Christmas 2012

We welcomed this break with open arms! We needed some family time. Miah has been super busy and hard at work. So we went to my parents house for a few days. They weren't here for Christmas but they officially moved here on the 28th of December. It is very exciting. 

There was A LOT of this!!

We did a lot of relaxing, just spending family time. We even brought the boys, Rex and Zoro. They loved getting to go outside in the backyard and helping Miah and Papa golf. 

Christmas Eve pajamas. I surprised my favorite two people with matching dinosaur pants I made and white shirts. They loved them. Bells thought she was really cool, having the same pants as Daddy and the fact that they were DINOSAURS!!

Showing off their muscles.

Bells with some fun toy airplanes. She has such an imagination!

We also did a lot of bike riding after Christmas. Papa and Grandma Tiger got her a spiderman bike. Although it came from Santa because they were not here yet. It was pretty cold so we would stay out for a bit, go around the block a few times, go inside for some hot cocoa. Luckily my parents have an awesome neighborhood with multiple parks and lots of kids. She has more friends at their house then ours. 

Miah snapped this shot and I think it is pretty funny. Just proves how goofy us girls are. How we are in our own little worlds. Miah is such a lucky guy, hahaha!

Apparently Grandma Tiger and I are pretty slow, she told her Daddy this multiple times. She would have to stop and wait. She has our competitive drive...

What is it about bum shots in our family? Although I do have to say, they are pretty nice! She was actually telling Miah he had a big bum bum and couldn't fit. She was probably right!

She just adores time with her Daddy. I love just watching those two together. We are quite the 3 amigos. 

I love this picture, not because its awesome but because it is me, my parents and my Uncle Bill. 

He moved here too! So we were able to spend a lot of time with him too. Man, have I missed him and his humor. Bells loved playing with him and he did with her. 

Welcome 2013

"I don't like it here, it is cold. Can we please move back to Hawaii?"

Miah and I....

Love is all we need!

She loves riding horses. Who doesn't? Luckily the park as one!

Wanting to make a heart with Daddy. 

There was also lots of cuddling. She is the best. She will come up multiple times a day and just ask if we can cuddle. I drop everything and cuddle. Those are the best times. 

I hope everybody else had a good holiday season and were able to spend some relaxing time with family.  But I do have to say, it was also nice to get back in the swing of things. The sooner we are done with school, the better. 

Trying To Keep Up

Everybody else was having more kids so we decided to adopt ferrets. Two boys actually and Bells named them Rex (actually T Rex but we shortened it) and Zoro. We got them just about a month ago and love having them around. Bells really enjoys having them. She makes sure to give them loves as soon as she gets up. She even woke me up at 2:30 am to tell me that the boys want to come out and play. They go everywhere with us. We took them to the park and they loved running around and digging. They went with us to Grandma Tiger and Papa's house. My parents love ferrets and had lots of fun with them. My mom even said she would babysit if we needed. They loved going in the backyard where my dad has a putting green and helping Miah golf. Rex is really good at golfing. Miah took a shot, missed and Rex pushed it across with his nose and put it right in the hole. I wish we had it on video!!  Bells loves running around and acting like a "lazy ferret" as she calls it. 

This is Rex, he has a cinnamon colored face and loves our attention. He loves to crawl into places, up pants and thinks Miah is his protector. He will always run to Miah and hide on / behind his foot. It is very funny. He really likes people's attention and will just hangout by you. He loves chasing ping pong balls around the house for hours, seriously! I will post a video, it is very entertaining. 

Bells and I giving Rex some love. 

Rex crawling up Miah's pant leg into his sweatshirt. 

Cute little Zoro. He is the cuddle bug. But he rather be out exploring on his own. He will fall asleep on Bells' lap while she watches some cartoons. He steals all his toys and hides them in corners. It is a fun game, letting him drag all his toys in one corner and then take them out and scatter them around the house. He will play hard and then fall asleep curled up in a corner. 

They will crawl into about anything.

The best thing to watch....them wrestling each other. They just go at it for ever. Then you get involved and they will team up on you. You'd better run for cover. 

Zoro getting some loves from Bells. They really are troopers with Bells dragging them around and shoving them down their slides. But they love her and chase her around the house. 

One of their favorite toys, a rope with a fish on the end.

They are babies and so we are training them right now. The are already potty trained, whew! I don't want to go through potty training again. Rex did like to chew on your toes a bit but we broke him from that. We are working on tricks right now but since they are kits (baby ferrets) they have so much energy, you only spend a few minutes at a time training them. 

We love having them around. Miah was a bit nervous, he didn't know much about them but I was onboard. I had them growing up and loved them. 

We now have three kids, which means we caught up to most of our friends! 

Instead of the crazy cat lady, we might become the crazy ferret family.

5 Years and Counting

It is only Nike in our family so with our Anniversary why would it be anything else? 

"Still Doing It" -Nike

December 22

We made it, we hit the 5 year mark!!

We look back and are so happy with where we are. We are truly blessed with each other and a beautiful daughter. 

One night after watching The Hobbit, I was thinking about how much the type of movies I watch and enjoy have changed. I never minded watching chick flicks as much but nowadays I don't watch them at all. I watch the super hero movies or crazy action movies that always leave me on the edge of my seat. I decided the reason was because those love story movies will never compare to "our love story". I am living the best chick flick of all time. So why would I watch anything else? 

I love my husband to the moon and back, twice as Bells would say. 

Happy Anniversary Miah!!

Family stockings are finally finished!! 

What do you think?

We love how they turned out. Miah was so surprised. I had been using a stocking that I had when I was a little one and Miah just had been using one we picked up at the store a few years ago and Bells had a little puppy head at the top stocking. So I figured we needed matching family stockings. I have a family I go to for my embroidery, they are seriously amazing people. He is a cop and she stays at home but they run their little business from the house. The machine is so interesting to watch. I called Ron up and told him I have some ideas for stockings but I needed some pictures of the snowflakes he has. After a few emails we finally got the design just right and I sewed the front took them over and he did all the fun work. I picked them up and almost cried with how beautiful they looked. I literally ran home and sewed the whole stockings together as fast as I could. 

Now we have the cutest little stockings ever. 

Now I can't wait to fill them up with all the fun goodies!

I think a Nike GPS Running Watch will look just darling in mine, don't you?

Christmas in a week!?! 

Seriously where did time go? 

The beginning of October is always so slow but then once Halloween hits, it is off to the races. My favorite time of year is this time of year. But it is also my least favorite. The worst day of the year..... December 26. It means the best time of year is over and we have to wait another year for it. I think this year has been just crazy. I know this sounds weird but I am still trying to get my life together, as in settle in. Will it ever happen? I think so but not for awhile. Miah and I were talking about it and we believe we want to move to a house. We need more room, especially a third bedroom. He thinks it will be for his study, hehehe but I think it will be MY SEWING ROOM! 

Anyway, I was snapping some fun shots of Bells the other day and after doing a little bit of adjusting, this cute little picture came out. 

I hope everybody is having a wonderful holiday season. 

One week left....

A Few Crafts

I had some time on my hands when I was sick. I hate being sick but even worse I hate sitting still and relaxing. I can't even sit through a movie without doing something else too. I usually take that time to write my recipes on their own cards. Slowly but surely one day I will have them all done. 

Anyway, I decided to post a few things I had been working on. 

I went with a friend to a craft party one weekend and they were making some wreaths. They had taken burlap and made them into roses and glued them on. A little plain for me and well I like to add my own touch to things and make it mine.  Take a coupon to Hobby Lobby and get this wreath for about $6, burlap, paint, wooden scrap piece and a glue gun. 

I cut out the desired circle size I wanted, painted the burlap the color I wanted, then cut the circles into a spiral. I then rolled and glued each circle up and Ta-DA....a rose!

I painted welcome, I was going to put Taylor but I am scared here.  I do not want anybody knowing my name by my front door. Being on the mainland creeps me WAY out! Then I started gluing the roses on and finally my welcome sign. I love it. Simple, cheap and fun!

A close up of the roses and sign. 

I think my dining room is my favorite room in my house. 

Not only because I love cooking and it is where my family gathers to eat, laugh and talk but because it is beautiful (to me at least). 

Our table needed some love, it is beautiful but it just needed something else. A table runner would be perfect I decided. So I came up with an awesome design and called my mom to tell her, she told me it would work, might have tweaked it a little bit and I went at it. 

I love the gathered look, simple sides and a little something to draw your eyes to the middle. 

Gray and white...perfect!

My dining room left side. 

My dining room.

Oh how I love you. 

Miah designed the center piece. I love it. A teal glass long bowl thingy and he added shells and candles. Perfect for our beachy themed house. What I love about the glass thing, it has ripples and it really looks the ocean waves. Crazy we found it!

I needed a blanket. It gets cold here and when it drops below 70 degrees, I FREEZE! Bells isn't really liking Arizona weather either. She actually cried the other morning because we had to go  to the grocery store and it was about 45 degrees outside. She wouldn't go out and told me she would just stay here on the lovesac. Obviously I took her, she cried, we drank lots of cocoa at the store and she told me over and over, she doesn't like Arizona and she wants to move back to Hawaii. Not someday but now. 

I made a blanket to match the house. More ocean theme. I love the free range quilting. Lines to just go here and there. It really added some funk. I binded it with some cool white fabric that had swirls, like waves too. Of course I had to add a triangle that I had embroidered with the 3 of Us. 

A close up....Can you see the swirls?

I really enjoyed these projects. I thank my mom for this. She gave me the genes to be able to do this.

I have a special surprise on my next post!!

No hints either.....

Surprise Party

It was not just a random surprise party but the town of Surprise's Christmas Party. 

Confusing, I know. Somebody invited me and I told them I didn't feel comfortable going to a party for some stranger. I went anyway. Boy was it fun! I was recovering from more kidney issues so it was very calming and relaxed. 

I wonder how sore this guy is after hours upon hours of walking around like this. 

He was so so Jolly, I just loved him.

They had about 12 hot air balloons that were all around. They would light them up and it just looked beautiful. 

Bells' favorite...why because it was a SPIDERMAN hot air balloon! The other side was his face and that looked even better!

Who would of thought, hot air balloons were Christmasy? But then again, the last 3 years we have been decorating palm trees and playing on the beach on Christmas day. 

The coolest event of the whole night, they had 4 guys jump out of an airplane and they all had lights or sparklers. They went all over and made fun designs and then landed right in front of us....like 20 feet in front of us. The coolest thing I have seen. Of course they waited to blow up the sky with fireworks until after they had all safely landed. 

Daddy and Bells got to ride an elephant. Miah was way excited.

He thought it was the best thing ever, LIKE EVER. 

He asked me if I saw him sway back and forth like crazy. 

Yes my dear, I did. 

Hmmmm, I look and wonder who has a nicer bum....

Vote 1 for Miah

Vote 2 for the Elephant

(he won't ever know)

She loves getting her face painted. These ladies are so talented and patient. Painting thousands of kiddos and wanting perfection. 

This lady especially...

Bells loves Jack Frost. 

I need to go to the court house and change her name on her birth certificate to drum roll please....

Ellah Grace Taylor Bells Jack Frost. 

She wanted Jack Frost on her face or arm, either would do. This nice lady didn't really know what he looked like. I showed her a picture I carry around in my pocket, just incase these situations come up. 

She couldn't do it. She said how about a nice pretty snow queen. My innocent angel looked up and glared, I AM NOT A QUEEN, I AM JACK FROST!

Taken back, she said well how about a pretty purple snowflake. Again, she is so sweet (why did we name her Grace? It should of been Captain Hook) ICKY PURPLE, I DO NOT LIKE PURPLE.

She through a life line to me...

Bells what about Spiderman? She thought for a minute, a snowflake on my arm will be just fine, but one of Jack Frost's snowflakes. 

She started painting. 

I dislike the girls like pink and purple and sparkles stereotype....so does Bells. After telling her she does not like purple, she added some purple. Bells was not happy AT ALL. 

But I convinced her it was something to do with Pitch Black and it was going to change to another color. 

Crisis Adverted....

She then decided to take some of that frustration from the face painting out and hit the batting cage with Daddy. 

We had a good time playing at the Surprise Christmas Party.

P.S. I do not carry a picture of Jack Frost in my pocket at all times. I had to look one up on my phone. Please do not forget to vote on the best bum!!