My life...just not on the road I expected (but it's still dang good).

The Ones That Never Made It

I had hoped to get even more posted, but here's a few of the 2010 shots that never made it to blogland...

A few of Annie, working her way from a pout...

to a smile.

Coley on St. Patrick's Day.

Annie carrying my Friday Flowers.

Annie and my Sister.

Coley dragging Annie around the living room in a sheet.

Kiddos at the park.

Annie on our way back from the Lake.

Annie eating strawberries on the front porch.

Annie playing in the living room.

Courtney Lee (who mastered her bike this summer.)

Annie drawing.

Annie & Shelby.

Annie coloring.

Soccer.

Lithia Park.

Dessert.

Coley wanted his picture taking while climbing the rock wall at Lithia Park.

Coley on top of the rock wall (after convincing me to climb to the top of it with him.)

A picture of me climbing back down.

Thankfully that one was blurry.

Measuring eachother in the pantry.

Dinner at Bella (just me and Annie.)

And some from Ross and Cali's senior prom. (He was broke so we cooked dinner for them over at my Mom's house.)

My Uncle Donnie came over to hang out during dinner too.

Halfway through dinner, my Uncle went streaking past the living room window.

The shot was totally overexposed, but maybe it's better that way.

Hope your 2010 was great and your 2011 is even better.

Christmas Programs

With this post, I have officially blogged all of my favorite Christmas photos and events. (A first time feat for me.)

That's Courtney Lee in the top row (center.)

And Coley in the front row (second from the right.)

And thankfully, I took a few pictures of Annie before her Christmas program.

Because the side of the stage she was standing on was not lit. (She's second from the right.)

My Dad's

Spent the morning of Christmas Eve at my Dad's...

Coley wanted to do a "See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil" thing but it didn't turn out so well.

Coley took that one of my Dad.

Ross and my Sister.

Me and my Sister.

My Dad (with a really funny face) and my Sister.

Some magic tricks.

And some pouting.

Random Ones

I was setting up my camera so my sister could take a family shot of us on Christmas Eve and managed to get a couple random photos (that I love) in the process...

These two make eachother (and sometimes everyone around them) crazy.

And I love the (rare) group shot too.

Grandma Jo's

We always eat dinner and open presents over at Grandma Jo's (Josh's mom) on Christmas Eve...

Courtney, Coley, Annie and my neices, Tate and Brooke.

Courtney Lee had been wanting that sewing machine for a long time.

Grandma Jo made scarves for me and all the girls.

Duck jammies.

A ring (from Josh's Grandpa to Josh's Grandma.)

I've only got a few more Christmas photos to edit. (I might just get them all posted before 2011!)

Christmas Evening

I'm on a roll here.

Christmas evening at my Uncle Brad's house...

My Sister took that one.

These two (my sister & cousin) harassed eachother all night.

And we all harassed my Dad (who's originally from New Hampshire) about the way he says bothroom (bathroom), quoter (quarter) and plosma (in regards to the new 'plasma' television he got for Christmas.)

In defense, he reminded my Uncle Brad that Easterners were here in the U.S. long before Westerners.

And then all the Westerners ganged up on him.

Still harassing eachother.

One of my favorite shots of the night. (My Sister, my Dad and my Step-mom.)

Shelley had the flu and was not in the mood for photos.

Annie was getting sleepy.

Very sleepy.

Very, very sleepy.

Still harassing eachother.

Still harassing eachother.

Christmas Morning

Coley got an electric drumset from Santa.

Courtney Lee got an electric keyboard.

Ross got a new jacket.

And Annie got a new baby in a crib.

Stockings.

#1 on Courtney's list to Santa was a dolphin Pillow Pet.

In fact, Pillow Pets were on everyone's list this year. (I even got one.)

And so were shoes.

Courtney wanted some new boots.

Coley wanted a pair of hightop Converse.

And Annie wanted a pair of shoes with laces.

Those were new lunchboxes for each of the kids with two coupons inside; one for a school lunch date with me and one for a school lunch date with Josh Downs.

Ross's wrapping job.

#1 on Annie's list was a real cell phone (but Santa improvised.)

Courtney got the entire Little House book series (My favorite when I was a kid.) and Coley got a bunch of books he needed to complete several different book series he already has. (His new favorite is the Percy Jackson series.)

And I got the first series of Little House on the Praire on CD (and a stand so I can ride my bike indoors along with a bunch of other stuff for my bike.)

#1 on Coley's list was Super Scribblenauts (and even though we don't have video games at our house, Santa still got it for Coley to play at his Grandma's.)

And everyone got their very own magazine subscription too. (And I got my favorite shot of the morning.)

Sometimes

The whole time I was shooting, there was a heated discussion going on in my brain about how I should quit being lazy and move the Christmas tree to the opposite side of the room for better lighting.

But sometimes, I just don't feel like moving the dang Christmas tree...

Christmas Cookies

I don't like to bake (or cook) but thankfully, my Sister is in town so the kids got to bake Christmas cookies.

I was in charge of clean-up and camera-work.

(And we got started remodeling the kitchen about 1 1/2 years ago...and gave up.)

That's Josh's "H + V" (Harriet + Valentine) cookie, my (pathetic) star cookie and my Sister's gingerbread man. (Turns out I don't own cookie cutters.)

Thank goodness for my Sister.

Every Year

Every year I find myself completely overwhelmed by the obscene number of Christmas photos I've taken and end up doing nothing with them; no editing, no blogging, no printing.

I just pretend they never existed.

I'm good about editing and posting all the traditions & photos leading up to Christmas, but it's Christmas Eve and Christmas day that get me.

We always go to my Dad's house early on Christmas Eve to visit and open presents.

Then we go to Josh's parents to visit, eat dinner and open presents.

And then we go to the Christmas Eve service at our church.

And then we come home so the kids can write letters to Santa and Josh can read The Night Before Christmas.

And then we start opening presents by 5:30 am on Christmas day (so that we can get Courtney to her mom's house by 7:00 am.)

And then we let the kids play with their toys for a few hours while we clean up and make breakfast.

And then we head over to my Uncle Brad's to visit, eat dinner and open more presents.

It's wonderful but exhausting.

And sorting through the thousands of photos I take during those two days is exhausting too.

And the fact that most of the photos taken during those two days are somewhat low quality (due to all the low light shooting) makes me even less motivated to edit them.

And the fact that my camera isn't focusing correctly doesn't help my motivation. (My camera flew off a moving vehicle a few months back and then was dropped again on Christmas day - I need to send it in but can't bare the thought of being without a camera.)

All that said, I'm hoping this year will be different.

I'm hoping to get a big chunk of my Christmas photos posted this week.

Then again, these Christmas Eve shots might be the only ones that ever make it to blogland...

Hope your Christmas was wonderful.