happy

Two weeks ago I got to see my kids for the first time since October.  It had been waaaaay too long!!!  We had scheduled THREE other times before that to get together...and all three times are the days it snowed or iced here in town!!  Aaagh!! So frustrating!! 

  

But finally it worked out and in the months between visits, they got three (yes, three!) new puppies who are now five months old.  They are Great Pyrenees, super soft and fluffy, and all girls.  And I have NO idea how in the world they tell them apart! lol

I would put different colored collars on them..but the kids and their dad say they know them all, so that's good.  That is A LOT of dog to be greeted by in their sunroom, let me tell ya! :)

Then I took them to have their pictures done at our favorite place - Portrait Innovations. (Just the kids. No dogs. Ha.)  Love that place!!  They always do a great job and can do a studio look that I can't do.

And of course you know I'm going to put up some of my favorites... :}

We chose a purple theme for our first outfits because the outfit that LM Sunshine has on is her very favorite and she feels so pretty in it :) so we were pleasantly surprised when we got there and our photographer pulled down a purple backdrop to match! :)

Don't let this picture fool you, lol! They did this willingly for the photographer...but then later as we were looking through them there was plenty of "Eww! I can't believe we did that!" from the girls. Ha.

My sweet girl and my spunky one.  :)

The weekend before I was supposed to keep them all day but my end of town got snow and as I attempted to get out of my neighborhood - just driving down the hill in front of our house - I started slipping and sliding...managed to stop...turned around and said well, I'm not going anywhere!  Later that day my kids called and left me a message that completely cracked me up.  I wish I could put the audio of it on here!

LM Sunshine started it out by saying, in her sweet and quiet voice:

"Hi Kiki! I love you and I miss you and I wish we could have seen you today and uh Happy early Valentines Day and I hope we get to see you really really soon."

Followed by LM Giggles who said at full volume:

"HEY KIKI! SORRY YOUR HOUSE GOT ALL.....SNOWED UP!!"

Ha!! Sums up their personalities pretty darn well.  :D

And my sweetheart.  :)  I always buy my kids an outfit for their birthday as well as something fun and this was Mr. Happy's bday outfit.  I knew he would like it because it came from me...but I underestimated just how much he would love it!  He definitely felt pretty handsome in it and adored that hat!  

We had watched this music video way back in October in the Women Getting Real Bible study that I've been going to (and of course now I don't remember what the connection was to why we watched it...but the song fit that night...lol)  and I knew right then that was the look I wanted to copy...

...pretty good copy, don't ya think??  :)

Aaand...one more just for the heck of it...

I would MUCH rather be the one behind the camera..therefore, there are basically no pictures of me and my kids...so now at least we have one of all of us together.  :) 

Counting the days until I get to see them again...and praying for God's protection over them while I'm not with them.  :)

fall pics

As much as I love photography and take bajillions of pictures of my kids all the time, every couple years I decide I want "real" studio pics. I have taken them to Portrait Innovations now three times and love it. A little while back, my best friend, Shannon, took her 3 year old, Jonathan, to have his pictures done and there was a certain prop they got to use that I couldn't get out of my head. I knew exactly what I wanted to do for this photo set! :) The kids had a blast and it was just fun! We did a clothes change also but I'll save those for another post at a later date. Here are some of my favorites...

At the very end, it was time for "the" prop. It had been sitting in a corner the whole time and I kept waiting for Mr. Happy to notice it, but even when the photographer walked over to pull it out, I had to tell him to look at what it was. Then his jaw hit the floor! :)

He said, "Oh my gosh!! But...it's not a REAL one, right Kiki?"

"Right. But it LOOKS like a real one!"

"YEAH!!! It looks real!! But it's not."

He had to take a minute and just look cool when he first climbed on.

Then came the BIG smiles!

Takin' it for a drive! (more like a push...around the floor. :)

Lookin' cool with his two pretty girls! :)

i two!

Today is my baby's 2nd birthday. I can't believe he's already two years old! Why do babies have to grow so fast?? :) He is so much fun right now. Although, I think I tend to say that at every different stage. :) His vocabulary is expanding quite rapidly and some of his favorite words are "no sir!", "cool!", "oh, twouble!" (He puts a "backpack" over his head and looks for an "animal in trouble" to help, just like Diego.), "so funny!", and many more. His favorite activities are playing with the Thomas train set he got for Christmas, running in circles, doing whatever his sisters are doing, making us laugh, and anything to do with music - singing, dancing, and listening. He is most definitely all boy, but he is also sweet and still cuddly, which I love. I know he won't be small for long, so I try hard to treasure the sweet hugs and kisses he gives, the way he runs his fingers through my hair when he's sleepy, and the times when he just wants to sit with me and snuggle. I pray that he will grow to love and serve God with all his heart, so for now we'll keep singing Jesus Loves Me and I'll keep reminding him Who created him so wonderfully - and I'll keep kissing those little chubby cheeks while I can! :)

Here are some of the other pictures from our Portrait Innovations session last week....

Patience...

...is always a lesson in progress. :) I had been wanting to take my kiddos to have "real" pictures done just before Christmas, but I ended up having to make a total of four different appointments due to one or more of us being sick! I was very sad when I ended up having to postpone the pictures until after Christmas, since I had wanted to do one set in their Christmas jammies. However, I finally got to go to Portrait Innovations on Wednesday and the whole thing turned out much better than it possibly would have if we had made it to one of the other appointments. There was one lady there looking at the pictures of her baby, another mom with two kids just finishing up a portrait session, and then us. By the time we were halfway through our session, we were the only customers in the building! It was so calm and relaxed and laid back and my kids had a blast.

Ok, here comes my plug for the day, so if you don't want to hear it, or I've already told you about it before, just skip this paragraph! :) I LOVE the way Portrait Innovations does their pictures! They have big rooms (compared to the tiny spaces provided at places like Penny's or Sears...) and the kids sit or stand on the floor - not up on some high platform. The photographer takes a million pictures (since it's a digital camera they're not worrying about using tons of film!) and just keeps snapping picture after picture - big smiles, laughs, quiet looks - to get a range of beautiful photos. There is no sitting fee at all. After your session is over you sit and look through all the pictures on large, flat screen tvs, going through 3 at a time to narrow them down to your very favorites. (While the kids can sit and play with toys!) The price is always up in the top corner of the tv so you can watch to make sure you're staying within your price range. (We had a total of 154 pictures and narrowed them down to "only" 62 at first. :} This would have been over $1,000 !! in the end we narrowed it down to 6 for less than a tenth of that first price!) If you purchase 3 or more poses (and you get three sheets of each pose you choose - in whatever sizes you want.), you also get a cd with all the pictures on it. You can bring this cd back anytime to have more pictures printed (at a higher price, of course) or you can print them right from your own computer at home, share them online like I'm doing, or email them to friends! :) You can even choose just one absolute favorite photo for their on-going $9.95 deal - which includes a total of almost 50 prints of your picture in varying sizes!

Ok, I'll stop rambling on about them now and just get to the actual pictures! :)

This is the one we used for the $9.95 deal. :)

The girl with the camera stood on a small pedestal to take this picture from a different angle. My middle child was standing with me watching and asked, "Why is she standing on that?" The girl turned around and said, "To make me taller - because I'm short!" My middle child wasn't quite satisfied with that answer and looked at me and said, "But, Kiki, she is not the statue of liberty!" Evidentally the statue of liberty is the only one allowed to stand on a pedestal?? :)

This next one is an example of how they just keep snapping pictures and end up capturing some great moments:

One of the best sounds in the world - a child laughing!! :)

Oh, you are also guaranteed one clothes change, and we did a more casual look for those but I will save them until next week....