Christmas Wreath

So recently I have found my creative side. Thanks in part to my new scrapbooking buddies. But also, Pinterest, which has become my new addiction :)

I came accross the directions to make the paper flowers here. They are really simple! And here's what I did:

I know I am a terrible bow-tie-er. I need to work on that :)

I think it turned out super cute!

Taco Pie

I think we are going to start posting some of our recipes on here. Maybe one of them will become famous :)

Also, sorry for the picture. We were already eating when the decision was made to post this recipe. So our taco pie is half eaten. But this way you get to see the... layers... So we can pretend it was on purpose?

Dinner tonight is a Joey Original: Taco Pie.

Ingredients:
1 lb ground beef 
1 pkg taco seasoning
1 pkg (12 oz) crescent rolls
1 pkg Fritos Corn Chips
1 pkg (8 oz) jack & cheddar cheese shredded
1 large tomato
2 cups lettuce
Sour Cream
Salsa

1. brown ground beef, add taco seasoning as the package directs, then set aside
2. dice tomato and lettuce
3. roll crescent rolls flat into long casserole dish, place into oven at 350 degrees for about 7 minutes
4. top crescent crust with ground beef, cover with Fritos and cheese - bake for about 7 more minutes
5. serve topped with lettuce, tomatoes, salsa and sour cream

To save some calories (which one of these days we will start doing again...) you can always use 99% lean ground turkey, non-fat sour cream and cheese, and skip the corn chips. Although, the corn chips do make the dish pretty delicious!

Recently...

Again, I apologize that I am such a bad blogger. I guess I don't feel like there is that much worth talking about? But I would like announce that Madison is finally on the right track to being completely potty trained. We've gone a week now with consistent going potty in the potty. Now we just have to get her to stay dry during naptime (which she does about half the time) and overnight (which is probably going to take longer). But we are very excited in the Myers household. We've done numerous potty dances, and have recieved dozens of "special treats." Jordan is also a wonderful, supportive big sister. She is just as excited for Sissy when she uses the potty as we are, and often participates in the potty dance herself! Joey and I are definitely hoping to be completely out of pull ups before we have to buy another box :)

Photoberfest Week 2 - Kids

Entry #1

I just love the pure, innocent joy of being a child. Remember when bubbles were this much fun?



Entry #2

Pretty girl :)



Click here to vote for me! Find my pictures and "like" them to vote :)

If you don't have a Pinterest account, let me know, and I can send you an invite!

Thanks <3

Today we were driving...

...on our way out to lunch. I was in the car with my mother in law, Cathy, and the girls were in their car seats in the back. They were quiet (well, at normal volume, I guess. Are they ever quiet anymore??) and Cathy and I were talking when all of a sudden they both start screaming at each other.

(Now, before I go on, I should mention a game that Joey and I often play with the girls. I will pretend to grab one of their noses, or an ear, and eat it. They then will either take my nose and eat it, or put it in place of their nose I took, or they will take their nose back out of my mouth and put it back on. They think it is the funniest thing!)

Anyway, I would say, considering the girls' age group, overall they get along very well. We've tried to teach them the concept of sharing, and while it is hard for them to grasp, I think they do a pretty good job. They play together, and act goofy together, and - more often than not - if I cannot understand what Madison is trying to tell me, Jordan can translate. So sudden outbursts like this are rare. And when they happen, they are usually over a toy. But since we were in the car, and it was only a 10 minute car ride, I knew they had no toys. So I asked Madison, who was crying at this point, "What happened?"

Madison's reply: "Jordan ate my foot."

Silly girls.

Jobs

Well, unfortunately, that job didn't work out.

I have to find something eventually, right?

I mean, I have a degree - but very little job experience, other than serving and 9 months of sales. But if no one will give me a job, how am I supposed to get that job experience? And, frankly, I don't want to be in sales anymore. I don't think I can handle the commission - the stressing every week that I will make my goal. The fear and the beginning of every month as to whether or not I will make enough money. It was fine at first, because I was doing great! But then things went downhill. I just don't know what I am going to do...

Changes

So many things are constantly changing. I just cannot believe how much my two little girls have grown from my babies into little ladies. I am just so lucky to have them in my life.

Jordan is still just as talkative as ever. She is very excited about the prospect of going to school. She talks about it all the time. I hope that if everything works out well in the next few months, we might be able to enroll her in a preschool. I'd love to give her a head start on schooling - plus I would love for her (and maybe me, as well) to make some new friends!

Madison's vocabulary basically blossomed overnight. She went from barely speaking (probably because Jordan would rarely let her get a word in edgewise) to basically speaking first sentences. She has gotten so good at expressing herself. It's almost hard to believe that just a few months ago she said basically nothing. And we have attempted potty training, but it has been slow going. And with us all so sick last week, we definitely took a few steps back. Its just about time to push the potty training into overdrive. I want to be a diaper-free household!

Everything with the house has been wonderful! We absolutely love it here. Having the freedom of being on our own - finally - was exactly what we needed. And while it's a lot of hard work, its so worth it!

I have definitely been a little worried about my job situation, though. I've known for a while that my current job is running out of work until October, but now that my last week is looming, I am really stressing out. I interviewed for a job last week that I *really* want, and I am just waiting to hear back from them. It would be so amazing if I got it, because it would put me working more "normal" hours so that I would have evening and weekends with my family, as well as give us the financial ability to maybe be able to afford things like putting the girls in preschool. I am just keeping my fingers crossed!

Well, that's all for now. I should get better about blogging more often, then I wouldn't have to play catch up so much... :)

My photography

For anyone who knows me, they know that I love photography. I photograph families for a living, and I photograph friends for fun. Well, this last weekend, we went to an art fair and looking at the photography booths has made me come to the realization that I would love to be able to do that, as well! I have put together a few of my favorite pieces that I have photographed so far, and as time goes on, I intend to continue to work with nature photography, and add to this portfolio. I have also set up a way for people to purchase my work over the internet, until I can get enough to be able to set up a booth at local art festivals.

This one was from Lake Eola

I took this on my cruise a few years ago. I love this shot.

This one was actually taken at Epcot during the flower festival. I love the colors!

To see more, click here.

So it turns out...

...I am a bad blogger.

Things have just been so crazy with the new house, I haven't had time. Hopefully things will calm down for us soon... A day to rest would be so nice!

We got some portraits taken today from the studio I work with. Portrait day with a 2 and 3 year old can certainly be - interesting? Especially when one needs a nap and the other isn't feeling well. But after 3 attempts, we managed to get that one good shot of the family! Hooray for my employee discount! I can't wait for my new beautiful framed 20x24 to come so I can admire my wonderful family! :) At least until we are due for another big family portrait in a few years... ;p

The House is...

...really coming together! I haven't had time to blog recently because we have been so busy at the house the last few weeks. Our kitchen is done! The paint in all the main rooms is pretty much done. Furniture is starting to find its place. :) We are really excited!

But, considering our mess of stuff that is currently residing in the front of the house:



We still have a lot to do!

What a Day!

So we were told all this week that we were definitely closing on the house on Friday (today). In fact, we knew that if we didn't close today we would loose our mortgage and our locked interest rate and would have to start completely over: a daunting thought. But as of last night when we went to bed we still had no closing time. They said we'd know in the morning. Noon came today, still no closing time. But we were assured it was still going to happen today. Our real estate agent, Cheryl, was *wonderful* throughout all of this, putting up with our many anxious phone calls. About 3:00 we (and by "we" I mean mostly "I") were getting extremely anxious because we still didn't know the amount of cash we had to bring to the table and if we didn't find that out before 5:00 we couldn't go to the bank to get the cashier's check and we wouldn't be able to close today. At 4:20 we finally got the call to go to the bank so we headed over, got our check, and headed to our closing. It took about an hour and a half, we signed 50,000 pieces of paper, found out that we saved a good chunk of change on closing costs, and then it was done! We are now officially homeowners, and we are *so* excited!!!!!!!!


The removing of the "For Sale" sign - minus the selling real estate agent's information (she is not someone we would ever recommend working with...).

Smiles

For a while the girls went through a phase where they just wouldn't smile for the camera. Jordan just made these weird faces, and Madison would just turn her head. I couldn't get a picture of them smiling for ages! But it seems like they might finally be growing out of that.


I got this picture of Madison this weekend. It's kinda a silly smile (she says "Cheeeeeeese") but it works for me! :)


This one is a good smile from Jordan.


And Madison again. So adorable.


And this is one of Madison's favorite things right now: dancing.

We really have some seriously cute little girls.

Some pictures I missed

So I was recently going through all my pictures from 2010 and I realized that when I first got my camera, I was so focused on getting pictures of the girls looking at me and smiling that I completely overlooked some candids.

I love this one because of the look of just complete curiosity on Jordan's face.




They probably could use some editing, but I just thought I'd share them. It's pictures like these that make me proud to be a photographer. To be able to capture children in just one moment. I absolutely will treasure these forever. My babies have grown into little ladies too quickly.

We are never ever ever...

...ever ever going to close on this house. Well, that's seriously how this feels. I keep getting my hopes up and they keep getting pushed down. Again and again. This whole house-buying process has felt like this and I am just so over it.

It's not that we are never going to close. We are like 99% sure that we are. The problem is when. We don't know. We keep getting told that it will be this week. Then by the end of that week they say, "Next week." And part of me just wants to scream! We were supposed to close last Friday, then it turned into this Wednesday, then Thursday, then Friday. Now we're thinking next week. But I'm tired of telling people that this will be it because it keeps not being it. Plus what's also really frustrating is we have plans and we can't do anything to this house until we close. We were supposed to move our stuff out of our storage unit to the house this weekend so we could get rid of the unit. But now we're going to have to pay another month for that, too.

I am just so ready to start this new life. To finally be able to be our own little family. I love my parents and my siblings, but there comes a time when you just need to be on your own. I did everything in my life out of order. You're supposed to graduate, get a good job, move out, get married, then have kids. And I am not complaining, because I love my life. But I just want to reach that "move out" stage so I can finally start feeling like a real adult. Right now, I still feel like a child. And I hate that.

I am sorry for the rant. Today has just been a frustrating day.

Quick Post...

So the house has been FHA approved! We're basically just waiting on some final paperwork and we should know by tomorrow if we are closing this Friday or next Monday. SO EXCITING! I cannot wait to get to work on this house, and make it our own :)

In other news... My dad got this computer working so while it isn't new, it's newer than my old computer. And now it has internet so that is even better. I can now upload some new pictures from my camera and post them so you can see our temporary cabinet in the house, among other things.

I need to go to bed now. This is going to be a loooooooong week...

Disney

We went to Disney today, and I thought I'd share a few of my favorite pictures :)


Our little princesses.

This picture is blurry (Yay my mom's camera) *but* Madison's expression is just so darn cute I had to share it.

Cheese!

Sitting and waiting to talk to Crush. They love each other :)

Mary Poppins is one of our favorites!

::hugs::




Madison has this new obsession with Chapstick (hmmm I wonder where she got that from?), or as she calls it: "Lips." I can't pull Chapstick out of my purse without her begging for it. She's so silly.

While we had a nice day, just hanging out with the girls, we definitely missed Daddy. We can't wait to go back again with him soon. We need to go a lot the next month and a half, because our season passes expire in March, and we aren't planning on renewing them.

A Quick Update

Right now it is looking like we will be closing on the house next Friday, the 21st. The dry wall is going to be repaired, and we are just going to make a plywood and curtain structure to replace the cabinets that are now missing, which should be enough to make the house mortgageable. Home Depot currently has the cabinets we have our eyes on on sale for 20% off so that's good timing. We will buy those and have them ready to put in for when we close :)

We are getting so excited that this might actually finally be happening for us!

Couting to five, and other amazing things...

So, bedtime, tonight, started off like any other bedtime...

...undress the girls, let them wear themselves out with the naked dance (them, not me), sit on the potty and read the potty book (I brought this back from when Jordan was about the same age, now for Madison), then jammies, story and lullabies... then, out of the blue, Madison grabs my hand and counts my fingers... nine, two, three four five (okay, not exactly perfection, but for a girl who usually greets me with "nananana" when I ask if she missed me, pretty bloody impressive). I started her again with one, and she counted up to five three more times. How cool is that? Being a new dad, I've often worried that Madison wasn't quite meeting the same milestones Jordan was, or that she was being slowed up for some reason, then, out of the blue, starting on Christmas Day, she's surprised me left and right. On Christmas, she said her first sentence ("I got it back"), she's started jumping (that was a little before Christmas, maybe Thanksgiving), and she just keeps surprising us day after day. Madison has come a long way in the last couple of months, and its a lot of fun to watch.

Jordan, on the other hand, is like a little adult. She speaks so well (and I'm not doting on her, I am an expert now in child development, thanks to my job, and she is miles ahead of the average 3 yr old in speech). Jordan makes up stories, tells jokes, and has conversations that last from the minute she wakes up to bedtime.

I'm sure I've bored you all with the bragging, but its what daddies do, so deal with it... until next time...

The House Saga Continues...

So. This house is a bank owned house. There is the bank that owns the house, and then the mortgage company that we are getting our mortgage from (I don't know the names of either). The mortgage company is basically requiring all the repairs that need to be made to the property are completed *before* we close on this house. The bank had agreed to take care of the big stuff (mainly- the mold) and most of the other things are stupid and stuff that we don't care about. However, we want the house so even though it is against our better judgment, we decided yesterday to go on ahead and just invest a couple hundred dollars and a weekend into these improvements.

So we went by the house last night to take some measurements and got in to discover that the people that were there to fix the mold didn't finish the job. This is what we saw when we got there:


They didn't replace the dry wall in the kitchen, and now some of the kitchen cabinets (which were broken) are completely gone. We can't just go put another one in because then they won't match, and we are not going to replace all of them.

So now we are waiting to hear back from the bank again to find out if they are going to fix the cabinets. We need to hear back from them asap because if they are we still have other repairs we need to start on that have to be done by Tuesday if we want to close on the house next week. But we don't want to put anything into this house if the bank is just going to tell us to shove it.

I really am so completely over this. I just want the stupid stuff to be behind us so we can have our house! It's like, nothing can go right in this process.

I'll keep you posted.

I'm not slacking...

I promise!

Due to some technical difficulties, I haven't been able to blog recently. I tried to switch into my dad's old (but still newer than my old) computer - but we're thinking the network card isn't working right. A replacement is on it's way, but in the meantime we finally got frustrated and Joey switched back to the old computer so we could at least have access to the internet. *But* all my recent pictures and my new photo editing stuff is on the newer computer. So I guess pictures will have to wait.

With that said.

Christmas was wonderful this year! The girls got a million billion toys, which we have put some away so they will have some new toys to play with in the new house. I got some new lenses for my camera, and some gorgeous jewelry from Joey and the girls, and Joey got a tv from my parents and a blu ray player and some movies from me :)

We have also learned in the last couple days that the bank that owns the house we are trying to buy has finally agreed to fix some of the problems with the house (mostly just things because it has been sitting not lived-in for so long) in order for our mortgage company (which has approved us) to approve the house to be mortgageable. So we're hoping that this is the last of the speed bumps and once that is all done we can close! I am starting to feel again that there might be a light at the end of this tunnel... so we will see how that turns out.

Here's to 2011! Starting the year off with everyone catching the flu - so things can only go up from here! ;p