I can’t believe this perfect girl is 7 years old. We had a nice birthday weekend and appreciated all the cards and well wishes.

Emma invited a friend to Build-a-Bear where she was pro at maneuvering her way through the store.

I thought she looked so grown up on the phone listening to Grandma wish her a Happy Birthday.

Emma is such a great well-rounded girl who seems to do something uber-creative every day. Earlier this year, the school librarian entered a story she wrote into a contest, and we’ll know how it turns out in April. We’re all so proud of her for so many different reasons, and I’ll stop there because there’s too much I could say if I go on. Happy Birthday Emma Grace, we love you too much!

On one of the last and coldest days in December, I met Kerbie and her family at the Equestrian Center . This session was a gift for her birthday, and I had a lot of fun avoiding the snowy muck to take these pictures of such a cute girl.

Kerbie and family, thanks for a great day. I hope I can come back this spring!

Nathan pointed out the other day that I only have 5 posts for this year. I know that’s despicable, but now that I’ve  reached all of my Valentine’s Day deadlines, I’m back on schedule for all things normal. So maybe I can get caught up on blogging as well. Today we’re celebrating at home. Kristy was here this morning to help the kids decorate the dinning room for tonight’s “fancy” dinner. For our menu, Nathan and I will try to make Sushi, and the kids will be in charge of dessert. In the meantime, we’re enjoying spending a day at home and getting kissed under all the hanging decorations that Emma calls “Mistle-hearts”.  Happy Valentine’s Day!

We all enjoyed our long weekend, but we didn’t let it keep us inside for too long. We went sledding and exploring the woods.

Nathan did most of the work pushing the kids down the hill before he got creative and took a turn himself.

Once we finally dried out, warmed up and emptied our mugs, I caught Emma taking a cue from Henry.

After making my ONE resolution for the year to be organized in every area of life, I had some things leftover that didn’t quite fit into that category. So I came up with some challenges for the year.

For one of the first challenges, I want to go one day every week trash-free. I first tried a version of this when school started. I was going to send the kids lunch once a week without any trash.. with the exception of natural food trash of course. I thought it would be sort of easy since we already mostly used re-usable lunchboxes and containers. I was wrong. I packed their lunch, and realized that Emma’s brand new lunchbox wouldn’t hold all the containers. I ordered some really cool fabric baggies. They never came in, and my $10.00 was spent. More importantly, I couldn’t write their daily “I love you” on their napkins. So, I put that idea aside for a while.

I’m ready to revisit this challenge with our whole family. I realize I will have to be a little better prepared, but I’m really excited about what this might teach us. In thinking this through I’m already becoming more aware of how much trash we produce in this house. I’m going to try to be very strict at first, but there is no way I’m giving up my toiletries!

Sometime before Christmas, I was able to do a photo session with The Medleys. Cutie Pie, Norah kept us smiling and made my job a hundred times easier.

Thanks Medley family! (Especially Norah)

After a 3 week Christmas break, I almost feel like I’ve won a battle with my sanity barely in tact. The kids were incredible, and I did enjoy the time at home that I felt we sort of missed over the actual Christmas part of their break. But still, when the snow caused an unexpected, (and ill-prepared for on my part) extension of our time together, I thought there may be a strait-jacket involved at some point, either used on me or the kids.  Thankfully, they got along great with each other most of the time. Which means that they were running and screaming and enjoying themselves… which means that I was left searching for a quiet corner to myself. Today though I sort of miss their happy energy. I didn’t have an excuse to make a huge bowl of popcorn and watch a movie. Which would inevitably lead to a nap on the couch and hoping that they wouldn’t notice I had missed half the movie. But on a good note, the tape remained in one place, no one asked me for 3 different sizes of batteries, and the rolling foot-rest stayed in the living room the ENTIRE day…. so far.

Hopefully a new year means new food. Healthy food isn’t completely new to me, once I tried to go a whole year without eating fast food french-fries… I only lasted 3 months. But I haven’t been eating right recently which hasn’t made me feel very energetic.  So, hello to grapefruit for breakfast and snacking on almonds…. with Nutella.

We had a wonderful Christmas this year with both our families. Christmas Eve still competes with Christmas morning for a spot as my favorite day of the year. This year my dad got to enjoy all the traditions with us. We ate clam chowder, opened Aunt Dru’s box of goodies, drank our eggnog,  and took our p.j. picture while it sleeted and snowed outside. We made it home at 40 mph on i540.

The next morning, Emma woke us all up bright and early to open our gifts and enjoy the white Christmas she had been praying for.

We slowly made our way back to Fayetteville for Christmas Brunch and then on to Harrison for dinner with my side of the family. By the time we got there though, I was feeling very queasy, and I am using that as my excuse for the lack of a single photo from that celebration. I did feel well enough to beat Nathan’s score at Guesstures though, and that truly made for a Merry Christmas.

I met Katie last month at her lovely home, and dragged her in and out of her barn for some fun senior pictures. (And really, aren’t the seniors much more beautiful now than they were when we were all in school?)

Thanks Katie for getting your shoes dirty for me. Good luck this year!