There's nothing like handmade

My friend, Emily, who has become a sewer/knitter extraordinaire, made a poncho for Annabel. We were inspired by one that we saw online on Etsy, and it must be said that the one Emily made is so much cuter!

I know the poncho doesn't match her outfit here. We were heading out the door to go the lake in our neighborhood and grabbed it at the last minute when we realized it was getting chilly. But still, the glaringly non-matching pants don't take anything away from the adorableness of the poncho. Or the girl in it!

Here's the view from behind. Another nice thing about it is that it's roomy enough that Annabel will be able to wear it next year too.

With her daddy. She's saying "cheese!"

And with the hood off. Annabel loves her new poncho! Thanks, Em!!

Cheers,
Cathy

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Let's go fly a kite

Yesterday we got a fun little kite as a party favor from a birthday party we went to. So since we are getting gale force winds in these parts, we took the kite out. Annabel loved the "pretty kite!"


The kite is that tiny yellow dot above the house. It got pretty high!


Chris attempts some tricks with the kite. Shortly after I took this one, it nose-dived into the backyard.

I took a turn with the kite too, and it was pretty fun! Chris took a couple pics on his phone, but I wasn't pleased with how I look in them. So as the author of this blog, I reserve the right to withhold less-than-flattering pictures of myself. Ha!

After a bit, the wind got the better of us, and the kite took a header into one of our trees. We were too busy trying to extract the kite to remember to take pictures, so here's one of the aftermath:


That's the poor kite's tail still in the tree. I guess we'll try to get it out... someday...

Cheers,
Cathy

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The dreaded "F" word

It's not what you think!! It's actually...

FUNDRAISING!!

Yep, it's time for Annabel's school's spring fundraiser. It's actually pretty cool, a little different. It's a flower catalog called flowerpowerfundraising.com. And not like 1-800-FLOWERS or anything like that. It's actually flowers (bulbs) and plants for your garden or landscaping. See? Pretty cool, huh? (Work with me, people!)

Here's the link directly to Annabel's school's fundraising site. You can order directly from this site and all items will be shipped to you. No middle man (ME!) bugging you and hassling you! And 50% of what you spend will go to Annabel's school!

So why am I blogging about it? To ask you to buy, of course! PLEASE?!?!? Here are a few items in the catalog (click on the photo to go to the ordering site):

20 double freesias mixture ($10). Apparently these bloom mid-late summer. All the flowers in this catalog are so pretty, it ALMOST makes me want to plant a garden. But then, who would I hire to take care of it?

Summer Garden Collection ($20) contains 6 Purple Liatris, 10 Peacock Orchids, 7 Mixed Gladiolus and 20 Mixed Harlequin Flowers. Gorgeous! If only I knew what to do with them all!

Top Hat Blueberry ($30) includes1 Top Hat blueberry plant (ships in a 4 1/2" pot), Terra cotta colored planter and planting medium. This plant will fruit by its second year. How pretty! And fresh blueberries without paying $3 a pint!

And there's tons more, like one of those hanging tomato planters, lots and lots of different flowering bulbs, other fruits, etc. And did I mention, 50% of what you're paying goes to Annabel's school!

I'm going to browse and see if maybe they have a lemon tree, or something else fun like that. Or maybe I'll get the blueberry thing. Then I'll blog about how I kill, er I mean, care for it.

Happy Shopping! And THANKS!! (And I promise I won't complain when you ask me to buy stuff for your kid.)

Cheers,

What a difference a year makes!

I have a feeling that I could use that blog post title for a lot of things, but I happen to have pictures to illustrate this time.

I've been busy, busy, busy editing all the photos from my bunny mini-session day a couple of Sundays ago. So I haven't been able to edit any of the ones of Annabel, including the ones with Annabel and her Ba Ngoai or her Nonni (I think that's how we're spelling it). I did edit one real quick just so that I'd have one to post. But to think, this was Annabel last Easter...

She was terrified of that bunny. I mean Terrified, with a capital T. I'm sure the photo on the photographer's camera right after this one was of her with her mouth wide open in cry/scream mode because she didn't want to be anywhere near that bunny.

And this was Annabel this year...

She just loved those "munny rwabbits!" It's amazing how much they change so quickly, isn't it?

Cheers,

Daddy and Daughter

I originally titled this post "Daddies and Daughters," but I really only talk about one daddy and one daughter here, so I removed the plural. Not sure it has the same impact, but oh well :-)


I love my husband. He is the best husband and the best father I could ever ask for. He works very hard at his job, providing for his family as the sole breadwinner. We used to be a dual-income household, but after getting laid off and not being able to find an equivalent job, I decided to stay at home with Annabel. And Chris fully supports my decision to do so. He does household chores and pitches in with mine when he sees that I'm a little overwhelmed. He goes above and beyond in caring for Annabel, and - even better - clearly loves every moment of it. Even changing stinky diapers! He absolutely loves Annabel and me, and tells us and shows us a thousand times, a thousand different ways every day.

I'm not trying to brag, or paint him as this perfect guy. He's about as perfect as I am, which is to say, sooooooooooo not. I'm just trying to say that I appreciate him.

While I like having family portraits done with all three of us (and when we can, including the red-headed, four-legged kids), I really enjoy taking pictures of Chris and Annabel together. They are my two favorite people in the world, after all.


Cheers,

In bloom

I'm sorry I've been behind a few days on my blogging. It's been a fun-filled and action-packed few days! Annabel's Grammy came for a visit, and she's been dubbed a new name. Annabel can't say "Grammy" so she's been referring to her as "Nonni" instead. The deal was sealed when yesterday, Annabel was looking at some of the pictures I had taken, and she pointed at the them and said, "Nonni!" It's funny how these things happen. Remind me to tell you how she got an uncle named Hot Dog someday.

I also had my first round of mini-sessions for my photography business this weekend. I'll post about that soon.

This morning, I looked out into our backyard to this beautiful sight:


This is the tree that was given to us by Annabel's aunties to commemorate her birth. It was planted when during her 30-day meet and greet. Hard to believe that was almost two years ago.

How beautiful!

Cheers,
Cathy

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Cookie Monster

Remember that blog post for Valentine's Day where I was ranting about sugar for toddlers? Well, he who casts the first stone and all that...





I still say Pixie Stix are all kinds of wrong! Yeah, who am I kidding? There's at least that much sugar in an Oreo, huh?

Cheers,
Cathy

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