Ten Year Wedding Anniversary!

Our Wedding Day

June 28, 1997

Is this really possible? A decade! Today Toomas and I are celebrating our 10th year of marriage. Ten amazing, fulfilling, beautiful years of life together!

I'm so lucky to be blessed with my wonderful, supportive, loving and caring husband! THANK YOU TOOMAS for these 10 wonderful years together.

And....

Here we are after 10 YEARS!!!!

(and *3* kids later....No worse for the wear(?)!)

When I look at these two pictures: the before and after, I feel SOOOOOOOOOOOOO blessed with all that I have!!! What a wonderful decade it has been!!! XOXOXO Toomas!

Krista is EIGHT Today!

Today is Krista's 8th birthday. WHERE do the years go? Eight is starting to sound old now too...I put together a little slideshow of Krista's 8 years and as I was watching it, I could REALLY start to see the differences in her right before my very eyes!!! I think it is especially noticable between this and last year--adult teeth really do make a difference! She is really growing up.

Krista is a bright, responsible, spirited, talented, friendly and special little girl. She has matured and developed so much in the last few years and I am very proud of her. She has shown dedication and responsiblity in her schoolwork and activities...and continues to amaze me with her thoughts and discoveries! She loves dancing, being with her friends, crafts, READING, rollerblading, riding her bike, swimming, writing and RECEIVING e-mails and recently basketball...the list goes on! She is so much fun to be with---always filled with smiles and laughter.

WE LOVE YOU KRISTA!!! I hope you LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE your new Nintendo DS! (Krista has been wanting one for some time now and guess what? Today is her lucky day!) HAPPY 8th BIRTHDAY!

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Krista's 8th Birthday Party

Yesterday we celebrated Krista's 8th Birthday with her friends. We had SO much fun! Krista said it was her best birthday party ever (something she says every year, but it is still good to hear!).

Every year I let the kids choose a "theme" for their birthday. We always shop at Celebrate Express for the lastest and greatest party themes. This year Krista picked the Pink Poodle theme, which was really precious. It came complete with an Eiffel tower centerpiece which Krista just loved. The little party favor boxes were just adorable as well.

I baked 3 cakes for the big event. One chocolate "8" cake, and a buttercream frosted vanilla spongecake. Krista loved the vanilla cake because of the pink frosting and the pink poodle. She didn't even want to eat it because she said it looked too perfect. I was so hapy she loved it. I wanted everything just right for her party!!

Following the pink poodle theme, we had the guests (10 girls and 1 boy) bring their stuffed animal dogs...We made sticker-jeweled doggie collars with personalized nametags. I think it was a fun activity for the kids. We also had a poodle drawing contest and played ring toss in the backyard. Luckily the weather cooperated and we had some nice warm sunshine so we could play and draw outside.

All in all it was a great day for Krista! Her real birthday is on Tuesday and she will be spending the day in a castle! Her school is taking their week-long field trip this week. I'm sure she'll have a blast!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TOOMAS!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TOOMAS!!

We're looking forward to a fun family day today and a nice dinner out on the town tonight. I got Toomas a "Karcher" for his birthday. Most of it was purchased with my "flea-market" money that I earned a few Saturdays ago, selling a good bit of junk from the basement. I can't wait for the sale next year to really clean out the cellar. It takes a lot of prep work (maybe 5 hours tagging and sorting the junk this year), but it is worth it. Turn dust into cash...and then clean it all up with the Karcher. For those of you who don't know what a Karcher is---it is a high pressure water washer that one can use to clean patio bricks, car wheels, grills, the house facade or just about anything imaginable! He was really happy with it too :)

Switzerland Trip Photos

So here they are! A few of the promised photos from Toomas' trip to Switzerland with his parents. The visited cities: Geneva, Interlaken, Lausane and Lutzern. They also took a good bit of video coverage-- so along with the video, I felt like I was "almost" there with them! I'm really looking foward to a family trip there sometime soon. Enjoy the scenery!

Krista Won The Regionals!!!!

Big news....Krista is the Regional Champion for rhythmic gymnastics!!! She won #1st place yesterday in the Regional Championship! I am SO proud of her for all of her hard work and discipline this year. She was SO happy to win yesterday and said she couldn't believe that SHE was indeed the champion!! In the last competition ( for our the Department) she was 4th and, for their first competition (inter-team) she was 3rd. Yesterday was the most important competition (and final) of the season so it is great to end with a bang! Last year's champion won a big trophy so hopefully Krista will be getting one also! She is really hoping so!

I put together a 6 minute video of the day. We were there for almost 4 hours! I'd say there were approximately 80 girls in the competition and each girl had 4 individual exercises and one team exercise that they were judged upon---The individual exercises were: cord, free-hand, hoop and ribbon and the team exercise was the ball. There were 2 gymnastic arena mats down and each mat was broken down into 4 grids with judges located at each grid (8 grids). So, in total for each song sequence there were 8 girls performing for their respective judges. It still took a LONG time to get through, but it was always exciting looking forward to Krista's next exercise. I think one area that helped Krista out a lot was in her timing. The judges are very concerned about the timing of the exercise in relation to the length of the song. Each exercise should finish PRECISELY at the time the music stops. Krista has really developed her ear and timing this year with all of her dance (ballet and tap) so she was really spot on in this important criteria.

In total Krista scored 258.5 points and was a good 5 points ahead of 2nd place. WAY TO GO KRISTA!!! It was the French Mother's Day yesterday too, so it was a super present for me to watch Krista win!!!

You can watch Krista's 5 exercises and the awards ceremony here:

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Kaitlyn Can Sing!!!!

Well this is funny, but Kaitlyn knows how to sing!!! She REALLY can. Her vocabulary pretty darn big for a 13 month old too! She can sing "Happy Birthday to You" and has even started singing the A,B,C song also!! Here is a little clip of Kaitlyn singing "Happy Birthday." It was taken 3 days ago on her 13 month birthday. She DID NOT want to sing for the camera, and put up a bit of a battle, but we got it. She is usually very happy to sing, except when I force her!!! Part I is ME singing the song to get her into the mood and Part II is Kaitlyn singing a few verses!!! You have to listen pretty hard but it is there :)

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Kaitlyn can walk!!

I have promised a walking clip so here it is!!! Kaitlyn continues to enjoy toddling along. She is still falling pretty often but she has the idea down pat now.

On the vacation front, Toomas and his parents returned from Switzerland a few days ago and had a really exciting adventure! They went to the peak of a few mountains and where it actually SNOWED! I will have to post some pictures of their trip because it was really breathtaking!

As I type right now Toomas is on his way back from Germany where he took his parents to the airport this a.m. We had a really fun time having them here, but as usual the time goes too quickly! It was really fun showing them around our new house and yard. The weather was just great too, so we lucked out being able to eat out on the patio every night.

So here is the promised walking clip. She is really LOVING the freedom of walking!!! At least someone is--- because since she's taken those first steps I've certainly lost mine!

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