If I had to guess this quilt has been in production for almost a year and a half. This quilt started when my dear friend was going through a devasting time in her life. At that time she chose a project, makeover her bedroom. So her, her mom & myself headed for Joann's to find exactly what she wanted.

Her mom cut all the fabric up and had it ready for us to come over and work on it. Well life got in the way of that plan and in March of last year I took the bucket of cut up fabric home and began work.

This quilt was a huge challenge for me. It really tested my patience and taught me a lot about quilting. This quilt was also the "back burner" quilt, I only pulled it out when I had absolutly no other project to work on. But after many months it is complete. I will be sending it off to MO to have it professionally quilted and in two weeks when it's time to had the quilt over to my dear friend's mom to bind it, it will feel complete. I will try and grab snap shots of her room when it is complete, cause I am pretty sure this is the final piece to her beautiful bedroom.

BTW, the quilt is huge, David is holding it up the best he could.

I couldn't resist posting this for all to see.

Important Safety Bulletin


The American Medical Association has announced a new national symbol for choking. Please inform all of the people in your safety department.

OLD SYMBOL





NEW SYMBOL

Another quilt for the books. I bought some of the fabric for this on ebay several months back and I have been drawing out the different ways I was going to complete it. I chose to pick the satin fabric for the pink ribbon in the middle. I offically started working on it on Thursday and finished it today. This is just the top, now I need to decide if I should machine quilt it (Stitch in the ditch of the pink ribbon), send in to a couple in MO who will long arm it for very cheap or... I just can't wait to get it finished off.

Go Seahawks!!!

If you don't already know David was given the gift of Seahawks tickets last year, and one of the benefits to these tickets are Playoff games... Well last night we got enjoy the Wild Card game against the Cowboys... It was cold... it was loud... it was stressful... and it was a BLAST! I LOVE football!! We enjoyed the game with another couple from our Sunday School class/bible study, Ben and Cassandra.

Quilts! Quilts! Quilts!

For those of you who don't already know... I love to quilt. I finished this quilt tonight for a coworker who had her first baby last week. It's the first time I did a nine patch by strip quilting. I had loads of fun with this (don't look to closely at my corners) :-). I even got to use my new sewing maching... I sewed little ducks in the corner.
It is so hard to give these quilts away, but I know she will get lots of use out of it. Now on to the next project....

Christmas!

Christmas is my favorite time of year. Here are some photos from our christmas celebration on Christmas morning. Other than this get together we had David's parents over Christmas eve, and my extended family got together on friday night- neither of which I have picture of, sorry :-).

Josiah got his own digital camera, which only means he will stop using mine :-).

Alex, in addition to the MP3 Player, got a cell phone & a baseball bat.

This was by far the funniest thing all morning, my mom wrapped Josiah's nutcracker in a box that was for a crystal vase. His face was a little shocked and uninterested when he saw that he was getting a vase. We had to explain to him that the picture on the box was not what was inside. He was excited to find a nutcracker inside- for some weird reason he loves nutcrackers. Josiah was also the proud recieptent of a cd player, and a remote control pirate ship.

And then, of course, my quest for the family photo. THis one is actually a tradition every year since we were married we have taken a photo in front of the tree- one year it was only the two boys but every year since then it has been all of us. Maybe someday soon I will get them all together in order and make a nice little frame for them all. What can I say, I love my family photos, the boys grow up so quickly that taking photos is so important to me... this one took about 10 shots to finally get a good one. I hope all of you had some nice family time over the last week and I pray your new year is a great one!

I got both boys in ties on sunday. I couldn't resist the kodak moment.

Josiah got his chance to sing in front of church yesterday and boy what an ordeal. When he first got up in the morning he was very excited, but as soon as we arrived at church he began his weekly meltdown (he doesn't really like Sunday School). So we did everything we could to bribe him to sing first service and with no luck it didn't happen. After getting him into his class we crossed our fingers and prayed that he would do it second hour.... I took this video with my digital camera so it isn't the best- plus it is a little shaky, but you at least get to see Josiah standing around doing nothing, he was so proud that he was up there with us watching and we were very proud of him. Josiah is wearing a green coat and is in the middle of the screen, half was through the first song he waves to me. The second song is 'Come on Ring those Bells' the first solo was sung by Mikayla, the daughter of some really good friends of ours. I love the little country twang she adds to the song!

Dear Friends & Family,

For those of you, who are enjoying the blog for the first time, welcome! Instead of the usually family letter I thought I would share our blog in our Christmas card instead. Feel free to post comments & check back often to see regular updates & photos of 2007; it is sure to be a fun year for us!

So here goes our 2006 recap…. It was another fabulous year in our house hold. Alex finished 5th grade and in our school district that was also the end of elementary school. He played baseball again and although his team only made 3rd place in the league and Alex was invited to play on an All Star team for a tournament. Alex turned 12 in November & sometime this year he grew so tall that he is eye to eye with his mom. Middle school has been an adventure so far, he is running from class to class and keeping up with all the homework that is assigned. He is starting to get into music and things that teenagers like to do. It is so hard to let go at this age!

The highlight of our year had to be the first camping trip we have done as a family (look at the July post for pictures & a detailed story). We spent 4 days at Warm Beach with a large group of families from our church. Both boys got a lot of bike riding in. It was a blast.

In September Josiah signed up for soccer and we enjoyed his first and only game. It was really a riot. If you have never seen 5 year olds play soccer it is a must do for all (look for pictures in the Sept-Nov posts). Josiah turned 5 this year & started preschool. He is learning basic math and his letters. Math seems to be his favorite subject. Josiah also received a blue ribbon for his cookies at the state fair (see previous post).

David & Cori are still both working for Disney in downtown Seattle. They both enjoyed another year on the churches softball teams. Cori is spending another year as director of the AWANA Cubbies program at church. In March of 2007 we will be celebrating our 7 year anniversary, it is so hard to believe it has been that long. We really feel blessed by everything we have been given. We pray for each of you daily & hope that you and your family have a wonderful holiday season!

Lots of Love,
David, Cori, Alex & Josiah

Leavenworth!

We made our annual trip to Leavenworth today. We had a great time and for the first time David joined us. We got a lot of christmas shopping done and the boys got a couple of hours of sledding in for the year. We also made a stop at the Hat Shop, so that should answer any questions about Alex's hat :-). My parents were with us and we took a charter bus with a group from my dad's work, Community Transit. It was a great time!

Josiah borrowed Alex's hat...

And Josiah decided he wanted to take a picture of Alex's hat all by himself...

Hope you enjoyed to photos. Hopefully lots more will come soon!

Thanksgiving.

We had a nice thanksgiving at home. I cooked my first turkey and learned a little in the process. My parents came over to celebrate with us and we all had a lot to eat & a lot left over.
:-)

SNOW!!!!
If you haven't heard yet the Northwest is suffering from some very cold weather.
Sunday night it snowed... four inches. Monday night it all froze, so tuesday the roads were solid ice. And tuesday night it was 17 degrees outside! Wow! we are not used to this. We did manage to play in the snow a little bit, but boy it takes forever to warm up when it is this cold.

At the Begining of November the Disney company sent me and Josiah on a trip to Disney on Ice. We were able to take along 50 kids from a local boys & girls club (Don't worry, they were brought by other adults so I didn't have to watch all those kids!
It was a lot of fun!

Josiah's first Soccer Game.
Ok, picture this: 21 4 & 5 year olds, pouring down rain, on one soccer field. What do you get? A whole lot of fun. We enjoyed Josiah's first soccer game on saturday, and it was a mob of children running up and down the field for 30 minutes chasing after one ball. Josiah did really well and when he was put at goaly he stopped to kids from scoring.

And then there is the trophy that he proudly carried around most of the day.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALEX!!

Wow! he is 12 already!? Hard to believe. First for his birthday we took him to get a new bike. Then on Saturday night we went to La Cocina, Y Cantina for our birthday tradition (every birthday we go there).

And of course, my quest for great family photos! I am actually impressed with this one.

Josiah was a power ranger for halloween. these pictures are from a "mommy & me" day. Last saturday I took him to the Pacific Science Center for some Halloween adventure. we had a great time walking through the butterfly exhibt, learning about how our bodies work & touching the sea life.



Below is a shot of Josiah scraping ice off the car. He wanted to help daddy, it took a long time but was worth the wait!




Alex's birthday is this weekend so maybe I can get some shots of him to share with you all- he is in a 'no picture' phase and I can't get him in one shot!!

It has been another fun week for us, well for me. I was lucky enough to have an all expenses paid trip back to Southern California for some work and fun. I spent 5 days in Anaheim at the Grand Californian, which is by far one of the more up scale hotels I have ever stayed in and this time was no different.
When I first checked in I had been up since 3:00 am, spent the day in Disneyland running around and was in my sweats when I was told that I was at "VIP" Status in the hotel and would I wait because the check in manager was looking foward to meeting me... yes really. That was a little weird, but as soon as I walked into my room the phone rang from Guest Services to welcome me to the hotel and find out if I needed anything (again... huh?). I was taken aback by all this attention... but After the second phone call the next morning to see how I was doing I felt pretty good :-).
I had a blast on Space Mountain, Indiana Jones, Tower of Terror, Soarin and of course Screamin. I walked until I couldn't walk no more and then enjoyed people watching in the Magic Kingdom. After an exhausting day I always find myself pondering why I love this place so much and then I realize how much magic and joy are held in the park and how the outside world is left behind as soon as you walk through the gates. By then my thoughts are usually interuppted by the screaming kid who wants to stay and see Buzz Lightyear.
The conference was a huge success, everyone was very thankful at all the hard work I put into it, but really it was a blast to organize.

On Tuesday night I got to do something most people never do.... I got to go back stage! that was so much fun (for those reading with little children or a great imagination stop reading now). We saw the costume shop, I will be forever traumatized seeing all those character heads hanging on racks, and buzz lightyear taken apart & laying all over the floor. I saw all the old buildings and heard what they used to be and what they are now. It truly is a piece of history I will probably never get to see again. Sorry, there are no pictures of backstage- I was told that if I pulled my camera out I might get shot. :-).

The bottom picture is hard to make out, but it is by far my favorite part of flying... It is the top of Mt Rainier sticking out above the clouds, usually you can see the whole mountain peering out against the blue sky, but on this day it was only the top part.

The view from my room at sun rise.

Soccer!!!

We signed Josiah up for Soccer this year, in hopes of giving him an outlet and a sport to enjoy. Since three of us are already in baseball, we thought it would be best to direct Josiah's sports interest to another area. After the first practice it was very clear that Josiah should have been signed up for Football instead. He got kneed in the head twice, then at the second practice he learned that he could knock other kids down for the ball. He is a good aim when it comes to kicking it in, but I don't think Soccer is the right sport for him :-).

Happy Birthday Josiah!!!!!

Josiah turned 5 on the 22nd and we had a Pirate party for him.
Grandma, Grandad, Grandma, Papa, Aunt neeners, Uncles Nathan, Andrew, and Matthew all came over for some Pirate fun.

With School comes fundraisers! we may hit you up in person, or if you are out of state check out the website at www.qsp.com Alex goes to Harbour Pointe Middle School #425009629.
Thanks for your support!