So, It's Saturday morning with just Chelsea and myself. Rob is landscaping and the older kids are at Grandma's. What am I currently doing? I'm on the computer (obviously) feeding Miss C one handed and listening to cartoons. Hey, when you don't have cable this is what you get. Plus I don't feel so alone if the tv is on.

I've done a load of laundry, dishwasher is running, camera batteries charging, house is picked up. I'm waiting for Chelsea to take her morning nap so I can go clean my bedroom. My goal is to spring clean my house and finally get my hallway emptied out and put away.

Chelsea is officially 9 months old as of yesterday, she is weighing in at 18 lbs and 6oz and 28 1/2 inches long. Still has one tooth. Has started to take 2 hour morning naps (yeah). Chelsea has had mash potatoes, spaghetti sauce and a taste of peanut butter. Chelsea is wearing clothes from 6-9 months to 12 months. Chelsea is wanting to stand more and is no longer content to just sit nicely on my lap. Baby girl loves to growl and blow raspberries an all around easy baby and she loves just about anyone who holds her. She still likes to yank my hair out but usually goes for my jewelry instead.

(Chelsea is almost asleep in my arms) Yesterday at the doctor she got three shots an oral vaccine and a finger prick, an she is practically perfect in every way. Can you guess what movie that line came from?????

After the doctors appointment I had to take Kelly over to the dentist for her last appointment. Chelsea slept the entire time Kelly was in the office. I heard the dentist say they were all done kiddo and I looked down and Chelsea was just starting to wake up. How nice was that.

Tomorrow I'll be up at the butt crack of dawn to go take photos of My friend Julie and Mom's friend Kelly as they are participating in a half marathon up in oro valley. Which is about 40+ minutes from my house and starts at 7 am.

The midget is now sound asleep and is getting very heavy, so I'm off to go clean my room.

Enjoy your weekend.

Okay so I haven't posted in a while. I know this is going to bite me in the butt latter when i need journaling for scrapbooking but I've been kinda busy and i just uploaded 170 photos off my camera.

These past few weeks have been dentist appointments, girl scouts, cleaning, dreaming, scrappin, spring nature photos, cooking. The normal everyday life stuff.

I just ordered 1700 photos from Clark photo.com. they have a free shipping coupon and it saved me about $35.00 otherwise they have a coupon for .05 prints. just go to there website.

For the first time we were all wearing green on St. Patrick's day. I set up my tripod and snapped a few shots. We had corned beef and cabbage with crash potatoes. Oh so yum.

The kids were so cute, Kelly and I along with her class went to the Fox theatre to see "If you give a pig a pancake". It's a skit based on the book. Along with that skit the cast also performed 6 other skits. The kids and I just loved it and I would like to try going to something like that again.

Hey have you seen my 8month old lately?
what a darn cutie. Chelsea still has those beautiful blue eyes. One tooth and one on the way. Chelsea loves jewelry as she is constantly pulling on my necklaces.

Chels no longer likes to sit contentedly on my lap but thoroughly likes to sit up on the floor and play on the floor. Chelsea rolled over for mom on Saturday night but still won't do it for me. She laughs at anything that Kelly does and when Wyatt gets close enough she is just fascinated by him. Chelsea has the best smiles and the sweetest laugh but watch out when she is unhappy she is a very vocal little thing (like right now) and voices her displeasure whenever she doesn't get what she wants immediately. Oh and you should hear when she growls and groans, no she isn't doodling her diaper this is just the noise she makes when engrossed in something.

Spring is here in Tucson and I love seeing all the gorgeous color instead of the drab brown.

Rob and I have decided to begin making some changes in our back yard. We plan on changing our garden into 3 separate gardens instead of 1 long one. I'm also going to get our pots going again on the patio and put the lillies and daylillies back. I missed all the varieties of lillies we had. I picked up this yellow guy the other day and need to get him potted.

Today I placed on order for these two items. The kids have outgrown (sort of) the one they have and this is what we really always wanted. The monkey bar thing well it's just something extra to have more fun on.

The wood playhouse will be here in about a month. Just in time for the summer heat!. We are planning on putting this in the old dog area, this will now keep Braxton out and I won't have to worry about him peeing on it.

Just doing some spring cleaning and changing things around. Saturday we spent two hours cleaning our fish tank and putting in new plants.

What do you think? This play set had everything I wanted except it doesn't have the wood top, we have the canopy, but still this will keep all the kids who come over very happy. If we ever move the darn thing is going with us.

Have a happy Monday.

Carrie

Phoenix Zoo

What a Saturday!
The Phoenix zoo is pretty darn cool. It was so much bigger than I remembered. The kids had a great time and they did fantastic.
We arrived at 9:30 and people were pouring in, but it never felt crowded. We had been expecting all week to have a chance of showers but the skies were clear and the weather was perfect.
What is so cool is that you can bring in your own coolers and anything else you want, they have several picnic areas and plenty of rest benches.
Okay so I can't say enough good

things about this zoo.
We went into Monkey village, and there were all these cinnamon squirrel monkey's free to roam. You are asked not to pet them and to try and stay at least 3 feet away. There were times when that was hard to do as the little guys would cross right in front of you.
My other favorite was of the Orangutan exhibit. It is still in it's early stages but the zoo has two females and big male and a juevenile that was too darn cute. I have better pictures of him but I haven't edited

yet so this is the one you get.
The zoo had so many varieties of monkeys that it was cool because the guys were scattered all over the place.
I really wish we could have spent two days there because by the time you get through all of it the bigger boys were taking their naps or we should have went to that side first. Oh well live and learn and there is always next time.



This is some of us just chillin' and having lunch.
Chelsea had a great time and was a great baby, this kid loves being outside and seeing all the cool stuff.
I was of course on camera duty and after getting home and uploading all 300 photos I must say I suck.
(Sidenote) Rob says I'm too hard on myself but I say the truth is the truth.
Lots and I mean LOTS of the photos were blurry. I was bitterly disappointed. There were so many that I thought turned out and I was excited about to come home and find out they were blurry, well dang it it

sucked hardcore.
Funny story- I see this guy taking pictures with gear. By this I mean good camera and pro lenses. I strike up and conversation with him and he gives me a couple of tips to get photos through the wire and he showed me the results. This guy was super nice and I asked if that was the 100-400 lens and he said yes and I said oh a 5D his reply was yeah the new Mark II. So we talk for another minute and I head back to the family.

Mom and I are talking and she says he seemed familiar. We figured out that he was the guy we talked to back in November at the zoo, back then he was waiting for his 5D and was shooting with his 100-400 on another camera body.
So fancy running into the same stranger about four months later and he was just as friendly as before.


We left at 4:30 that afternoon and went over to Hobby Lobby, grabbed some In-N-Out for dinner and got

back to Tucson at 9:30!!
Woke up Sunday and we skipped church to just relax and now, today life is back to normal doing laundry and cleaning up.
Rob and I have been told by a couple of people that we need to go to some wild animal safari that is also in Phoenix. I'm going to check it out.



I better stop monkeying around

and get busy. Have a great day.

First a quick prayer for my friend Kristie, she is in the process in adopting a baby girl and the birth mother is changing her mind.
Lord, provide this family with your strength and wisdom in this hard time. please Father help this mother do what is best for her baby. That raising a child is not all sunshine and rainbows and that it is hard work and she will need lots of support. Know matter what the outcome Father please be with Kristie in staying in touch with this young mother to be the support she needs. May Your will be in the decision. Amen


My goals for the year- I refuse to say resolutions- have dipped here and there. I have two and a half that I'm faltering on. One I haven't made my photo idea calendar or finished my two peas photo class, I haven't been posting to the challenge every week, but I have taken the photo to post. I believe that is it.
I have been thinking about my blogging the last few weeks and I started this just journal our every day life. I use this blog to put down things I would other wise forget. To be honest I forget lots of things lately. So I tend to get very hard on myself when I don't blog on a regular occurrence.
When it comes to scrapping I use this blog to fill in any holes of my memory and match memory with pictures.
A re commitment is due.
I, Carrie Ross, do solemnly swear to blog a minimum of weekly, to tell my story and to perserve my memory of my children for use in future blackmail.

Photo #1- The African daisies are blooming in my mother in laws neighborhood and this one shot was taken in her back 40 area.
Photo #2- Our family went Thursday the 26th to the Sonoran Desert Museum. I switched camera bags and forgot my extra battery so I only got a few photos before it died. We had a very nice time and are now members so we can visit any time for free with our pass. Yeah more photo ops! Wyatt loved walking the trails and was on a constant move while Kelly grouched and complained most of the trip. Rob and I agree that we need to do this more often so that the kids will one day appreciate it.

Photo #3- I heard about this coupler ring that you can put two lenses together and make a super macro. The ring is only eight dollars and it has been fun to use. Granted you have to be able to get within a half inch and there is a very narrow focus but you can do some cool things.
Photo #4- I was in a hurry this last Sunday, Rob was preaching and had left early so I was trying to get everything done. Now that Chelsea sits up so well I gave her a quick bath in the sink. I must say she liked it but I don't believe as much as she does splashing in the bathtub.
Can you believe Chelsea is now 8 months old? I need to do her Mr. Bear picture.

Last Saturday I hung with the girls to chat and scrap. I think we did more chatting than anything else. I even brought my camera but I spaced out having Julie's daughter take our photo around the table. Well next time they are hanging here and I will get another chance for a group shot.
What's up this weekend. Tomorrow we are heading up to Phoenix to visit their zoo. I was talking to the kids today and they are soooo excited. Nina is coming along too. I didn't realize how much mom and I missed when we did the walk last year. This time I am coming fully loaded. It's not like I can just go any ol time I want. Plus I LOVE animal pictures. I'm thinking about doing a small wall of my favorite zoo shots. ooh maybe I'll do a mini album.
I must say I have felt extremely busy the last few weeks. I have spent one day just backing up photos onto dvd's for myself and my mom. Just doing that to a weight off. Granted it should have been done a while ago. My new neighbor was burglarized and the theives took their external hard drive with all the pictures of their young son on it a couple of weeks ago. It broke my heart and spurred me into action.
Coming soon...... kids first dental visits