2016

 I can't believe it's 2016

I remember when Olivia graduated kindergarten and they announced her class would be graduating in 2016... I couldn't wrap my brain around it and now here it is...

Olivia received her first college acceptance letter 2 weeks ago.  She is still waiting to hear from 4 other schools. 

All 5 schools span west coast to east coast.. She is only applying to one in-state school.

I'm both excited and anxious.. I can't wait to see where she ends up.  

On New Years Eve I had Jeff and the kids stand out in the cold with sprinklers to take this fun pic. 

I impressed myself by getting it on the 3rd try.  :)

I have a feeling it's going to be an exciting year for Jack too...
Here's some fun pics I took of him last week.
He recently got his braces off.

So far, 2016 is off to an exciting start.. 

It's going to be a great year!

Christmas and 2015 wrap up...

 Trying to catch up today on the blog...

We had a great Christmas.. Low key, quiet, quality time together kind of Christmas.

The best part was we had a WHITE Christmas... It's just what I needed this year. 

Having the kids out of school gave me time to have a few photo shoots with Lucy.

Here she is in her elf pjs and santa hat with some of our packages.

Mom and I had so much fun wrapping this year.. I love the beauty of a simple wrapped package and pretty ribbon.

I saw some fun snow pics on Pinterest with girls in semi-formal dresses, I showed them to Lucy and she volunteered to brave the cold in a party dress to take some fun pics. :)

This one is my favorite.. 

I had picked Jennifer (our exchange student) up from school on the last day of finals and she couldn't wait to help shovel the snow and build a snowman.

My mom helped and he turned out super cute.

I had ordered a "snowman kit" years ago and found it in time to dress him up.  

At last Christmas Eve.. These photos are a little off due to my white balance, but I'm posting them anyway...

Here's everyone by the tree after they opened their Christmas pjs.

My girls..

Lucy with my moms dog, Pippa. 

We are now getting ready to ring in 2016.

I'm excited to see what the new year holds.

I'm not making resolutions this year, but intentions instead. 

I'm letting go of some things I've been holding to and I'm ready to make some self discoveries this year. 

XOXO

I survived November {barely}....

Here it is almost Christmas and I haven't blogged about my crazy November...

Have you ever had one of those months that throw you into a tailspin?

So, here goes...

November 6th, I'm on my way to a "girls" lunch with my mom, Olivia and Jennifer. The girls didn't have school and I thought it would be fun.  On our way we passed a small Christian college that's close to our house.  We were stopped for a pedestrian in the crosswalk when all of a sudden a woman slammed into the back of my car going about 30 miles per hour.  Witnesses said she was looking down, probably texting... Luckily, no one was hurt.

My old trusty Land Cruiser took it like a champ, the little Honda that hit me...not so much.  

We ended up with a new bumper.

Fast forward one week later...

November 13 (Friday the 13th).. Olivia was with her boyfriend trying to cross 3 lanes of traffic to get to Starbucks and ended up crashing her car...

Again, no one was hurt.. But, Olivia's car was totaled. 

Then November 17th.. We here in Spokane experienced a "windstorm" guts over 70mph.

We lost power for 60 hours, no electricity, no heat (other than a gas fireplace that doesn't work very well).  Schools were closed and we sat around trying to keep warm.  As luck would have it, Jeff was out of town on business and missed the whole thing. 

Here's some iphone pics from the storm.

 Yep, I broke my McDonald's rule.. It tasted good by candlelight..  :)

 We had fun one night making shadow puppets. 

Every year for Thanksgiving we go to our friends cabin to celebrate.  It's fun to "get off the grid", but I have to admit I was not too excited since we had been "off the grid" only a week earlier.  

We had a great time as always and of course ate way too much.

 View from the cabin

 We ended up with too many pies this year.. we had a pie per person..  

Oh man, it was good!

To finish off the month, we received notices from Lucy's and Olivia's schools about a lice infestation.

Well, as you can imagine this threw me over the edge and I was doing daily lice checks, washing everything in hot and vacuuming every surface in the house.

I then had psychosomatic lice for the next week.  Ugh!

Luckily, there have been no signs of lice.  

So, all in all I guess I can say I'm thankful for all the blessings we received and

Thankful November is over..  

...and my other senior

...and my other senior, Jennifer

Jennifer is our international student from Beijing, China.

Jennifer was also with us last school year.

Jennifer has been a fun addition to our family.

She is super smart, has a great sense of humor and is beautiful inside and out.

Jennifer has promised if she ever writes a tell all book about life with an American Family, she will not use our real names.  LOL!

Jennifer and Olivia are both knee deep in college applications..

I'm excited to see the acceptance letters about to come in...

Both Jennifer and Olivia are only looking at one in-state school (not the same one)... all the rest are out of state. 

I have two about to leave the nest and this school year is flying by... 

There will be much more to post in the upcoming months... 

Happy Halloween

I have had this idea in my head for over 2 years..

earlier this week Olivia agreed to go out for a photoshoot.  I love this location at an old cemetery here in town.

I, of course added the ravens in photoshop.  :)

This makes 2 photoshoots with the $7 thrift store wedding dress.. I call that a good buy.  :)

Happy Halloween friends!  Stay safe!