Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Grateful...

"Give thanks to the Lord for He is good; His faithful love endures forever." Psalm 118:1


Photo above taken by Shelly Peters


I am forever grateful to my Lord and Saviour for blessing me with these three boys...

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with Clay's sisters in town...thank you Nana and Poppie for the delicious Thanksgiving meal that was pre-prepared (mostly!) for us. Thankful that Clay flew in Thanksgiving day and was able to be a part of the holiday with us. Still can't believe I got up at 4:20am to partake in the Black Friday Madness...even more stunned that I got hubby out of the bed to attack Walmart at 5am (he actually said the only reason he was grudgingly going with me was to make sure I didn't go crazy with the pocketbook!!) Got some good deals though...enjoyed the day with family...can mark "shop at largest mall in America on Black Friday" off my lifelong "to do" list :)

One more feeding for the littlest man and then I'm off to bed...gotta sleep hard and fast...2am will be here before I'm ready for it! :)

Thursday, November 25, 2010

Happy Thanksgiving!


Happy Thanksgiving!
Hope everyone has a wonderful, blessed day!
Love
Carrie

Wednesday, November 24, 2010

a walk through our day

For our family who are not able to be with us today...we love you and miss you so much. Wish we could all be together! But as promised, here is a walk through our day. It was simple but very memorable.

...I am busy addressing these...

Parker getting fitted and measured for his tux in the upcoming wedding... :)

Parker helping Ashee make our lunches...

CiCi and Carrie making a "quick" (only 3 hrs) Target run...more snow and ice fell while we were there...

KK and Parker getting excited about working in the kitchen...

Ashee, KK and Parker making a double batch of Chex mix...yum!!!

...and in the meantime, Cooper is enjoying his front row view of the falling snow out on our deck.

Ashee and Parker feeling quite satisfied after their successful baking experience with the Chex mix...

CiCi in kitchen during this time making dinner...
Ashee and Parker creating cool things with the legos...

KK and Parker building (and knocking down) towers...

a quick-before-bedtime picture...goodnight all!

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

awaiting the aunts' arrival...

Cooper - 6 weeks old



...just hanging out with these two while we excitedly await for the Nolen girls to arrive...Parker is thrilled that his aunts are flying in for a Thanksgiving visit!! See you soon girls!

Thursday, November 18, 2010

an album for my brother

At the start of this year, I started collecting photographs for a project I wanted to complete and give to my brother. Knowing an engagement and then a wedding would be in the very near future, I thought that now would be the perfect time to make this special book of memories for him. Each time I was able to fly down South, I would look forward to spending some time perusing through our old family albums and handpicking favorite pictures of my brother and me growing up.

I laughed, cried and smiled throughout the whole making of this album. I was so happy with the end result and was thrilled that I decided to make a duplicate copy for myself so that I could reminisce over the memories as often as I wanted to! (My husband is thrilled that I finished it too...more so because my scrap area has been clean and organized for several weeks now...for the time being anyway... :))

Here are a few pages and details to share...




(simple simple simple pages. Loved the pictures on this layout. :) used old school paper and embellishments, but thought it added to the theme nicely. ha!)


...included a good bit of hidden journaling throughout the book. I love journaling in scrapbooks, but don't always like it to be front and center.

...we both loved Christmastime with our family. Our mom and dad have always made it so much fun for us! Love that we always shared the special holiday with family...love the crazy and exciting times we had with our cousins when we'd get together...loved the homemade goodies that Aunt Polly would bring to us in her signature tins several times during the season (the fudge always went first!)...loved our mix of handmade, funky boutique, and formal ornaments that always adorned our tree...love the traditions...loved our Christmas pjs...love the memories of sitting in the little living room next to the fireplace staring at the white lights on the tree...loved all the special seasonal goodies that we unpacked from the attic each year (the walking snowman, the New England Village and its sweet accessories, the Nativity, the handmade felt advent calendar that hung in our hallway, the miniature Christmas trees that were placed on our dressers and decorated with mini ornaments...how could we ever forget the Christmas Muppets? ha! ...and so many more)...loved the many Christmas books mama would set out for us to read each night through the month...loved the Christmas Eve Candlelight service, the Christmas musical and Christmas plays at our church...love how our parents made it fun for us in every way possible and through all the hooplah always reminded us the Real Reason for the season. I could go on and on and on and on about the many things I remember and will always cherish from our childhood Christmas memories.

I hope I can pass this same feeling on to our children so that they will look back with a warm heart and smile.



Enjoyed creating the layouts about our school days, youth group and church trips and events...this brought back many, many memories.




Paperclipped behind the title of the above page are some of my favorite quotes/sayings on family.


LOVE this page for the poem my mom wrote about us and the pictures to fit! (notice the far left and far right pics!!)


Towards the end I included a letter to Taylor.
One final page will be added after Taylor and Fair's wedding...to include the whole family. The last page of the book though, is the page shown below of the two of us at Taylor's Senior pictures.


I am so very thankful for my family and love my brother very much. He is about to marry the girl of his dreams and I couldn't be happier for both of them. Before he says "I do" on December 11, I wanted him to be able to look back and smile on the last 25 years of his life...we have been so blessed to have the parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and friends that we do. I am thrilled that he is about to "officially" join a precious family that will also have him smiling over the next 25 years!!!


I love you Taylor and couldn't be a prouder sister. Thank you for all the memories of the past and the memories to come!

P.S. Reminder to self: show Taylor where hidden journaling is otherwise he won't have a clue it's there!!!

Album and page protectors: American Crafts

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

playing in the white stuff

We've been doing a lot of this these last couple of days...

...and this sweet little bundle has been entertaining us with his cuteness.

In between the laundry, spit ups, Christmas shopping (online), diaper changes, the picking up around the house (only for the same area to get trashed again 2 min later! ha!), phone calls and about seventy-six other day to day responsibilities, we've been running out to play in the "white stuff" as much as possible. :) With it getting dark by 4:30 in the afternoon, we have to jump on the opportunity during the daylight hours. I love hearing Parker's squeals and hearty laughs each time he falls or goes sledding down a hill. The excitement in his voice as he runs around makes the half an hour it took just to get him dressed and out the door all the more worth the few minutes of play outside. It makes my heart smile.

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Wintry roads and a special Tea for Cooper

Yesterday morning most of Minnesota woke up to a winter surprise. While we were expecting 1-3 in of snow, we weren't expecting 5+ inches of powder and ice covering our driveways and roads. This picture was taken around 7:30 in the morning. By nightfall, there was a bit more. I did have to smile as I looked out into our backyard thinking of all the fun Parker was going to have this winter playing in the white stuff.

So, the girls from our Sunday School Class treated us to a Sip n See for Cooper yesterday. (thank you Lauren for coordinating and Susie for hosting at your beautiful home!)

Let me just start by saying that I had no idea what I was talking about when Lauren called me at 8:30am Saturday asking if I still wanted to make the drive to Chanhassen (from Eagan). Most of the girls coming lived closer out that way, but I had quite the commute. The weatherman had said 1-3in, so how bad could it be? Of course I was still making the drive! If you're at all familiar with the area you know that it doesn't take 45 min to get from my driveway to Hwy 77...well, it did yesterday. Not only that, but it took me almost 2 hrs just to get to Chanhassen. Snow plows hadn't been around yet since it was still so early, so the roads were totally snowed under. I couldn't believe it when I pulled out of our neighborhood and started seeing cars everywhere stuck off the side of the road, vehicles skidding in the middle of hills and cops on literally every street (that I drove on anyway) to assist people in getting their cars "unstuck." (I'll take this moment to thank dear hubby for recently purchasing my nice, new snow tires that got me up each and every one of those hills yesterday without too much sliding. I actually felt kinda bad as I slowly putt putted past vehicles unsuccessfully spinning their tires for traction, but I knew if I stopped I wouldn't be able to get started again! ha!) Needless to say we were late for our own Sip n See, but so was everyone else so I didn't feel quite so bad.

I equated the drive out there to a feeling of a near death experience when I rode the Texas Giant at Six Flags over Texas back in Junior High. It may not have been as fast of a ride, but the white knuckles were about the same. To say that I had a death grip on my steering wheel the entire drive out there would almost be an understatement (I came close to taking a picture of all the stalled and stuck vehicles on one of the roads, but I knew if I posted it my mom would never quit worrying about us up here. :)) Once I got on the highways, the roads weren't nearly as bad, but still not a day at the park...

The warmth of the company, the food and the decor was felt as soon as Parker, Cooper and I all trudged our wet clothes and boots in the front door of Susie's.

The next hour and a half or so was such a treat to be able to visit with girlfriends as we sipped on tea and laughed and talked about everything to do with pregnancy, labor and delivery, infancy, and even the toddler stage, and nothing to do with anything other than those topics listed above. I take that back...the weather was mentioned once or twice.  :)

Thank you so much to each of you who helped to make this day so very special for us. I cherish our friendship and love the priceless girlfriend time that we share. Thank you again Lauren and Susie for all the hard work and time you put into this event to help make it what it was.

(Thank you Mike for helping me with my car troubles!! ...that's a whole other story that I won't get into, but lets just briefly say that something is definitely not right with my radiator and to top that off, I think I left part of my car in my neighbors driveway yesterday afternoon when I got back to Eagan...I think it's ok though because it's just a plastic part of some sorts that goes underneath the car...I guess we'll know when hubby gets home! Jeff, my neighbor, was kind enough to come shovel my driveway for me because when I tried to get in, the car got stuck. I spent a total of 3 hours and 20 minutes on the road yesterday, made it all the way to Chanhassen and back and then couldn't get in my driveway. Go figure. Well anyway, thank you Jeff!)

...ahhh, home sweet home. It's actually peaceful looking when you're not out driving in it!

And after the babes sleep...I fold laundry. Since "white" seemed to be the dominating color of my day, I decided to take a picture of the white load of laundry that I was folding last night. Onesies and burp cloths...in my opinion moms, you can't have enough of these!!!