Swimming in the New Year

Well, we are still homeward bound with all of the snow. I thought to take the older two out in the snow. But Lily cries anytime the snow even touches her skin. Sooo ... I thought it would be fun to get the kids in the hot tub. They had a lot of fun :-) Lily looks so funny in the goggles!

Here's a picture of Lily's Dollhouse. Pete 'renovated' the Doll House. He found it at DI for $14. It's really cute and in good condition. We got the Madame Alexander dolls from DI and from a garage sale that Emily went to. I got the doll clothes at a garage sale for 10 cents each. I guess our garage sale habit pays off around Christmas! :-)

A Merry Christmas

We have had a GREAT Christmas. We loved seeing the kids' reactions and opening the toys. We also have enjoyed being the "Griswolds" of the neighborhood.

I hope everyone has had a Merry Christmas!

My Favorite Kind of Jewelry

We had a great Anniversary Celebration this year. Pete tricked me and told me to wear a nice outfit (I was showered and wearing jeans which is REALLY nice for me these days). I put on tights and a skirt. We kept joking about where we were going. Then he pulled into the A&W restaurant which is attached to a gas station. I tried to be nice, but Pete said I gave him the look of death. He got the door and I said, "are you SERIOUS?" Anywho, he ordered two A&W freezes and fried cheese curds. (I thought I heard him say "cheeseburgers" and thought this was the real deal). We opened our presents. Then we got up to go, and I was a little disappointed that we didn't get the cheeseburgers.

Anywho, I didn't know where we were going, and I wasn't going to make any guesses after that trick. He took me to LaCaille, which was really good and really fancy. He had planned to take me to A&W first all along to trick me and to make sure I had something in my stomach because I wouldn't last until the late reservations. It was a great dinner and the lights there were beautiful!

Pete got me an ipod touch. Yay!! it is so much fun!! I wanted to post links to a tutorial I found to convert DVD for an ipod. If you are getting an ipod or mp4 player for someone you can load some movies on it for them before christmas. Pete was laughing at me because I got so excited about the ipod touch. I probably wouldn't get as excited about a piece of jewelry. Terrible! I guess I love gadgets!

Tutorial link

Handbrake software link

I made Pete a compilation of our e-mails, journal entries, and notes while we were dating. Not as fun, but as Pete said, we will probably have that in 10 years and not my ipod touch :-)

Happy 5th anniversary Pete!

Christmas Light show

By popular request here is a video of our light show. Pete did the sequence to the "Main Street Light Parade" song. This was the song they played for the DisneyLand Light parade and is the intro to our program.



We have the show running from 6PM to 9PM on weeknights, and until 10:00 PM on the weekend. Tune to 99.9 FM!!! The Cathy Classic Station!

I'll keep posting some more videos. They take forever to upload :-)

Amelia's Baby Blessing

We had a great family day yesterday. We had Amelia's baby blessing in our ward. Pete gave her a very sweet blessing. Following church we went to Pete's parents house for brunch/lunch.

I delegated the whole meal. Becca brought her Cinnamon rolls, we had every possible type of breakfast casserole from Pete's sisters and mom. We even had home-made chocolates. Mom made a really fancy fruit plate with mangoes, kiwi, strawberries and Cheryl brought some danish wheels and flowers. I did make one sausage casserole, but I didn't set the oven timer right, so it was ready an hour after everyone had started eating. ha! Anywho, thanks to everyone that was able to come and help out!

Everyone had fun at Pete's parents house. Pete's mom has all of her kindergarten stuff in their basement and the kids loved it. They also have a "Chi" machine, which is supposed to redistribute your chi ... Here's Doug trying to redistribute his "Chi" while kids are crawling on him:











Proud Grandma's:













Family Photo: A little strained as Phillip didn't want to take a picture :-)









Feeding Frenzy!

Impromptu Photoshoot

I wanted to get a picture of Amelia in her blessing dress for her blessing this Sunday. Again, I thought about going to Target .. but after yesterday's Artic Circle Fiasco I decided not to.

Artic Circle story: I wanted to take the kids somewhere that had an indoor gym. I took them to Artic Circle. We first went to the bathroom, then ordered food ... I was a little scatter brained and left the baby's blanket and purse on the counter where you order food.. ."ma'm is this yours?" Ga'ak! I got the food and the kids settled. By this point Amelia was screaming. I got her latched on with my blanket and thought everything would be fine. Then Phillip asked "Do they have a potty by this park?" He had to go number 2. So I plopped the baby back in the car seat, kept Lily in her high chair and ran Phillip to the bathroom. I kept running back and forth because I didn't want to drag the girls into the bathroom to wait for Phillip to be done. I finally heard what I usually hear at home. Phillip screaming at the top of his lungs, "I'm DONE!!" I could only laugh at my self. I was probably showing my plumber crack half of the time while bending over and taking care of the kids. It's funny how simple things can be really hard to do with 3 kids. Once it was all said and done, the kids had a lot of fun in the indoor play structure. :-)

Sooo...my sink and counter were full of dirty dishes. My hair was greasy and the house was a wreck, but I decided to take a photoshot of Amelia in her blessing dress. This time I put the bouncer in the crib and then draped a blanket over it. Pete's mom made the dress. She looks pretty cute.

Fall Art

With Thanksgiving behind us, we are in FULL SWING of our Christmas festivities. I took a picture of one of my projects and wanted to post it before it isn't relevant. I made leaf art for Pete's birthday present. Before Amelia was born, the trees in our back yard were really pretty. Here's a link to a picture. Phillip and I collected a lot of leaves. I think in all we collected about 50. I tried to get varying shades of color in the same kind of leaf. I don't think you can collect too much.

We put the leaves within 4 of our Harry Potter books. I think it was about 4 weeks time and they were dry by Pete's birthday.

Once they were dry, I glued the dry leaves onto white paper with Elmer's glue. I had a nice frame with a matte (for kids pictures) and stuck the leaf art in the frame. It was a fun project. Now we can pull it out next fall.

Here's a picture of me and the kids decorating for Christmas. I finally cleaned up my mess yesterday. I'll post some videos of our Christmas show soon!

Happy One Month Amelia!

Well, It has already been one month! Crazy! For the occassion I put Amelia in an actual outfit and not a sleeper. :-) Amelia is a good baby. She is on the wake up at 3 AM and 6 AM schedule. Hopefully she can start waking up at 4 AM. That extra hour makes a big difference. She has a lot of the same expressions as Phillip did. She likes to furrow her brow and look around.

Lily loves to help her. She says, "SAD!" if the baby is crying and will say "Ginkee" to tell me that the baby needs her binky. Lily also comments on Amelia's hang-nails and spit-up and says, "Eeeeew!"









Olsen Girls :-)







Phillip is funny and likes it when he goes on outings with Pete. He says, "Only boys can go!" Right now he says "Boys are funny and girls are silly." I told him that Pete only had sisters and no brothers. Phillip said, "I have brothers. Anthony and Andrew. They just don't live at my house."










Here is Phillip, Pete and Grandpa Olsen at Pete's Transformer birthday party. Phillip helped me plan the birthday party. He got a Bumblebee Costume out of the deal. (smart boy). I made a good Carrot cake for Pete. Here is a link to the recipe. (This is one of my favorite recipe blogs. Everything I have tried turns out really good).

Anywho, just taking it a day at a time. I used to make big lists for each day, but right now I try to limit it to 1) Take a shower 2) Take care of kids :-)

NewBorn Photo Shoot - How To

I sometimes feel guilty that I don't take my kids to get their picture taken that often. However, the cost and the stress of it all makes me think I can do it on my own at home. I did get some cute pictures of Amelia the other day. Here are some of my tips :-)

1. Align the stars -

Make sure:

• Older kids are away or occupied
• You are rested and not too tired (you don't want to start bawling because of a bad photo-shoot :-)
• The baby is fed and burped
• If possible, get a helper

I took my pictures while Pete took Phillip and Lily to church. :-) Thanks Pete!

2. Find a good location

I got this idea after paying for a photo-shoot at Kiddie Kandids. I pulled the bottom cushion away from the couch and added extra pillows for support:

Once the Pillows were set up, I draped a sheet over the couch and propped Amelia in the corner of the couch.

3. Have good lighting

A flash never looks very good for portraits:

Use a couch that is close to a window that gets a lot of light. If there isn't a couch, you can always drape a blanket or sheet over a car seat and put the baby where there is good lighting.

Use a reflector to fill in face shadows. I tried to do this by myself, but it was a little difficult. Get a helper to hold a mirror or piece of tin-foil to bounce the natural light onto the face.

4. Use the continuous shutter option

If your camera has the option, take the picture with the continuous shutter enabled. Little babies are cute but they can do some funny things with their hands in a split second:

4. Delete bad pictures. Pick out your favorite and add any effects. I always like black and white pictures.

Trick or Treat! Smell My Feet! :-)

Here is our latest family picture:

Ha! We didn't get a family picture in the hospital because the kids couldn't visit (Swine flu). Life has been too crazy to set up a photoshoot. But for Halloween we were able to get an updated family picture. Maybe we will use this as our Christmas card picture. Ha! We drove by Inkleys and they were doing free portraits. We missed the time window but they let us use the backdrop. (Luckily they were done because the props were pretty destroyed after I tripped over them and the kids kept throwing the leaves everywhere).

Phillip REALLY wanted to be a scarecrow at the last minute. We came up with a pretty good costume with the straw and face paint. He had to go potty before we went trick-or-treating. We didn't want straw all over the house so Pete helped him go potty outside. The next day the kids were playing outside. Pete went to check on them and Phillip was bare naked from the wasted down. Pete asked him what he was doing and he said, "I want to go potty outside."

Here is me and Lily outside our house. Pete already cleaned up Halloween and I feel our house looks a little bare. Only a short time until our Christmas decorations can go up!!

Another successful Halloween!

More Baby Pictures

To say the least, it has been an adjustment after bringing little Amelia home. I was glad that Pete didn't have to go to work until today. We are glad that everyone is still happy and healthy.

Baby Pictures:

Boo! One of Amelia's Halloween costumes :-) (a garage sale find)

Little Girl Sleeping.

Our darkest and biggest baby. She came out with dark hair and with a lot more hair than our other kids. Pete can't get over the dark hair. She definitely has some of the same facial features as Phillip did when he was a baby.

Meeting the Family

Lily can always smile for the camera. But... 5 minutes later ...

She doesn't appreciate being second fiddle :-)

Phillip has been a good big brother and is helpful with the baby. It's still an adjustment but he loves to hold her and kiss her.

Welcome Amelia Rose!

Born in October 6:30 PM
Weight: 7 lbs 14 oz
Length: 19 inches

Amelia was born yesterday and we were glad to welcome her to our family. She looks a lot like Phillip did when he was born. She has dark hair and darker skin. It will be interesting to see how she looks in a few months.

We are both feeling well and will be home soon to meet the rest of the family.

Post Due-Date Pick-me-ups

Sooo ... I have geared myself up for a week of post due-date blues. I had false labor the day after the Halloween party, and now the days seem to drag on.

Here are some fun things we have done to fill the time:

Decorate cookies:
I invited the girls I visit teach over to use up the rest of the frosting and sugar cookie dough. We had some fun with the new sugar colors I got for Halloween :-) Pete gave my cookies to his home teaching families. (Killed two birds with one stone :-)












Caramel Apples:
I invited a family over to make caramel and candy apples. We made these last year. After I burned both the caramel and the candy I realized that this was one of the things that Pete did and I thought I knew what I was doing. Oh well .. the kids liked them :-) I was more successful when I made them with James for his birthday.













Fall Colors:
I took some pictures of our trees on our side yard. I am pressing some of the leaves for a possible decorating project.













Garage Sales and Thrift Stores:
Pete came home with a 4ft tall stuffed Homer from DI.
I would say that is one of my favorite finds. :-)









Cute kids:
Phillip and Lily I think sense that we will have a big change soon. But they had fun today when I got on the trampoline. Maybe the bouncing will help!

Halloween Birthday Party

Well, when we were trying to plan our Halloween party, it seemed like there was a college football game every weekend. And then there is the little event of have a baby in the middle of the month. So... we decided to have a family night Halloween party on my BIRTHDAY. Yay!

THEN:


















Here is a picture of me on BYU campus the first time I struck out on town in the pumpkin outfit. I had to use a pillow to fill out the costume. It was kind of hard to sit at the computer lab in the Tanner building. Pete is glad that I was silly enough to stay single until we met in Philly :-)

NOW:
I didn't need a Pillow this year :-) Great Pregnancy costume. Seven years later, married with 2 kids and 1 on the way. The good 'ole pumpkin costume is always great any time of the year :-)




























Here are some highlights:
Cotton Candy - Edible Witches Hair



















Costumes:
Best Couple costume! - Oma and Opa Wirthlin


















Scariest Costume: phillip (mummy)


















Lots of other great costumes but I was so busy I didn't get pictures of everyone!!

Doughnuts on a string:














We also did bobbing for apples, decorating cookies. We had a live Star Wars fight outside with Pete dressed as Obi Wan Kanobe (spelling?) and Paul Hatch as Darth Vader. It was pretty great for the little boys, Phillip especially, and REALLY scary for the little girls.

Melanie and I did a Skelebones dance with black lights.

We kicked off the Halloween light show at the end of the festivities.

There were about 65 people that came to the party. CRAZY!

Great times! Great Food! Thanks for everyone who came and helped out! Thank you to Pete who did a LOT of the work for the party. I LOVE parties, I LOVE dressing up, and I LOVE halloween.