Happy New Year

2009 has been an amazing year for us! We finished paying off all of our debt, raised chickens, bought a rad new house, spent 6 days at the beach, camped in Ohio, visited the lake countless times, discovered new parks and trails, celebrated birthdays and overall had good health! It doesn't get much better than that! I anticipate that 2010 will be just as wonderful with new adventures and a lot of growth. I don't do new years resolutions but there are a few things that I'd like to accomplish.....in 2010 and beyond.

-learn how to crochet
-sew my own cloth diapers
-improve my knife skills (cooking)
-reduce clutter in my house
-stay on top of laundry
-craft with the girls more
-volunteer in our community

Dan and I are constantly talking about our hopes and dreams, we make goals and try our best to accomplish them! It may seem silly but talking things through and making a plan seems to garner better results. We stay motivated and we watch as our dreams come true. The past 2 years have really shown me that we can do anything when we put our minds to it and work hard! I hope that 2009 has brought joy to the people I love and that 2010 is filled with bountiful blessings and dreams come true!

Happy New Year!!

alive and well

I feel like I haven't blogged in a really long time! We've been out of town at Dan's parents house in Charlotte, NC.....and honestly I just haven't felt like blogging. Life has been lazy and mellow and full of laughter and love! Corny......I know. But it's really true. Tomorrow is Dan's last day of vacation and I am bummed! We have spent the last 10 days watching movies, wrapping presents, eating delicious food, talking endlessly and sometimes just sitting in the same room doing completely different things.....but always together. I love having my husband home, if only he didn't have that pesky job! :o) The girls have had so much fun with Daddy being home these days, I know I won't be the only one who misses him when he goes back to work.

I have a couple of cool things I want to blog about in the next few days......one of them being our journey into cloth diapering! I am super duper excited (so excited I wrote super duper!) to share our experiences thus far. But for now I will leave you with some cute pictures of Maddie and Charlotte making cookies on Christmas eve. Charlotte did very little in the rolling and cutting of the cookies, but man was she on top of some sprinkles! Those cookies were smothered.

Doesn't she look like such a big girl?
My baby is growing too fast. Boo.

Like her necklace? :o)

Tasting one of her creations

Christmas morning

Merry Christmas! What a great morning we have had. Dan and the girls are playing Candy Land and we're watching Elf.....quite possibly the best Christmas movie ever! The girls woke up at 7:30 this morning and after diaper changes we headed downstairs to see what santa brought us. We played with the kitchen and the doll house which were both big hits! Eventually we got to stockings and then played some more. I made orange pecan baked french toast and we lit a candle and sang happy birthday to baby Jesus.....4 times! Then we opened presents and of course played some more. Chicken salad sandwiches for lunch and after their game is done we'll have nap time.....I'm pretty sure everyone is going to nap! Dinner tonight will be steaks marinated in my Christmas marinade overnight, ginger glazed carrots and fancy macaroni from the Pioneer Woman. At some point today we will change out of our pajamas, but we're not in any hurry for that. Eventually we will also clean up all the toys and put them away, but for now they are all over our living room in a haphazard mess of fun! I hope that you had as wonderful a Christmas morning as we did. Enjoy the rest of your day, and Merry Christmas to all!

Schultz family Christmas morning 2009
Pajamas, bedhead and all!

Happy birthday baby Jesus

Stockings

Charlotte got her very own headbands.....
and she already broke both of them! lol

Maddie licking the frosting off santa's leftover cookies

Opening presents

Charlotte loves her Waldorf doll

Ribbon wands.....Dan did a great job making them!

Where's Charlotte?

Peek a boo

Felt food

Snowman ornaments that Dan and the girls made for me

Ready, set, Christmas

Maddie and Charlotte made sugar cookies, sprinkled reindeer food on the lawn and set out milk and cookies for santa. Then they went to bed and the fun began. Dan and I finished the last few things that needed assembly and wrapped a few straggler presents and set everything up for the big reveal tomorrow morning. I am exhausted! We have not stopped all day today. I'm ready to climb into my cozy bed and sleep. Tomorrow morning is going to be fun....I'm excited! Here's a sneak peek of what we're looking forward to tomorrow!





And our Christmas eve picture with our special matching jamas. Christmas 2009

Maddie may look like she's being a loving sister.......
But she's really trying to lick Charlotte's face.
Lovely!

Last year. 2008

Have a very merry Christmas!!

DONE

I am done with all things Christmas related! Finally. Dan finished the ribbon wands and I did the last stitching on the canvas bags. I am so happy to be done.....and just in the nick of time! I even have all of my wrapping done and Dan has assembled the wooden sink, stove and microwave.....the refrigerator is scheduled for tonight. I have stockings to stuff, and presents to put under the tree and then we will be ready for tomorrow morning. This afternoon I am going to make sugar cookies with the girls, then dinner, Christmas eve presents (matching pajamas and their Christmas ornaments) bath time, Christmas presents from the California grandparents over Skype and then off to bed with the littles. Maybe a movie or two for the man and I, some sugar cookie eating and sugar plum dreams......lots of sugar apparently! :o)

I made these canvas bags for the girls to use with their play kitchen....grocery bags or what not. But I think they would be good bags to take to the library, or the beach, or even as an overnight bag. I painted the doily circle and sketched and painted the letters and then embroidered around them. The birds are appliques.

Charlotte's canvas bag:




Maddie's canvas bag:




For the past couple years my mom has been getting us pieces of the Willow Tree nativity set. This year I got the last installment.....the creche. I LOVE this nativity! It's all wood, hand crafted and very simple. The colors are muted and lovely! It's really, really beautiful. I was afraid that the girls would get their little hands on it and break it, so I set it up on our dining room table and thus far they've left it alone! It's too precious to break. Thanks mom, for giving us this amazing nativity set.....we will enjoy it every year!

moving day.

Dan very kindly informed me last night that my crafting stuff is driving him crazy and it's time for me to move it all upstairs! Turns out, I'm thisclose to being done with my projects anyway, so what better time to move?!? I am in love with my shelving unit! It has SO much space.....even though I'm only using the top two rows as my designated space, there is just so much storage and the drawers are truly fantastic. I've already moved most of my stuff up there and I have a separate drawer for ribbons, trim, thread, elastic, sewing pins and scissors and I haven't even come close to filling everything up! I thought I'd post some before pictures so everyone could see what great shelves these are before I go crazy and fill them all up with crafting supplies and books! I'll post some after shots once I get all organized. Dan has already installed my counter height crafting table (which is not shown) but there is still some trim work that needs to be done, so I'll post pics of that too once it's finished. All I need now is a comfortable stool and more craft/sewing project ideas and I'll be set!!

You can find this shelving unit at Ikea, although we found it on Craigslist for a steal of a deal! The line is called expedit and comes in different sized units. The drawers and cupboards are sold separately and are fully modular which makes customizing very easy!

Straight behind Dan is where my work table is