MY SNOW PRINCESS

Don't you just love my excellent mothering skills? Notice the boot on the wrong foot?

She eats snow the entire time she is playing out there. I should just sit her in the driveway for a few hours, and then I wouldn't have to shovel at all!!

Yep, I win the mom of the year award for this one. Who else stops to take a picture of a panicked screaming child? Um, that would be me. Might have been because her boots were on the wrong feet? Have you tried riding a bike on an icy driveway, wearing snowboots, on the wrong feet? At least she was pretty well-cushioned...

NO SCHOOL, DAY TWO

We have had quite a little snow/ice storm here the past two days. It's been nice to stay home all snuggled up by the fireplace, smelling yummy things cooking all day in the crock-pot, and spending some extra time with my girls.

Having fun with friends.

NO SCHOOOOOOOLLL!!!!! YEAH!!!! (It's hard to jump in snow gear)

This one is for you Maddie. She wanted a catching the snow on my tongue picture. Except, I'm not really seeing any snow???

We have the best miniature sledding hill right across the street from us. It's perfect for the little ones. We didn't get a lot of snow, but everything is covered in a thick layer of ice - it made those sleds go VERY fast!!!

Pam, this reminds me of when we were little and your dad would put the sprinkler up in the trees on those rare nights in Florida when it actually froze.

It really is beautiful..

The "after snow frozen cheek" look...

WHAT???

You just have to see it to believe it. For the past "who-can-keep-count" years, Kirsten has been begging to be homeschooled. Every time I think about that, see that in writing, entertain the idea of it, I have visions of trying to simply get through homework (you know what I'm talking about, don't pretend you don't). I think I just might rather poke both my eyeballs out, than to homeschool. Okay, I admit, there are days when the idea of the whole lifestyle of it sounds kinda nice, but mostly, not so much. So, today, she actually broke out a list. A LIST!! WHAT??? You have to read it to believe it. It makes me laugh because apparently she has a whole vision in her head of what homeschooling would be like (Deb, you may begin laughing HERE). Okay, maybe she has a clearer vision of it than I do. Who knows. It's just so hard to justify homeschooling her, when she has the opportunity to be in the most AMAZING school on the planet. Seriously. It's incredible. And for your reading pleasure...... the list......

Number 21 made me laugh.

She is only on number 37. I'm a little afraid of the next 13 reasons. Number 31, "more sleep, less crabby" just might make the whole thing worth it!! You know, it just goes to show you, no matter how wonderful a life you create for your kids, to them, it's just never quite good enough....sigh.... If she only knew how good she had it. Oh and number 11??? SIGN ME UP!!!

HIS GIRL

When my 8th grade girls group started back up over the holidays - I wanted to have a really, really great bible study ready to jump into. I had been praying for several weeks about this and doing a ton of research. I really wanted the study to be RELEVANT to their lives, right now. I have so many girls in my group who are unbelievably passionate about their walk with Christ. I find myself feeling very humbled that God has honored me with this task of helping them to grow and shepherding them along - sometimes I feel so inadequate. I went to visit our local Lifeway Christian Bookstore, just hoping to find the right study after I couldn't really find anything after searching on-line. I walked into the store, and the very first book that caught my eye was this one....

I had never even heard of this book, but quickly realized (having three of my own girls), that this was a must read. I quickly tucked it under my arm, and proceeded to the teen bible study section of the store. I looked at several studies, which all seemed pretty good, but this one just kept jumping out at me. It was called "His Girl". I looked at it several times, and it seemed that God was telling me this was the one. Don't you wish you can explain that feeling? I wish He would speak audibly with his booming voice (why do we all think he has a deep booming voice?) "HEATHER, THIS IS THE ONE". But instead, I got that quiet little peace that is becoming familiar when I know I am walking in His perfect will. So, after discovering that they only had half of the girls study guides in stock that I would need, I was a little frustrated to find that it would take 10 days to order them. 10 DAYS??? Snail-mail. I went ahead and ordered the rest anyway, and picked up the (way expensive) DVD to go along with the study. I got home and showed the study to Kirsten (MY girl! :)), and she couldn't put the book down!! She said "I'm gonna read this whole thing before we have our first small group!!". Well, that was certainly a good sign. A few days later, I picked up my book that I had bought for myself, the one about the five conversations you must have with your daughter?? Well, guess what? As I began reading it, I was thinking, this is all sounding very familiar........ it reminds of the leader's guide I have been reading through for my girl's study........ GUESS WHAT??? That book was the book my girls study was based on!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Same author, Vicki Courtney (also the auther of "Raising a Godly Daughter in an Ungodly World") I felt like God had just spoken in His big booming voice. Now THAT was a good sign that I had chosen the right study for my girls. And they absolutely LOVE it.

The girls love how their study guide resembles a teen magazine! If girls really understand and believe that they are indeed God's girl, they can face this crazy world and live with newfound freedom and faith. They can take a stand in what they do, what they believe about themselves, how they respond to pressures regarding purity, how they dress, who and how they date, and how they interact with other girls. They can learn that they aren't called to fade into the background or conform to the world's standards. They can be HIS girls, confident young women who base their self-worth in who they are in Christ and follow Him with abandon.

MY GIRLS ( and oh yeah, HIS GIRLS!!)

On a side note, Kirsten was making her sandwich yesterday before school, and she squirted her mustard on her bread, and suddenly she was shoving it in my face saying "Oh my goodness Mom, LOOK!!! My mustard squirt looks exactly like the word JESUS!!!". Wow. Now that's my Jesus-lovin girl!!

LET IT BE

Okay, first of all, one of my new years resolutions is to blog a little more, I really need a "mommy" outlet, not just a creative-photography outlet, so yes, I'm mixing business with pleasure, you will just have to get over it. This post has a little story behind it. When we went to Minnesota a few weeks ago (16 hours in a mini-van, three kids, two dogs, and a husband....enough said). Anyway, while we were there, my sister Karen and I had a wonderful day leaving the kiddos behind with the dads to go sledding, while we shopped our little hearts out! It was one of my favorite days of our vacation!! So, that day I was telling Karen how I have been wanting a "chimey clock" as I call it, for a very, very, very long time. I have told my hubby this for the past 17 years, and he actually finally remembered and got me one for Christmas (after a few more reminders). The crazy thing was, he ordered it off the internet, so actually never heard the "chiming" until we received it. Now, he certainly received an "A" for effort with this gift. But let's just say that after unsuccessfully putting electrical tape over the hole that the sound came out of, to try to buffer the obnoxiousity (is that a word?) of it, and after the stinking clock chimed ALL NIGHT, every hour, we finally just took the batteries out. So anyway, back to the story, I was just telling Karen how I loved our sister Jennie's clock and that I had been looking for one. Not ten minutes later, there it WAS!! Just waiting for me to buy it!! We looked at it, and played all the songs on it, and decided it was definitely borderline, downright "gawdy", but I just loved it anyway. And guess what? It had a light detector - meaning it would NOT chime all night long. So, I decided "Happy Birthday to me" and bought the clock, a little nervous that my hubby and his gift would feel a little betrayed. I told Karen I didn't recognize ANY of the songs this clock was playing, so she was trying to sing them to me, right there in the middle of Sam's Club. Nope, nothing, didn't recognize a thing (maybe it was her stellar singing skills). So, I bought the clock and took it back to Karen's house and handed it to my hubby, who took one look at it and the first things he says "These are all BEATLES songs!!???" I was born in the early 70's - how can I have no recollection of Beatles songs? Let's just not bring up my amazing skill at forgetting anything that it not pertinent to TODAY. Karen and her husband were rather intrigued at my fascination with this clock that I have waited SEVENTEEN years for. I didn't hear the end of my own "coveting of my own clock". But, there is just something about a clock chiming in your house that just makes it feel so homey and cozy. I don't care what song it's playing! Not that I have anything against the Beatles, it's just that I wasn't planning on hearing a Beatles song every hour, every day, for the rest of my life. But, hey, it's okay, because I LOVE MY CLOCK!!

So today, I received a package in the mail from my sister, with various things we had left behind at their house. On the very top I find this baggie...

And open it up to find this fabulous T-shirt!!!

And here is my beautiful (although borderline gawdy) clock.

And for your listening pleasure "LET IT BE".

And the obnoxious sound in the background would be my dogs and their bone clanking around on the wood floor. That sound fills my days.... along with the Beatles now.

MY LITTLE GENIUS

What can I say? I just had to show off my little cutie for a bit today..

Yep, sheeeeeer genius!!!

A DAY IN THE LIFE

Today began with my first thoughts of my sister's new puppy she got last night. Check out her blog HERE to see pictures! Then I realized that because of yesterday's snow, we had a two-hour delayed school opening - WOO-HOO!! Richard had to head off to work at the normal time, except today he had to deal with not only the normal ridiculous traffic, but the Inaugural Day traffic as well... We had a nice slow morning, not the typical before school kind of morning. After doing the morning mom's taxi rounds, two hours later than usual, Emily and I headed to one of our favorite places - Target! I was so excited to find a coat that I had been keeping my eye on - on sale for 75% off!! It was a $70 coat that I got for $17!! I was so excited, that I got one for myself and one for Kirsten in another color, I was thinking if she didn't like it, I would just have two! But what do you know - she LOVED it!!

Later in the day, when I was trying to make a call from my cell phone, I was trying to figure out why the calls weren't going through. Then I heard on the radio, that even though they put up a few extra temporary cell towers today for the Inauguration, apparently it wasn't enough. Sometimes it is still so strange to me to be living in a big city, where it snows, and where your commute and your cell phone calls can be disrupted by presidents being sworn into office. I'm just a small town girl from Florida, sometimes this life just seems so strange! The girls both were able to watch the Inauguration on TV at school - it was such an historic day to witness really. Even though I'm not terribly fond of our President, it was rather moving to see our very first African-American President be sworn into office. One day our grandchildren and great-grandchildren will be reading about this in their history books. It has been fun to talk with the girls about what it would be like to be moving into the White House today. How amazing it must be through the eyes of two little girls. I asked my girls "If you were becoming the President today, what is the first thing you would do?" Kirsten said "I would even out the taxes", Hannah said "I would cancel school", and Emily said "I would have a CAMP-OUT!!".

I was giving Emily her lunch, and she says to me "Mommy, I cannot eat this rice, it makes the breath come right out of my mouth". Now, how can you argue with that?

Happy Inauguration Day from Maryland!

SNOW DAY

Today we woke up to an unexpected snowfall!! What a wonderful surprise!

Don't you love Kirsten's new haircut???!! SASSY!!!

This was this morning just after it started snowing. The girls were so excited - we have hardly had any snow this year!! (Although, we did get our fill of the snow and cold when we were in Minnesota!) Gotta love the matching Grandma Marion mittens!

My boys LOVE the snow - they couldn't get enough of it in MN - they were happy to play in it at home some too. Notice Bailey's pink foot? That's his "who me? I didn't eat a marker" look.

Then we had some fun inside modeling some snow hats and coats with the neighbors!

And of course, Miss Boo had to join in!

My beautiful Hannah bear...

And the "after the snow" traditional hot chocolate - then off to naptime ....

A FEW FAVORITES

Can you believe this little cutie is only six weeks old? Not only can she hold her head up this well on her tummy - but she can even roll over!!!???!! I wouldn't believe it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes! Yep, she is destined to be an overachiever. She is so cute I could just eat her up!!

A MATERNITY SESSION

Isn't this one of the most beautiful pregnant ladies you have ever seen? I had the chance to photograph her and her husband as they are in the final few weeks waiting for their little baby boy.

They have a stunning wrap-around view of the inner harbor in downtown Baltimore. So much to look at while waiting for baby.

And their kitty! He was very curious as to what I was doing!