Down on the farm

Christopher has been gone on a Team Building trip so it has just been me and the kids. This means I plan lots of activities to completely wear them out so I get a good nap out of them and hopefully a good nights rest. Yesterday we were up and at 'em early and headed out to Frying Pan Farm. My friend Elizabeth suggested it and man was it fun-- throw in the fact that it is free and it is down right fabulous! Apparently I parked in the wrong parking lot so we had a nice walk down a dirt road. The boys had fun stopping and playing on the old trucks and farm equipment (I am begging for another trip to the emergency room I guess.)

Who needs a triple stroller right? We have been using our Jog stroller since the airport guys broke the wheel off our regular stroller then basically told me it was my fault for trusting them with it-- nice. Now we just have Liam or Sam perch on the front... TOTALLY safe.

Poor Sam was subjected to lots of picture taking that day. I wanted to see if I could get a good picture our of our old point and shoot camera (this thing made it through Iraq with chris!).

It doesn't do to bad of a job. The harder part was getting Sam not to grin like a crazy person :)

Liam on the other hand barely acknowledges me when I take his picture. Sure he says cheese, as he looks anywhere but at me. I don't even ask him to say cheese is the funny part. I just ask him to look at me.

After all three cuties piled on the stroller I realized no one was getting a work out but me, and although I do need it badly I could see this outing was going to have the reverse affect and simply tucker me out. I booted them out of the stroller and told Sam he needed to run around. He got out and literally started running in circles. I started laughing and asked him what he was doing "Mom you said to run around!" Then after seeing the chickens they decided they were birds. This is them flapping down the road.

This farm is sooooo toddler friendly. In all the barns they have bench's for the kids to stand on so they can look down into the stalls. The boys stared FOREVER at these two HUGE pigs. When it snorted Liam laughed so hard and Sam tried to mimic it:

Then they had this great little yard area with mini tractors. Liam had a hard time getting up

But Sam had no problem

I thought this sign was great, especially the part about making cool tractor noises. It worked, I totally started making tractor noises for the boys.

After the boys kicked back and relaxed watching Peter Pan in the car. I had to take this picture for Chris's Dad, I am telling you it is hereditary!

We will certainly be returning soon and often to this great little place.

A Messy Day

The heat FINALLY gave way Friday, but then it started raining. Which I actually was grateful for. I kinda needed a hang out at home day. The boys however have become accustomed to my go go go lifestyle and thus were bored relatively quickly. They had already gotten pretty messy with their fudge sickles

so I thought it was a good time to break out the paints. The boys had fun using the new paint brush's and requesting me to paint things (which they usually could not recognize due to my lack of painting talent).

Liam decided half way through that he missed his finger paints and went a little crazy.
Sam was jealous that I was snapping pictures of Liam and requested he get one taken. (By the way it is really weird to be using our old point and click camera again) I love that he wants to get his pictures taken but now he will only smile with this HUGE fake smile yelling CHEESE!!!! at me :)

Who wants to go to Vegas with me?

Alright so in keeping with my awesome run of luck, while we were in Williamsburg my DSLR Camera was stolen out of our car. This prompts the question, with all the amazing luck I have been having lately who wants to go to Vegas with me?

In other news Abby is ADORABLE!!!
But I already knew that :)

A Curious George B-Day for Liam

Today is Liam's Second birthday. He is a VERY good little boy. We have been so blessed and are realizing i more and more. He loves to go with the flow, give hugs and plays nicely by himself. He is a great napper and an even better eater. While he gets a little rough with younger kids on the playground and is very territorial Chris and I couldn't be more crazy about him and neither could his brother. Liam is Sam's safety blanket. He is always making sure that Liam is near by and hates to go anywhere with out him (school being the only exception-- thank goodness for that). Liam is currently obsessed with Toy Story, but he also loves Curious George or as Chris and I call it (written as it sounds not is spelled) horhey curioso. We decided to go with that theme for his birthday party which we held in UT in tandem with his cousin Ava who was turning one. We held it at Robyn's park that also had a fun splash zone (that I forgot about hence the naked Crawford kids). My amazingly talented friend Christa has just started a Cake company and I commissioned her to make a curious George cake. Didn't she do an amazing job!

She gave me some cards and they were all gone by the end of the party! The kids all loved it and couldn't wait to eat it. And man when we ate it was it GOOD!!!! Chocolate Cake with Chocolate ganach (spelling?)! We had a big yellow pinata for the kids to whack. After it was broken open Liam discovered that part of it made a great hat!

When it was time to open presents I made the mistake of giving him the present from my parents first. I knew what it was and that he would LOVE it. It was a Woody doll where you can pull the string and it talks, and he has a hat that goes on and off etc. Well Liam went nuts!!!

He refused to open any other presents and walked off to sit by himself with his precious Woody. He also discovered that Woody's hat was a good place for fruit snacks, as was his holster.

We then played pin the butterfly on the log, and the kids had to wear a curious George mask so they couldn't see. Man can you tell who cheats and who doesn't!!

Abby thought it was a great party to and enjoyed being snuggled by many of her aunts and both Grandmas!

It was a wonderful party and I am so glad he could enjoy it with all his family. Tonight we will have another smaller get together which I am sure I will take more pictures at and post soon! Happy Birthday Lemers, as Sam always says we sure like you.

First Day of School

Sam is in preschool!! He has been waiting anxiously to go to school like his cousins and Lucy.

I was worried because we weren't able to attend the open house and meet his teacher or show him around. We talked to him about it all weekend and took him by to see it. He attends on Tues Wed Thurs and has to bring a lunch! We went shopping for a lunch box but the only one we could find was a big adultish one at Ross. I was bummed because I wanted him to be excited about it. That night we headed to the mall and Chris was my hero when he found a Wall-E lunch box at the Disney store! Sam was so excited about it.

On the first day of school he marched into the office and said to the director "Look at THIS!" and held it up. His teachers said he did great and every morning he wakes up excited to go.

One funny thing is when he came home the second day he was speaking some crazy sounding language and I said "You know Sam we never want to make fun of the way people talk." He said very defensively "I'm not mom I'm just talking like my friends at school." I am sure his Asian and Hispanic friends at school look at him like he is crazy when he tries to speak to them in their language. I am hoping this means he will pick up the language where ever we go fairly quickly. He really is loving it and I am loving hearing his stories and seeing his art projects.

Liam is having a harder time with it. On the first day he had to pose for his picture also. He kept saying "CHEESE Mom CHEESE!" Then when we dropped Sam off he was very upset and kept looking into the back of the car and saying "Bro Bro?" Or asking me where he was. I am personally really enjoying my special time with him:) Wednesday night he had taken a LONG nap and after yelling to us from his bedroom for about 45 mins Chris and I decided to let him stay up for a little bit. He played around and then climbed up onto the coffee table and with out warning threw himself onto Chris....

no wonder the boy has already had stiches. We probably shouldn't condone such behavior but he was sooooc cute. He would count "one two one!" and then launch himself.

In a scarier note I have been waiting for one of the kids to get into the elevator before I get there and disappear to another floor. I am so worried about it that yesterday afternoon before I picked up Sam I though I would be all ready and have the double stroller loaded and in the hall so I could just wake Liam and Abby up and put them in the stroller. I had Abby strapped in the car seat and Liam was still asleep in his crib. I was yanking out the double stroller and the door slammed so fast I couldn't catch it. Of course our doors automatically lock so there I was in the hall with both babies inside. Hello adrenaline. I sprinted down four flights of stairs and dashed into the main office. I was able to tell the front desk person what happened through gasps for breathe (I am super out of shape!). He quickly gave me a spare key and I again sprinted up the stairs. I could hear Abby crying loudly all the way down the hall. Liam however slept through the whole thing. Hopefully that is the one and only time this happens. That reminds me that I need to return the emergency key... oops.

On a happy note Abby has started realty smiling at us! It is gorgeous with those big dimples. Before I locked myself out Abbers and I were laying on our huge bed and talkin'. She kept smiling so I ran to get my camera. Of course she only smiles when she makes eye contact so every time I would raise the camera she would stop. She is cute nonetheless!

Why does Technology hate me?

My lap top died... 'nuff said

My day just got even better!

If you know me you know my obsession with baking cupcakes and my dream of opening a store (The Grady's were often my Ginny pigs and I suspect now that we live apart they have lost some weight :0)) Here in DC is one of my Favs Cake Love. When we were at Tyson's the other night Chris came back to the play place after I had dispatched him to find a treat and told me there was a cake love down stairs, needless to say we immediately packed up and headed down. Today I was perusing their website and thinking about doing some of the recipes when I discovered THEY DELIVER!!!! I don't know how many times I have said to Chris "Man I want some goood cake." But have no desire to get up and bake one or go try and find a bakery. Taadah! I mean 36 dollars is a reasonable price for delivering baked goods--- oh wait that is INSANE! Good thing I am no longer preggers because when one of those cravings hit I would have totally justified it! I guess I will have to be happy that I am in the same city as my favorite place!

Great Expectations... and why not to have them

Alright so we are here. We have arrived. We are back! I am so excited to be back in DC. This city served me well while Chris was away. Of course Kerstin and Christa had a lot to do with that and my amazing job... Thank goodness Kerstin is still here (Christa you'd better visit soon). What is hilarious (although not really) is that whenever Chris and I embark on a grand new adventure together it always starts out fairly awful. When he headed off to Iraq (which was bad enough in and of itself) I found a large mass that had to be removed. When we started law school we were homeless for the first week, and had to rough it in a Marriott, during which time Sam contracted Roseola and was sooooooooooooooo sick. This time we had the whole flight incident. Then we had a very stressful packing/ moving up to DC day. We did get to enjoy a fun morning with Sams good buddy Thomas Lacy. I had a wonderful time catching up with Terish. The boys had so much fun in Elmo land.



I had fun finally going on some of the rides now that I wasn't preggy.

They were pretty tuckerd by the end of day and we had to stack them up in the strollers.

The boys had fun watching movies
and sharing a pull out bed... and apparently a pillow :)

Once we finally GOT to our apartment complex lets just say I was bummed. Wow were my expectations WAY to high. When I had look up the place we are living at online I looked at their Sister complex which had hardwood floors, stainless steel, granite counter tops and were decorated immaculately. Yeah this is not that place. I knew I had to have a good attitude and kept telling myself this is TEMPORARY housing. I made a mental list of positives (everything is free: rent, utilities, phone, Internet, cable and maid service once a week, lots of space and beautiful grounds) and the negatives (totally outdated, no one in the surrounding neighborhood speaks English, fourth floor-- grocery shopping is a bear, the bathroom sink and vanity are IN the bedrooms not the bathrooms etc.) and realized it is so vain of me to get all upset because our apartment doesn't look like a Ethan Allen add. So I got over it and we started unpacking.

I was in the living room organizing our movies when I hear screaming coming from Liam and Chris says "Kelly get in here!" I ran in to see blood pouring down Liam's face and all over Chris's arms and hands. Apparently our little dare devil thought he could jump from his bed to Sam's-- and turns out he can't. After consulting with Chris's sister Kim who's a nurse, he headed off to the emergency room.

While there he ran into the play table making blood gush everywhere once again. I joked with Chris that at least they took you seriously then. It always seems to take forever in the emergency room and I often wondered what would happen if I walked in actually gushing blood. They took a big bed sheet and wrapped him up then strapped him to a papoose type board to keep him still. (This is why I did not go. I had a very traumatic incident when I was four and had to get stitch's in my hand. They put me in a straight jacket-- hello terrifying. It is my only vivid memory pre-age six). The doctor put some numbing gel on him and told Chris that some kids fall asleep during the process. She then injected some stronger numbing medicine and began stitching. Chris said Liam looked at him and said "Out Daddy?" twice and by the second stitch had fallen asleep! He came home and zonked for two more hours. I am sure this is the first of many stitches, casts etc. we will be seeing. I am just grateful that if it had to happen it did while Chris was home!

Devestation in my photography world

Right before Christopher took the bar and little miss Abby was born I did a photo session with all of my nieces. This was prompted by my making two pettiskirts for each of them (I now know why they are usually 80-100 dollars each hello work!) They all looked soooooo adorable in them! It was so fun to give them to the girls and watch them immediately start to twirl when they wore them. We met early in the morning and the girls were all gussied up complete with make up, amazing hair and stellar props (think baby legs, huge lollipops etc.). I took an insane amount of pictures, the girls looked so cute and were having so much fun modeling. I went home and edited the pics and was dying at how fun it was. There were a few that became immediate favorites. After going over them with my sister-in-laws I went home and began organizing them all on my external hard drive. It started making a weird noise (should have been my first clue) and then stopped working all together. I of course freaked out when I went to geek squad and they callously informed me that all my pictures (all of them, Sam and Liam's birth, our time in Europe our time in Williamsburg, Disneyworld, all my photo sessions, my photoshop texture files, EVERYTHING) were gone, and that they hoped I learned my lesson about backing up my files--- they seriously said that, my mouth dropped. What is so awful about this is that my external hard drive was my back up. All our pictures were on Christopher's laptop--- who's hard drive also tanked two weeks earlier. After sobbing for quite sometime Chris took pitty on me and we sent it to a clean room and were ready to fork over the 1800 they quoted us to get our pics back. A very nice lady called us this weekend and let us know that they were unrecoverable-- seriously worst luck ever. This pretty much demolished the portfolio I had been slowly building up. All that was left were a few of the girls pics that accidentally copied to my computer.



The girls laughing at Ava:



Luckily over the past three weeks I have had some pretty fun photo sessions. I got to take two families the Reynolds and the Swansons. The Reynolds had adorable Ava who is just take off walking:



Robyn and Jeff will celebrate their two year anniversary soon. Such a cute little family!


This is the second time I have been able to do family pics for the Swanson family.



It was so fun to look at the last one and see how much the kids have changed!



Ali was such a cute toddler and has become such a gorgeous little girl



The twins are practically teenagers now and Aiden has lost all his cute toddler chub and is all grown up.



Kelly and I took some pictures of her adorable little girls together in their pettiskirts. Morgy's red hair is so cute and I would kill for Ashlyns curls.



Morgy was playing with her webkin frog and on a whim I told Kell to bring it with her and these turned out to be some of my fav pics ever!





We of course had to get pics with Mason. Who Kelly and I swear has an allergy to cameras. The second I would lift it up he would start sobbing. Luckily when he cries you can catch some that look like he is smiling ;)



I love how fluffy the skirts are! The day Kelly came over I had serendipidously just received my package from babysteals with six different pairs of striped baby legs. The purple and blue looked perfect!



Claire and Annie wanted some senior pictures. I have decided teenage girls are by far the most fun to shoot. They don't mind being cheesy to get a good picture and since they all kinda want to be models the ham it up. Add in wardrobe changes and cute personalities and it made for a really fun time! It helps that both these girls are gorgeous!Annie


Claire



Their toesies



After telling Claire she needed to open her eyes more (while the poor girl is staring into the sun) and that I was mainly taking pictures up their nose.

Marissa is getting married in a week. She is the sweetest girl and didn't even blink when I stuck her up on a huge rock in front of a huge old tree. Or when people honked as they drove past.



I just about died when she showed me her electric pink heels! How fun is that.



I wish I had approached my bridals with more fun. I was sooo worried about my dress getting stained ro ripped I wouldn't do anything fun.Ali wanted some special pictures in her baptism dress so I suggested we go up to the Draper Temple.



It is a lot of fun getting so much practice. I am still a long ways from where I would like to be but having fun getting there! It is especially hard since photography is an expensive hobby. I would love to be able to do more studio type pics but umbrellas, flash's, screens etc. are WAY out of any sort of dream price range currently... but maybe someday! For now I will keep trying to recover my pics from various family and friends!