Strollers ?? Opinions please

With this new one on the way, i'm looking for a new stroller. I love my full size one, but it's just that - full size. I need a good umbrella stroller for the space, traveling, etc. I hate the cheap ones, they're no where near tall enough for me and I end up with an aching back or just carrying the child. My preferences (in order):
1. tall handles
2. shade
3. basket underneath
4. sit & ride seat for Ains
Has anyone ever seen an umbrella stroller with the seat on the back for older kids?

I want your opinions, experiences, etc. Thanks!!

Tulip Festival 2009

While dad & Sandy were here we went to the tulip festival. We went Saturday morning as it has been really busy the past few Sat afternoons. I don't know that it got quite so busy this time, Saturday was a bit cold and rainy. We didn't stay long, which was probably better we had more shelving to do. The fields were gorgeous, but the wind blew right over them, so it was pretty cold walking around them. Ainsleigh had a lot of fun. She held a bird (though it mostly stood on my hand as I steadied her arm), we both got our faces painted - she had hers picked off within a few hours and then started working on mine, and then asked where they went :). She also liked the ducky races, the bouncy houses, and most of all her pony rides - that is always her favorite.

big helper

Ainsleigh is really into helping lately, I try to allow and encourage it as much as possible, although sometimes that does take additional time and patience - I want her to enjoy helping. This past weekend my dad and stepmom came to visit and help us put up some shelving. Some of it needed to be painted before it went up - so Sandy and Ainsleigh painted it together - Ains really did a good job, she's getting so big it amazes me sometimes the things she can do. I guess when I paint her dresser i'll have to have her help me.

Easter egg hunt

finding an egg - yeah!!


posing for the camera - if only I could get her to look at it, too.


I didn't get pictures of Ains in her Easter dress, maybe i'll dress her up the next nice day and take some. We decided to do an egg hunt at the house Sunday afternoon. It was cute to watch, she got so excited with EVERY egg she found. The hair is post nap, so that's part of why it's a little crazy - it's growing, but I think it will still be a loooong time before we have a bob again. She and I both miss pigtails so hopefully it grows fast.

Updates

Wow, time is flying by. I am now 7 months along, I can't believe that means less than 2 months to go!! Auuggghhhh!! I feel like I still have so much to do. I am getting excited, just want to have all my ducks in a row. I am still working on doing stuff to decorate the house, then will get to work on stuff for the girls room. I actually have to do stuff for Ainsleigh and the baby is getting Ainsleigh's crib bedding and her current dresser when I finish painting one for A. In a few days I can say I'm due next month, which kind of makes me laugh because it's bit of a skew since i'm due at the very end of the month, but that's okay. At my appt last week I made all of my appts through the end, that felt kinda wierd. I am having another ultrasound in a few weeks to make sure the baby is growing okay since I am constantly measuring small. I did the whole time with Ains too, so no one is real concerned, just bettter safe. I probably just have another pip squeak. We'll have to wait and see, and no, we haven't settled on a name yet - still accepting suggestions.

free digital scrapbooking

So, things have a changed a lot in the free digital scrapbooking world since I posted about this last. There are still a lot of freebies out there, but in my opinion you do have to look a little harder. The biggest change is that a lot of the sites that do a freebie each week or so now "retires" these kits at the end of each week. That means you only have that week to get them, then most of them go to dollar bins in their respective stores. For most of them, the collab kits are still free indefinetily. Big thanks to my sister-in-law Erin for letting me in on a bunch of these sites. I am working on revamping my link list on the side, I was working on editing it and accidentally deleted it completely. There's a list of places to check for the weekly freebie each week and there will be some other links as well. If you find any I should add, or discover some that aren't there anymore, etc - just let me know and I will try to update it accordingly. Happy scrapping.

Music on my blog??

Okay, I ALWAYS look at blogs, and do generally everything with the computer muted, today I unmuted it and couldn't figure out where the music was coming from - apparently I have music attached to my blog??!! How long has it been there? Now I get to try to get it off in the next few days, and i'm not even sure how it got there! Have a good day everyone.

scrapbooking...

Sorry, no updates on free downloading sites. The little bit of time i've spent on scrapbooking stuff has mostly been reloading all of already downloaded free stuff into my program. I got a virus in the fall, and still haven't caught up completely since then. I didn't lose anything, I was able to save it all and reload it, but I have to reload each free download kit seperately. Anyways, as we're getting pretty settled into the house I should have more time soon to update that sort of thing. Anyways, this past weekend scrappingsimply.com, as far as we know the cheapest place to print 12 x 12's, had a sale on printing. So I did my last touch ups to the few pages i've had a chance to do and get them printed. I thought I would show you the finished product. It will be very interesting to see the way things change as I do this more and more.

Celebration time!!

Ainsleigh's birthday was a little spread out this year with the move. Her birthday was on a Tuesday and we moved the following Saturday. My family wanted to come for a party, but they're far enough away it has to be on a Saturday. So, we put her party off and had it after we were moved in and somewhat settled. I worked on her actual birthday, I think i'll ask for it off next year, so we took special treats for snack time at "school" - she picked them out, brownies and Capri Sun. She really liked that. While we were walking through the grocery store I kept telling her it was her birthday and she was 3. She would get excited over it being her birthday, singing to herself and repeating, "oh yeah, it's my birthday." But, she was not yet convinced that she was 3. She kept telling me, "no mommy, I be 3 in March." It took a few days to convince her, but now she agrees she is 3. With turning another year older she got to move up in classes at daycare/school. I was concerned this would be a really hard adjustment for her - one of her 1 year classroom teachers moved up to the 2's not long before she did, but this time it was all new and a much higher student to teacher ratio. But she has done awesome. It helps that she already knows many of the kids from the past two classes, and that her best friend McKenzie has her birthday just before Ains. I'm grateful it has been an easy transition for her and that she is almost always happy when I drop her off. Nothing makes you feel worse than when they cry every day as you drop them off.

Present from Papa & Nana Pack - Her first gift was from Papa & Nana Pack, it was a set of Hello Kitty scrubs that she demanded to put on immediately and wear to bed, but i'm not sure why I didn't get a picture of them - they're super cute. We let her open it the night before so we could both be there without her having to wait 2 days after. Now she thinks any package that comes to the house can potentially be a gift for her and she can't wait to open them.



The card she got from them was super cool and had this crown in it. She couldn't wait for me to cut it out for her - she loves anything at all princess like right now!


Party at our house. We had a family party Saturday the 21st with all of my immediate family and Rachel and Brady and boys. They had lots of fun, Ains loved having all of the other kids to play with. She is a little timid about tearing paper on gifts, so she asked the other kids to help her. It was such a mass of kids standing around it was hard to get good pictures of her opening gifts, but that's okay.

The cake was kind of funny. My original plan was to make an ice cream cake, lately she only eats the icing off of cake. Then a week or so before her birthday she asked if we could make cupcakes and they decorate them themselves. Great, no time necessary for me to decorate anything :). The morning of her party she decided she had to have a cake, that it wouldn't be a birthday without it. So I made a cake and very quickly decorated - it was very fitting of a 3 year old, it basically looked like she had iced & decorated it. But it still tasted good. She also said we needed to decorate the house for her birthday. I wish I had had balloons and streamers because I think she would have totally gotten into it. I included the top picture of me lighting the candles because this was in the middle of the song. As soon as I lit them the first time, even before we started singing she blew them out, so I lit them again and she got to blow them out twice!


Her birthday outfit was pretty cute - she wanted to wear her pink dress that desperately needed ironing, but was not allowed, and her princess pajama pants. They played dress up at some point during the day, and she kept this dress on through the rest of the party.

fun times with baby Lillian

Lillian came to play recently while Meredith helped me pack some things up. Ainsleigh always feels like Lillian needs whatever she does, and makes sure to put it on for her. Usually it's some of her dress up dresses, this day it was winter hats. Hopefully she'll take such good care of her new sister as well.