Learn from others...

One of my favorite past times is studying the lives of others (I guess that is why part of me likes to look at other people's blogs to see what they are up to). But more than that I love reading about the successes of others and how they did what they did. I happened upon this site tonight that I thought was interesting and thought I would share here:

25 Greatest Self-Made Men in American History

While I don't necessarily agree with everyone on the list, it is interesting reading about their lives.

Here's Smore Dayley Adventures...

This evening after our Family Home Evening lesson we had planned to make Smores with the girls outside on the patio. Well currently we do not have a BBQ so my creative wife turned one of my old car wheels into a nice fire pit for us to use. The girls had a lot of fun. While I was setting up, I had to move some large water barrels out of the way. When I was doing it Anabelle came up to me and said,

"Dad I know why Mommy married you. Because you are strong and can lift things, and because you can juggle."

I thought that was too cute. She went on to elaborate regarding the juggle part, explaining that I was a clown! Here are some pictures from our adventure this evening.

Katelyn had the tendency to always cook her marshmallows over well!



Notice Elin is going for the four marshmallow roast!

My little ones...

Christmas Memories

Here are a few memories from this Christmas with the girls.

When I went outside to get something from the car I noticed a blinking red light in the sky. I quickly called the girls out and said, "Look, look there is Santa in the sky." Katelyn quickly responded, "Dad - don't be silly, that's a plane." "Oh, my bad," I added.

The girls heard Santa's jingle bells outside their window.  Unfortunately I did not, as in the other room at the time. But Shirley got their reaction on video - super cute!

A secret Santa left a bunch of gifts for our girls and baby Kash the night before. I look forward to someday being able to do this for other families. It sure brings us joy to know someone is doing something that kind for us. 

About three hours after tucking the girls in bed I peeked in and noticed Anabelle had kicked her bed covers off. I walked in and grabbed the blankets to cover her back up. Katelyn opened her eyes, and asked, "Did Santa come already?" After answering, "not yet," she went on to tell me how she was unable to sleep because she was so excited. That reminded me of my day's as a child, on Christmas Eve. 

While unwrapping presents, Katelyn says - "Dad, look Santa uses the same gift wrapping paper as us."

Everytime Elin opened a present she would say, "Oh look Mom, this is my favorite..." 

Katelyn wrapped up a potatoe and gave it to Anabelle as a joke gift. Anabelle's face was hysterical when she unwrapped it. Katelyn had another gift for her for real.

I'll Miss Ya Grandma!

Christmas Morning I got a call from my brother Ryan. In tears he told me the tragic news that my grandmother had passed away. My mom went to visit her Christmas morning and to drop off some gifts for her, when she discovered her. The medical examiner said it was a result of coronary artery disease (which is the number one killer of Americans - a.k.a. heartattack). I was so sorry to hear the news, and chose to refrain from letting my girls know until later in the afternoon after they had a chance to unwrap and play with their presents. I then left to spend the rest of the day with my mom, and help out the family however I could. I was so sorry to see my grandma go, but at the same time I have this great peace that she is comfortable where she is now. She was such a hard worker in this life, that I know she never really gave herself a rest, and I feel like she is finally getting that time for herself. I can just see her so happy reuniting with Grandpa George, with this huge embrace and so happy to finally be back with him after over 32 years apart. I'll miss you Grandma - but I am so happy for you and know you are at peace and full of joy.

Sunday Afternoon Drive...

This blog is quickly turning into a gallery of my favorite pictures of my girls. This afternoon we went out for a drive, and just stopped at a couple of different places that looked interesting. Along the way we shot some photos, and ended up getting a number of good ones. Here are a couple of them.

Our little Elin the Bean...

I wanted to post this cute pic of Elin from where her sitting in her car seat. She has the most adorable natural smile (as seen in this picture)... however many times when we ask her to smile she smiles real big and has these little squint eyes. Funny little girl.

Google Search

This evening Katelyn was working on the computer. Later after she was done I went in to use the computer and clicked on the open Internet Browser tab. There I saw an article that Katelyn had been reading which I thought was just so cute - it was titled: "10 Great Christmas Gifts for your Dad that He'll Love." If that wasn't cute enough I went ahead and hit the back button to see what else she might have been looking at and it went to the Google Search results page with the name of the search Katelyn had conducted, "What can you make for a christmas present to give to your dad?" When I first read it, it kind of made me laugh, and a huge smile filled my face. Now as I write it here, it makes me a little emotional just thinking about how sweet it is of her to be trying to come up with something nice that she can make for Dad for Christmas... I love my little girls!

Here is the screen shot for her search:

How cute is that? My little Kiki is truly amazing with a huge heart when it comes to helping others.

Another thing that was sweet of her, was that I gave her $10 to spend at her school because they were having a holiday sale or sorts to raise money for the PTO. There Katelyn bought little gifts for her two younger sisters. Each got a little teddy bear (Monkey for Anabelle, Elephant for Elin), a lip gloss, lip makeup, and a hair clip with a big flower. When I asked Katelyn if she got anything for herself - she looked at me with her big eyes, and said, "No Dad its Christmas time - time when we get gifts to give to others." I thought that was cute as well.

Another Favorite Photo

This was a picture I got of Shirley and Elin enjoying time together at a local park. I just love the interaction between the two of them.

Fall Colors

The other day I was driving through Queen Creek, and noticed a beautiful road lined with incredible fall color pecan trees. I made sure to bring the family back the next day to get some photos. Here are few of my favorites.

Elin with Brown Hair

Tonight just for fun while I was editing some pictures I decided to see what Elin would look like with brown hair. This is how it turned out...

When I showed Elin she did not like it very much. She is of course very proud of her hair color (and she should be with all the attention she gets). After seeing these pictures I just could never imagine her with any other color than her beautiful red hair - oh excuse me... I mean ORANGE hair - as she always says. Here is the picture without any edits...

Shirley and Elin

Tonight I was shooting some pictures of Shirley and Elin since it is such a common occassion of Elin cuddling with her in bed at night. One of the pics that turned out was just so beautiful. The way Elin looked up at the lamp next to her, which casted the light on her face makes her look like an angel.

Girls in Bed

Tonight Elin was excited to sleep in the same room as her sisters, rather than her toddler bed in our room. We of course were excited as well for the decision. So we pushed the girls beds together and for a moment we thought everything was well. But the moment we went to turn the light off, Elin immediately jumped up and asked to come to our room. However before that happened we did get some cute pics of the girls altogether. Here they are:

Shirley and Elin

We went to the park tonight and tried to get some family pictures done but Elin was not really cooperating when we tried to do the whole family. She was just having one of those days where she did not want to be happy. Later in the night though, after eating some dinner, I caught this picture of Shirley and Elin. I thought it was cute enough to post here on the blog.

70's Party

Last night Shirley and I went to a 40th birthday party for our friend James Martin. The theme was 1970's. It was one of those nights that the side of my head hurt because I was smiling and laughing so much. Here are just a few pictures from the night.

Amazing Video - Galapagos

Today I found this amazing underwater video taken at the Galapagos Islands. It is definitely worth taking the 7 min to view. My favorite part was between minutes 3-4. During this part Katelyn made the remark, "Well at least now we know sharks are not an endangered species..."


Galapagos from Darek Sepiolo on Vimeo.

Pictures from the Park

Yesterday for Veterans Day we decided to take the girls to the park... While there we took some pictures and got a bunch of cute ones. Here are some of our favorites.

Anabelle the Monkey

Anabelle is such a monkey. Here she is scaling up between the door frame.

Anabelle's Gun

Seems like everyday Shirley or I hear something and say, we need to put that on our blog... Then a couple days pass and we forget all about it... Arrgh! Well one of those moments just happened this morning, and before forgetting I wanted to throw it up here real quick. 

Anabelle this morning was playing with lego blocks and she built a device that looked similar to a gun. My first thought was, her little Tom-boy side was coming out. Then she goes on to tell me exactly what she built.

"Dad, this is a ball shooter. It shoots these balls at people, and when the balls hit them it sprinkles flowers all over them."

She went on to tell me how it works, and how it can also be shot at people's homes to sprinkle flowers on the houses as well. 

Stockton Wedding

Last night, I photographed the wedding of Missy Hale and Clancy Stockton. Great couple, who I enjoyed working with very much. Shirley and the girls came to the wedding reception as well and they all four looked incredible. I am going to post a few pics below of the couple as well as a couple cute pics of my girls. Also thanks to Dalin for shooting this shot of my whole family...

Here are some of the pictures I took of Clancy and Missy before the wedding. These were all done at Fulton Ranch in Chandler.

 

 

 

 

Elin and Peanut Butter

Elin's addiction: Jar of Peanut Butter. She is always asking to carry the jar around, with a spoon. It is quite funny how much she loves it.

Talking Great

Elin has been talking so good over the last couple of months. She now is constantly using sentences. It has really surprised us how much she has learned over the last couple of months. One of these days I am going to get some recordings of her to post on here. Her voice is so sweet.

Working for us...

A couple of weeks ago Shirley and I recognized that every night as we were trying to gather the girls in their room to say prayers and then go to bed, it was next to impossible. Every single night they were wired with energy, and it just always seemed to end up as a negative experience, rather than positive which of course it should be. So Shirley had the idea that every night we should have a rule that the TV's and computers are off in the house after dinner. We got the girls on board, and gave the rule a shot.

Wow, what a difference it has been making for us. Over the last week, we have found that the time we have been spending together as a family after dinner time has been tremendous. We have been playing games, watching movies, singing, and reading books. In just one short week, we have had so many rewarding experiences already. The girls are still a little wired when bed time comes, but we have noticed improvement there as well.

Yearbook Photos

There is a funny website called yearbookyourself.com. On it you can upload a picture of someone, and have it transposed on various different yearbook photos. Shirley and I were doing it this evening with photos of Katelyn and Anabelle and below were some of our favorite results.

Funny Cartoon for Halloween 2008

I thought this Halloween cartoon was pretty funny. I think even those going through the process themselves, could get a laugh at this. Hopefully no one sends me comments about how insensitive I am or something. Rather I hope it brings a few laughs to you for today.

Dancing with the Stars...

Tonight while Dancing with the Stars was on they had some tap group come out - all guys. Well during the routine they yanked their shirts off, and Anabelle and Elin started yelling - Ewww... Yuck... Gross... Then they were covering their eyes with their hands. It was pretty funny - especially seeing our little two year old react that way.

After the dance I tried to do the same for them, and surprisingly when I yanked my shirt off I got the same reaction. What's up with that!

Remembering Old Photos

I happened to stumble upon some old pictures of the girls taken back in 2004. I could hardly remember these pictures, and I figured they were so cute I would post them to the blog in a collage to share with everyone else.

Big Pictures

I changed the format for our blog, so that I could start posting bigger pictures, without the hassle of having to click on them to see a larger version. Hope everyone likes the change.

Visit to Park Tonight

Tonight we decided to take the girls to the local park, just a couple blocks from our home. While there I grabbed some cute pics of the girls playing which I thought would be worth posting on our blog.



Elin getting ready to go down the slide.

Anabelle climbing across the rock wall.

Katelyn peeking out through the hole.



On our way back to the car, I turned and caught this cute pic of Belle.