Wild

Loving this wild and lush arrangement on our kitchen table right now.  

Simplifying

Natural light makes everything beautiful.  I was headed upstairs to fold laundry today and stopped dead in my tracks and grabbed my camera.  Peony season is here.  I'm one happy girl.

Gwen

I don't get to our family blog as much as I would like to these days.  As the girls get older my spare moments are fewer and fewer.  I am taking a floral arranging class.  I love it.  This past week's assignment was to make a floral head wreath.  Gwenners was my model.  I have lots of pretty pictures but just enough time to post this one.  I seem to take the lazy route and post on instagram more frequently than here where I should be posting for our family "scrapbook".  My goal is to get back to my "real camera" and be better about documenting my girls so that they have pictures to put with their memories as they grow older.

Sweet Lily

My sweet Lily on Christmas Night.  I came downstairs to find her just like this. The sign of a very happy but tired little girl.  

McGee Christmas Card 2013

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photo credit:  elizabeth harris

Christmas Day

                       

We had a great Christmas.   Santa found our home.  The girls were hoping for penny boards and when they looked over the railing Christmas morning, they were beyond excited.  Elle was most excited about her remote control helicopter.  Gwen had been hoping for  mermaid tail fins and Lily wanted a playhouse.  Santa did not disappoint.  

The girls played with their new things most of the day.  Lily was coloring her cardboard playhouse for hours!  I was in the kitchen cooking for our Christmas Dinner while Jon spent the day teaching the girls all the ins and outs of skateboard safety.  After years and years of mostly just dolls for gifts, this was a fun year for Jon with the girls getting some things he could actually relate to!

I was so busy cooking and getting everything ready that I never got a picture of the adult table.  It was pretty cute. The girls had their very own "kid table" and they helped me decorate it.  They even got to stay in their pajamas the WHOLE day!   I found the cutest English Crackers at World Market.  The pop sound with the toys falling out and the paper crowns were a big hit.

The McGees had a very Merry Christmas

Christmas Sunday

Love these 3 soooo much!  

I thought Elle would like having a different dress from her sisters but when I pulled everything out for the girls, Elle said, "why am I not matching??"  I will  match them into their teens if they'll let me :)  I had black tights for Gwen and Lily but could not find them for the life of me as we were rushing to get out the door for church.  They're not babies anymore and I am loving watching their personalities develop.  

I want to freeze them just like this forever.

Christmas Room

  Christmas is my very favorite holiday and we're getting so excited.  Just 4 more sleeps!  We started decorating the house the day after Thanksgiving.  Without question, the favorite thing the girls take out of our Christmas boxes are their Santa Sheets.  I've taken this photo almost every year and here is my lily jumping on her Christmas bed.  Last Christmas she was in a crib so this was the first year for her to have Santa Sheets.  Elle moved into Lily's room so we had to get another set.
They get to pick out their own Christmas trees for their bedrooms every year.  At night with the lights on them, it looks so magical.  I close their doors at night so each morning when I come in to wake them, the smell of pine is incredible.  There's nothing like real pine trees.  I'm hoping these sights, smells and sounds of Christmas are being soaked up into their little minds. You only get one childhood.  

Christmas Kitchen

White Christmas

The jingle bells on red velvet ribbon we put on each stocking are the girls' favorite addition this year.  And just like every other Pinterest reading mom out there, I put our tree in a basket.  The cowhide bowl next to the basket is filled with our favorite Christmas picture books.  

Santa Wreath

❤ A subtle hint for Santa to stop at our home ❤

Baby June Elizabeth

One of my best friends, Christy, had her 4th baby recently. I'm not a professional photographer but my gift to her was to take pictures of her sweet newborn baby girl at the hospital and also a few days after they came home.  

These were a few of my favorites.  How cute is this little angel!? I miss this newborn stage a lot.  Nothing sweeter.

Pumpkins

I have a collection of all different types of pumpkins -- glass, carved wood, silver, etc.   When I ran across these black and white checkered ones, I knew they needed to come home with me.  

Lily the Lamb

Gwen the 50's Girl

Elle the Indian

Halloween 2013

Happy Halloween!

10 year Anniversary (6 months late)

Jon and I celebrated our 10 year anniversary last April.  In many respects it feels like we've been married a lot longer than 10 years. And that's not a bad thing.  We have 3 little girls that now call us mom and dad.  We've had the ups and downs like any other couple but one thing is for sure....We love each other.  Even in the more difficult and stressful periods of life, I have not once wondered if Jon loves me.  He is an incredible husband and father and there's no one else I'd rather journey through this life with.  He makes my life Happy.

On our Anniversary, Jon was out of town.  I was a bit bummed about it until he sent me this video at the crack of dawn the morning of our anniversary.  He had been working on it for a while and I can't help but tear up every time I watch it.

Here's to many many more years with my Jonnie.

❤ ❤ ❤

I couldn't resist this one...

Mimi

Lily has a little cow pillow pet.  She calls it her mimi.  The most important part of her mimi is the little strap on the side that has the velcro on it.  That strap is like GOLD.  When she sleeps at night she has to put her head on her mimi and then she holds the strap. Every morning she walks into our bedroom in her jammies dragging her mimi.  When we go downstairs for breakfast - mimi gets dragged down the stairs.  I have to make sure when I wash her pillow pet that it is dry by the time it's bedtime.  One of these nights I'm going to sneak in her room and get a picture of her with her sleeping and holding on to that velcro strap.  It's so cute. The very bottom picture is my favorite.  We have a little window seat in our upstairs hallway that looks down on to our driveway.  On the days that Jon takes Gwen and Elle to school, Lily will run up to the window seat, open the shutters and sit and watch them hop in the car and drive off to school.  She's missing that Gwen isn't home with her in the mornings anymore.  I'm SOO happy that I still have my Lily-pie home with me...and her mimi.

Chandelier in the Kitchen

I recently put this antique brass chandelier in our kitchen.  This picture doesn't do it justice.  It's really, really beautiful.  I've imagined one here for years.  I loved the lantern I had up previously but this is a fun change.  It's a little bit tricky to photograph.  When the light is off it photographs "black" but that's not how it looks in person.  It's an old and weathered brass.  I love how it looks with the mix of antiques and more rustic natural wood we have downstairs.  

Lily: First day of Preschool

My Lily-pie is in preschool this year.  She was beyond excited about her backpack and lunch box.  Her little backpack says, "bonjour" and 'happiness" all over it.  When we saw it in the store she squealed with excitement and tried it on.  Her little lunch box is bright orange (her favorite color) and she had to have it IN her backpack like her big sisters.  I miss my little side-kick during the day.  A lot. 

Gwen: First day of 1st Grade

Oh boy, can you tell Gwen is excited about being in 1st grade?!  She searched and searched for the perfect backpack.  When she found this gray denim hello kitty one the search was over instantly.  She said, "other kids might say hello kitty is baby but I'll say, I LOVE her".  I love Gwenner's confidence.  She checked the computer daily tracking its arrival.  So cute.

She loves her teacher and her class.  Lily misses playing with her in the mornings and I do too. Gwen makes me so happy.

Elle: 1st Day of 4th Grade

I can't believe my Ellers is in 4th grade!!!  She loves her teacher and has a bunch of friends in her classs.  This year she told me she had to get a BIG backpack because in 4th grade that's when you have lots of homework and BIG books.  I love this girl so much.

Family Room

The girls are back in school and are happy to have routine again in their lives -- I must say, I am too.  I stopped at the flower stand today and got some fall flowers for the family room.  Makes me happy. Our family room is finally coming together for me.  The scale is difficult in this room because of the vaulted ceilings.  That table in the corner is 60" across.  It's a kitchen table and still gets swallowed up in the corner.  I would love to have a round table there but this was one we just had and I've made it work.  I now have a lamp that has the correct scale for the room.  I love the silver.  To the right of the fireplace there needs to be a chair to balance out the room.   I have an amazing one in our storage unit that I found at a consignment shop over a year ago.  I just need to save my pennies to get it reupholstered.  Most of my day is with my sweet girls and doing laundry and grocery shopping and cleaning...fussing with my house is my hobby and passion and my creative outlet.  Today just putting the flowers out and taking pictures made me happy.