Recent occurences

Obviously we had Thanksgiving a few day ago, which will be a separate post, but I just thought I'd do a little update of other things that have been going on.

A few weeks ago, my friend Liz offered to take some photos of the children. She has a nice camera and has been taking a photography course, so she said it would be good practice. It was such a kind offer, and I decided to go for it. We arrived at her house at the agreed time, and she began by taking a few pictures of Lainey. Well, that turned out to be the easy part, because Luke just would NOT cooperate. First he cried, then he got a runny nose. The he wanted to play with various different toys. We did manage to get a couple of half decent ones, but nothing like a smile from him. Never work with kids or animals, I tell ya.

So, I decided to try taking some at home, in his 'natural habitat', if you will. And some outside. And it soon became clear why I am not a photographer...

So I ended up going with one of Liz's pictures for our Christmas cards. She did a wonderful job with the photography- it was the model causing problems!

A few weeks ago, Trev and I attended our very first football (American football, that is) game. We watched Utah State get completely thrashed by Boise State. To be fair to USU, Boise are the 6th ranking team in the country. I think the final score was something like 52-21.

Even though it was quite cold, we had lots of fun, and decided to try to attend several games next season.

Here's Trev with his brother Caleb

And here's us, this was towards the beginning when the score was even so we were still in a good mood.

Well, that's some of what we've been doing in the last few weeks. Only a few more weeks until Christmas, this year is rolling by!

Picnik.com

I had heard quite a few good things about Picnik.com, so I decided to give it a try. I edited a photo I had taken of Lainey, as seen below.

Before-

After-

I was really pleased with it, considering I only spent about 10 minutes on the site. It's a very user-friendly site, many of the features are free (I used only free features) You can get more features if you upgrade, I'm not sure how much that costs. One day we'll have Photoshop, but

at the moment, free is good!

One of the best things about Picnik.com is that I was able to upload a photo very quickly, edit it, and save it to my computer, without registering or anything. So easy!

Two beautiful kids + an autumn day = recipe for perfection :-)

I really just want to do a post about my babies just for the sake of it. 'Cos, you know, I love 'em. I spend so much time with these two and yet I cannot get enough of them. When Luke's nap runs a bit longer, as it sometimes does, I seriously miss him. And Lainey- I could just cuddle her all day long!



They're pretty much my shadows, and I love it that way. It's a challenge sometimes, like when Luke wants to be my shadow in the kitchen, grabbing everything the moment I put it down. But as I try to be the mother they deserve, I realise that they are my teachers. In developing the qualities that I need to be a good parent, I'm becoming more like the person I want to be. I am nowhere near the end yet, and I am lacking in so much, but I pray that I will allow myself to be shaped into a more patient, loving, happy and beautiful figure.



A little about Luke :-

Luke is a typical, energetic, happy toddler of almost two years old. He is helpful and so much fun to be around. He loves to be outside, swinging, sliding, climbing and collecting sticks and rocks. He is also a book-lover and tends to gravitate towards those with animals and vehicles. Alarmingly, he has recently developed a love for knives and scissors, but he's usually obedient when we ask him to put them back.

He is learning new words all the time. The most frequently said words at the moment are- dinosaur, thank you, cracker, pig, egg, hello, and, of course, car. Luke is a daddy's boy. He is a joy.




Now, Lainey :-

Lainey is just a sweetheart, there's no other word for it. She's a happy little thing who is always ready with a smile. She's quite a mama's girl, which I love! She loves to watch what Luke is up to and often tries to join in.

She has mastered the art of speed-crawling, and loves to pull up on the furniture and stand. She seems to be quite brave and has been toughened up by Luke's endless tormenting.

She still loves her bottle and pretty much only her bottle. She eats teeny amounts of baby food but she really loves her milk. I'm going to have to work with her on that! Oh how I love her!

I know I'm biased, but I really do feel so lucky to be the mum of these two munchkins.

Harvest dress

This girl could look cute in anything! This dress didn't turn out as nice as I thought, but Lainey pulls it off somehow. I used the same pattern as last time (the black, pink and green one).

We remembered!

You might remember the report of our Guy Fawkes celebrations last year. Here's year two of the tradition...

The glow sticks were a huge hit with the two kids (three if you include Trev) haha. hem...
They waved them around and made designs on the floor with them, and Luke even managed to use the little connectors to join them together. (Tip for all parents- glow sticks are really inexpensive, and make a fun activity.) I don't know what I'm going to do when my kids are too old to be fascinated by these things. Hopefully by then we'll live in a state/country that allows fireworks year-round!

Also, can I just say that photographing these things is addictive! It's so fun to put the camera on night mode and see what kind of effects you get.


And although halloween was a few days ago now, there were still some ghosts lurking around. Can you spot them?

Yes our bonfire night celebrations are a little pathetic, but we try! Happy Guy Fawkes Day :-)