Saturday, December 25, 2010

Wishing Everyone A....

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

I hope everyone has a wonderful day with family....and enjoy this white Christmas...those of you who have snow! :)

Friday, December 24, 2010

Merry Christmas Eve!


We've been having a fun Christmas Eve and it all started by waking up to beautiful snow that has continued throughout the day! I love how it covers all the trees...snow makes everything look beautiful.....well, with the exception of roads when you're trying to drive on them! :) Our Christmas Eve will also conclude with snow ice cream...hopefully...I haven't told Jacob of my latest plan, but with the abundance of snow and the influence of Abigail and Bethany (and of course, ME!), it shouldn't be too hard to convince him! ;)

The other day, with some help from Jacob, painted our toenails and fingernails to match and be Christmasy...the girls fingernail polish didn't last very long though, so we just got pictures of our toes. :) Jacob declined getting his nails painted, for any of you wondering. ;)
I have no idea why, but the girls decided to go around in nothing but diapers....
and in Abigail's case, a hat!
Bethany carried a jacket around...I guess assuming that if she had a jacket I would let her out the door, which she tried on several occasions to escape through!
This picture is a little blurry, but it makes me laugh! Some day they both will want to kill me for posting a picture of them in only their diapers....yes, Bethany is wearing a diaper, but it's hilarious because it looks like she isn't! :)

So, while the girls ran around naked, Jacob made a little snowman for the girls....
Isn't he cute! Maybe tomorrow we can make some big snowmen to be his buddies! :)

Have a good Christmas Eve!

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

It's Been Crazy Around Here...

I guess December is a busy month no matter what, but it has seemed extra crazy around here. We were all sick last week with a cold and the girls are still getting over it, but thankfully they didn't seem to get it as bad as Jacob and I. The week before that Jacob had hurt his ankle really bad and at about the same time, work quit because of the cold weather so that's been pretty tough. He's been applying for a bunch of different jobs, but that bad thing is that a lot of them can take months before they let you know if you have the job or not, so it's tough to know which direction to go since in a couple months someone could be contacting him with a job. He is actually working today though, so that's a blessing, but I'm not sure if he'll be working tomorrow or not.

Sunday morning, my sister Elisabeth, who is a flight medic on the Staff for Life, was in a helicopter crash. It was one of the scariest things and I didn't even know the whole of it till later, but it's truly a miracle that all three of them on the helicopter survived. They all have similar conditions (broken back/crushed vertebra), but nothing life threatening. Both the pilot and nurse had to have surgery right away and they thought Elisabeth was going to have to, but then they decided since she was young and strong to see if it would heal on its own. So she is wearing a brace and if it looks like its working, she will be wearing it for the next 6 weeks. She went home yesterday and I got to see her and spend some time with her, which was really nice! She is such an amazing person and definitely one of the strongest people I know and she kept up her wonderful sense of humor through the whole ordeal and it was funny to get to hear her yesterday. :) She has an amazing story though. There was no reason what so ever why that helicopter didn't go up in flames immediately on impact, other than the grace of God, because when they hit the ground fuel was spraying up into the helicopter (they were all soaked in fuel) and there were flames on both sides of the helicopter. She said she knew she wouldn't be able to get out quick enough because her legs weren't working right, but then the flames just went out! God truly was working and had His hand on them and I am so thankful that they all made it out alive! We'll probably be visiting my sister often over the next couple of months since she's going to have a lot of down time and she still needs prayer, since it'll be pretty tough for her.

On another note....Jacob and I had our 4 year anniversary on the 9th! It's kind of hard to believe, but it's been a good 4 years...even during his deployment there were some good times too. We went to a nice steak dinner for our anniversary...the first time in a long time where we didn't have one of the girls with us, so that was nice and relaxing and so like the times before we had kids. Including the toothpick finale! I love you Jacob! :D Then the next evening we went to see Narnia-Voyage of the Dawn Treader, where we snuck food into the theatre (that is where big purses come in handy!) and then Jacob had to go get a pretzel along with a big soda....then we proceeded to watch the movie! :) Of course, both of us throughout the movie would worry about it being too loud and waking up the girls or trying to cough quietly so as not to disturb the girls! Yeah, I think we need to do it more often...we're out of practice with it just being the two of us since we're so used to doing things with the girls. :) After the movie we went to Toys R Us (I really do love that store!) to do some Christmas shopping for the girls and that was a lot of fun...I could spend a really long time in there just looking at everything! Then as we were leaving we saw a Krispy Kreme Donuts.....so, Jacob stopped just for me and he even got milk so we could eat donuts in the car! It was a fun two day anniversary!
A lot can happen in 4 years and we were blessed with two beautiful little girls!

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

More Baking Adventures

I didn't take a "final" picture of these, but this was the beginning of Homemade Oreo Cookies. They were amazing! So easy to make and they tasted incredible....everyone who had them loved them, including the girls. Abigail in particular loved "her chocolate cookies"....she even got really upset at Jacob when she thought he took all of her chocolate cookies! I'll definitely be making them again...and hopefully taking more pictures. I've realized I'm hopeless when it comes to taking pictures. First off, I always forget to take pictures, second of all, they are generally horrible pictures.....well, other then this first one. I think it turned out pretty well...probably my best picture of food ever....which isn't saying much I know! :)

Yummy granola...I eat this stuff a lot.
Yes, I know this isn't a baking photo, but I was cooking when this happened....Bethany loves cheese and I guess I wasn't cutting her a slice quick enough so that is what happened to my block of cheese. Maybe someday she will be my helper in the kitchen, not just the "eat and lick everything in sight"......especially my chocolate covered pretzels!

I made a lot of chocolate covered pretzels for deer season on Jacob's request...including white ones, but of course, for some reason, I have no pictures of the white ones. *sigh* They were so good though, especially the white ones! :)
Mini Cheesecakes.....oh yummy! These were sooo good. I made oreo ones too, but they were all gone by the end of the day, which (being me) was when I thought I'd better take a picture of them.
Please excuse this horrible picture, but trust me it was the best of all the ones I took (pretty bad, I know). This Chocolate Cream Pie is probably the best pie out there if you like chocolate pie....it's amazing and it sets up so nice! It's also easy to add either meringue or whipped cream to the top of depending on your preferences.
Peanut Blossoms! If you want to attract any ones attention, especially kids, then make these. They were really good and I'll be making them again, probably around Christmas. :)

Thanksgiving Fun!

It's hard to believe it's been almost a week since Thanksgiving....fun times always go by so fast! We had a wonderful Thanksgiving even though it decided to rain and sleet as soon as Jacob had the turkeys ready to deep fry outside! It then snowed while he did the second one! Making memories for sure with that experience. :) We had a lot of yummy food, and I most certainly mean a lot of food....it was all delicious though. My desserts all turned out good...no flops or anything so that was good. The mini cheesecakes were a hit so I'll definitely be making them again...I will post dessert pictures another time. :) My sister and her husband had also gotten my family Band Hero.......so, yes we did a lot of "rockin' and a rollin'"! :)There was some serious concentration going on...... :)
Mom was having a lot of fun on the drums! It was fun having her and Dad both playing together....we had a hard time convincing Mom, but I think she liked it after she tried it. :)
We played lots of card games.....
Did lots of silly stuff! .....
Played with toys....lots of them....
Sat around and talked....a lot!
We worked out....oh wait, that's Bethany! I guess she thought she needed to work off her turkey dinner! :)

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

I feel horrible that I haven't blogged in awhile...like always, time gets away from me and then before I know it I'm behind. Extra stuff has been going on this month so the past two weeks have gone really fast for me and of course this week is Thanksgiving so it's another busy but fun week since we're going to be heading down to my family's place tomorrow! That also means I have some "sweet" baking to do, but I'm excited about that because I love to bake...the bad thing is limiting myself to a few things and not trying to convince myself of making "just one more dessert"! :) The desserts right now are: two Chocolate Cream Pies, mini Oreo Cheesecakes and some cherry ones, and Peanut Blossoms. I'm really tempted to make Pumpkin Cream Trifle though...I just found the recipe last night (after I went to the store) or else I'd probably be making it. I keep telling myself I don't need to make anything else, especially since I already went to the store and I shouldn't go again....it is sooo tempting though!

Ok, moving on to less tempting thoughts....ummm, yeah, now I'm completely lost and forgot what else I was going to write about......never mind I will show you all some pictures till I gather my thoughts. :)
They love their daddy! Jacob did shave off his beard and mustache not long after I took this picture(he did it just for me...I suppose I do prefer the clean shaven look a little bit better, but I do love him no matter what :) ) so when Abigail looked at this picture she started asking about where his beard and mustache went to!
Abigail and I were having fun taking pictures......Bethany, not so much. :) Here they are waiting to head out the door again. A week and a half ago Jacob's granddad died, so last week was pretty hectic with the visitation and funeral. Jacob was also a pallbearer so we had to make a late night run to Kohl's and get him a suit (thank goodness for holiday shopping hours!) and something for me to wear. I don't know what you can really say about a funeral...you can't really say "it was a good funeral", since that doesn't really fit the occasion, but the guy in charge from the funeral home said he had never seen so many people come to the funeral service at the church and then come all the way out to the cemetery. So, it was impressive how all the family and so many people connected to him came together.

We also got to spend another weekend down with my family, so three weekends in a row coming up this week! I love it! My brother Nathan was home from college for his week long break, so it was awesome to see him again and I can't wait till tomorrow to see everyone again! We had some fun game times too, which hopefully we'll continue tomorrow! :)
Abigail was pretty happy to see Nathan since she's been talking about going to college with him ever since he left....I should be happy she isn't anywhere near college age or I wouldn't be able to keep her from going! It's pretty neat how close she is to all her aunts and uncles...one of the benefits of having spent 6 months with them while Jacob was deployed. I hope she and Bethany are always close them...it's pretty special.

Well, since I know I won't be blogging till after thanksgiving......

HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!
I hope you all have a wonderful day!

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Veterans Day

We don't always realize how important this day is and how much we have because of the millions of men and woman that have and still are fighting to keep us safe and protect our freedom. So many have lost their lives giving us things that we (often times) take for granted; but you can bet their families don't ever forget....they all sacrifice so much. Even in a military job that doesn't really have a meaning, you are at the mercy of those in authority over you and if they tell you to jump you jump and all you can do is pray that you make it. Jacob had to leave for his 6 month deployment last year when Abigail was 9 months old and I was almost 6 months pregnant. I can't even describe how difficult that was for all of us, but we made it through and Jacob came back to meet Bethany!She doesn't seem to notice that anything out of the ordinary is going on, but this was in the airport the day Jacob got back!Abigail getting reacquainted with her daddy in the airport! I'm so glad that we don't have to worry about anymore deployments, but we still need to remember all of those that are deploying or still deployed and their families....so a big thank you to all that have served and are still serving in any area of the U.S. Military!

I love you so much Jacob!

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Friends and Stuff

We're having an amazingly warm week considering it's November, but I'm not complaining....I'm loving it! It's good to be able to get out and run with the girls and not worry about it being to cold to have them outside....I'm trying to figure out what I can do this winter to keep running even when it's too cold outside for the girls. I want to be more prepared for when I start training in February, for the half marathon in June, so I want to be running this winter and be running at least 5 miles by the time I start my training program. I know, big goals for having two girls to work around, but I think I can manage it! And actually, any running that I can do between now and February will be more than I did at the beginning of this year. :) I told myself today I couldn't believe that just a few months ago I was running 13+ miles....at least I know since I did it once I should be able to do it again!My friend Emily took this picture of the girls all ready to go out to the bonfire last Friday! They were sooo excited and it was sooooo cold out there so I had to get them bundled up pretty good...of course, I'd get one all zipped up and get to work on the other one just to turn around and have to repeat it all again since they couldn't seem to keep from trying to peel out of everything as soon as I wasn't looking! We had a wonderful time cooking hot dogs and s'mores even though it was cold and the kids didn't seem to want to sit around the fire like all the adults were doing. Then we came inside where it was warm and had homemade hot chocolate with homemde whipped cream while we played team Skip-Bo and talked and laughed till about 11PM! It was A LOT of fun and we're definitely going to do it again sometime!Here we are with our friends Nick and Emily from our church, with the catch of the day. :) We have become really good friend with this couple and we try to hang out together every chance we get and we always have a blast! I really enjoy having Emily for a friend; I never really had any friends outside of my family, so to finally be making friends and having someone to share with and encourage and get encouragement from is a real blessing and a new experience for me! Of course, Jacob is still my very best friend (no doubt about that!), but it is nice to have friends to talk to and share experiences with during the day when our menfolk are at work. :)

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

It's November....

Time seems to be going by fast. Of course, it doesn't always feel that way during the day, but the months are going by so quickly...I can't hardly believe that it's less then two months till the end of the year....crazy. In some ways it feels like it was just Thanksgiving and Christmas and here we are coming up on them again. A lot has certainly happen during this last year though, so that helps to put it in perspective. The last couple of months have been fun times for us....we're making so many new friends at our church and it's been amazing! I mean, we're constantly getting invites for bonfires, game nights and different events involving our friends from church and that's totally different for us compared to last year! It's been so encouraging too....Jacob and I have never had that the entire time we've been married (almost 4 years now!) so it's nice to finally be making friends that are alike in beliefs and at the same stage in life. We're actually going to be having a bonfire tomorrow night with two other couples from church...it was kind of a last minute idea so not everyone could come, but the smaller the group the more we get to visit one on one with everyone and one of the couples we haven't spent much time with so it will be nice to get to know them better. Of course, it is suppose to be the coldest day/night of the week, so we probably won't be spending too much time outside other then to cook our hot dogs and s'mores and then we'll be running in to have hot chocolate! :)

I think Jacob is home from his long fishing trip....so I'll be back another time!

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Picture Perfect Day

Nothing can quite capture the beauty of a sunrise, even more so when I'm the one behind the camera, but it's still pretty (might be a little prettier without the water tower looming up over the treeline) and I'm glad I thought of taking a picture. It's about time for some more pictures since the last couple of times I've neglected to post any...which means I have lots of pictures I could post.They can be so cute and lovable sometimes!
It's so cute (and extremely nice) when they both sit and watch movies together. Bethany only lasts about 2 minutes max before she is on the move again....sigh....maybe soon.


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