What Matters Most To Me

Getting a head start

The kids are all in the showers, the dishwasher is going, and I have a minute to sit down and prepare for the week ahead. Something new I'm going to start is Menu Plan Mondays (which I still need to sign up for) but I went ahead and got a head start on it all.....

So for today, it is Menu Plan Sunday.

Monday

Breakfast-Oatmeal, Strawberries and Milk

Dinner-Beans, Spinach, Cornbread and Tea

Tuesday

Breakfast - Sunday Morning Pancakes , Blueberries and Milk

Dinner - Skillet Chicken Parmesian , Salad and Tea

Wednesday

Breakfast - Cereal, Banana and Milk

Dinner - Sloppy Joes, Fries and Tea

Thursday

Breakfast - Pumpkin Muffin, Apple Slices and Milk

Dinner - Chicken Pot Pies (in ramekins) and Milk

Friday

Breakfast - Eggs, Toast, Cantaloupe and Orange Juice

Dinner - Pizza (at Toni's, we will be traveling)

Saturday

Out of Town

Sunday

Out of Town

It's the Most WONDERFUL Time of the Year

Whoever thinks that photographer's always have great, perfect pictures of their children........think again! We went to a Christmas tree farm to select our tree for this year, and no I don't have a Christmas tree sitting in my living room already either. We select and tag it, pay for it and then drive back to the farm on our selected date to pick it up. Anyway, I thought it would be the perfect place for a picture for our Christmas card this year.....which in past years I've waited until the last minute and never end up getting out the Christmas cards I had intended to. This year is different. I had it all figured out....I'm starting early on all of this stuff. All I needed was a picture of the kids for the card.....ONE picture....just one, that is all I needed, and this is what I have.....

Katie started off mad, not sure why.....she just WAS NOT happy.

This is Spencer trying to force Katie to look at the camera, and Natalie...."her tights were itching her".

Now Katie is getting mad at Spencer because he is laughing at her throwing her temper tantrum.

I just have to laugh at this one. Natalie is looking at Katie and thinking "What is the matter with you?" and Spencer is obviously getting frustrated because he just wants to hurry up and be finished and Katie of course....still throwing her temper tantrum.

They look real happy don't they? I didn't post the one of Katie running to the truck crying and Jerome going and talking to her and calming her down before this shot. So...now Katie is cooperating and now, now it is Spencer's turn to throw a temper tantrum.

OK, now he is REALLY showing his pouty face. After this shot......I GAVE UP!!!

Now don't think I had the kids standing there for over an hour or anything trying to get ONE picture. All of these shots were taken within a matter of five minutes.......FIVE MINUTES. I figured if I wasn't going to get anything worth printing for cards or for large prints for family for Christmas, I had might as well make the best of it.....so I kept shooting regardless of how they were acting. 

And here is the shot, finally after all of that I finally got this shot......

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.........just kidding, do you actually think I managed to get one of the three of them being on their best behavior, smiling and happy? No, not a single one. So, I guess I'll be making a trip to Target to get a box of Christmas cards to send out this year. Hey, maybe I'll luck out and find a set with three happy kids on it, it won't be my three happy kids, but at this point.....I think it will do.

It's a good thing I love my kids so very, very much. Because at the end of all of that......this sign looked VERY tempting. Do you think they'd be happy working with elves at the North Pole? Just kidding. But do you notice how happy Katie is now? Do you notice that she is not wearing tights? Do you realize that that temper tantrum she threw was simply because she HATED her tights and wanted them off?

I gave up on getting pictures, it just wasn't meant to be for that day. Instead we moved on to a different part of the Christmas tree lot to look at some other trees that weren't so prickly. We had fun and found the perfect Christmas tree.

So there you have it. The reason I don't have a large, beautiful picture of the three of my wonderful children hanging on a wall in our home. I have one child out of the three of them that actually enjoys having the camera in front of her. Anyone want to take a guess which child that would be? Yes, it would be my Natalie. She is the only one that likes the camera in front of her and the reason that most of the pictures posted on this blog are of her. Who knows maybe one day I'll have a large beautiful picture of the three of them hanging on the wall in our home.....but for now.....I GIVE UP.

[Having my cake and eating it too]

I spent this evening with Natalie baking a chocolate cake and chocolate icing.....completely from scratch.I found the recipe on Bakerella 's website, which is originally a recipe of The Pioneer Woman . She has made a cookbook, which I can't wait to get my hands on. We had a bit of shopping to do this evening and while we were in Border's there it was, The Pioneer Woman's cookbook. If only I didn't have to buy winter coats and boots this week I think I would have picked it up as a birthday present for myself.

Natalie loves baking with me and I love it that she is learning measurements and how to cook as I teach her different recipes. She decided to play little Bakerella and grabbed my cell phone and started snapping pictures with it, cracks me up. We finished the cake, put it in the oven, made the icing and her and Spencer licked the spoon clean. We are all anxiously waiting for the cake to come out of the oven. It is baking right now and is making our home smell heavenly.

I made The Pioneer Woman's apple dumplings a while back ago and they are by far my husband's favorite, especially with a heaping spoonful of vanilla ice cream. We'll see what he thinks about the chocolate cake. I have to give a warning though, she uses a lot of butter in her recipe....a WHOLE lot of butter. Not something you want to make everyday unless you are desperately wanting to put on about 20 pounds. But for today, we made it for my birthday, and I enjoyed every minute I spent with Natalie baking it.

Jerome left to go pick up Katie from her friend Sydney's. We have had a very busy day today. From the Turf Bowl (which we didn't win), to shopping for winter coats and boots for the kids, and baking a cake with Natalie. We had planned on watching a movie tonight, Ghosts of Girlfriends Past, but are not so sure now. We are all pretty tired and ready to get some sleep after our busy day today.

(I'll post some pictures that Natalie took while we were baking...here...just as soon as I figure out how to move the pictures on the cell phone to the card in the phone.....electronics....something I am not great with).

Goodnight all....and I'll let everyone know how the cake is tomorrow.

~Amber Hope

Strawberry Shortcake and Something Scary

 
 

Natalie looked adorable as Strawberry Shortcake for trick-or-treating. She loved her costume, especially the green and white striped tights. She had wanted to be Dorothy but after many failed attempts at finding a pair of ruby red slippers (see post below), she picked out a cute Strawberry Shortcake costume.

As I loaded these pictures I couldn't believe the resemblance I saw in Natalie to me. Never have I ever thought any of my children look like me. Spencer and Natalie favor Jerome, and Katie, she is a spitting image of my Grandma Strickland when she was a little girl. I was excited to see these pictures and see that at least one of the three babies I carried looks at least a little like me. Of course, her big brown eyes she gets from her Daddy though.

She giggled as she told me, "Look mommy, they knew I was Strawberry Shortcake so they gave me a piece of strawberry candy".

And now on for something scary......

Lots of fake blood and a really scary clown mask for Spencer. He said he couldn't wait to give Grann a picture of him as a clown.....a scary clown.

You should have seen Molly's reaction to him (our dog). She flipped out and was barking at him like crazy. I told him to stop because she didn't know who he was but he thought it was funny that she was barking at him. Finally he pulled the clown mask off but Molly still wouldn't go near him.

We had a great time trick-or-treating together but ended up stopping about halfway through because it was starting to get cooler, Katie's poor toe was killing her (a trampoline incident I never posted because it was to gross), Jerome was having to piggyback Katie and the kids were all yelling they were hungry. So we left early and took the kids to McDonalds for dinner.

I had planned on getting these posted sooner....specifically before November. But, life happens and time got away with me. Better late than never I guess.

I hope all the coloring looks good. I edited these on my new monitor. Jerome surprised me with it as an early birthday present. I absolutely LOVE IT! A big huge difference from using a 19" CRT to a 23" wide LCD/HD monitor. I calibrated it and am keeping my fingers crossed that the coloring and contrast print up the same as what I see when editing. Thank you baby for the new birthday present....I looooove you!

~Amber Hope

Taylor Swift

Katie LOVES Taylor Swift, she can sing most of her songs and knows all of the lyrics. It is so cute to watch her sing her heart out to her songs, which is what she was doing here...

All she is missing is a sparkly silver guitar and a pair of cowgirl boots! I have her recorded on my cell phone, her and Natalie, singing their heart out in the back of the van to Taylor Swift's music.

When we were trick or treating she kept getting aggravated because nobody could figure out who she was so she would tell them Taylor Swift (she would say with a way of "you don't know...you should know" attitude). Then when they would find out who she was she got a lot of "Well, now you have to sing for your candy". She would giggle, blush and then sing a line from one of her songs.

Spooky

The house smells like pumpkin pie and the pumpkins look great glowing on the dining room table.  Can you guess which one is Natalie's pumpkin or should I say Boo's pumpkin? 

Spencer's pumpkin was HUGE, we found it at Sams. I have never seen such a big pumpkin, other than at the pumpkin festival. It took him quite a while to get it all cleaned out and ready to carve. When it came time to carve his pumpkin, the pumpkin carving knives did good at first then bent in all different directions. I had to get the kitchen butcher knife out and then finish the carving on his pumpkin.

And Katie's pumpkin, she wanted a polka-dot pumpkin, so we got creative with hers. I pulled out Jerome's drill and showed her how to drill holes in it. I helped her drill holes all over her pumpkin and she loved it! The best part was when we lit the candle in her pumpkin, it put glowing dots all over the walls. "It looks like a disco ball!" she said. I had to make her put the drill down, she was having a ball drilling holes all over her pumpkin, if she had kept drilling the way she was...I knew she wasn't going to have much of a pumpkin left, lol.

Seriously...can it be this hard to find Ruby Red Slippers...

I remember the days when the girls were younger that I couldn't wait until the Disney Store came out with their Halloween costumes. We would make a special trip to pick out the princess they wanted to be that Halloween. We would buy the dress, the tiara, the shoes, the wand.....everything to make them feel like a princess. We've gone through Minnie Mouse, Jasmine, Belle, Snow White and so on.

Well, here I am this year, the day of trick or treating, doing what I swore I would never do....waiting until the last minute. It doesn't help either that I have two daughters that are just like me when it comes to making decisions. Decision making isn't their best quality either, lol. It hasn't actually been to the last minute. I did go out yesterday looking for a pair of ruby red slippers. Natalie decided at the last minute that she wanted to be Dorothy. I thought "OK,we still have a Dorothy dress, we just need a pair of ruby red slippers". After two days of searching every store imaginable....no ruby red slippers anywhere were to be found.

So today as soon as she got of the bus we made a trip to the Halloween store. She has grown so much that the childrens costumes didn't fit her and let me just say we had a hard time finding her one in the womens sizes that was of approval. She picked out a Strawberry Shortcake costume, with matching green and white striped tights. We get to the check out line and there behind me stood a woman with a pair of ruby red slippers. I couldn't believe it, after all this searching they had them their at the Halloween store. Natalie decided to stick with the Strawberry Shortcake costume (thank goodness because the ruby red slippers cost the same amount as her whole costume). We went home, bag with the Halloween costume and fake blood (Spencer's costume accessory) in hand, and rushed around to get ready.

Note to self.....DON'T WAIT UNTIL THE LAST MINUTE NEXT YEAR!!!!

And here we are (pretty close to last minute) working on carving the pumpkins. Actually we made it a two day process. Jerome helped the kids clean the pumpkins out and get them ready for carving for the next night....seeing that I was on some pretty strong pain meds and couldn't help in the fun. If the pictures look a little bit blurry....they are. I didn't feel like stumbling around trying to find my flash. I took some pictures of them gutting their pumpkins and then Jerome looked at me, smiled and told me I should go lay down. And that is what I did......I slept all night.

TSYFL Cheer Competition

The girls did great at their cheer competition this past Sunday. They have worked very hard for it too! The D-team (Katie's team) took 2nd place in dance and cheer for their division and the C-team (Natalie's team) took third place in their dance and cheer for their division. 

This competition always falls on the second week in October, and every year Jerome has to miss most of it because drill weekend is always the second week of the month. I had a hard time choosing whether to record or take pictures (I would have done both if I had another set of arms). I wanted Jerome to be able to see Katie's dance and cheer so I recorded instead of taking pictures. Jerome made it just in time to see Natalie perform her dance and cheer so I was able to take some pictures of her performance.

Just how many cheerleaders were there?? LOTS!!!

Most of the shots I took were after all the teams had performed. The pictures (technically) aren't perfect but in every other way are. I love this one of Katie and Jerome.....

Spencer was playing around too, having a good time like everyone else. Yeah.....he might not like this picture but oh well...

Simplify

Sometimes our life just seems so busy, I feel like I am always trying to "catch up". I have decided to simplify our life in whatever ways that I can. I know being a mom that sometimes life just feels overwhelming, but lately it has been to overwhelming. I want to be able to enjoy the simple things in life.

I have been taking care of my sick kids now for over a 2 weeks. We've made several trips to the doctor, several trips to Rite Aid and filled lots of prescriptions. I am thankful that everyone is starting to feel a little better.

Today all of my kids are back in school, and hopefully not to return home with some other virus they've picked up from school. This morning started out wonderful. I was up early, unloading the dishwasher and putting away all the clean dishes, making a nice hot breakfast for everyone, getting lunches packed, getting Spencer on the bus, waking the girls up, braiding their hair, finding their shoes and getting them out the door on time to catch the bus. I had my day all planned out. Seeing that I have been gone from home more than I have been here, I decided to work on getting the house cleaned back up, laundry finished and some editing done. I feel like we have been living at the doctors office, three tips alone since Monday. I haven't had the time this week to keep up on the house and I needed to get caught up. 

I gathered up all the laundry, and let me tell you there was a lot. I have been making the kids shower and put a fresh change of clothes on when they come home from school, or when we come home from being at the doctor's office and then again after coming home from practice. The flu has been going around here in our schools like crazy and I am just trying to keep the germs they pick up from school or the doctor's office out of our home. I put the first load in and a few minutes later the washer stopped. I new it wasn't finished washing, so I went to check on it. It was full of laundry and sudsy water and wouldn't do anything. After calling Jerome, and trying to get it to work again, no luck. This isn't at all how I planned my day out......the washer wasn't suppose to break. I have to much to do to deal with another appliance in our home breaking (the deep freezer broke last week, we had to have lost at least $300 in food). So I decided that I'd spend the day at the laundry mat, and look to the brighter side of "at least it will all be finished in one day". But before I could load any laundry in the van, I had to make a trip to storage to drop off the girls play kitchen I had loaded in the van.

As I was driving a song came on the radio that just made me laugh. I'm not sure who sings it but it made me laugh. It has a phrase in it "sounds like life to me". I dropped the play kitchen off, and went through Rite Aid to drop off another prescription. Now I am back home, I have the laundry loaded and ready to go, but now it is time for the girls to be getting off the school bus. I think I'll wait and go to the laundry mat while they are all at practice. Somedays I wonder if I'll ever get everything "caught up". Sometimes I think there is just to much. I remember the days when the kids were younger, we didn't have a lot but we were happy. We are happy now as well, but sometimes I just miss the more simple days. I don't know how we accumulate so much "stuff" over the years. So with that I have decided to SIMPLIFY. I know my kids may kick and scream when I go through their closets and drawers, under their beds (which isn't suppose to have ANYTHING under them), and through the rest of the house. It is time to tackle the clutter that is cluttering up our life. In the end I do hope they will be happy with my decision to simplify. Honestly, I know they will. Because instead of having a mom that is always cleaning they will have a mom that has more time to play with them, whether it be going on hikes or playing in the leaves. It will make our life more simple.

[cheering in the pouring rain]

[taken with camera phone]

It POURED the rain at Saturdays game. Katie got to cheer first:) After she was finished cheering we gave her some hot chocolate from the concession stand. Her little legs and hands felt like popsicles.

Then it was Natalie's turn to cheer. By this time it was beyond pouring the rain. You can see by how drenched she looks even in her slicker.

Lucky for us the concession stand had plenty of hot chocolate and Natalie's team didn't cheer the second half of the game. We were able to go home.......soaking wet from head to toe.

I believe the girls got a good lesson in what dedication means:)

After the game we all went home, took warm showers and put our p.j.s on for the rest of the day. We were just going to relax and have a peaceful Saturday. That is until I received a call from Katie's team mom asking where Katie was. I thought when they said everything was postponed for the competition that it also meant the practice before competition. We hurriedly got ready, but not without an argument from Katie. She stomped all the way down the hallway to her room crying, "Why do I have to practice today? I don't want to practice today! I don't like cheer leading anymore!!" and then her door slammed and a few minutes later she came walking out wiping the tears off of her face dressed and ready to go to practice. Dedication my dear, dedication.
We have always made it a rule, that when you sign up for something, you are going to finish it out. Katie truly does love to cheer, but she just didn't want to practice Saturday after cheering in the pouring rain at the game. I can't say I blame her.....I was looking forward to a nice relaxing Saturday around the house after the game. 

[blueberry muffin]

I love blueberries and so do my girls. Anything blueberry we love, blueberry ice cream, blueberry tea, blueberry pancakes, blueberry muffins......anything with blueberries.

When Jerome and I were newly weds and lived in San Diego we would often eat at a restaurant called The Soup Plantation. We loved it. I loved the blueberry muffins they made. Forever I have tried blueberry muffin recipe after another trying to find that perfect blueberry muffin. We finally found one we love, but that doesn't mean we will quit trying to find another "perfect blueberry muffin recipe".

Outstanding Blueberry Muffins

Streusel Topping

1/4 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 cup sugar

3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

4 Tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small pieces and chilled

Muffin Batter

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature

3/4 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2/3 cup milk

1 cup fresh blueberries, washed, picked over and drained on paper towels

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Spray or grease a muffin pan or line with paper cupcake liners.

2. Prepare the topping. In a small bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, and cinnamon. With a pastry blender , cut in the pieces of butter to make a crumbly mixture. Set aside.

3. Sift the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt into a medioum bowl. Set aside.

4. In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in the vanilla and milk. Blend in the flour mixture just until incorporated; do not overbeat. Stir in the blueberries.

5.Spoon the batter into the muffin pan, filling the cups almost to the top. Sprinkle each muffin with streusel.

6. Bake in the center of the oven for about 20 minutes, or until firm to the touch and golden. Cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then remove the muffins to a wire rack to cool completely.

I found this recipe in one of Natalie's favorite cookbooks -

[Small Town Parade]

We have been so busy lately, so much going on. The kids were in the parade Thursday evening, Natalie for C-team cheer, Katie for D-team cheer and Spencer for A-team football. Spencer and I both were sick, and hadn't planned on being in it, but after the long walk to drop Natalie and Katie off to their floats, we passed Spencer's A-team float and Ken and Dawn told us to ride with them in the truck (thank you so much Dawn and Ken).

Miss Teen WV was placed behind the boys A-team float in the parade. The boys all had fun with that. She gave the coach a signed picture and he in turn auctioned it off to the boys to whoever would give him 250 bellies at Monday's practice. She also agreed to be at the practice and blow the whistle for the 250 bellies.

Katie's "OK mom, enough pictures look"........

Towards the end of the parade we passed the coach's wife and his little girl.....

I wasn't able to get a picture of Natalie until the end of the parade (we had to chase her float down to get her on it).

[Isaac +Savannah]

 

 

 

Happy birthday to my sweet youngest sister Savannah. Love you sis!

If you would like to view Savannah and Isaac's gallery, enter the main site, under client galleries enter the password     love

They tied the knot several weeks ago. It was a very emotional and happy day. I have been working hard on her gallery, trying to finish it up before her birthday (which is tomorrow). I was going to wait and save these and give them to her in a book but I just couldn't hold on to them anymore. If you are planning on viewing their gallery....you might just want to grab a cup of coffee (it's a long gallery). Enjoy!

~Amber Hope

I will be disconnected from the computer today. I am rearranging my office, and then getting everything back in it's place. I am sure that it will be an all day task, but ready to get it finished. I have so many sessions booked for these next few months and it makes it so much easier when you have a good place to work.

Speaking of which, someone's birthday is coming up soon (hint,hint), these would be SOOO nice.....

 

Not all of them, it looks to unorganized and to chaotic to me, I know it's Pottery Barn, but I think this is a little bit to many with to much stuff. I think I'd go nuts looking at that much stuff everyday!

I'm thinking maybe one row with these -

 

 

This one is an absolute necessity. Jerome is always forgetting his cell phone, we have three different places in the house that we charge all these little gadgets.....this one is a MUST, lol.

 

So if there is a little birdie out there somewhere, have him go my hubby's way and give him a little hint, hahaha.

[back in the game]

 

Yesterday was Spencer's first full day back at football practice. The doc took the hard cast off yesterday morning and put a rubber cast on him and cleared him for football. Needless to say he was one happy boy. Now he is back in the game and ready to play some football.

 

This is how we spend our evenings, every single day of the week except Wednesday (church). We spend our evening to the sound of whistles blowing, the sound of tackles being made, and the sound of the cheerleaders from each team doing different cheers.

The kids practice times have moved from 6-8 to 5:30 -7:30. We are still struggling trying to make sure we get dinner before going to the field and then rushing when we get home to get everyone showered and tucked in bed at a decent hour. Their schedule keeps us pretty busy and on the run. You want to have peek into our lives.....just look at all these pictures. That is what we have been doing now for the past several weeks and still have several more weeks to go.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now.....off to fix dinner, get the kids ready for practice, and head to the field for another long evening of football and cheer practice. Then home after practice, showers, snack, brush teeth, read and tuck the kids in bed.