Other phone pics

Since I CAN.  :)

Paul and Em in our pool.

Trail up and around Mt. Baldy, Indiana Dunes.

Black bean salad, eaten with chips.  YUM.

New York.

Big sky.

Happy Hollow trails in the beginning of autumn.

Putting up Mom's Christmas tree for her.  Sorry they're all so blurry!

Sammy/Dickens, my dad's family's new puppy.

A little arrangement at our in-laws' house.  I usually use this as my background all Christmas long.  :)

I'm SO grateful to have a phone whose pictures actually come off it.  You don't even know.  AND thankful for the technology that allows 4 or 8 GB of storage in a device smaller than my thumbnail. 

Obi the Pup

Obi's really struck me as adorable lately...maybe it's because of the cute things she's done, or maybe it was because yesterday we FINALLY let her out of her cage when we had a child over and she surprised us by being EXTRA good!  I can't even describe, it was like my nephew was her puppy or something.  Check out the not-so-carefully planned photos of her below!  :)

Sleeping with her blankie. Her eyes are kinda creepy when she sleeps with them halfway open.

Sharing chips oh-so-gently with Paul.

The blankie and the blow-up bed...her two favorite things!

Tired after playing in the snow with Paul.



This is from yesterday.  Tanner was LOVING our little skull, and he thought it was hilarious that Obi would lick it (she licks EVERYTHING).  I love everyone's different expressions here.



Obi, patiently taking the beating petting from Tanner.

The two were BFFs!  He was holding her muzzle here and she was licking him.  It was adorable.

Pooped out from a long, happy day!

Also, some pics from my phone! (Finally!)

Some lovin' from Paul.

Laziness in the sunshine.  :)

Falling asleep in the WEIRDEST positions sometimes!  :)

I'm trying to post a video, but having some difficulties getting it to upload.  It's only 18 seconds long, but I've waited over an hour.  :(  It's like the above picture of Tanner "petting" Obi...but she really didn't mind, at least not the way she minds when WE do things that bug her.  She started crawling away from him, but then he smiled and started crawling right along with her...and they just sort of crawled together.  The video stops before they made it to the hallway by the bedrooms, but it's still cute.  I'll try again later when I'm feeling more patient.  Anyway, we were super worried about how Obi would be with a small child around the house.  Now we know better!  She'll be just fine.

Obsidian the Model

My friend Jessica (check out her photography blog HERE) pointed her readers to a FREE online photography class going on this month (check it out HERE).  I figured, with my little point-and-shoot Canon PowerShot A560, I could stand to learn a thing or two about taking decent pictures.  Of course, I don't have a fancy camera or any real background in photography, and no aspirations of any photo business ever (my flower business would be enough for me!), but I DO love scrapbooking.  So why not?  It's free, right?  So what do I have to lose?  :)

Anywho, the class is called the Joy of Love, and each day they send a prompt to help you photograph the ones you love and a tip or two.  Which I just need.  Obi, our puppy, is a difficult model.  I can never get good shots of her--especially when she's moving around!  But I worked on using more natural light (avoiding those red evil dog eyes that I usually have to edit out because of the flash I usually use) and getting down to her level.  I also caught her in a few moments of boredom rest.  I like the result.  What do you think?  Isn't Obsidian a GORGEOUS dog, really?

Obi looks BORED.

Obi looks AT ME.

Obi looks SURPRISED.

Obi looks BORED (again).

Obi looks OUT THE WINDOW.

FHE 1/31/10

Paul and I really do love FHE, but we've kinda been slacking lately.  Between the madness of the holidays, the fact that neither of us really grew up with FHE so it's not "routine" in our minds yet (even after YEARS in YSA FHE callings and attending meetings), and the fact that we both kinda assume the other person will remind us, or plan it, or...whatever...yeah, we just sort of let the ball drop.  So we basically do it when we remember.  Well, one of our main goals as a family this year is to be better about that.  So, thanks to our chart that keeps it at the forefront of our minds and helps us know exactly what each of us must do:

Isn't it cute, all laminated and velcro-ed?  :)

Song: "If I Listen With my Heart" (a primary song we are trying to learn!)
Prayer: Paul
Lesson: Chapter 8 in Choosing Glory.  For FHE as a married couple, we've mostly been reading books together, one chapter at a time, and then discussing thoughts that come up.  These are usually church-related books, but they wouldn't necessarily have to be.  Once we FINALLY finish this book, we're thinking about taking turns presenting Conference talks in any way we want.  We're kinda excited about it, because it would involve real study and planning.

Can I just put in a plug here?  Sister Lili Anderson was my strengthening marriage and family teacher at BYU, and I LOVED her class.  As not only a PhD/Marriage and Family counselor but also mother of 8 kids, she has SOOOOOO much insight about the gospel and how it relates (in concrete ways) to marriage and parenting.  Of course, you get as much out of it as you put into it, but talking about the principles she reviews in her books has really already helped Paul and me.  Personally, it's been a healing thing for me to understand the feelings I've had about different trials in my own life and what those feelings mean in context of the gospel.  I TOTALLY AND COMPLETELY recommend her books to anyone.  The first one, Family Foundations, is pretty much our curriculum for her course (besides a really big coffee-table-style book breaking down the proclamation on the family), and it merits reading.  In it, she introduces what she calls the Three Realm Model, and this second book is all about that.  We really love it.  It makes certain parts of the gospel make a lot more sense.  Check out her website and order her books at lilianderson.com!

The awesome book.  Okay, moving on...

Activity: Yahtzee.  I beat Paul in our first game by 4 points.  He beat me the second time by over 70 points.  But I came back in our "tiebreaker" round to win by almost as much, thanks to an actual Yahtzee.  It was way fun.  And I got a massage out of it.  :)

Treats: Peanut Butter Fingers!  My roommate used to make these once in a while, and I loved them lots.  I'd wanted to make them over the holidays but, y'know, I didn't want Emilie to DIE, so...I made them now.  Let me know if you want the recipe!  I'm too lazy to type it all up right now.

So, that was it!  It was a fun evening.  We always enjoy the spirit of unity we feel when we actually settle down and DO FHE.  Hopefully now that we're starting to get more organized we'll have more fun stories and experiences to share!

Yummy PB Fingers...High Five for FHE!  :)

Valentine's Day Advent Calendar

I'm kinda excited about the super easy, super cheap-o advent calendar I made for Valentine's Day this year.  Check out THIS LINK for my inspiration.  (I say inspiration, but that's pretty much exactly how I did mine...I even used 2/3 of her ideas for the daily to-dos. :)  Paul almost walked in on me making the countdown in the back room today, and I actually got a surge of adrenaline...I suppose I MUST be feeling better!

Here it is!  SO simple, and it didn't cost me a dime.  My favorite.  I tried to make it heart-shaped (hahaha)...and instead of printing out her ideas, I just typed my own and glued them to half an index card, then hole-punched the top and put a little ribbon through. I'm excited to get started doing all the little lovey-dovey things (that we forget to do after a while in our busy lives) tomorrow!  Now I just need some inspiration for some FREE, fun Valentine's Day dates...or gifts!  We haven't really settled into many holiday routines yet, but I know that even if it's scaled down and FREE, I still want to do SOMETHING.  Any suggestions?

Adventures in Babysitting

(Did anyone else love that movie when they were little?  Or was it just me?)

I got to babysit my poor nephew Tanner this week, because he was too sick to go to daycare.  The poor guy, as it turns out, has an ear infection, sinus infection, and upper respiratory infection.  That's a lot for a 17-month-old to handle.  No wonder he pretty much zonked out all day!  I was going to watch him on Saturday, too, but...I got sick myself.  Thankfully it was my sister and mother to the rescue!

BUT.  I digress.  There was a really cute moment when Tanner, while watching "Curious George" episodes, decided he was tired.  In his little coat (he'd had it on most of the morning because he wanted to leave me), he just got up, grabbed his sippy cup and his blankie, and walked behind our couch to the entry way.  He laid down right by our shoes, pulled his blanket up around himself, drank from his sippy until he was too tired to swallow right, and put himself to bed.  He slept there for almost two hours!  It was adorable.

Pepes, by Caida Lee

It's rare these days that my sisters and I are all in the same place, and we celebrated by going out to our family's favorite place, Pepes.  I don't actually love the food as much as the rest of them do, but I love the free chips and salsa and I love that my family has so many memories there.  :)  Mom, both my sisters, my niece, my hubby, and our friend got to spend Friday night eating good food and spending time together.  My sisters are awesome and I miss them.

My niece got to be our photographer for the evening.  I deleted most of the photos because, well...she's six.  Most of the photos were of the table, her cup, or our elbows.  Also, she thought it was hilarious to photograph boobs.  Like I said...she's six.

But we did get a few good workable shots out of the evening:

Me and Darland 2.

Darland 3.

At least Paul looks good here!

Jordan, in town for a friend's bday!

A little marketing for Pepes...menu and all...

"Oh, I can take pictures of myself, too!"

Caida and Grandma Linda

Just Caida Waida Potata Head :)

This was one of about seven in her "armpit" series.  I spared you the rest.  :)

MUAH!