Happy Thanksgiving!

Wishing all a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday! I am grateful for all the readers who continue to come and check in here daily. Thank you!

The winner of the 25 free Shutterfly cards is Debbie from Mountain Breaths - Thank you for your comment and good luck in creating your cards.

Christmas cards...

I am one of those people that don't really like to rush holidays so I like to enjoy my autumn and celebrate November as a month of gratefulness and Thanksgiving before getting too excited about Christmas.

With that being said now is the time I better start thinking about Christmas cards and getting them ordered so that once December does arrive, I am prepared and ready to send them out. I have used Shutterfly Christmas cards for the last 2 years. In 2009, our card featured our family all dressed up at Nathan & Tammy's wedding and last year, I shared nature photos of the 2010 monarch migration on my photo cards. Can you guess the subject of my cards this year? Of course it will be our new baby granddaughter, Brooklyn Faith!
I especially love the above card selection because we have been truly Blessed this year. It is one of Shutterfly's flat 5 x 7 selections. (all photos can be enlarged by clicking on them)

If you like a folded card with lots of room to write inside as I sometimes do, I like that Shutterfly lets you search their card selections by color. With a little girl who looks great in pink, what fun it was to find cards with lots of pink in them on this page.
It is easy to create photo calendars on Shutterfly and this year, I am making a 2012 calendar as a gift for Jeff of our cycle trips in 2011.

I think we will both be excited to see special photos each month from places we have traveled to and the wildlife we have seen along the way.

If you are interested in Shutterfly cards and gifts they currently are holding "the giving sale" with some great bargains. Shutterfly has graciously offered me 50 free cards for blogging about them which is easy because I use their cards. They also offered me codes for 25 free cards (not including shipping) to give away to 3 lucky readers. I have given away 2 of those to faithful followers who commented on previous posts and I have one more code for someone that comments on this post - winner to be announced tomorrow. Good Luck!

Brooklyn's special day...

On Saturday Brooklyn and Jayme were honored with lots of friends and family at their baby shower. They were both dressed so beautifully in black & white...and Auntie Tammy was a beautiful hostess.
The table was themed "baby bee" of course...
and soon the house was filled with great friends and family who all enjoyed meeting Brooklyn and showering her with some of the cutest gifts.
Ashley and Mari came and met Brooklyn the first night she was here and we tried to take a fun photo of the 4 of them but Brooklyn was hungry and more interested in sucking on Mari's hand. We tried again on Saturday but neither Brooklyn or Mari were interested in looking at the camera :)
Mari wasn't the only cousin Brooklyn met that day, here she is with her cousin, Kaitlyn, who just started kindergarten this year.
After the shower was over at noon we cleaned off the table and then refilled it with tons of food as my whole extended family came to celebrate an early holiday dinner and to meet Brooklyn. Here she is with her cousins, Kinley (almost 6 mos) and Mari (3 months).
After having a house full of company all day long, both Grandpa and Brooklyn were exhausted!
Please continue to pray for Justin! He was so missed at our family gathering as he wasn't feeling up to coming. Pray for strength, healing from the surgery, peace and comfort.

mosaic Monday...spectators

I spent the afternoon trying to net goldfish (which isn't the easiest thing to do) and these guys were the spectator section.

beautiful girls...

Sorry for the lack of blogging this week, I was busy taking advantage of the good weather and cleaning out gardens so I didn't even pick up a camera for days. Of course I wouldn't leave home without the camera and now I'm spending some time loving on my girls...Looking at Jayme's baby photos we think Brooklyn looks a lot like her - comparing the two of them in photos, you can definitely see she got her mommy's big eyes (so far blue!) and long eyelashes.
I'm heading back home tomorrow to be closer to the rest of the family. Please keep praying for Justin, for pain relief, comfort & peace especially as he recovers from surgery.

Grandpa & Brooklyn...

I've been busy catching up so haven't taken any photos at home but thought I would share a few from this past weekend when Grandpa Jeff finally got to meet Brooklyn. She stared at him for a long time as he did at her...so fun for them to finally meet.

Home...

I am home tonight after spending some time with Jayme & Scott where I witnessed Brooklyn's birth and her first week of life. I have traveled to a lot of wonderful places and done a lot of wonderful things in my 50 plus years but this past week was amazing! I am so in love with this precious little girl...
You may have noticed in my previous posts there has been no mention of Jeff meeting our precious Brooklyn - well that is because he too was away from home. A hunting trip with 2 of his brothers was planned before Brooklyn was even conceived and lo and behold it was scheduled over her arrival.
Jeff, Wayne & Rod were in the mountains of Colorado when they had to leave one campsite and spend 3 nights in town because of heavy snowfall.
Once it stopped snowing they found a spot at a lower elevation to finish out the 10 day trip.
Seeing the photos Jeff took, made me thankful I only go camping in our rv ;)
I'm also thankful that he is home and we get to travel together back up north for him to meet Brooklyn!