What a long, long day!

Natalia's birthday is this week and she is turning 3. She is totally obsessed with "birfday" parties lately that we decided to have one for her on Sunday. After deciding on this, the next thing I know Gerben is all finally finishing the painting on our main floor. Let me tell you, this is no small project. It started out on Saturday with a trip to



(Please ignore the terrible quality photo. I was attempting to use my canon point and shoot camera. YUCK!)

At Lowes we picked up new interior doors and all the hardware to go with them. We currently have the icky, yucky brown slab doors. Once we got home, Gerben got started on the destruction and preparation.

Sunday started bright and early with our traditional Sunday breakfast and then it was off to the grocery store and Home Depot for me.



Once I got home, the fun began for me. I got to paint, and paint and paint and paint for the next 13 or so hours.



Around 6:00 or so, Gerben had to head into work to reboot the server. Of course these things never turn out as expected. He took the girls with him, to get them out of my hair but there was problems. The quick 1 hour round trip turned into about 2+ hours. I was waiting at home for the call to put the pizza in the oven. This is when that happened



As you can tell, I didn't begin to make supper until after Natalia's usual bedtime of about 7:30 and the girls still both needed a bath and were not home yet. By the time we got dinner finished and the girls bathed and into bed it was this time



Only after that did I crack open the can of primer and begin to paint. Bedtime came late for us. Very, very late. This late in fact...



Trust me when I say, morning came too soon. By this time, I was out of bed, showered, dressed and making Emma's lunch!



Can I go back to bed now?

What is with these photos?

Ok, so they are a little bit strange and technically they suck but they do have pretty good stories behind them. That is why I have chosen them for today.

Here is photo #1



While taking down the Christmas decorations today, Gerben and I got talking about male and female ends to the lights. I figure it must have been some sex-starved man that came up with that terminology but heck, it works! Anyways, after this brief conversation, Gerben decided to see if Emma knew what male and female meant. Obviously, she knows man and women or girl and boy but who ever says male and female to a 5 year old? No surprise, she didn't know the difference between a male and a female. After the explanation that men have penis' and women have vagina's she clued in. Anyhow, next thing I know, he is showing Emma both ends of a cord and is about to explain male and female ends. Woooo, I wasn't sure how he was planning to explain this. Now, if you are thinking what I was thinking about penis' entering vagina's, well no worries, that isn't the way he explained it. He just told her that a mans penis sticks out and so do the prongs on the male end of a cord. Phew! That explanation was just fine by me! Next time I need to relax and get my mind out of the gutter for a while!

Photo #2



Gerben gave me the giant Toblerone bar for Christmas so yesterday, I decided to dig into it. Now, in all honesty, I am not a huge chocolate eater but I decided to try this out. Honesty, I didn't like the chewy nougat in the middle. I was telling Gerben about this and he informed me that it was the nougat. I couldn't get over the way he pronounced nougat. He says "new-gat" kinda sounds like new-cat, whereas, I call it nug-at. Truthfully, I don't really know how to say it but I love to tease him about his pronunciations because from time to time the dutch pronunciations from his past can trickling into his english vocabulary. Book, is a classic world that he always pronounces a little wierd. I say, "bu-k" he says, "boo-k." It's a little thing but something that always reminds me of his dutch language roots.

I did it!

I completed the first week of Project 365. It has been great fun so far. I am having a blast pulling at my camera and snapping all kinds of photos. Here is my layout for week one.

Kit is called Touch of Winter by Nikki Scott at Elemental Scraps
Template is by Moriginals

It's good to play like a kid again!

So, I have found an entirely unexpected advantage to taking on this challenge. It is forcing me to find great ideas and activities to do with Natalia. This way I get some great photo opportunities. If I don't do anything, than there is nothing to photograph.

Today, I decided to dig out the Play-Doh. I really hate this stuff because of the mess it creates and I cannot stand seeing all the beautiful coloured dough be squished together into one giant colourful ball. I like the colours kept seperate. For the longest time I wouldn't let Emma play with more than one colour at a time but I have eased up.

Here's the pics of the day. I haven't decided which photo to use for my layout of the week but one of them for sure. I am leaning towards the first photo at the top of this post but first I need to see if it will fit in the last opening on my week 1 layout.








And, just to prove that I was in fact, in on the action. This is what I created.

OMG, I need to learn how to count!

Geez Louise! On Wednesday, I said in the title of my post that I had 2 pictures to share but I shared 3 then earlier today I think I said I had 5 photos to share and I posted 6. Oh man! I really think I need to go back to kindergarten!

Anyways, I was feeling kind of bad for Natalia today. She seems to be spending too much time playing the Nintendo DS and not enough time playing like an almost 3 year old. So, I took her outside for a bit this afternoon and took a ton more photos. She had a blast playing on the slide and of course I went photo crazy. Here are some of the results.








Oh, and I forgot to post this photo with the rest of them this morning. I don't know what it is about this photo but I love it!

It's Jan 8th and I have 5 photos today

Each and every weekday morning I get up around 7:30 or 8:00 so I can get Emma to school for 9:00. This morning I decided to take the camera with me on the "long" trek to school. (We live less than 1/2 a block from the school.) I captured quite a few shots on the way but the one that really spoke to me and that I will use for my Project 365 is this one.



I didn't choose it because it's the best photo technically, I choose it because I cannot believe how much Emma is becoming more and more like me. Growing up, I had 2 distinct tradmarks that were always commented on, my freckles and my dimples. Well, I have noticed over the past few months that Emma is getting more and more freckles across her cheeks just like I always had. This photo captured both the freckles and the dimples! I can't deny that she's not my kid!

This next bunch of photos were the runner's up for the day. I love them all but I can only choose one for my Project 365.







I must say that I love the picture of Natalia with the huge snowball. She was trying so hard to push it around the school yard but she just wasn't strong enough. It wouldn't budge but she did light up like a light bulb when I sat her on it. She's such a ham.

2 Photos for Today

So I went slightly over-board again today. This time I choose 3 photos and it's only 2:00. I am pretty sure that the photo of Emma and Jess will be the one for my project.

Jessica came to visit us on December 26th and today was her day to head home. Emma always has a tough time when her beloved Aunt Jess leaves so naturally this had to be a photo opportunity. Seeing as Jess' plane left early, Emma roped her into walking her to school in the morning. I took this picture just after they walked out the door.



The other picture is one that I have been dying to take for a few weeks. On December 27th Gerben and I headed to Ikea to buy new furniture for our bedroom. I was so excited. We had originally ordered a King mattress and entire bedroom set from the Brick but after they messed around with our order for about the 4th time we got mad and cancelled it all but the mattress. The mattress was due to arrive on the Monday so we needed to get some furniture quick. If you want quick furniture, Ikea is about your only choice. In the end we instantly agreeded on a set and bought it. I like it 100% more than the one at the Brick so I am thrilled. The only downfall is that the bed is so high I feel like I need a stool to get in it.