Easter Weekend

We had a great Easter weekend and spent lots of time with lots of our family. On Saturday we went over to Noni and Grandpa's house (my dad and stepmom) to dye Easter eggs and have lunch and play with the boys. On Sunday we went to GG and Papa's church (my Grandma and Papa) to have a big breakfast and met up with Grandma Joy. After that we headed over to Meema and Peepa's house where we ended up staying a few days to visit and help out with some appointments that the girls and I had. We had a great time and the girls love going over there and playing with all of the dogs and their grandparents :). Sophia has discovered their dog door and loves to make trips out onto their back deck to play when she thinks nobody is looking. Olivia had an encounter with a dead spider that was in a bag of markers she was playing with and it did not go over very well. She hates spiders just as much as I do.
Over the past few weeks I have been involved in a new craft that I LOVE called quilling. This in addition to the dollhouse/miniature stuff that I do as well as knitting, sewing, cross stitch, pillow making, and paper doll making. Not that I ever have time to do any of them but those fleeting moments when I do have time I love to work on crafts. I know, I'm such a craft whore LOL ;). Any ways, quilling has been around for a long time and was really popular in the Victorian era. It was a fashionable activity for young ladies. Quilling involves curling very long thin pieces of paper around a needle and making various shapes with them to make pictures, cards and the like. Here are some pictures of my first project.






The second one is kind of blurry but you get the idea. I like quilling because it really isn't that hard and can go pretty quick so if you don't have a lot of time you can still get quite a bit done and make progress on your project. I will post pics of more of my projects as I complete them. Well I better run. Gotta fix some snacks for the girls.


- Jessica

Britney Concert

Okay I've totally had a busy few days but I'm finally posting about the Britney Spears concert we went to last Thursday. I got the tickets for my mom's birthday and we took Olivia with us. It was the best concert EVER! She had hired performers from the Big Apple Circus that did really cool acts that Olivia was mesmorized by. She had a great time and actually ended up falling asleep for the last third of the concert! I'm so totally glad I brought some really good ear plugs for her. The Pussy Cat Dolls opened the show which was really neat. We had general admission tickets on the floor which was neat. I ended up bringing the wheelchair because my knee is still swollen and all and with having to standnfornlike 3 1/2 hours that would not have worked. When we got there we realized that because I was in the chair I wasn't going to be able to see over everyone. So we found the floor manager and he took us to the wheelchair section which was a big platform raised about 6 feet of the concert floor so we would be able to see. It was totally awesome and they even gave my mom a folding chair to sit on. I took pics with my iPhone and they didn't come out too well but you can get the idea. It looks like we are far away in the photos but we were actually pretty close. Anyways, here are the pics!



She had a huge one story 360 degree tv screen thing that circled the main stage. Her show was in the round and had three rings just like a circus.


































- Jessica

Catdog

I swear that our dogs must have been cats in their previous lives. Chiquita LOVES scratching posts and uses them exactly like a cat would. Today I went to Petco to get some things and I picked up one of those ball in a loop toys that is for cats. The ball goes around the loop and the dogs went nuts over it trying to get the ball out.




I also got a little toy mouse on a string that hangs above a little circle of magnets that makes it constantly move and is also made for cats. The dogs argued over who got to play with it more.






As the evening wrapped up I was very suprised to find Olivia like this on my chair:






She NEVER does that so it was nice to be able to get her upstairs into bed already asleep. Gonna finish packing for our trip tomorrow. I can't wait! This concert is supposed to be amazing. If your curious check out Britney Spears Circus concert videos on Youtube. The show is set up like a 3 ringed circus with acrobats, clowns, magicians, tight rope walkers, etc. Yeah I know it's weird that I like her and all but you don't go to a Britney concert to hear the music. You go for the awesome and truely amazing show she puts on. Okay must go pack now.
- Jessica

Good Morning Sophia

This is what I woke up next to this morning. Too cute!



Her hair is never like that so I thought I would take a picture. Today is going to be a busy day. Tomorrow we are leaving to go up to Tacoma to see the Britney Spears Circus concert. I got tickets for my mom for her birthday and it has been a tradition for us to go to her concerts together. And this time we are taking Olivia which will be fun. We are staying in a hotel and will come back Friday. I also decided to start trying to lose weight and I am on the Medifast program which I started this morning. I'm totally psyched about it and am looking forward to being healthier. I will post some pics from the concert when I get back.

- Jessica

A Walk In The Park

Yesterday was a really nice day outside. It was one of the warmest we have had all year so we decided to take a walk down to the park and let he girls play for a while. OliviA wanted to wear a dress which was really cute paired with her Crocs and Sophia wore shoes for the very first time. She did really well in them and hardly fell at all. Here are the pics:






































- Jessica

Nice Evening

Yesterday we went to spend the afternoon and evening with Meema and Peepa (Dane's parents). Their house is close to my doctor so usually when I have an appointment we will go over and have an evening together. We watched the movie Marley and Me which was so good yet so sad. The movie is about a couple that adopts a rather difficult dog and tells the story of the life of the dog and couple. Spoiler alert ahead, if you don't want to know what happens skip the next sentence. In the end the dog dies and it was suprisingly emotional for me because it brought up a lot of feelings about a dog I lost about six years ago. Dane and I had just started living together down in California and I adopted a chihuahua named Star. She was adverstised in the paper as a rescue dog and I ended up beating over two hundred other applicants to get her. We had only had her for about a month in California and then we moved back up to Oregon. About a week after we got here Dane and I went out for an afternoon together and ended up leaving her alone for about four hours which was the longest she had been alone in our new place, but we had left her longer before at our old place. When we got home we found her collapsed under the kitchen table. We rushed her to a vet but she had already been dead a few hours. The vet said she probably had an undiagnosed heart condition and that because she was in a new environment and was scared that she had probably had a heart attack. It was really an awfull thing to go through but I firmly believe that she was meant to be with us for only a short time. She taught me a lot in the little while we spent together and that has gone on to benifit our family today. After watching the movie we rounded up the girls and came home but I managed to sneak in a picture before we left.


Here are the girls rocking out to Diego in their matching pink pjs. I know it's nerdy but I love to dress them alike. Can you believe that one time when we were out and they had worn matching outfits someone had asked me if they were twins? Yeah, I know. Anyways, we came home and went to bed and got up this morning and have had a nice relaxing day of arts and crafts and Dora. I love the weekends.

- Jessica

First Post

So I've finally decided to start a blog. Hopefully I will be able to keep up with it. Not much to report today. In a little while we are going to Meema and Peepa's house for the afternoon and into dinner. I have a doctor appointment with my regular doc out in Lake Oswego to follow up on some stuff with my fibromyalgia. Should be good.


- Jessica