Christmas Celebration with Emma and Maddie

The Kilian Family came over to our house on Tuesday evening for a little Christmas celebration. Unfortunately, Phil wasn't able to make it home to enjoy our time with them due to weather related travel delays. The girls had a great time playing together and exchanging gifts.

Thanksgiving and Other Things

We spent the afternoon at my Mom's house for Thanksgiving. After dinner, Emma and Grace went outside for a walk with Grandma.

A few weekends ago, Grace and I traveled over to the east side of the state for our friend Daryl's wedding. Here is my little "dancing queen".

This was just a cute shot I thought I'd post on one of those warm fall days a few weeks back. I think Grace was looking at an airplane.

Happy Halloween

I took Grace out for a few hours on Halloween night to a "Trunk or Treat" at a local church. The kids enjoyed it and all looked super cute!

Happy 2nd Bithday Grace

Last weekend we had a birthday party for Grace. Here are some pics of her enjoying the festivities.

Fall Festival

Saturday was the big day for Kenny and Crystal's annual Fall party. It was a great day and the colors around their yard were beautiful! We enjoyed a bon fire, hot cider and plenty of good food and treats made special for the occaison by Crystal. She even gave us apple butter in cute mason jars as "party favors"! The kids loved running around, playing in the leaves and playing football with the "big guys"....aka the dads:) Thanks Kenny and Crystal for another great party and for all the time and effort you put into it!

Apple Orchard

Last Sunday, Scott and Stacey invited us and the Kilian Family up to their house for dinner. After dinner we went to a great apple orchard to pick apples. Here are some super cute pics of the girls having fun while picking (and eating) apples.

Girls Rule!

We found out Monday that we'll be adding another baby girl to our family in February. The ultrasound was quite conclusive so unless something was really hiding, Phil will now be outnumbered 3:1. I tried to post a picture of our ultrasound but I'm having trouble figuring out how to make it larger than the tiny little one that we actually have. Most of you just want to know boy or girl anyways right? Anyways, we're excited and I think it will be nice for Grace to have a sister that will be close in age.....we'll reassess that comment in a few years!

Grace's First Haircut

I took Grace in with me to get her hair trimmed last week. She wasn't super fond of the idea but a little bribery with a dum-dum did the trick. Phil was disappointed that she didn't get a "real haircut". I'm not sure what he was expecting but apparently he was hoping the stylist brought out the clippers. It was just a trim!

Birthday Parties for the Emmas

This weekend was full of birthday parties. Saturday was my niece Emma's party, and Sunday was Emma K's party. Cousin Emma turned 3 while Emma K turned 5.

Baby #2

We just wanted to let all of our blog readers know that baby #2 is scheduled to arrive February 19, 2009. We are very excited and with the exception of weeks 6-9, I feel great. I am currently about 15 weeks pregnant so we'll be sure to keep everyone updated on the progress.

Golf

This weekend, we had the chance to get outdoors and enjoy the last of the summer days. Since Phil loves to play golf and Grace and I enjoy just hanging out with daddy and being outdoors, we had a win-win situation for some nice family time. Phil golfed while Grace and I tagged along, drove the cart, and enjoyed the great weather. Grace loved being on the course and especially enjoyed watching Phil play. She would get out of the cart when Phil teed off and putted to take him extra golf balls or pick up his tees......it was pretty cute.

Las Vegas

Phil and I got back from a 5 day trip to Las Vegas today. Given Phil's busy month of July with recruiting, his boss gave all the coaches a week off to just get out of the office to spend time with family before the hectic season starts. So, we decided to head to Las Vegas. Our good friends Hope and Dustin (see Rocho Family blog on my links) live in Vegas about 20 minutes NW of the strip. So, not only did we get to take a little time away for ourselves, we also got to visit with Hope, Dustin and their brand new baby girl, Trinity Love who was born August 6. She is healthy and beautiful. It was wonderful to hold a newborn baby again. It brought back a whole slew of memories from just 2 years ago. She was wonderful!

Hope and Dustin are incredibly generous and thoughtful. Would you all believe that when Dustin picked us up from the airport he suprised us with tickets for that evening to Cirque du Soleil's show "O" at the Bellagio. It was incredible. Phil and I had contemplated going prior to leaving Kzoo, but tickets were sold out when we looked into it and the cost was a bit overwhelming. Well, needless to say.....we went and it was amazing. I've never seen anything like it before in my life.

We were able to do and see a lot of neat things in just 5 days. We also were able to see another Cirque show, Mystere at Treasure Island. Mystere was also wonderful and we really enjoyed it. There are just so many details about our trip that I could include in this entry, but I'm already using so much space.

So....to close, I'll post a pic of sweet baby "TLove"....she is so cute!

Hanging out with Mom

Today Grace and I spent some time outdoors working in the yard. She is a good "helper" and enjoys picking up sticks and rocks for me. These are just some cute pictures I thought I'd post.

Fourth of July

This is the second year that we went to the Schoolcraft 4th of July parade. This year, Grace really enjoyed the parade! It was fun to watch all the kids. Emma and Maddie had the most fun collecting all their candy.

Photography Class

I started taking a photography class at the Kalamazoo Institute of Arts last Thursday. It's once a week on Thursday evenings for 8 wks. We have weekly assignments. Tonight at class, my instructor really liked a picture I had captured of Grace. So, I thought I'd post it. If I get any other good comments on future projects, I'll continue to pass them along.

5 Random Things

Stacey "tagged" me to list 5 random things about myself on our blog. So....here it goes in no particular order :)

1. Although my taste for color has changed over the years and I've gone through several "trendy" favorite colors, I would have to say that my favorite colors both to wear and decorate with at this current time are greens, browns and reds. Now, that's not to say that I still don't love pink, especially for Grace:):)

2. I have aspirations to travel the world......who knows if it will happen but the three places I'd love to visit are Hawaii, Italy and the Western US (Montana, Oregon, Utah, Dakotas etc.)

3. I enjoy photography and little arts and craft projects. I feel that this is my way to keep my left brain active when I spend most of my days primarily using my right brain. And lets face it......primarily right brained people tend to be more boring - those left brainers are much more interesting!!!

4. I'm a carb freak - bring on the cakes, cookies, breads, pastas, crackers, potatoes, fruits and veggies. Who needs protein?....the only way I really get protein is in my dairy food. Maybe that's why I'm always craving sweets. I've tried the whole "south beach" way of life....it didn't last unfortunately.

5. To be quite honest, if I could change one thing about my physical appearance, I would really like to be taller. I'm not talking giant status here....just like 5'4"-5'5". It's really hard to find clothes that fit when you're 5'1".

Okay....that's enough.

Amber - you're up!!

New Job

For some of my blog readers this may be "old news", but for others I wanted to pass along our latest "good news". Phil was recently named an Assistant Basketball Coach for WMU's Womens Basketball program. The team is under the new leadership of Coach Tasha McDowell who came to WMU from the University of Wisconsin. We are very excited for many reasons. Phil will now be coaching and recruiting amongst other things which makes him very happy. He is greatful to have been a part of Coach Hawkins staff as Director of Operations but is very excited about this wonderful opportunity to get back into coaching. You can read the press release from today at http://www.wmubroncos.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=24388&SPID=1925&DB_OEM_ID=4600&ATCLID=1477244

Landscaping

For the past two weekends, we've been working on our front yard. The landscaping was overgrown, underkept and needing some TLC. This has been something on the agenda since we moved in almost 2 years ago, but this was the first spring that we were able to get to it. Phil and I spent almost all weekend over Memorial Day and then this weekend finishing it up. We thought we'd pass on some pictures of the finished product. Now we've just got to figure out how to get grass to grow in our shady, dry front yard:)

Piggys

Today was a monumental day for me as a mom with a daughter. Today I put Grace's hair in pig tails for the very first time. It was soooo cute......Phil even thought so. We thought we'd pass along a few pics of the occaison.

Hope's Baby Shower and Mother's Day

Hope and Dustin were in on Mother's Day weekend from Las Vegas for Hope's baby shower. We also spent the day with Phil's family to celebrate Mother's Day.

Destin, Florida

We went to Destin, Florida a few weeks back. We headed down in our "mini" with our good friends Scott and Stacey. It was about a 16 hour drive but Grace did pretty good. We had a great time - beautiful weather, a great place to stay and wonderful time relaxing and spending time with each other.

Our house