We're Back!!

Thanks to those of you who have kindly reminded me that I haven't blogged since August.

I appreciate that you missed me. Only problem was, I didn't have a lot to say.

Or time to write once I had something to say.

Or time to find pictures to help illustrate the things I wanted to say.

And then, I wanted to be chronological about the things I wanted to say, and that was far too overwhelming.

So, today, we will start where we are.

And today, the most exciting thing is that this guy is coming home early from his business trip to sleep in his very own bed.

Not Diggity's bed...

We're pretty excited about that around here. Since we haven't seen each other for a couple of weeks.

And I'm pretending that the coming home early (even a day earlier than the original "coming home early" date) has nothing to do with the total-hormonal-crazy-coming-home-traveling-breakdown that I had yesterday afternoon, combined with the still-recovering-from-the-back-injury-and-I-can't-do-anything-frustration I'm dealing with right now.

But I suspect that it does.

I'm good either way.

Because we've decided - no more long separation trips like this. We all had a lovely time on our trips (G and I to New England, Diggity to California, then Taiwan and China), but this being apart for long periods of time is not for us.

And we've lots to catch up on, so stay tuned...

A Tribute

Many of you out there have met my wonderful car, Miguel. His full name is Miguel Manuel Santa Fe. (We had a naming contest among my friends when I purchased him. We wanted a name that fit his personality and heritage as a Santa Fe. *grin*) My first car purchase as an adult, he and I have had many wonderful adventures together. Road trips, daily rides to school, driving members of the 2002 Savior of the World cast to the Conference Center...I'm quite attached to him.

As you might imagine, when Diggity suggested at the beginning of this year (after another large repair bill from Miguel's yearly inspection) that we should replace him, I balked. I was not keen to replace him. I did not want a car payment. I was fine, thank you. I may have refused to discuss the matter whenever Diggity brought it up.

Then, President Obama announced the CARS program.

And we found out that Miguel qualified as a "clunker." (Don't worry. I didn't tell Miguel. I didn't want to hurt his feelings with a label like that.)

And then we found out the CARS program was ending soon. So we looked. And we found a new car. And the new car arrived a couple of days ago, and today was the day we had to turn Miguel in so he could be crushed into sheet metal.

Poor Miguel.

I took a few pictures of Miguel in our driveway before we took him to the dealership this afternoon.

I told G-Man we were taking mommy's car bye-bye and bringing home a new one, and he gave Miguel a hug. Awwwww...

We brought home a Subaru Forester. My family drove Subarus until we got a minivan when I was in junior high. I like them, and I'm pretty excited. I was sad to see Miguel go, but I must admit, when the salesman was showing me the car (Auxiliary plug for my iPod! Functioning lighter plugs so I can actually charge my phone! A mute button for the stereo ON my steering wheel! And MORE!), I got more and more excited to have a new car.

Here's our new car (no name yet):

Thanks, honey. I'm glad you insisted. And you even found a way to get me the seat warmers. I love you.

Any name suggestions?

Happy Anniversary!

I can't believe it's already been four years, sweetie. I sure love you.

He Likes to Climb.

Luckily, he only dares go this high with help from Diggity.

Yes, he has a huge bump on his forehead and his cheeks are really red. The bump is from a run in with an older kid in nursery and the cheeks are red because he gets really red cheeks when he's tired and hasn't had a nap. I used to be able to get him to sleep before we left for church, but no more. So, red cheeks every Sunday.

He also likes to run everywhere he goes and he's started yelling a lot more.

Fun stuff...

Lots of fun new stuff going on over at the photography blog...

New logos and website! See here.

New pictures of my amazing grandparents! See here.

And coming tomorrow (and for a few days after that), fun pictures of the young women in my ward.

Thanks to those of you that have added my fan page on Facebook and have been over to the website and let me know what you think. Please know your support and kindness means the world to me. And just so you know, I'm going to still be posting here, (AI performance show later today!) but I'm going to be splitting time, stories and pictures between the two. So if you don't see much going on here, you can check over there too.

Also over on the photography blog, but it belongs here too...my new favorite picture of Diggity and G-Man:



Have a great Tuesday!

The Disposal King

He does take out the trash every week, and for that, he also deserves this title. But, no. He deserves this title for his awesome-Tim-the-Tool-Man-fix-it job earlier this week.

He replaced our disposal! Isn't he awesome? I was going to do it and he took care of the whole job while I was editing engagement pictures. He's such a stud.

Christmas Eve

After relatively smooth travels to our final destination, we were welcomed by family and a delicious dinner. Our family acts out the Nativity with whoever is in the house for dinner that year. My dad is always the angel. The picture is out of focus, but it gives you a sense of his brilliant performance.

We had a lot of family in the house this year - both my family and Diggity's family was there. It made for an excellent Nativity.

G-Man was Joseph

Joseph wasn't digging his costume so much.

Mary and the baby Jesus.

Joseph and Mary prepare for their debut

We had a very sassy shepherd in the house this year.

Shepherd and two of the three Wise Men - bearing pineapple

After the Nativity, we decorate luminaries to light for my mom. Everyone created a luminary for someone they wanted to remember for Christmas and then we lit them and put them on the front porch.

This was G-Man's first luminary. He loved coloring.

I love that G-Man is watching his Grandpa make Grandma Marsha's luminary.

Snow, Snow, Snow

It basically hasn't stopped since Friday afternoon. (Well, maybe it's stopped now. I haven't looked outside in a while.) G-Man wanted to go outside this afternoon, so we bundled up and went out. Our primary objective was to find the Sunday paper, but we were unsuccessful. (I did see it for a brief moment when our driveway was plowed later in the evening, but it was swept into the huge pile of snow along our driveway. We'll find it in April.)

To give you a better idea of what we are dealing with in terms of amounts, I'll give you some visual comparison.

These shots were taken Friday at 3:00 p.m. - just as the storm was starting up:

These shots were taken this afternoon at about 4:30 p.m.:

See the snow around our huge Christmas lights? That should give you some idea. And some of that snow has melted because we had the lights on for a while last night. It's crazy. I couldn't believe G-Man could walk in the snow. It was higher than his knees in some spots. But he valiantly followed Diggity around and dug some holes with his little sand shovel. The best part was when Diggity flopped on his back and made a snow angel and then G-Man did the same. (The camera was safe and dry back in the house. It was still snowing, so I took all of these shots from the garage.)

Every winter we are here is crazier than the last. Hopefully we'll be able to venture out tomorrow. Wish us luck. Here are a few more from today. (Including two I tried a new edit on. Not sure if I like it. I was trying to work with the blur I was getting from the snow falling and G-Man's constant motion. I'm just going to have to switch over to shutter priority mode to take pictures of him from now on...)

Snowed In

We've been walloped. It's pretty deep out there. I don't think the snow has stopped since it started in the afternoon on Friday. G-Man thinks it's pretty great. He and I went out to do some shoveling this afternoon while Diggity was digging out the church building (even though it turned out that church was canceled for today. Yup. Snow day from church. Not the first time this has happened either.) I was pretty impressed with G-Man's endurance in the cold. His face got pretty red and he still hung in there. He wanted to explore the cul-de-sac and help me with the digging.

Some shots from the very start of the storm on Friday afternoon:

Drink some cocoa and enjoy the winter wonderland!

The Windy City, Day 1

We're hanging out with Diggity this weekend in Chicago. I love this city. However, it's ridiculously cold here right now. Since out dear child refuses to wear gloves and rips off hats and will barely let us put the hood of his coat on, we need to find indoor activities.

Our first full day here was Friday. G-Man had a rough night in the hotel port-a-crib. We made plans to go to the Field Museum and by the time we got in the car and were on our way there, he fell asleep. So, we drove down the "Magnificent Mile" and drove around the museum campus where I took these pictures of the Chicago skyline.

We went to run an errand, and G-Man woke up. So we headed back to the museum and he was asleep again.

So, we gave up on the museum for the day and went to get pizza. Deep dish, that is. Chicago style. We went to a really great place called Gino's East. It was loud, fun and had great food. And this was the setting of probably my favorite G-Man story to date.

Deep dish pizza takes about an hour to bake, so we were in the restaurant for a while. The men at the table next to us finished their lunch and got up and left. The table was vacant for a while and then a new family came in to take the table. The mom was wearing something like this:



G-Man was eating snacks and playing with the sugar. Then he looks up and...

"Roaarrrrr"

"Roaaarrrr"

"Roaaarrrr"

Diggity and I look at him, trying to figure out why he is suddenly roaring. Roaring very loudly and very intently. Then, I realize he's staring at the woman in the coat. He's roaring at the woman in the coat. Having never seen a fur coat before, he thinks this woman is a bear. Or a lion. On one hand, I'm pretty proud of him for making the cognitive transfer - I thought it was pretty cool he could see something he had never seen before and categorize it and make that sound (I'm a geeky schoolteacher. Sorry.) On the other hand, he's now roared 7 or 8 times and the woman is noticing and I'm getting the sense that she is a little offended and how do you tell a stranger that your son is roaring at her because he thinks she is a bear...so I just laughed.

I guess you kind of had to be there, but take my word for it, it was hilarious.

Blast Off!

We took G-Man's Little Einsteins rocket outside on a warm day a week or so ago. Diggity came out to play with us too.

I'm really going to miss these fall afternoons.

He runs everywhere these days. He sometimes gets all the way across our culdesac before I can catch him.

He had such a great time having the rocket outside.

Aren't they just the cutest guys ever?

*So, I need a little bit of help. I'm trying to decide how to put my photography logo on my pictures. Both options are shown above. Option 1 is the white branding bar at the bottom with the logo in black. Option 2 is stamping the logo right on the photograph. Leave me a comment and let me know what you think!

True Love

My husband really loves me. He shows me in so many ways all the time and he's my best friend. I'm so grateful for him.

But he did something that went above and beyond in the love-showing department on Friday night.

He bought me this:


Obviously, an iPhone is an expensive gadget and just the fact that he bought it for me is really such a wonderful gesture. But there's more to it.

He doesn't have one.

To really understand how huge this is, you have to know Diggity. Diggity, the early-adopting-technology-loving-Applephile. He loves Apple products. He used to work for them. He had the first generation iPod (The fact that I had a 40G iPod was a bonding point in our early dating.) and you'd think he would have been one of the first in line to get an iPhone.

Nope.

He's been waiting, watching, trying out other people's iPhones. And after months of debating if I really needed one, I decided that I did. (It is part of Operation Robison Reorganization. This operation will be taking place over the next few months. I'll update you as my dejunkifying continues. The iPhone was part of step one - digital files and media. My calendars and contacts and digital media needed to be housed in one unit.)

And so, we bought it Friday night. I'm trying hard not to spend all my time playing with it. I won't bore you swooning over it. I'll just show you the pictures I took with it yesterday when Garrett and I were out taking these pictures:








P.S. It's a nice day out today, but the wind is blowing and I'm worried all those beautiful leaves will be gone. I need to take pictures next week! Aacckk!