HBTM

My husband had a really hard time turning another year older this year ...................he decided that 35 was middle age. Since I am three years older than he is - I certainly do not think that 35 is middle age! I reminded him that I gave birth to his daughter a month before I turned 35, to which he replied.............."And aren't you glad you had her before you became middle aged!" Thanks honey!!!!!

Anyway, I am not having any problems celebrating another birthday............you see , I stopped at 26 and I actually just celebrate the anniversary. So, this year is my 12th anniversary of turning 26.

So here are 26 things about me:

1. I was born in Oklahoma City......in fact, my mother just sent me the following picture of downtown Oak City. If you look in the lower left there is a big tree with a white building - this is where my parents lived when I was born.
2. I have lived in 6 different states and 3 countries outside of the US.
3. I have lived in 13 different cities (and towns) within those 6 states.
4. I have lived in Kentucky longer than I have lived anywhere else (16 years so far)
5. I have been to Australia three times and want to go again.
6. I am of Jewish descent.
7. I went to a very small private school from the 3rd grade to the 7th grade.
8. I went to a very large public school from 8th grade on. Talk about culture shock!!!!
9. I have no desire to attend a high school reunion.
10. I was raised in the Church of Christ and was baptized on June 11, 1981.
11. I was married June 11, 1994 (Steven picked the date)
12. I am an awesome procrastinator!
13. I was engaged once before. His Italian momma taught me how to cook.
14. I am a carb addict - if it was possible to live on bread, pasta and potatoes, I would be a very happy girl! Of course I would probably have to put some cheese on them, but anyway...
15. I love to watch those exercise shows (like Denise Austin), but I never actually get up and do the exercises (how sad is that)
16. I am a reality show junkie.....Survivor, Dancing with the Stars, Big Brother, American Idol, So You Think You Can Dance.
17. I actually enjoy watching soap operas - they make me realize how good my life is ;-) (All My Children began the year I was born.)
18. I am not really into game shows or games.
19. I am lousy at playing cards (just ask Steven)
20. I have worn glasses since I was 10 years old. I even had bi-focals at one point. And just so you know, it is just as hard to adjust to not having them as it was having them to begin with.
21. I love spending time with family - the more the merrier!
22. I can sing numerous songs from Playhouse Disney
23. I am way behind in my scrapbooking.....according to my scrapbooks, Emma has just been born and we are still in the hospital :-(
24. I am a Daddy's girl (and proud of it!!!)
25. My favorite thing on this planet is having Emma throw her arms around my neck and squeeze while telling me in her sweet voice "I love you"....it just melts my heart.
26. I gave myself a party this year - yeah me :-)

Ok - I had thought that I would do 26 things and then throw in an additional 12 for each year that I have celebrated 26......but it was tough to come up with 26 so I think I am going to stop here.

I will post pictures from my party after the week-end. I loved scrapbooking all night for Lisa's birthday, so I decided to do that for myself. So a few of my friends and I, along with our Cricuts plan on scrapbooking, eating and socializing all night long!

Big Girl Bed

We have been shopping for a new bed for Miss Emma. She has to be one of the oldest kids in town to still be sleeping in her crib. But she hasn't wanted a "big girl bed" and only just recently even started getting out of it on her own. I have to say, it has been really nice to just put her down for the night and not have to worry about her getting up constantly. Unfortunately, as long as she is, she is about to become longer than her bed (not quiet -but close!).

We have been trying to decide if we want to do the daybed, a twin, or go ahead with a full size. I think we have decided to get a daybed with a pop-up trundle. That way if we should need it, we will have a "king" size bed for company.

Here are the three beds we picked out yesterday. I like all of them, but there is a pretty big price difference between a couple of them.

Bed A: Iron and Oak
Bed B: Cherry Wood
Bed C: Black Onyx Finish

Bed B is probably my favorite, but I am actually leaning towards Bed A. Steven really likes Bed C in the black. I like it, but am just not sure of black furniture for a little girl. We are also looking at a slat twin bed that comes in oak, cherry, pine, black or white. We had no problem picking out a crib.............I never expected it to be this hard to pick out a stinkin' bed! Help!!!!!

Blogiversary!

I just realized that today it has been one year since I started my blog. One year and 94 posts later.......................I think if I realized how close to 100 I was I would have tried to get those last 6 in. Oh well - there is always next year. Thanks for reading :-)

The Easter Bunny Came

I would like to say that Sunday dawned with a clear blue sky, the birds were chirping and spring was in the air.......but I can't.

Instead, it was cloudy, gray, gloomy, cold and spitting SNOW!!!!

Regardless of the weather, I was going to enjoy the holiday with my girl. I had to rethink her wardrobe for the day, but Plan B turned out well, so it was meant to be!
I would love to show you pictures of Emma with her Easter Basket full of goodies..............but I wasn't too awake yet (I had overslept) and let her get into it before I even thought of getting the camera. Oh well - maybe next year!

We went up to Michael and Patricia's for dinner after church and had a great meal and some wonderful time spent with family. Thanks Tricia for fixing the meal!!!!! After dinner, we waited for Scott, Bethany and Ethan to arrive so we could let the kids hunt for some eggs. They were so cute running around outside looking for the "hidden" eggs. Of course after all the excitement, followed by candy, both of them were a little bit wound up. Emma started to fall asleep sitting on the floor with her coat still on while eating her candy. But she took care of that by getting up and running around :-) Needless to say, once we put Emma back in the car - she was OUT!

Hope everyone had a great week-end!

Emma hamming it up with Mommy, Daddy and Grandma.
Checking out the new book that Aunt Tricia got her.

Emma just really would not cooperate with me at all in my picture taking endeavours. I tried and tried and she just wouldn't do it!

Emma and her quest for eggs!

Ethan running to get just one more.....

Ethan was very proud of his basket full of eggs.

Catching up!

With everything going on and then I got sick (AGAIN), I am way behind in my blogging. So this is my attempt to get caught up. Below you will find three posts on what has been going on in Emmaline's World!



Happy Reading!!!!

War Zone?

Monday evening, we heard a really loud noise, just as the strong winds came through. We went out on the back deck and this is what we found.............................

Does anyone need any firewood? ;-)

Happy Birthday Leah!

On March 12th, our great-niece turned 3.

Her party was on Saturday, so we piled in the car and drove north for the week-end. We stayed with Steven's oldest brother, whom we don't get to see but a few times a year. It was great to see everyone and we had a blast watching Emma and Leah play.

Cinderella & Snow White

Simon says...........Trying to hit the pinata with a blindfold on while keeping the little princess bag on her arm.Leah had lots of help opening presents!

After a hard day of partying and playing the girls are all ready for bed in their princess nightgowns (or jammie dress as Emma calls it) with their milk in their princess cups. Leah even has her princess blanket!

Making "funny faces" at lunch on Sunday. And no - we did not ask them to do this. They came up with it all on their own!

Emma and Leah with Marshall (this is Steven's brother).

Snow Angel

We have been very fortunate this winter to have had very little snow. I say this as someone who grew up in New England and snow was pretty much a constant in the winter. The first couple of times it did snow this year, it was only a little bit. Unfortuately, for Miss Emma, we were not able to take her out to play in it. By Sunday, March 2nd, when it was in the low 70's I thought that we would have to wait till next year for Emma to get a little bit of snow playing in. Then on Friday it began to SNOW!!!!

When we woke up Saturday, it looked like a winter wonderland. Now I will say again, I don't like snow. I have had my share of it. But I was actually excited about it. I knew we didn't have to go anywhere, it was supposed to warm up again the next day and I could take Emma out to play!!!!

Her daddy taught her to make snow angels, and she had the best time.

Mommy's perfect little snow angel ;-)

After lying in the snow - she realized just how COLD it was. She didn't like the cold, or her pants getting wet from the snow, but she kept getting down there to make more angels.

Romans 8:28

" And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose."

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I came across this scripture while visiting a friends

profile on Facebook.

It has been a very stressful and emotional week and this was a great reminder that it will be okay.

God has a plan and is working it out right now - we just have to love Him and continue to follow Him.

So, We Thought We Could Dance

I would like to say that the above picture is of Steven and I..............but, obviously, it is not.

I would like to post a picture of Steven and I dancing..............but, obviously, I have not.

I mentioned a few weeks ago that we were taking Ballroom dance classes. The class consisted of us, Barry and Jill, Scott and Bethany, Shannon and Susan, and Tristan and Abbey. It was fun to learn something new with a group of people that you already knew and also knew that they would love you no matter how dorky you looked trying to pretend that you had rhythm. I discovered that I apparently left most of my rhythm back in my 20's.

My big plan was to take my camera to the last class and take lots of pictures. Our last class was last night. Or I guess I should say, it was supposed to be last night. But our instructor, scheduled her new class to start last night at the same time our class was supposed to be. Needless to say, it was not a pretty sight. The end result is we will not be getting a last class, but will be receiving a refund for the one hour and 15 minutes that we were not instructed.

I have to say though, that even with all the drama that took place with our instructor, I had fun. I would have liked to learn more.................I feel like I was given all the dance steps with no instruction on how to put them all together.............oh, yeah..........that is what happened. We had thought about taking the next set of classes, but we are going to have to find a new instructor first. So I guess for now, we will just continue to practise the steps we have learned and one day we will figure out how to put some of them together.

So............5, 6............5, 6, 7, 8..............................and remember, if you are doing the cha-cha, it starts on 2 :-)

Dreams do come true

Emma had a great time at her party! She had been asking me for days if she could "open my party", like it was going to come gift wrapped or something. I decided to cook dinner, which you really should not attempt if you have worked most of the day (like I did). We had spaghetti, meatballs, garlic toast, frozen fruit salad, and my sister-in-law made a pasta salad (Thanks Bethany!). And of course....there was CAKE!...................yes, you read that right......spaghetti! I ask everyone to "dress up fine" and then fix something that is slippery and red. It is one of Emma's favorite foods and I was pretty sure she would eat if I fixed it (she hasn't been eating too good since she got sick) and actually, it wasn't too messy. The kids all did really good with it.

I was going to post a few pictures, but I couldn't narrow it down, so ....

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com

I need to say a special thank you to my Dad. He showed up, calmed me down, ran errands for me, helped cook dinner, did all the dishwashing and loved on my girl and me lots!!!

Apologies to the Ballards for Logan getting locked into the toy room with the lights turned off. Poor little guy!

All in all, it was a great evening. Good food, good company and happy children. It really doesn't get much better than that!