Month: October 2012

The tradition is living, we have done it again, we went to Apple Hill. One of our favorite little getaways to drink some cider, eat apple doughnuts, buy pumpkins, apples and of course take pictures 😉 I love going back and comparing the pictures from previous years to watch how different the kids were. This year was even better, because not only did my parents come with us, Oleg and Lilya did too 🙂 The kiddos loved it, especially Bella as she got to ride a pony for the first time. The talk of fear and her stating that she was not going to ride it, somehow turned out to be false and our precious princess got on that pony and was the happiest kid in the crowd. Often times, she will think about something for too long and will start changing her mind as many of us do. It then becomes a big challenge to get her to think otherwise, but sometimes we succeed 😉
Our little man has turned 9 months and of course I could not pass up an opportunity of a small photoshoot. His progress can be found on “Joshua’s Page” He has been nothing buy joy and smiles and we are thankful for him every singly day. Thank you precious Lord for gifting us such gifts- our children. There is nothing more dear on this earth.

What a whirl of emotions.  I enjoy garage sales quite a bit and having my own sounded like a great idea, especially since our church decided to have another mega garage sale.  You might be thinking big, but I am talking mega, as in HUGE.  This year I volunteered at our church garage sale to price items, where I thought we would be given a bunch of stickers and have items lined up by price…well, I was wrong.  They did hand me a stack of stickers with a pen and I was asked to simply price items as I thought was fair.  My first thought, “are you kidding me”, my second thought, “this could be fun”.  One thing I was told is “we want to get rid of stuff, not keep it”, and “everything should be approximately priced, a dime on a dollar”. A dime on a dollar?  Do you mean to tell me that if a person paid $10 for something, now we get to sell it for a buck?  Yes, that is exactly what they meant.  It certainly opened my eyes to the idea of my own garage sale.  I have pre-priced everything before even heading out to help with church mega sale, but once I came home, I have re-priced pretty much everything as I realized things will not sell.  Our main goal for this garage sale was to get enough money, to send gifts to our sponsored children all around the world and in our case, we have seven of them, so that put quite a bit of pressure to sell for more.  It was a blessing to have our parents and Oleg and Lilya jump on board and with our team efforts it turned out to be a great day.   I don’t know how others organize garage sale on regular basis, for me it seemed like a big job.  Not only do you have to gather all of the things that you know you do not use, but you also need to price them, get them in one location and get up before the sun comes up to put it out in front of your house.  Oh, and of course the yard sale signs to put up where it would drive traffic.  Long story short, it was a great experience.  We teamed up with our dear neighbor and made it happen.  I was blown away by people bargaining, just when you think you already put a pathetic price on the item, they ask to pay less.  What do you do?  You sell it to them for less, just so that the item would leave your front lawn.  All of this experience made me realize how worthless stuff is.  Here we go out and buy all of this “stuff” to make ourselves “happy” and what do we get?  Just “stuff” that we eventually get tired of and want “new stuff” and the cycle keeps going.  All in all, things are worthless!  It became more clear than ever that our life here on earth is so temporary yet we so easily forget and carry on as if we are here to stay.  This sale has definitely put an end to clutter, I am all about useful, practical and needed items.  I took it as a great lesson from my Father above and am so grateful for this experience.

It was somewhat of a spontaneous outing for our little family, but we definitely had much more time to enjoy it this year versus last year. Leaving early makes a huge difference 😉 This pumpkin patch has become a small tradition without us realizing it. There is something about pumpkins that are just massive and kids all around in their costumes smiling for pictures. Of course there are other attractions such as the train ride, corn maze, hay ride and of course endless menu of fatty fried food. This year, we could not leave without an ice cream cone and a root beer float 😉 Joshy got to go on his first train ride, which he enjoyed quite a bit. It was a quality time well spent. I love our little family and thank God for moments like these shared.

Since I saw one of the little girl rompers on line, I have not stopped dreaming of doing a little photoshoot with my sweet girl. I ordered one as soon as they went on sale and picked a day to make it happen. I could not have asked for a better subject or lighting, she did absolutely wonderful. Thank you Lord for blessing me with my little girl!

It has become somewhat a tradition that our side of the family leaves the everyday busy life and goes up to Truckee, the majestic mountains where you can feel nothing, but the presence of our Heavenly Father. It’s a blessing to have a friend who is very generous to let us use their cabin a couple of times a year. This year was even more special, because it was Oleg’s birthday and Joshy joined us 🙂 To make it even more exciting, him, Barry and a few other guys, decided to participate in Tough Mudder, which consists of many different obstacle courses, including wall climbing, mud pits, ice baths, monkey bars and many more. Needless to say, the boys did great and came home as stinky as they get but everyone was healthy and that is what’s most important. We celebrated the big day with a wonderful meal and galore of desserts, followed by family time and presents. There never seems enough time to take all of the beauty in, but a couple of nice walks were an absolute blessing. The girls, even managed to squeeze in some girl time in the three short days that we were there. This year, we added another little shopper, my princess and she enjoyed it fully. I am feeling very blessed and grateful for such wonderful family gatherings, and hoping for many more to come.

What joy it has been to watch my precious daughter learn and being able to teach her all that I can.  She is absolutely amazing at memorizing and has been practicing reading, writing and just having fun.  She asks me every day for projects and sometimes I feel overwhelmed with all that I want to do with her and choosing is quite a task for me.  I am beginning to separate all of the activities into subjects and categories and plan ahead.  She definitely enjoys every bit of what we have been doing so far and it has been a lot.  Instead of writing what she has been working on, you can see for yourself.  Joshy is also stepping in, with tiny steps, but he has had a few projects himself 🙂   I am one proud mama of a 2 ½ year old and 8 months old 🙂 Great job my babies!