Photos

Christmas Recap

We are back from our Christmas getaway. We had a fabulous time. I so wanted to cut back to something that was more about family and less about stuff, and I think that we succeeded.
We drove over Saturday morning to Sunriver - it was snowing pretty well on the pass but the 4runner (which was literally stuffed to the brim with stuff) did fine. Got there and luckily the place was ready early so we moved in. There was about 4" on the ground, and the kids were simply thrilled. We spent our days playing in the snow and the evenings we did different things - Saturday night we did crafts and made all our own Christmas decorations for the tree. Sunday night we made sugar cookies and decorated them. Then we decorated the tree. Monday night the kids put on their new PJs and we read 'Twas the Night Before Christmas' and ran out in the snow in our bare feet (a P family tradition according to dh, who knows) It rained a little on Monday afternoon, but then we got more and more snow and so there was plenty for the kids to play in.
I went to the gym over there each day, boy do I love that gym. It feels so decadent. The locker room is really beautiful - lots of gorgeous stone and the spa room has a waterfall, rocks and a ceiling with 'stars' on it. The showers are individual rooms and everything just smells so good. It was so relaxing each day to go work out and then get ready in their room like a spa.
We had brunch with Santa, Mrs. Santa, Rudolf, a teddy bear and some elves on Christmas Eve. It was terrific. They had it at the great hall. It was so great DeNel, as Emma has really changed. She was SO EXCITED this year - just bursting. She was hugging the critters and smiling and jumping up and down. The elves remembered us from last year and were marveling at how much the kids had changed. It just was so great to have them so excited and happy.
We had dinner delivered on Tuesday and it was great. It felt really weird not to cook much of anything, although I did do the breakfast casserole I always do. The kitchen there wasn't really equiped well so it was a good decision, but still a little strange.
Exercise equipment was the theme this year for me - dh got me a dumbbell set I've been wanting and an exercise ball for the house. He also got me some pampering (facial, massage, etc) I'm excited. I'm going to space it out a little. I have a goal of loosing 45 pounds by 1/1, and so I'll reward myself when I reach that one. Then maybe another one at 50 pounds. We'll see.
Christmas Eve was pretty funny - I have to tell you a story. So we were trying to get the kids to bed, and they were resisting. The house had an open floor plan with a loft upstairs with 3 queen beds where the kids slept. It looked out on the living room (and tree) I went up since they weren't settling, and Jakey was laying with his glasses on still looking downstairs. I turned him around, took his glasses off and told him that Santa wouldn't come if he was awake. We set the alarm for 1am and went to bed.
We crawled out at 1am and had a terrible time finding the presents we had wrapped to hide them and unwrap them for the 'from santa' gifts. I stuffed the stockings in the laundry room and we set them all out on the long bench in the dining room, which was on the far side of the tree.
So in the morning I get up at 6am, not a sound from upstairs. I go back to bed. At 7 I get back up. A little whispering but no one comes out. So I go upstairs and they are awake and looking pretty glum. "Hey guys, do you want to go see what Santa brought?" Jakey very solemnly says, "He didn't come" It seems he had been checking over the railing nad saw nothing changed down by the tree, so they had decided that Santa had skipped us. They became dramatically more animated and happy after I said that I had seen he had and they raced downstairs to see what they got. They were thrilled.

Less then a week till Christmas

It is Wednesday morning. I have jogged 3 nights in a row - not far, not fast, but I've actually jogged. That in and of itself is totally amazing.
Yesterday was Jakey and Vi's Christmas program at school. They were very very nervous about the whole thing. They did great - sang several songs, got up and even did the hand stuff that went with the songs.
Today is their holiday party, more pictures soon.

The Weekend

Well it is Sunday night, and another weekend has sped by! Saturday night DH and I had a neat date - we got to go out alone to listen to music. A good friend of DH's is in a band, the Kronikles. They were playing at a small bar in Albany, so we headed up to see them play. They are TERRIFIC! Here are some pics of the group.

Sunday was also a banner day - I tried jogging for the first time in over a decade. I guess all my hard work with the EFX early in the morning has paid off. I jogged a mile at the gym this afternoon! I know, not very far, and certainly not very fast, but I did it. I didn't fall over in exhaustion, I could still hold a conversation, it was great! I also did a 'plank' and lasted 75 seconds.
I'm down 40 pounds as of this morning (yeah!) although I hope to be down 45.5 by New Years so I have some work to do.
Have a great week, more pics as things get recorded.

Christmas Santa Picture

Thought I'd share this year's Santa picture. Santa is looking younger these days!

The weekend

Me right before we went out Saturday night - I had to have this dress taken in a bunch to fit (hurray!)
Jakey helping set up Christmas decor outside

Emma decorating

Violet

Daddy and the kids setting up our giant inflatable snowman...

Elf

The big thing around the internet is to Elf Yourself - here is the link to us minus one child....
http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1218823910

Graduation and 19 days till Christmas

Well last night was the big event. DH walked in his graduation. I got off work early, went home and got the kids. The girls were so cute, they each picked their favorite dress (which unfortunately for them was a very cool springlike dress in each case) and then we bundled up and headed to the show. When we got to the parking lot we were greeted by two men in kilts playing bagpipes. We got settled and listened to the commencement ceremony. The speaker was a local politician who owned the Coca Cola company wouth of us in Roseburg. He talked about the 10 things to make you successful. It was interesting, in that a lot of what he said held true. I of course can't tell you all 10, but they were basically, get an education, keep learning, work hard, play hard, take calculated risks, and don't forget to ask for help.
He was a little long-winded but good.
We went to dh's favorite restaurant for dinner. It is a chinese buffett. While I was up getting food, who should I see but dh's best friend who had also graduated. He had a large amount of family come in and they were dining across the restaurant,but we all stopped to visit for a while. It was nice too, he mentioned to me that he and his wife are both going to start the same diet program I'm on come January 1.
Dh started it a few days ago by the way. When you start there is a pretty drastic weight loss. Even more drastic for DH - he has lost 11 pounds in about half a week. He is very pleased. Like me though, he finds it hard to believe that it works.
I got up and worked out again this morning - took most of this week off as I have been fighting a cold.
Tonight is the big holiday party at DH's work. I picked up my new smaller dress last night at the seamstresses house and visited with her. We have a little holiday shopping to do as well, as we count down to Christmas. I think this will be decorating weekend too - I'll post pics after the weekend of all our activities!

December

I can't believe its already December, how can that be? Today I woke up with a terrible sore throat and a stuffed up head. Ick. On a more upbeat note, a big problem at work resolved itself today. As I may have mentioned I'm also involved in personnel issues. I had started in on a big one that was fraught with troubles and I expected it would be a long time coming to a resolution. The employee solved my problem by quitting today - hurray!
Still eating right. I am now 13 weeks in and 38 pounds down. Not too shabby! Of course I had salt tonight, and I intend to weigh in tomorrow, so it might not all work out so sweet. Hopefully I won't retain too much water!
What else is new - oh, we bought a Jeep Wrangler this weekend, that was fun. DH has wanted one for a while, and now he has one. Its cute, and ufn to drive. Today his drive to work was through hurricane force winds and flooding, so it was good he had something that could 'boonie crash'.
We spent most of the weekend reassembling our house after our vacation, dooing laundry and cleaning the RV. Tomorrow night I take clothes to the seamstresses to see if she can resize things so they don't hang on me so baggy. Saturday I have a hot date with the hubby at his company Christmas party.
I'll try to be a better blogger soon.

More Pictures

The girls at the pirate showThe kids at Mickey's house

Jakey, Emma and I on the Jungle Cruise.

Violet with Princess Aurora and Snow White during our 'audience'.

Thanksgiving Week

Whew, it is good to be home!We have spent the last 11 days in California, seeing all the kid sights in the Orange County and San Diego area, and visiting with friends and family. Let me see if I can recap the highlights for you.

We left on Friday and drove with a stop at a rest stop, arriving in Anaheim in the afternoon. After setting up and cleaning up, we headed over to DH's brother's house for dinner. It was great to catch up and see how our kids had grown. We stayed and visited for hours.

The next morning we were up EARLY and off to Disneyland for the morning. It turns out that Myley Cyrus was filming her Christmas Special. We didn't get up by the stage but we did watch her perform a bit. We rode some rides, had breakfast with the characters, and planned on leaving at noon. Turns out the shuttle service takes a 2 hour lunch, and so we couldn't get back to the RV and on down to San Diego. AFter many phone calls, we changed our camping plans and stayed the rest of the day in Anaheim. When we got back to the RV we changed into PJs and then the kids and I went and watched the fireworks while sitting behind the RV on the pavement.

The next day we packed up and headed south to Oceanside. We pulled into Legoland and spent the afternoon riding roller coasters, and buying legos. Then off to our spot for the night.

The next day we drove down to San Diego and spent the day at the San Diego Zoo. That night we had dinner with my college roommate, Karen, and her boyfriend. It was so great to see her again and catch up!
The next day back to San Diego to the Children's Museum, then we drove north to Anaheim. That was an adventure. Traffic was TERRIBLE, and we took 2.5 hours to travel 50 miles. We got there, set up in 5 minutes, and raced to the Pirate Dinner Show. It was so fun! My niece was even taken up to participate in the show, and the acrobatics were fantastic.

Thursday was turkey day. Up early again for early-entry to Disneyland. We walked right onto the Matterhorn, and we met with Mickey himself. Then we took a nap and spent hte evening with Dh's brother and his family. DH's mom's sister and her husband was over and it was crazy how much she reminded me of my mother in law. It was nice to see them all.

Friday we were back to Disneyland for the day. We snuck over to California Adventure and saw Aladdin (very good) and rode Thunder Mountain and Indiana Jones. While the twins were riding Indiana Jones with Daddy, a cast member approached Emma and I. Em was kinda sad right then and he started talking to us. I guess Disney is doing 'A Year of A Million Dreams' where they give away dreams. he gave us a private audience with the Disney Princesses in the afternoon.

We raced back over at 3:30 and were met by a page in teh ballroom away from the regular 'meet the princess area'. He asked Vi what her favorite princesses were, and then he went away. he came back and told me that they had gotten those two for us. We were taken back to a private room where the two princesses were waiting for us. We sat with them for a while and talked and visited. It was nice.

Dinner that Night was Medieval Times, where I made a memory by giving my dh a black eye! We were lined up to get a picture taken. For anyone not having been to Medieval Times, they give you all these paper crowns to wear. So I felt mine starting to fall off and I reached out to grab it. I connected with DH's eye. It started bleeding and then eventually he got a pretty solid black eye out of it. DH's brother was worried and it was totally embarassing.

Saturday we drove home and got back last night. I weighed this morning and - ta da - not only did I not gain through all the theme parks, families, etc - I have lost a total of 35 pounds!!!! YEAH!!!!!!

So back to work tomorrow. Pictures later.

Tackle It Tuesday

Well I'm having trouble loading photos right now, but I will get there. For the last week I've been tackling our spare room. We affectionately call it 'the Bat Cave'. Our house is built on a hill and from the street it looks like a one story home. Downstairs under the front of the house is a concrete foundation butted up against the hill. The room that is down there was storage when we bought the place and unfinished. We've been slowly transforming it, but with Mom moving in everything went on hold. Last weekend we went through and hauled tons of stuff to Goodwill, and then I started laying carpet squares. I didn't realize that I had that skill, but now I do. I spent a lot of hours in the middle of the night, but it is done. Now we have a beautiful workout room that I actually WANT to go workout in. If the rest of the house were only that simple! I took pics of the horrible pile, and I will get a shot tonight of the after effects.
Look for pictures tomorrow when blogger lets me upload pictures!

Tuesday

Just a short update. It is Tuesday, and I've lost 30 pounds. I'm pretty excited about that but every single day continues to be a struggle. I guess some days are more then others really, but they all are a challenge.
This weekend I promised myself that I would workout each morning for half an hour. Easy enough, we had the time change this weekend so 5am is really what 6am was last week. Theoretically I'm just going to work an hour later and its all fine. I got up Monday and did my 30 minutes of high intensity interval trainings (HIIT) and this morning, the alarm went off and I thought, 'Oh, I'll go for a walk later." Then I thought, 'how totally embarassing, I ask myself to do 5 days in a row and on day 2 I'm wimping out?' I got up, and I did it. Burned 380 calories in 30 minutes. I still went for a walk later with my friend, but I kept with the program. Anyway, just a snippet into the life of a heavy girl trying to get lean.
Monday was certainly a Monday in every way. Started the day with poor Emma slamming her thumb in the front door. Went to work and took the van keys so the Nanny had no car so had to run it home. Accidently ran a red light (luckily no one was coming, what was I thinking?)
Today was a better day. Well it was till I got home. I'd been telling Vi that she and I would go look for minature hedgehogs - there is a pet store in town that sells them and we wanted to see a real one. Well its going to be our 'girl' thing. Then she takes the nanny instead, and it totally hurt my feelings. It is hard to share your kids sometimes, not often but sometimes.
As to Tackle It Tuesday, I am tackling some stuff. I'm working on what we call the 'Bat Cave' which is a room where our exercise equipment is stored as were some other boxes. Last weekend we emptied all the boxes, and I've started laying carpet tiles. I have a ways to go, but I'm making progress. I suspect it will take most of the rest of the year to do it, but eventually our workout room will be a pleasant thing to be in.

Happy Halloween

We took the kids to DH's work - they have cubicle trick or treat time each year. Every person who wants to participate hangs an orange pumpkin photocopy outside their cubicle. Its a nice time for people to see the kids and its certainly a safe environment. The adults have fun with it too - different areas have themes. This year the one group of Indian programmers were all dressed like they were wounded with bandages everywhere The one team leader was in scrubs with a stethescope. One man was dressed as William Tell, with an arrow through his head and an apple on top (and lots of cotton with red paint on either side.
We once again decorated over the top, with our blow up wolf arch by the door, a fog machine and screaming casket.
Happy Halloween everyone, let the holiday season begin!

10 Year Anniversary

What a great weekend. DH and I have now been married over 10 years, and on our anniversary, Thursday, we had quite a day.
I woke up to three roses (which in our secret language means 'I love you') a stuffed duck that sang 'Singing in the Rain' and a beautiful necklace. At lunch I received a dozen more roses and a note that said, "You are my world" Dinner was back at the restaurant that we had our first date at, at the same table with a single rose, just like our first date. At dinner DH gave me a beautiful anniversary ring. Overall it was lovely.
We snuck off Friday to the ocean, and played at the beach. Everyone got sick or had horrible allergy attacks, but it was still fun.

Some pics from this week...

Jakey in action at his Karate Class
Jakey helping Emma run her one round around the track.

Crest Drive Elementary School kids and teachers waiting to start the Jog-A-Thon.

Monday Catch up...

Wow, I'm a bad blogger, aren't I? I just got home from the gym (yeah me) and I thought I better log on and update. Tomorrow night is the mid-Autumn festival, where we will eat round foods and talk about ancestors and stare at the moon with Emma and talk about her other life. I've invited up a girlfriend who just returned from China this summer with her daughter to share in the fun.
We took the train to Portland this weekend for the day. It was a nice trip, and we took the streetcar downtown and then the tube out to the zoo. After the zoo we went to lunch downtown and then I went to Mecca (ops, I mean Nordstroms) and I fondled $600 pumps and settled for a mini-makeover in the makeup department. They were having a 'makeup event' so it was fun.
We also went and spent some time in the Classical Chinese Garden, it was lovely. here was a wedding there and it was really beautiful. We took lots of photos of the kids in the beautiful landscaping.
I'm down 15 pounds (more yeah for me) So far so good. Skinny jeans here I come!

Remodeling

I've been pretty scarce lately, I know. I thought I aught to let you all in on a little secret. I've started remodeling myself. Doesn't that sound simply lovely. At 41 it finally occurred to me that I've let myself go. I've put so much effort into my family and friends and work and what not, that I haven't spent much time on me.
So two weeks ago I started a medically supervised weight loss plan. Today I went to the gym for the first time since I can't remember when. So far I've lost 11 pounds! I know it's all water but I'm encouraged that the diet is easy enough to follow and reasonable. You eat 7 times a day. Six of those times are small portioned 'snacks' and the 7th is a full meal with at least 20 grams of protien.
I also dyed my hair back to it's original color, and put some effort into the little things I've been neglecting. Funny how life gets away from you and you don't pluck, primp and do all the little things that make you feel like a girl.
Just in case you think I've totally forgotten how to be the self-sacrificing woman, I've also signed on to volunteer at the kid's kindergarten every couple of weeks :) Some things never change!
I'll try to be more consistent in my writings. Today I was super woman at lunch and didn't get a chance to post on my blog. Tomorrow is officially the anniversary of when we met Emma. Today I wrote a letter to Emma's foster parents and sent it to be translated. I'm scooting under the wire, but the service will get it translated and send it and a box of Moon Cakes to her foster parents late next week in honor of the Mid-Autumn Festival. It is traditional to send moon cakes during that time, and I'm glad to do it. I hope that they will again write back and reveal a little more about Emma's time right before she came to be with our family.

A year of Emma

Well we are coming up on a year now that Emma has been with us - I've been playing with making a slide show to show how much she has changed. I need it to remind myself - sometimes I don't realize what a year can do! Enjoy!

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

First Day of School

Well today was a big day at our household - the first day of Kindergarten! DH, being the amazing man that he is, took off at 10am, and drove the 45 miles home so he could go with me to take the kids to their class at 11:30.
I think that the thing that strikes me the most is how my perspective has changed over the years. Five years ago I couldn't imagine that my babies would ever do anything other then lay there crying and not being able to communicate. Now they are in public school!
I'll post pictures later, when we get them off the camera. I did want to share one little vignette though about the day. After we dropped the kids off I came home and had lunch. Nanny and Emma had gone downstairs, and I could hear them. Emma, being only 2-1/2, has to wait a few years for school but she was pretending to be going today. She was packing her backpack full of stuff. Nanny was doing a great job of playing along.
when I went downstairs I found Emma, still fully dressed with a t-shirt and pants. On top of this she had applied a tinkerbell constume and wings, and her Elmo backpack which barely shut. She had stuffed in a wide array of toys and goodies so she would be 'ready' for school.
All my worries about how she would take being alone with the Nanny were unfounded. She was happy as a clam going to her own pretend school.

Labor Day Weekend in California

This weekend is a big holiday in the US - Labor Day. We took our one last quick jaunt down to California before the kids start school and headed to our family in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Our family has a condo with a deep water dock, as they are in the process of restoring a boat so that they can go out on the high seas. Right now the boat is beautiful on the outside but needs some finishing on the inside. They have christened it 'the Rubber Ducky' and it is going to sail in a couple of years.

We drove down on Friday, and Saturday we swam and played around their condo. It was HOT.
Sunday we braved BART and rode into the city. The Bay Bridge was closed for repairs and so everyone else was riding BART too - it was crowded! We went to China town. I had always wanted to go, and I needed Moon Cakes in order to celebrate the Autumn Festival. I've been mulling over September in general in my mind, as we are also coming up on the one year anniversary of getting Emma. Anyway, I suspect we'll have a joint celebration of the Autumn Festival and the deay Emma came to be with us. Although it was a terrific day for us, it was a pretty hard sad day for her so celebrating the AF seems smart. Basically AF is a time for families, where everyone goes out and looks at the full moon and thinks of their loved ones. It seems appropriate somehow.
While we were in Chinatown we stumbled across a playground just off on the corner. We stopped to let the kids run off some steam. The playground was full of asian kids, and one woman approached me. She was from China and had adopted her 7 year old from China 5 years ago. She was having nice memories of her own child watching Emma play.
We had some other excitement this weekend as well. We have noticed over the last year that Emma has trouble with how dry our climate is compared to China. This weekend we went somewhere even drier, and boy did she let us know. When Emma hits a dry warm climate, she gets nosebleeds. Not just any old nosebleeds either, but big scary ones at night. They wake her up and she feels like she is in some kind of terrible horror movie. We had one every day we were in California, and our poor family had more sheets to wash then I would have ever imagined. Of course the poor cousins we were staying with had never seen anything like it either, so we'd have 5 kids in our room, one covered in blood and 4 looking scared or crying. Weee.
Other then that our trip was fantastic!
Here are some pics of the weekend for your enjoyment...

Tackle It Tuesday....

Well today I have no pictures of before (or after) but my tackle for today was....my toes! I gave myself the evening off, and went to the mall. I ate dinner alone, I shopped and shopped (didn't buy much of anything, but it was fun to look) and then I got a pedicure and foot massage. Ahhh, dreamy.
I did buy a few things as well. I bought tap shoes and a dance bag for my little dancer. She starts class in 3 weeks and I talked to the office today and got the list of supplies. Payless Shoe source sells ballet and tap shoes, go figure!
I got Jakey 3 shirts too - even a spiderman shirt that glows in the dark. He took one look at it when I got home and said, 'Mom, I LOVE you' Good to know that it is all about what I bring him!
Nanny had a better day. She even bravely took them to Target. They came home with coloring stuff and itty bitty pigs with velcro feet. They are completely smitten with her (and so am I!) It is such a nice change from prior nanny.
DH set up his tripod and his camera last night before we went to bed, and set his alarm for 2:30am. He got up to film the eclipse and stayed up for a while, trying to shoot the perfect picture. He said the moon was red.
He came back to bed and he calculates got a total of 3-1/2 hours sleep last night before geting up early to go to the gym and work out before work. He was only barely coherant by the time I got home - he had parked the kids in front of Mythbusters and they were happy as could be doing a 'Slumber Party'.
Oh, I also ran the Certificate of Citizenship over to the post office today so now Emma's passport is officially on it's way. Hopefully in 12 weeks she will have her Certificate and her passport back in our house!

The fun never ends...and a great evening!

Poor Nanny. First full day of work. She decides she is going to take the kids to the park, so they load up in the van. She backs out. She hears a scraping noise. The running board on the passenger side has fallen off except for the front. It won't stick back up. It won't come undone. So she unloads and comes back in. They play, they nap, they play some more. They go outside for a minute to color, and Vi carefully locks the door and pulls it shut. Nanny has not brought the kids. Little did she know what an efficient and safe child I have!
So when I got home all 4 of them were sitting on the front lawn. She felt awful as the house wasn't as clean as she would have liked (it was probably cleaner then I left it for her!)
So as a bonus, the passport office called. They want more paperwork, so I have to call them tomorrow and figure out how to take time to go do that as well. It seems that although the clerk who took my paperwork friday did not want my certificate of citizenship and did consider the birth certificate enough proof, the woman reviewing today did not.
Threw all 3 kids in the tub after that and ordered Chinese food. This week is a big week for us actually. This is the last free week before Jakey and Vi start kindergarten. Tonight is even more special though. I'm so proud to tell you that my dh finished college tonight! He has been at this for as long as I have known him, knocking out a class here and there. He probably has enough credits for 3 bachelor's degrees, but tonight he completes the last one to give him his diploma. He did a degree completely program through a local university here. During the entire 19 months he has gotten all As (3.95 since he got an A- in a class) and I am so proud of him. A lot has been thrown at him during this - he had a retina detachment, cateracts, a 5 car pile up and neck injury, a slip on the ice and a rotator cuff tear, surgery to repair it, adoption in China, the loss of his Mom in our home. Yet somehow through all that my guy kept at it and he did it! I have cards for him and more pride then I can even begin to share. Yeah HUBBY!

An Adoption Video...

When Love Takes You In - Steven Curtis Chapman
Amy put this up on her blog while she is waiting for her referral (hurry up China!) and it made me cry. The one little girl looks so much like Emma....

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Passport Time

Well this morning I drug myself up bright and early, and took all 3 kids to the post office. Doesn't that sound like a fun way to start the day? Although the rest of us have our passports, little Ms. Emma is still sitting with her Chinese passport and US Visa. Since we plan on flying over the pond next spring, we thought we better get a matching passport to the rest of the family!
For those of you outside the US, passport turn around times have grown to amazingly long periods now. Headlines say 3 months, but we've heard rumors of close to 6 months. Since we leave in 8 months, we figured better to be safe then sorry.
Getting a passport in a small town for a child who wasn't born here is an adventure. Thank God we re-adopted when we got home. If you are adopting internationally, when you get home adopt in your state, even if it isn't required. It makes so many things easier, and getting a passport is no exception.
The US issues one piece of paper to prove citizenship when your child arrives in this country. It isn't something you get copies of, it is a single copy. Had we not readopted, we would have had to send our lone copy off with the passport application and been without it for 8-12 weeks or more. This way I gave them an official Oregon birth certificate and off it went!
We got there 15 minutes before the offices opened, and we were 4th in line. By the time their office did open there were 10 of us waiting. I'm glad we went when we did.
So another thing done in our slow planning of our trip across the ocean. Jo, here we come!

The Thursday Thirteen

Thirteen things in my purse...
1. wallet
2. cell phone/palm pilot courtesy of my gadget guy, dh
3. pen
4. passports
5. passport photo of Emma
6. lip gloss
7. lip stick
8. ticket stub from the last movie we watched
9. change
10. notebook with list of things to do because I still don't use the palm pilot as anything more then a glorified address book!
11. a crumpled up dandelion that one of the kids gave me as 'my flower'
12. Some Susan B Anthony dollars waiting for Jakey to loose another tooth (Or Violet)
13. Emergen-C packets for my vitamins

Not a very creative Thursday Thirteen, I know, but I'm getting back in the swing of things! Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!


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A few more Family Camping Pictures