WELCOME!

Welcome to my newly designed blog!! I want to give a big shout out and "thank you" to Ms. Ellie at Rainy Day Templates who helped me with the design and taught me, "Ms. HTML Code Illiterate", how to put on all the finishing touches (which are still in progress)! She was fantastic to work with and was super fast....oh, to have the brains for stuff like this!! :-)

The greatest part about this new blog format is that I can show you much larger images. And, really, who doesn't want to see these faces as large as possible?? Hehehe. ;-)

I'll be back soon with new client photos! Until then, good night!

Recipe for Perfection

Saturday. Sunny. Warm. Hiking. Will. Bailey and Kelsee. What more could a girl ask for? It's the recipe for a perfect day. Some quotes from our day... :-)

Bailey and Kelsee to Will: "Why does Mom always make us stop for dumb pictures?"

Will, Stacey, Bailey & Kelsee: "Really? Snow? In 65 degree weather? Weird. But beautiful."

Bailey to Will: "That feels good...oh, up a little...no, down and to the right..."
Kelsee to Stacey: "Are you kidding me? We had to stop our hike for this??"

Kelsee to Bailey: "Look sister, I can even do tricks and we're still faster than Mom!!"

Bailey to Will: "Dad, it's easy...you cross the river like this..."

Kelsee to Bailey: "Sister, get out of my way, it's my turn!"
Stacey to anyone who would listen: "Noooooooooooo!!!!"
(Bailey took quite the tumble, but jumped up like nothing had happened. Whew!)

Kelsee thinks to herself: "Maybe she's faster because her tail is shorter??"

Bailey and Kelsee to the tune from Dukes of Hazzard: "YEE HAW!!"

Stacey: "I LOVE SPRING!!!"

Bailey: "My mom's a weirdo...I don't know her right now."

Hope you all are having a wonderful weekend! Find reasons to be happy...you'll be glad you did!

FINALLY!

Finally! Something to make the cold weather exciting.....snow!!! These are pictures of our walk from tonight (not great pictures because it was so dark out, but still funny)... It was Kelsee's first time in the snow -- she REALLY liked it!!

Bailey taking one for the team

Kelsee saving some dessert for later

Bailey (the athletic machine) in action

Kelsee just loving life

The ice we were walking on

Will getting chased (or was he doing the chasing???)

My big helpers helping with my snow angel

Kelsee practing for the balance beam in 2012 Olympics -- and on an icy balance beam at that -- she's a shoe in!

It's supposed to keep snowing/icing -- we're hoping for a snow day tomorrow!! It won't happen, but I can at least go to bed with visions of grandeur...and save the disappointment for tomorrow morning. Sweet dreams!

The Great Out(in)doors!!

Dear winter --- you and your cold, windy weather can't stop us from our fun!! We win!! Sincerely, Will, Stacey, Bailey and Kelsee

We packed up all our camping gear and made the long journey to the forest of our living room for a night of camping! Complete with the tent, the sleeping mats, sleeping bags and both dogs, we settled in for the night.

Post Adventure Thoughts:

- I'm not as young as I once was -- my back was not so fond of sleeping on the floor.
- The three person tent that we thought would be PLENTY big is not nearly big enough when you have Brunhilda the dog (Kelsee) sleeping with you. I woke up once having been pushed clear to the edge, breathing tent fabric.
- It's much easier to start a fire in a gas fireplace than by rubbing two sticks together in the great outdoors. But it's not nearly as fun.
- Bailey is not a fan of the fact that my sleeping bag only fits one person (and no dogs). She kept trying to wiggle her way in, but to no avail. :-)
- I'm super excited for the spring when we can put our backpacks on and go out and show nature what we've learned!!
- I have the most amazing husband EVER! We have so much fun. I love him.

Dedication

That's right, we really are this ridiculous. Every night, we head out for our evening walk and I'm sure on these cold evenings as our neighbors sit drinking hot chocolate by the fireplace, they look out their windows and laugh at the nuts bundled up in snowpants (that's me), and other winter gear that makes us resemble marshmallows. And you know what, I'm okay with that! :-) As you can see, Bailey, much like her mother and father, is not a fan of the cold. She wears a coat as well to keep her warm. Will thinks she looks stupid in it, I think she looks warm and cuddly....I'm such a girl. Minus the dogs crazy eyes, I thought this picture from tonight was pretty funny...

To all our family in the midwest and in Washington state.....here's to ya! I know you are dealing with much colder temperatures than we are...may the force be with you to help you endure!!! :-)

Christmas 2008

For my first post on this blog, I thought it would be fun to share a few pictures of our Christmas. We had such a wonderful time with my family in town! Thanks so much to Mom, Dad, Chad and Tasha for coming to visit!!! Bailey and Kelsee also had quite the exciting Christmas with lots of attention and lots of gifts. They are still tired and recovering from all the excitement...