My family and friends!  I have missed everyone so much.  I can't believe that I have had such a hard time blogging, I really didn't anticipate this.  I thought, Okay during pregnancy it's understandable.  But when the baby comes how can you help but blog about your sweet little baby!  I thought, oh now I know how to use my camera and I'll have a baby to practice on!!  But seriously, this transition to 3 kids has been SO HARD!!!!  I keep expecting to wake up and feel like I can handle things, and then I don't.  I have so many amazing friends who have managed 3 or more kids and still do all the little things you are supposed to do (including blogging so everyone can keep informed).  Well, I have an even higher level of respect for you all now.  I think most days it is all about survival for me.  My kids eat, wear clean clothes, get to school and are picked up on time, and go to bed somewhere close to a decent time.  That's all I can manage.  No promises anywhere else.  I feel like a mess most of the time.  I'm tired all of the time.  I can't figure out how to fit in things like grocery shopping into my day.  And how am I supposed to lose all this stinkin' baby weight feeling this way?  This is probably way too much information for a lot of you.  I'm sorry.  I do know this isn't going to last forever.  It's just a season of my life.  Just a blip in the grand scheme of things.  I know . . . .

I'd like the blip to be done.

On the bright side.  My little Sophie is the sweetest baby that there ever was.  I love having her in our family and as hard as this has been for me, I wouldn't wish it different if that meant we wouldn't have her!  What a little blessing from Heaven she is to us.  We all just adore her.  Ian and Clara have been wonderful.  They help me and play together so that I can take care of the baby.  My husband has been nothing but supportive of me, as difficult as I must make his life lately (because I just can't seem to handle everything that I should).  My family loves and supports me.

So, I know that even though this is difficult and you better believe I'll be happy the day I wake up (probably after a full night sleep) and feel like a normal person, I'm extremely well blessed.

Thank you for indulging me in this mini-rant.  I hope every has a great week! :)

I can't believe I am just getting to this . . .

Here is Sophie at 3 weeks old when she was given her blessing.  She is wearing a very special dress that Adam's Nana made for Clara when she was born.

Last year in Clara's kindergarden class she learned to sew, well, she learned some basic sewing skills.  In fact, last Christmas she asked for a sewing kit.

So when she found out that she was allowed to dress up at school for Halloween she decided that she wanted to sew her costume this year.  I don't have very advanded sewing skills myself, I can wing certain things when I have to.  So we asked Grammy to help with the project.  The three of us went to JoAnn's and picked out the materiel and then Clara and her Grammy went to work.  Clara did end up doing quite a bit of her costume, Grammy helped with a few of the harder things and supervised!  There is a picture of the finished product in my Halloween post.

We didn't have a family theme this year.

Clara decided on her costume because at school they were allowed to dress up as long as it was a historical character.  She wanted to be the Egyptian princess, Cleopatra.

Ian insisted that he would be a cow.

And I didn't want to stuff Sophie in one of those bunting things, so I thought a cute little pumpkin would work.

I only have the pictures of the pumpkins tonight.  We just had our second annual pumpkin carving contest and everyone did such a great job!  Let me know which one is your favorite!

I think the bright, beautiful colors of spring and Eastertime insprired me to pull out my camera again.  Oh my, the poor thing had dust on it!!!!

We had a fun egg hunt on Saturday morning.  We like to have the Easter Bunny come on Saturday, so we can help the kids focus on Christ during Sunday.  We also had fun decorating eggs!  I love that Ian is old enough to take part in these activities!

Lovely, isn't it?  And can you believe I have it all put together already?  I'm so on top of things!!!!

It's too far past Christmas to spend a lot of time on that.  And I'll be honest . . . I didn't take a lot of "christmassy" pictures.  I did take a lot of pictures for other people - but not so much of our Christmas, which is a shame.

We had a great Christmas!  My whole family was able to get together earlier December, EVERYONE was together.  I know that won't happen all that often.  We had a great time doing things together, including a fun gingerbread house party at our house for all the kids!

Okay, so I cheated a little by making 2 parts to this Thanksgiving post.  Can I tell you how much more work editing pictures with people in them is compared to the photos without them?  In this post I am showing you the "easy" edits without people.  Which are basically pictures I took before anyone got here, just me having some fun with my camera.  Hopefully I'll get the important pictures ready soon so I am not posting about Thanksgiving on Christmas!

As I briefly mentioned we had the big dinner at our house this year.  It was fun getting this ready.  I had a lot of help from my wonderful husband and my mom and sisters (Thank you, thank you, thank you ladies).  And of course my children, who did their best not to mess everything up as we cleaned.

Clara has decided she only likes dresses.  But all of a sudden it's 40 degrees outside!

Good grief, it's been a while!  The only excuse I can offer is that I got sick:(  We went on a weekend trip to Georgia, that I am blogging about now, as soon as we got back both kids were sick.  And then I got sick.  And seriously I was SICK for 8 days.  I can't remember the last time I was sick and this bug just wouldn't go away.

But now I am better and Thanksgiving is past (we had the big dinner at our house this year) so now I can blog again!  I know you all are cheering :)

Dr. Dale Meeks (whom Adam bought the dental practice from) and his wife Patty invited Adam and I up to Georgia to their hunting cabin for the weekend.  Early Thursday morning we dropped the kids off at Grammy's house and drove about 6 hours into Georgia.  It was so nice to have time together to just talk!  We got there at about 5pm and Adam and Dale got dressed from head to toe in camo and off they went.  The Meeks own several hundred acres in southern Georgia and during the season they hunt.  Deer, wild turkey, coyotes, and I don't know what else.  This is a whole new world for both Adam and I.  And yes, I did go out twice hunting (can you image? you'll see picture evidence soon . . .) Although I shot pictures instead of fire arms, it was fun.  I haven't done a lot of nature photography, and with no kids I took full advantage of the opportunity.  Adam, sadly, didn't get a chance to shoot anything.  But we had such a wonderful time.  The weather was cold and felt like a nice brisk autumn, the Meeks were warm and generous hosts.  They made us feel at home and perfectly comfortable.  We had fun being together with friends and experiencing new things.

Now you can see some of the pictures I took, fair warning . . . there are a few.