Photo Hunt - Messy Hands

My kids are such messy eaters!

Theme Thursday - Family

This picture was taken over Hanukkah and I did use my timer and my tripod. It really needs better photo processing though. I am not real good at that yet.

Thursday Thirteen #19

A recap of my 2007.

1. I started off 2007 5 months pregnant with our third child. We knew we were having a girl.
2. I was driving a new Honda Minivan that we succumbed to at the end of 2006 (see #1).
3. Our big family vacation was a trip to visit the Big Mouse and all of his friends and Princesses which was quite difficult for me (see #1).
4. I started a new position at my company in February. It was a huge move and I am still not sure I am fully getting it yet.
5. I took one class in the Spring 2007 semester that was my hardest yet for my MBA. I got an A and haven't been back since. I plan to continue in the Spring of 2007.
6. Miss V was born on May 18th at 1:39 am, weighing in at 7lbs 6 oz. Mommy was a week overdue and was sent to be induced after my regularly scheduled appointment.
   
7. I took three months off of work for maternity leave.
8. My oldest started Kindergarten this year.
   
9. I entered the world of Mac's in September with my new desktop. Its wonderful.
10. My new hobby became digital scrapbooking. I created many pages for the kids' albums and had them printed for their books.
11. The big hit at Hanukkah this year was the Wii that I managed to get in September. I am glad I persevered and watched the websites closely so that I could give it to my son. He loves me.
12. I started taking my photography more seriously. With all the wonderful photographers out there to inspire me, I spend many hours learning and practicing with my camera (and Photoshop) to attempt to have just a quarter of their talent.
13. The final thought as this year comes to a close is to list my goals for next year:
• Continue to spend as much time with my kids as I can. Go visit their schools and get involved in their lives.
  
• Get back on the weight loss/exercise band wagon <--- Slacker!
• Go back to school
  
• Work on my knowledge at my job. Learn more and contribute more
• Take a photography class and learn as much as I can about being better
  

WW - I need a nap

Bye-bye Hard Drive

Well, the writing was on the wall with my laptop. It was acting real slow and locking up. I got scared about a week ago and backed up the whole system (which I don't do enough). Today is the day it decided to shut down and fail to boot. Luckily it was still under our 3 year warranty so HP is shipping me a new HD, but of course it will take some time to get her back up to speed. I will try to keep blog posting while she is down and out (borrowing my work laptop for the night) but I may not have everything working properly for a little while. I'm pretty sad. I have never had a HD crash on me yet.

Photohunt - Light

I love how the light was shining through this window at the York Minster in York, UK. I brightened it up some to bring out the beautiful colors.

On Beautiful, by my two-year old

This conversation took place at bedtime tonight between me and my Miss E.

Me: Hi beautiful.
E: Hi mommy
Me: Are you my beautiful girl?
E: Yup!
Me: What do you think beautiful means, E?
E: **thinks for a second and says** I got it from my Momma!

Theme Thursday - Windows

This is my first Theme Thursday but I am excited to participate. Stacy will be hosting these on her blog now! Her pictures are just amazing and her advise is even better.

Here is my picture for this week's theme. I took this one of my youngest during a photo-shoot for her birth announcements. She was a few weeks old here. I set up a 'studio' in front of our living room windows and took some nice shots with natural light.

Thursday Thirteen #18

Thirteen facts about Winter.

1. Astronomically, it starts with the winter solstice (around December 21 in the Northern Hemisphere and June 21 in the Southern Hemisphere), and ends with the spring equinox (around March 21 in the Northern Hemisphere and September 21 in the Southern Hemisphere).
2. 17 Cars are needed to equal the weight of 1 loaded snowplow (50,000 lbs).
3. Believe it or not, snow is actually clear/transparent. Snow appears white because the crystals act as prisms, breaking up the light of the sun into the entire spectrum of color.
4. During the winter Orion dominates the sky.
5. Nighttime predominates the winter season, and in some regions it has the highest rate of precipitation as well as prolonged dampness due to permanent snow cover in such areas.
6. Hibernation is a state of reduced metabolic activity during the winter. These animals "sleep" during winter and only come out as warm weather returns. For example, gophers, bears, frogs, snakes and bats hibernate.
7. During the winter months in the northern hemisphere, a gloominess nicknamed "winter blues", "February blahs", "Holiday depression", or doldrums, is informally noted amongst people. The severest cases of this type of depression is diagnosed as seasonal affective disorder (SAD).
8. In the United States, January has the highest rate of suicide.
9. The highest seasonal total snowfall ever measured was at Mount Baker Ski Area, outside of Bellingham, Washington in the United States during the 1998–1999 season. Mount Baker received 1,140 inches (29 m) of snow.
10. The best time to build a snowman is usually in the next warmest afternoon directly following a snowfall with a sufficient amount of snow.
11. Skiing was originally a practical way of getting from one place to another in packed or crusted snow. In Norse Myth, skiing was invented by Skadi, the snowshoe goddess. The word "ski" entered the English language from Norwegian in 1890.
12. During the American Civil War, on January 29, 1863, the largest military snow exchange occurred in the Rappahannock Valley in Northern Virginia. What began as a few hundred men from Texas plotting a friendly fight against their Arkansas camp mates soon escalated into a brawl that involved 9,000 soldiers of the Army of Northern Virginia.
13. Freezing rain is a type of precipitation that begins as snow at higher altitude, falling from a cloud towards earth, melts completely on its way down while passing through a layer of air above freezing temperature, and then encounters a layer below freezing at lower level to become supercooled. This water will then freeze upon impact of any object it then encounters.

My Biggest Dilemma

I have an unhealthy obsession with pens. I love them. I love to collect them and horde them and look at them and put them in cups and in my desk and in my purse and steal them from hotels and from people who leave them in the break room and kitchen and conference rooms and I never throw them out when they are not working anymore. My hardest dilemma when I was leaving my cube this morning on the way to a big meeting was which pen do I choose? The ones that write good that are metal? But then I cannot chew on these. Or the ones that have nice grippies? But they write terribly. How about the markers in different festive colors? But these tend to get all over my hands. So I went with the mechanical pencil. Fun to play with, makes a cool clicking noise, writes well, can chew on and it looks oh so cool with the fun spin up eraser.
Is anyone as nuts as I am??

WW - Uh Oh

Photo Hunt - Small Toes

These are the cute little toes of my Miss E.

Thursday Thirteen #17

Thirteen of my favorite 'things' we have in our house.

1. The TiVO and DirecTv DVR. We are TV junkies.
   
2. The new Keurig coffee machine. We recently upgraded from the Senseo, which we still love, but we wanted a K-cup machine.
   
3. Our big screen TV in the basement (spider/s and all).
4. Our sectional with 4 recliners. Need something to lounge on while using #1 and #3.
   
5. The iMac.
6. My DSLR camera.
7. Our Amish hand-made bedroom set that we waited 6 months for. It was totally worth it.
8. My craft desk that is also used for homework/online classes. I love having everything for scrap booking in its own place.
9. The hot tub. Its so nice to sit outside under the stars.
10. The pantry in the basement. It was an after thought when we finished the basement and had an extra space. It really comes in handy for those weekly trips to Costco.
11. The bookcase we built in our living room turned library. We have so many books that its nice to have a place for them all.
12. The Gladiator Freezerator and matching garage storage in our newly organized garage.
13. The kids playroom. Its so nice to have a place that I can leave messy and not have to look at the toys all over the floor.
    

WW - Dust on my Treadmill

A Spider in the Projection TV?!?

About two months ago, hubby and I were chillin' downstairs watching our big screen (as we do every night after the kids to go bed) and we noticed the biggest creepy crawler we've seen in a while going across the screen. Hubby immediately jumps up and grabs a wad of tissues and attempts to swat at the TV to crush large man-eating spider. Just as he gets to the TV, it crawls off the screen and out of sight. We look on the floor and behind the TV for a while with no luck. But of course we were both freaked out by the size of this monster spider that we hesitantly sit back down and continue to watch. Mr. Spidey didn't return. The next night, Mr. Enormous Hairy spider reappears to interrupt our TV time once again. The wad of tissues still by the recliner, Hubby jumps up again to fight with eight legs that look like they could swallow him whole. Running up to the TV, careful not to totally knock it off the stand, the spider manages to crawl out of sight once again. We scratch our heads and wonder how we could have missed such a large spider vanishing into thin air, until it hits us. Mr. Home Invader is INSIDE our TV! What a sly and cunning spider to be sitting there, mocking us making us look like the idiots. Acting like a dog chasing around a pen light trying to bite it or a cat following the cursor on a computer screen, hubby and I look like crazy people trying to chase this large, crawling spider across the glass wondering why we cannot catch him.

So this game goes on for a while, spider appears we say, "Hey, it looks like he is on the outside this time", only to jump up and be fooled, yet again by our oh-so-smart TV guest. Mr. Spidey is probably a very tiny sole but since he is being projected on the face of our TV screen he of course looks like he is the size of our dogs.

Then it becomes a game. Odds have it that when spidey appears, my camera would be way upstairs.
Hubby: "Look there he is right in the middle of the screen".
Me: "Crap, my camera is upstairs, think he will sit there while I go get it?"
Hubby:"Dunno" and goes back to reading his computer.
I consider running up and down the stairs to grab my camera while I try to judge how fast he is moving and usually say, "Ah, screw it, be right back". When I get back downstairs, out of breath and ready to pass out (need to start exercising again) I say to hubby, "Well, he still there?"
To which he usually replies, "You just missed him".
Me: "Crap!"

Until last night. He reappeared while we were all comfy on the couch. I played the above scenario and ran to get my camera. Of course he was gone when I returned but 10 min later, he decided to show off and sit on the screen long enough for me to snap this first shot of him while watching "Brothers and Sisters on our TiVo". This unimpressive shot makes Mr. S look real tiny since he seemed to be walking on the glass of the TV instead of being projected 5x's its size.

We often wonder how long he can live in there. What's he eating? Has he spun tons of webs? What about babies...ugh.

Does anyone know how to get a spider out of a TV??

Photohunt - Long

The long driveway leading up to our house.

One Hundred Things About Me (Better Late than Never!)

1. I was born in the 70s, as seen in this picture of me as a child playing on red shag carpet.
2. I am the first born and have one younger brother.
3. My brother is 3.5 years younger.
4. My parents met in high school.
5. They are still married.
6. I skipped kindergarten (well I spend 2 weeks there) before they moved me to 1st grade. Apparently it was too easy for me.


7. I have naturally curly hair which my mom used to blow straight when I was in elementary school.
8. In the 5th grade I got it all cut off and have been wearing it curly ever since.
9. I had terrible buck teeth and needed braces for many years.
10. I hated this Hawaiian shirt.
11. We're Jewish and I had a Bat Mitzvah at the age of 12.
12. It was a lot of work to learn all the Hebrew but the party was very fun.
13. I bought my first car with the money I received from my Bat Mitzvah.
14 I had a dog and a cat as a child. The dog was a Maltese named Poppet.
15. I am still in my awkward phase.


16. I used to go to sleep away camp for the summers.
17. We moved when I was in the 10th grade.
18. I had to make all new friends at a new high school.
19. Our new house was much bigger and in a better neighborhood.
20. I was a band geek.
21. I played the flute all through school.
22. I was in the marching band and concert band.
23. I also was a singer in high school and was in the improv club as well as school plays.
24. I was a geek.


25. I loved this jean jacket.
26. The A stood for nothing.
27. The button I am wearing is of the Monkee's.
28. I saw them in concert in the 80s.
29. I also saw George Michael in concert with my mom.
30. I listened to the Beatles a lot in High School.
31. I loved MTV and watched it non-stop (that's when they used to play music videos).
32. I got my first real stereo set for Hanukkah from my Dad.
33. I sold that stereo after I got married.
34. I collected records.
35. I loved to ice skate every Friday night with my friends.
36. One summer I decided not to go away for sleep over camp and was a counselor at a day camp.
37. I should have gone back to sleep over camp, it was too much work.
38. I applied to four colleges and got into them all.
39. Of the four colleges I applied to, only one of them was out of state. That's the one I chose.
40. I was able to arrive early as a freshman because I was in the college marching band.
41. This one time, at band camp - I played the flute my first year and then switched to piccolo.
42. We played for all the home and away games.
43. The marching band was tons of fun but lots of work. I was in such great shape!
44. I was a geek in college too.
45. Being in the band allowed me to see all of the football games, which I love.
46. I majored in Psychology and wanted to minor in Chemistry.
47. I dropped the Chem after I took my first year.
48. I added Women's studies as a minor in my third year.
49. I also sang in an A Capella group in my Jr and Sr years of college.
50. I liked singing more than being in the band so I dropped band in my Sr year.
51. I finished my degree in 4 years.
52. I worked at the college book store my Jr year restocking shelves for practically no money.
53. The summer before my Sr year I got a job at a local bank as a collections agent.
54. I worked P/T at the bank through my Sr year.
55. I kept that job for one year after college and moved into an apartment.
56. I hated being at that bank so much that I packed up and moved back to my home state with no place to live and no job.
57. I started temping in an engineering office which I hated at first.
58. I learned a lot while I was there and moved onto a different company.
59. I met my hubby on my first day at my new job.
60. He thought I wasn't going to cut it as a technician.
61. Boy did I prove him wrong.
62. We worked together for a couple of years and kept our relationship a secret.
63. When we decided to get married, we told everyone we worked with.
64. They immediately move hubby into another group to get him away from me. He later quit.

65. We were engaged for 15 months.
66. That was 13 months too long!
67. We got engaged at a wedding of a friend.
68. We were married in September, Labor Day weekend, in a beautiful old mansion.
69. I wanted a fall wedding in October, but moved it to Labor Day so it could be earlier in the evening (since we are Jewish it would have had to be after sundown on Sat) and I didn't want it to be a real late night.
70. The ceremony was supposed to be outside in the garden.
71. Not only did it rain on us that day but it was actually a hurricane!
72. The ceremony was inside.

73. Our honeymoon was a cruise.
74. We have two dogs that we got when we moved in together.


75. We sold the house that hubby had when we met and moved in with my in laws for 8 months while the house we are in now was being built.
76. We have three acres and have three other houses that share our driveway.
77. I like it out in the country, its nice a quiet when we sit in our hot tub and look over the farm behind us and gaze at the stars.
78. I got pregnant on our first attempt with Mr. Z which surprised us both.
79. We knew he was going to be a boy since there were no girls born in my hubby's family for three generations.
80. I always thought I wanted to have three kids while hubby wanted two.
81. I was a week early when my water broke. Mr. Z was a small but very good baby.


82. I was home for 6 months maternity leave with Mr. Z.
83. I got pregnant again on our first try with Miss E.
84. We used all the 'methods' we could find to sway the odds that we would have a girl.
85. Since we were scared our attempts failed, we decided to not find out her gender before she was born and hear the surprise.
86. I was a week late when my water broke and needed to go to the hospital to be induced.
87. I needed to see the evidence that we in fact had given birth to a girl and made them take her diaper off.
88. Due to the nature of her birth, with no pain meds, I was so traumatized that the surprise announcement of her gender wasn't as exciting as I thought it would be. But of course we were thrilled we had a daughter.


89. I took 4 months of maternity leave with Miss E.
90. Miss E had colic and would scream and cry for hours each night. It stopped cold turkey when she was 12 weeks.
91. When we found out we were pregnant again, this time it was a surprise, I was really scared.
92. I always thought that having three kids was something I wanted but now that it was facing me, and my other kids were still little, I wasn't so sure. I wanted more time to decide on a third. But that decision was already made for me.
93. Miss V was also a week late, after an induction, again.
94. I caved and decided to get an epi after Miss E's traumatic birth.
95. I LOVED the epi!



96. I am not all that into fashion. I hate to shop for clothes and only do it when absolutely necessary (like now - need to get at least one more pair of jeans that fit!). I also wear the same earrings every day.
97. I don't feel that I am really good at any one thing. I wear so many hats that its hard to juggle them all.
98. I really admire people who own their own businesses. While I think that would be rewarding, especially doing what you love, I would have no idea what I would even want to do.
99. I love taking pictures and post them all over this blog. I hope that one day I can be as good as some of you.
100. I am glad to have this blog and the people that I have met through it. I love coming here and writing down my thoughts, reading yours and I am excited to be a part of this little community.

Haiku Friday - Joy to the Blog

My one hundred has
passed me by, but I wanted
to tribute the blog

This has been so fun
sharing my life with you all
thanks for your reading

So here's to the last
Hundred and five of my posts
many more to come.

First Snow of 2007

The girls were having fun in the snow yesterday afternoon.

Thursday Thirteen #16

Thirteen Phrases that I totally cannot stand.

Last week I did phrases that I think are interesting, this week I am doing phrases that people use in every day conversations that really peeve me.

1. "I will touch base with you later" - You hear this one at work often. You are going to touch what? Don't touch me - please. If you want to talk to me, say you will call me later.

2. "Getting briefed (or debriefed)" - This is a fancy way of talking about a meeting. Say presentation or discussion, but briefing, I just don't get that one. Is there a briefcase involved? A large file with documents in them? Must be a military thing.

3. "Hang in there" - This is a blow off phrase. You are having a bad day, hang in there. Or better yet, deal with your own problems and leave me alone.

4. "Running with that" - Another way to pass the buck. I am not working on that project, Joe is running with that so don't bother me!

5. "Chuckle-Head" - what exactly is that? I hear that one often.

6. "Turn-key solution" - It never is. There is always something else you need to do/buy to make said equipment work.

7. "At the end of the day" - What is going to happen at this theoretical end of the day? At the end of the day, we will all get along better. Does the end of the day really ever come?

8. "SME (or Schmee)" - Subject Matter Expert. Ugh, this is so annoying. Usually these people know just as much as the rest of us.

9. "Been there, Done that" - OK, cocky. I don't care to hear your bragging.

10. "Low Hanging Fruit" - This one does not paint a mental picture of actual fruit on a tree, but someone grabbing one's self (or someone grabbing someone else - you choose). Of course its supposed to imply something easy to grab and take a hold of - again I don't see fruit.

11. "Boondoggle" - Meaning screwing off. Where did this one come from?

12. "The long and the short of it is" - Just say, conclusion or therefore. That is a really long phrase that really means, if you were listening to me, I don't need to recap but since you weren't here's the answer.

13. "Action Items" - C'mon, this is a fancy way to say to-do list. Who wants the action item to pick the low hanging fruit??

WW - Hanukkah's First Night