like to wonder through by myself, but not a place for my hubby. He was a trooper (although he would have rather had a root canal) he hung in there :o). The girls did get to have their face painted by the Cirque De Solei makeup artist and did chalk drawings on the sidewalk. That was fun, even I couldn't resist a little sketch!

Stitch says, "Aloha, Cousin!"

Simba says, "I just can't wait to be King!"

my "masterpiece" LOL

Seeing Spots!

Before,
during,
after
At our school we celebrate our love of reading w/ "Book-o-ween". Since this will be my last one with one of my own children, I begged McKenna to chose book characters where we could be partners. We were pleased with her idea of 101 Dalmatians. :)

Punkins carving pumpkins

Thanks to my mom helping me at work today, I was able to get home at a decent hour. The girls had enough time to carve their Jack-o-lanterns just before the sun went down.

Happy Halloween

Scott really gets into decorating the outside of our house for Halloween. It seems we get pretty involved as well. Although I do have to temper it a little and remind him, after all, "Halloween is for the kids".


Halloween 2005 (Obviously, the wrong date on the photo.)




Halloween 2006


Halloween 2007



This year Scott made a head stone for me. (It says, "Melle B. laid to rest, a shallow grave will serve her best.) He said I should consider it an "honor". I didn't find it funny at all. So, with a little help from McKenna and my mom, we wrote his epitaph and I made him a headstone. Check out the video below.

I hate to sound like a broken record, but I've been so busy. I just can't seem to get caught up with anything....
Awww, but finally, my favorite day of the week - Saturday. I fortunately have today to add a few posts, work on a few photos projects of my own and hopefully make a few Halloween costumes. (I'll let you know how that goes.)
I did make time to take a few photos of the girls while we picked up some pumpkins this week. I'll start w/ this photo, but hope to post a few more after I play with the photo effects. I so badly want to try some in b & w, but then we miss the beautiful fall colors. "Fall colors", those are my colors for today. I do love, oranges, reds and yellows :)