The tree is up, the stockings are hung…..the cards are uhhhhh….

…….waiting for a decent picture of my little angels!  I always look on Shutterfly and see these perfect holiday cards and think “that would be cute”.  Then I go through my pictures and realize mine won’t look like that    The good news is that on Shutterfly’s website they make it very easy create the cards!  I can play around and make cards for lots of things.  Some of my favorite cards I made were our Christmas cards last year http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/christmas-photo-cards.  I also have used them for invitations for the boys parties as many of you have seen http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/birthday-invitations.  And they are kind of like Hallmark – you can make a card for anything!  Most people use these http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery for birthday or other holidays, but I used them to announce when Justin was going to be a big brother!  No Mom; there are no additional announcements to be made…..

Long story short – I absolutely love using Shutterfly for many different reasons.  Now if they had something that magically made my 4 year old and 1 year old sit at smile at the camera I’d be all set!!!!

Disney 2010…..in pictures!

 

 

 

 

I'm baaaaccccckkkkk.......

Blogging has taken a major backseat the last year. I'm not sure why. I love being able to go back and look at posts of what Justin did when, etc and now I am not going to be able to do that with Mason. I think a big problem is I ran out of space to upload pics on my main account and that's what I log in to read everyone elses's private blogs, then I'm too lazy to switch accounts and upload my own pics. Maybe I'll just pay the $20/year or whatever it is for unlimited.

Anyways, I'm going to start with the now and work backwards as I can.

Last Friday, Katie & Josh invited us over for dinner. I was looking forward to a good dinner with friends and then head home to get things ready for hockey. Little did I know when I walked in I was greeted by lots of friends and family with a surprise 30th birthday party! I was so happy! We had a great time, ordered pizza, drank (too much) and hung out. Needless to say hockey paperwork was put on hold :) My brothers and sister-in-law and cousin Morgan all came in from Michigan so it was great weekend with them! I wish more family lived in town....hint, hint!!! Thank you so much Katie for having everyone over!!!

Saturday morning we got up and went to hockey practice so they could see Justin skate. He did really good! Then we got pumpkins and went home to carve them while watching football. After a nap by most of us we went to the Rivermen game and then after Morgan watched the kids for us (thanks!) and the adults went to the riverboat for a short trip and then BWW for last call! We decided when we lost $50 we'd leave...Rob and I lost $35, Mikey was even and Ryan won (before the BWW tab!) so it was a good night :) I don't remember most of the end of it, but that's okay.

Sunday was a lazy day, the family packed up and left and then we lazed around until it was time for trick-or-treating. We just went to some houses right around ours and then went home to hand out candy, but didn't get many kids. Oh well! The weather was at least nice!

I'm glad I had such a fun weekend because work sucks. Plain and simple. Everything right now is a problem job. Even ones that I don't even have the PO's in hand. Plus I lost a big product line yesterday. They gave the line to the St. Louis rep. It sucks. It was a line that is part of a bigger product family and St. Louis had the rest. This is the second line they have gotten from me. I think that everything was fine until they saw the $$ potential of the territory from my numbers the last couple of years and now they are trying to get it all for themselves. And I am afraid they are going to succeed. They are playing the "we are a multi-million dollar company" card and I have a 2-man show here. My big line says they are sticking with us and they are happy with my sales, but I've learned that nothing will surprise me. I really don't want to move again and I think I burned the bridge at CAT when I took the job and then backed out. I don't know what I'll do if it comes to looking for work :(

Okay; back to work for now. Coming up next....Disney trip!

Video -- Mason walking!!

One year old!

I can't believe my baby is one year old today! I told him this morning though that he doesn't get presents or cake until 7:57pm since he made me wait ALL DAY and evening one year ago :)

Happy Birthday Baby! I hope you know how much mommy and daddy love you!!!!

It really doesn't seem like a whole year already. That might be because he did nothing but cry for about 3 months straight. We almost had him on Craig$list....but I'm glad we kept him around. He is the happiest, most smiley little boy and he absolutely adores his big brother!

He has been consistently taking about 4 steps in a row now. He has done more a few times, but not on a regular basis. He gets up in the middle of the room and stands all of the time. Changing his diaper is more like a wrestling match these days!

He is still on formula because his belly is still sensitive to milk. We put him on the Go-and-Grow milk based formula and he was up all nights crying like before we put him on hypo-allergenic formula. So for now he's on normal Similac, but we might start mixing in small amounts of milk with it to try to wean him to all milk.

Mason LOVES LOVES LOVES food. Any and all of it. He is such a good little eater! He is eating all table foods now because he didn't really like Gerber after tasting my yummy cooking :) (you know...the one or two night a week I cook!). He usually eats more than Justin does!

He also loves his dogs :) Tucker tolerates him more than Quincy, but they are both good with him. Justin and Quincy have been best buddies lately and the dogs will go out and play fetch with Justin for such a long time. They actually bring it back to him too which they usually don't do for me and Rob!

I think that's about all - I know I'm slacking on the blog, but it is so much easier to update pics and such on facebook since I have it on my phone and just take mobile pics. I'll try to get better, but don't hold your breath :)

Advice from the richest man alive.....

I read this online today - the best advice Warren Buffet has ever received. He may be the richest man alive and one of the most savy business man the world has ever seen, but his advice can be followed by EVERYONE - rich and poor because it has nothing to do with money. I know that my brothers and I have been lucky to have this from my parents since we were born...and a lot of children are not so fortunate. I hope I can pass this unconditional love on to our boys and hope it makes them better men someday.

"The power of unconditional love. I mean, there is no power on earth like unconditional love. And I think that if you offered that to your child, I mean, you’re 90 percent of the way home. There may be days when you don’t feel like it — it’s not uncritical love; that’s a different animal — but to know you can always come back, that is huge in life. That takes you a long, long way. And I would say that every parent out there that can extend that to their child at an early age, it’s going to make for a better human being."

Memorial Day Weekend!

I realize I'm out of order, but want to get all of the pics on the blog from my slacking lately!

Memorial Day Weekend was awesome! Uncle Mikey, Uncle Ry and Aunt Manda came to town to celebrate with us. Saturday was mine and Rob's 6th anniversary and Sunday was Evan & Sandy's wedding so they watched the kids for us - HUGE HELP! Also, we found out we had a leaky window issue the week prior so Uncle Ry came down early to help Rob with that one. Thanks so much! It was awesome seeing you guys!









We were not counting on this when we pulled off some of the old siding to replace :(



























Daddy and Justin at Old Chicago for our Anniversary dinner!

All of us kids - per Dad's request :)

Family pic - but we look Chinese! We took better ones at home later in the evening.

Mason at Old Chicago

Uncle Mikey and J-Dawg

Aunt Manda & Uncle Ry at Old Chicago

The start of Mommy's photo shoot! I don't take them to the photography studio (almost never) since it usually is too stressful with just okay pictures. So I took a TON myself and I'm pretty happy with the result! This was just the point and shoot too - I should have have our Nikon!

Family photo with all of us!

I like this one :)

Oops...out of order -another of all of us!

Mason on our playset

He loved it!!!

Now he wants to be on it all of the time :)

LOVE LOVE LOVE them!

I should have had video of Daddy making them laugh!

My new favorite pic of my boys - in a frame, a skin-it on my phone, screen saver, etc!!

He's so handsome I couldn't decide which to post - so you get all of them :)

He loves his swing too!

Campfire! Yummy smores and hot dogs on the fire!

Awwww....good pic! Awesome photographer :)

Happy 6 year Anniversary babe! I can't wait for 60 more :)