New Years Kisses...

Who will you be kissing this New Years?

Happy New Year, I hope you're ringing
it in with someone very special!

My Christmas Love Letter...

About a week before Christmas Matt was helping me do some technical tweaking to my Emma Downtown blog when somehow we came upon the conversation of how he never reads my blog. I was giving him a very hard time, because unless I prod him he never looks at it. It usually really doesn't bother me, but I guess I felt the need to make a point... which is if it's important to me shouldn't you be interested?! So I told him if he ever had a blog I would look at it all the time.

Christmas morning came, and Matt asked me if I wanted to check my email... not really it's Christmas. He said one of your presents is waiting for you on your email, I couldn't get it here in time.... Oh, well when you put it that way, I'll be right on that! I wasn't expecting what I found. The email simply said "and you said it couldn't be done". Click Here

I'll I know is the best things in life can never be bought, and to me gifts and words of the heart will last much longer than anything that can be wrapped in paper and ribbon. Amongst all of the things I will remember from this Christmas with the special times with family, the girls, friends, and laughter, the one I will remember the most is being given the gift of knowing how much my husband cares and appreciates me, still after all these years.

So now, you can keep up on what Matt has to say on his very own blog.... and I said it couldn't be done! I should know better than to ever make a challenge like that, to a guy who can't say no to a challenge!

Baby Jesus, is Born today.

The skies don't seem to be as dark as usual
The stars seem brighter then they've been before
Deep within I feel my soul a stirring
As though my hope has been restored
The shepherds say they've heard the voice of angels
Confirming rumors spread across the land
That a child protected well from Herod's anger
Is our Father's Son, and the son of man

Love is raining down on the world tonight
There's a presence here I can tell
God is in us, God is for us, God is with us, Emmanuel
He's the Savior we have been praying for
In our humble hearts He will dwell
God is in us, God is for us, God is with us, Emmanuel

I feel compelled to tell all who will listen
That peace on earth is not so out of reach
If we can find grace, mercy and forgiveness
He has come to save, He is all of these

You're the Savior we have been praying for
In our humble hearts You will dwell
You are in us, You are for us, You are with us, Emmanuel.


lyrics by...

Casting Crowns
Peace on Earth
'God is With Us'

Merry Christmas

Snap shot views of our Holiday...

We kicked our Christmas Eve evening
off with dinner, and fun & games
with family & some very special friends...

Mom and Dad really let their hair
down to play our Christmas tune game!

And oh my... look at that,
Santa made it down the chimney to our house!

Santa brought fun horses,
and some other goodies for both girls.

Santa marked the stockings with each girls initial,
so there was no confusion!
(good thinking Santa!)
(You must have known these girls
like to fight over who's who's!)

There was excitement and cheers for the
beautiful gifts they were given!

But, ELMO he was the biggest hit of all!!!

Next came our traditional Christmas breakfast...
homemade pancakes, bacon, and eggs.
Yum!

Then an afternoon, of games, puzzles, ham leftovers,
playing with new toys, and lazy beings!

Merry Christmas!
From our family to yours.

We hope that on this day of Jesus' birth
that you were able to celebrate, have love,
family, joy, and happiness surrounding you!

it's almost here...

It's Almost Here!

growing up before my eyes...

Lootchie...

My little dog
- a heartbeat at my feet.
~Edith Wharton

Known to most as Emma Lou.
But, to those who love her & know her well,
she is Lootchie...

The pug is living proof that God has a sense of humor.
~Margo Kaufman

a fun filled weekend...

After a week of snow, and sick kids, we finally
got well enough to get back to some of our planned holiday events.

After several snow days, finally things melted off...

Thursday marked our annual baking day
we got a little carried away with how many kinds of
cookies we wanted to bake this year... so,
-- Friday we continued on with day
no. 2 of our 'annual baking day'!

We baked, and decorated,
and ate along the way (of course)...
It was really a lot of fun, even if I don't love to bake!

Bella loved helping, and I am so enjoying her age,
she is such a BIG helper!

Meritt, has since discovered she LOVES 'ookies'...

Our friend Kelli stopped by to supervise on the sprinkles!

Then, we bundled up for horse drawn caroling...

Bella loves horses right now, (they are her favorite)
and is really into Christmas carols,
so this sounded right up her alley!

So, we sang, and rode...
We got lucky, and it even snowed
a little while we were on our ride!

Finally Sunday, it was time to wrap...
I've put it off as long as I could,
so today, I organized my stuff, put together a
wrapping station in the basement, and got busy!

Did you know I love being organized?
It makes jobs, even dreaded ones so much more fun!

Each and every gift got wrapped...

Matt thought an action shot would be nice,
(wasn't that so nice of him... grin)
yes, that's me in my jammies, un-bathed, and gross...
don't judge, you know this happens to you too!
RIGHT?!!!
OK, judge, maybe I am the only one that
gets so busy wrapping & working,
that I don't get washed up, or brush my teeth
until LATE afternoon...
Oh, well. That's life!

8 or ten hours later... I am done!

Yahoo...
It was a fun weekend, all in all!

big plans.... fizzled out!

We had all kinds of big plans for the weekend, but they quickly got derailed by two very sick little girls. Seems as though I spread my lovely stomach bug to my little loves. Oops, don't worry I did get repaid for it! We had planned going to a holiday party, a festival of lights parade, and some other holiday-ish festivities... but instead, well, I will spare you all the details... because just trust me when I say it was YUCKY! Let's just say we are almost through a whole Costco sized box of diapers, and I did at least 15 loads of laundry... fa la la la la :)

Poor little things, this is how we spent well most of the better part of 2 days.

On the bright side, we did get a fun visitor this weekend...

SNOW!


At least we did one holiday-ish thing this weekend,

even if it was just outside our window!