nothing says Easter...

...like candy corn called Jesus Seeds!



Hope everyone had a glorious Easter! :)

348 - 364

It's the home stretch! Almost there!

348 of 365: Pretty Lady
I took portraits of both girls this day, and this is the best portrait Olivia I have gotten to date. She's so pretty.


349 of 365: nudity
Yep, the girls no longer where clothes. You're more likely to see them naked than to see them clothed. Please don't judge us.


350 of 365: self portrait
Taken at work, in one of the Christmas balls I hung all over the place


351 of 365: Santa baby
Look! Both girls sitting happily on Santa! I never thought I'd see the day!


352 of 365: beat
taken after a long long afternoon of last minute Christmas shopping


353 of 365: magic
These are Olivia's ornaments (I buy her one from this set every year) and I was playing around with bokeh (the circles in the background)


354 of 365: let me sleep
Vash laid down in this baby bed I use as a prop for newborns. Olivia's the one that covered him with a blanket - so he wouldn't get cold during his nap.


355 of 365: pensive
perhaps worred about Santa?


356 of 365: sugar
the day I baked sugar cookies until I was buried in sugar


357 of 365: chocolate
the day I baked chocolate chip cookies until the package of chips ran out


358 of 365: Not a creature was stirring...
Christmas Eve, right after Santa had dropped by. I must have been on the computer and just missed him ;)


Lets break in the 365 to talk about Christmas. Firstly, I hope everyone enjoyed theirs. We certainly enjoyed ours. This year Olivia truly understood Christmas... she understood that she was going to get to unwrap a whole lot of presents. We'll work on a better message for her later ;) So for Olivia, every time she was done with a gift, she would point to a new wrapped present and say "Owivia open nother pwesent mommy??" She was always very polite about it. Claire wouldn't open her presents, but she would sit next to you while you opened it, screaming "WHAT IS IT!??????? WHAT! IS! IT!!!!!!!!!!!!" I just died laughing.

Christmas day we started at our own home, then we drove to Upper Sandusky. In upper, Tim and I quickly realized that we had forgotten sippy cups. Olivia can use a real cup, but Claire can't (though she can use a straw) To substitute, we gave Olivia her juice in a disposable coffee cup. Hilarious!


This image of Karen pretty much sums up all of the adults feelings of Christmas by the end...


From there, we came back to Columbus, and went to Tims parents house. We attempted a picture of all the grandkids together, but it didn't go so well...

359 of 365: presents


360 of 365: Generations
Three generations of men in Tims family. Oh and Claire. Because she manages to weasel herself into many pictures


361 of 365: snow now??
We had no snow over Christmas. It actually felt very Halloween/Thanksgiving-like in the weather department. Of course it snowed 2 days after Christmas. Thanks a lot Mother Nature!


Since it snowed, the next day we went over to my parents house to visit Haley and Aunt Sue, and play in the show. Got to love a bundled kid.






I asked Haley to throw snow, since it was such fluffy snow, and looked so cool when it was thrown.

362 of 365: SNOW!!!




And Haley tried so hard to teach the girls how to make snow angels. Claire was really the only cooperative one in that attempt, and even that probably had more to do with the fact that she could barely move in her snowsuit.




363 of 365: dropped
Claire has now stopped napping. In her crib. She has, however, taken up Olivia's method of just dropping to sleep where-ever she is. Only Olivia won't leave Claire alone. So here's Olivia sitting as close to Claire as possible, while watching tv and picking a wedge. Love that kid.


364 of 365: snuggie
I love all my presents that I got for Christmas, but it's the snuggie that gets the most attention. I love that thing. Probably because it's zebra print.

Is it possible to catch up 32 pictures in one day?

I don't know, but I'm going to try! In roughly an hour and a half, it will be December 31st, which is the last day of my 2009 365 day project. And I want to finish on time. I really do. So there might well be a blitzcrieg of blog posts over the course of this day, so that I can have a proper finish.

Our first day back from NYC, I decorated our Christmas tree. I had put the tree and lights up before we left, but saved the ornaments for when I got back. Olivia helped me (for real, not air quoted at all!)

333 of 365: Mommy's Helper


The girls' favorite gift we brought back from NYC was their taxi cabs. They're the kind you can pull back, and then they spring forward. The girls had a ball with those.

334 of 365: TAXI!


I love the game Pikmin, so when we went to the Nintendo store, we bought this bulborb doll. Technically for me. We knew a child would take it. Shoulda figured it would be Claire.

335 of 365: its a fwog


If you got a Christmas card from us, you should recognize this picture. If you didn't, it's either because you're not on my list (sorry) or because it's sitting here on my counter without an address on it (even sorrier!!)

336 of 365: Christmas Cuties


It's really sad to me that Claires winter coat is a hand-me-down from Olivia. Not because it's a hand-me-down... but because it was Olivia's FIRST coat. Olivia wore it when she was 6 months old. Claire is two.

337 of 365: Baby it's cold outside


What can I say... Tim loves Vash.

338 of 365: Save me


Awww, our completely decorated tree!

339 of 365: Silent Night

25 to go!

all about Rockerfeller

Friday was Rockerfeller day. Jessica has talked up going to the 'Top of the Rock' pretty much ever since she's moved to NYC. It's just like going to the top of the Empire State Building... except you can see the Empire State Building! I was sold. Like before, by this point in the trip, I had this feeling of if we didn't get to Rockerfeller, I wouldn't mind. And then after doing it, I couldn't imagine not doing it. It was that cool. You can buy one time visit passes, or you can get morning/evening passes, so that you can go up twice in one day. We went with the morning/evening.

The cool church from a few posts ago






The front desk people had warned us that it was overcast and cloudy, and might not be the best day for viewing. But I love how the clouds turned out in the pictures, so I was fine with it (though I agree that it was quite a bit hazy up there)

331 of 365: limitless


The Statue of Liberty looks so small from here!


The New Years ball never comes down (which I never knew) so I got a shot of the 2009






I loved the actual building facade of the Rockerfeller




I loved Rockerfeller Plaza, only because now I can say I stood where the Today Show does their outside segments, and where those wide shots for Saturday Night Live are taken. We didn't end up going to a Today Show airing (way early, plus the regulars weren't there) and we didn't ice skate (long long long long long lines) But it is so neat!








The Plaza is lined with Flags. I found Ohio!




These weren't at Rockerfeller, but how neat are they??


We went shopping after our trip in the sky. We spent more on this day then we did if you combined every other day on the trip. We went to Tims two favorite stores in NYC: The official NHL store, and the Nintendo Store. The NHL store was a bit of a bummer, only because there was very little Blue Jackets stuff. Though it's to be expected, given how bad of a team we are. I saw the cutest ornaments, and if they had had it in Blue Jacket, I would have gotten it in a heartbeat.


And there was a motorcycle in the front window. I took a picture of it so Tims dad could see.


After shopping, we headed back to the apartment to drop things off, eat, and rest. Well Tim rested. I photographed the apartment. And Pretzel. Pretzel is my sisters Chiuaua. He is the best dog. According to Jessica, he was an utter spaz for about 2 years, but he's great now. Tim adored Pretzel, which is something I never thought would happen. He's just not a little dog kind of guy. But he talked about stealing Pretzel away in our luggage many times on the trip.








Pretzel loved when Tim would nap on the couch


So we met up with my cousin Stephanie when we went back to the Top of the Rock at night. Even though she's been living in NYC for a few months now, she hadn't gone to the Top of the Rock either. I have to say, night time was really cool, but I honestly enjoyed day time better. Which is SO NOT what I predicted I would feel. But I didn't bring a tripod with me, so in the beginning, all of my shots were looking like this...


Oh, here's Steph and Me


I did finally wise up and started resting my camera on ledges. After the first shot, I realized I had my camera far to back on the ledge...


...so I pushed my camera right up to the very edge of the ledge, just holding on to the strap. It made both Stephanie and Tim very nervous. But I was confident my camera wouldn't fall.