Nothing Like The Feeling...

...of the wind in your hair. One of Morgan's newest thrills. Love it. Love her. Love the smiles and giggles that accompany it.

Look at that tornado of hair!

Strategery

As usual, I'm a bit behind in my blogging. Easter for us was a bit of blur of a weekend as we had a lot going on. I helped host my fourth baby/bridal shower in five months the Saturday before. Then Easter Sunday morning our church held its service at the Verizon Wireless Amphitheater, the property that we are in the process of purchasing. It was an awesome service and cool glimpse of what things will be like in the future! From church, we made a quick trip up to Fredericksburg to celebrate with Jonathan's family. At Great Grandpa and Grandma Schlueter's, we set up Morgan's first egg hunt in their back yard. We thought this would be a better location than out at the ranch house where Morgan may have picked up sheep poop instead :) I was a bit skeptical that Morgan would catch onto the gist of the egg hunt, but the girl got it from the get-go and wasn't ready for it to end ... until she discovered that there were treats inside the eggs! Thankfully, this year she was satisfied with animal crackers, goldfish, and raisins as her treats. I get the feeling next year she'll be demanding candy :) Daddy was already disappointed that there wasn't candy in her eggs ... poor guy wanted a part of the action!

After that, I had three days to get the three of us packed up - for Morgan to head to Grandpa and Grandma Schlueter's and for Jonathan and I to head to NYC to celebrate our fifth anniversary. More on that to come...

Our Little Easter Bunny

Before the Easter holiday passes, I'd better post Morgan's Easter pictures. I went with my friend Kristi and her kids, Audrey and Connor. Morgan and Audrey had matching dresses, a by-product of one of our previous shopping trips together. Naturally, Kristi and I couldn't resist getting a few pics of the girls together. Overall, this was one of Morgan's better professional photo shoots of late. How can I tell? Well, frankly, she's smiling in the majority of her pictures. Hope you enjoy!

Here are a few pics from Easters past. The first is Morgan's picture from last Easter, her first Easter. As you can see, the bunny ears have become something of a tradition - mostly because I think they are stinkin' adorable on the girl. One day she'll really hate me! The other two come from a treasure trove of old pictures I received at Kel's wedding. I'll post more soon; they're just so funny.

2008

1987
How I hated this haircut. I was never meant to be cool...

1985
Okay, so after reading Mom's caption to this picture,
it wasn't taken at Easter after all.
Oh well, it's already uploaded so you're getting it anyway.

I do love this man...

Family Pic from Kel's wedding last weekend.

Five years. Today Jonathan and I celebrate a half decade of marital bliss. It's so hard to believe because it has gone so fast! We've been blessed with many great times together over these past years ... and what's even better is that I feel equally blessed for just having his partnership and presence through the everyday mundane times.

Here are a few things I love about my man:

• The boy has enough A&M t-shirts that he could wear a new one every day for two weeks straight - often though, it is limited to about five days a week.
• He loves to eat my baked confections even though he is (mostly) committed to his no-carb diet.
• He makes a mad homemade pizza and is the grill master.
• He likes things clean - even cleaner than I like them.
• He hasn't given up the military crew cut that was mandated in the Corps of Cadets, even though it's been ten years since he was part of the Corps.
• He loves to spend money like I love to horde it; it makes us a good pair ... and lends to some nice "discussions".
• We both place a high importance on family - our's individually as well as our parents, siblings, and grandparents. And we each genuinely love each other's family.
• He's a great dad who enjoys making Morgan laugh and smile.
  
• He is an awesome provider for our family and has supported me unconditionally in my role as a stay at home mom.
• He asks for my opinion and advice because he honestly wants to know. And he even tolerates my unsolicited opinions (often tirades)!
• He laughs at my goofy jokes and sense of humor. Praise God for that.
• We can talk "legalese" and enjoy ourselves.
• We both love his parents' ranch and my family's farmland.
• He still thinks I'm beautiful and tells me so.

And that's just the tip of the iceberg. I tell you I am a darn lucky lady ... though sometimes I need to be reminded of it!

Love you Babe! Here's to another five years of "bliss"!

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Wedding Week So Far...

Morgan and I have been spending this week up in Springfield, Missouri helping to prepare for my sister Kel's wedding. We actually haven't done much helping at all - there's been a lot more visiting with family and friends.

Early in the week two of my best friends from college (which is also in Springfield) drove into town with their kids so we could all get together. It was awesomely fun, but friendships (like life) take on a different dynamic once you have kids (and we all three do). Consequently, our get-together became more of a playdate at JumpMania. The kids all had a great time and wore themselves out literally to the point of tears. Thankfully later that night after all our kids were in bed, we were able to reconvene for a little adult conversation ... and to pretend we were young again!



There's also been a bit of March Madness action going. It's one of our family's favorite times of the year as we have our annual competition. Sadly, our Illini did not fare so well in the first round. Nonetheless, the competition lives on! So far, I'm not doing too bad.



There've also been a few opportunities for Morgan and Maddie to get together which hasn't happened since Christmas. Maddie has learned to walk so that has made playing together much more entertaining to watch :)

Maddie giving Morgan a "kiss" in their matching jammies.

Blasted blog!

I have to admit I'm growing weary of my blog. I desire to be like so many of my faithfully blogging friends, but frankly I don't have that interesting of a life nor do I have that kind of time. Well, I guess technically I could make the time in the evenings once M is down to bed, but I just don't want to. By that time of the day, I'm tired and want to relax. Isn't that okay? And... since I started Facebook, I haven't wanted to come back to my dusty ol' blog. It symbolizes effort and commitment where Facebook is more like a drive-thru - you're in, you're out, you're on your way. Instant gratification for me and all my Facebook "friends".

But for those faithful few who keep checking in on me (or more likely - my cute daughter), I'm here blogging for you with the randomness of my life of late. I'm warning you; it's lame...

1. What I LOVE Right Now.

Seriously, this stuff is A-Freaking-Mazing! What is it you ask? It's like a miracle dishwashing solution for anyone with hard water. We replaced our dishwasher about a month ago after suffering through many long months of its lackluster performance. However, I was pissed when the new dishwasher seemed to not do much better. About that time, it dawned on me that our hard water was a potential culprit for all the spots and splotches on our "clean" dishes. In doing some research to test my theory, I came across LemiShine. I found it at Walmart for like $2.50. I gave it a whirl, and my dishes (which have a rough finish to them that doesn't clean easily) looked like they did the day I bought them. Brings a tear to my eye even still. I've used it several times since and still rave at how my dishes look. I'm telling you JUST TRY IT if you have hard water!

I told you my life is lame ... and revolves on simple pleasures. Oh, and no, I don't regret buying the new dishwasher ;)

2. What I HATE Right Now.

Yes, it's true I have a complex over this book series. I feel like something must be wrong with me because EVERYONE else I know (and whose opinions I respect) LOVES this series. I just don't. I can't stand it. I read Twilight (Book #1) and hated the first 17 chapters of it (these chapters were mostly about budding teenage romance). The last seven chapters were the only ones worth reading (the ones containing a good vs. evil battle) but still didn't vindicate the rest of the book. I decided I'd start New Moon (Book #2) in hopes that things would get better. Nope. After three chapters, I could see it was going to be more of the same and stopped reading. I will probably watch the Twilight movie when it comes out on DVD later this month to see if I like it any better than the books, but I will likely not finish this series. Plus I have a few good friends (Twilight groupies) who said they'd fill me in ad nauseam on the rest of the story over dinner or coffee - a prospect which sounds infinitely better than wasting more hours of my life on these books. There are just too many other more worthy reads on my list.

So what's my beef with these books you ask? No, it's not the vampires; I don't care about that. Let me see if I can enumerate some of the reasons...

a. The pathetic teenage love story. It's so over-the-top and melodramatic. It's the whole "My Life is Nothing Without You" mantra that makes me want to stick my finger down my throat. This is the same reason I dislike Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet. I know, again, this makes me weird. And yes, I was a teenager once, but honestly I don't think I ever acted this way over someone I was with. If you knew me back then, please correct me if I'm wrong...

b. The female lead, Bella. The author wants the reader to believe this girl is supposed to be intelligent. Um no. The girl is so irrational in her thought processes and actions that there's just no way. A friend of mine from high school (who enjoyed the series) summed Bella up well: "Bella was so whiny if she had been in the same room as me I would have slapped her."

c. Poor writing. I appreciate that these are Stephenie Meyer's first published books, but her writing did not overwhelm me. And I can forgive a lot for the sake of a good story.

Enough of my rant. I still love all my Twilight-entranced friends and hope they will tolerate me despite my perhaps-too-loudly-and-avidly-stated distate for Twilight :)

3. What Is Going On In My/Our Life Right Now.

A few highlights:

• Morgan turns 18 months on Friday. I can't believe she's already this old...
  
• My youngest sister Kelly gets married in a week. M & I will head up to be with her and the rest of the family next week in preparation. Jonathan will join us for the wedding weekend.
• I've been able to expand my legal practice in the past few months.
• JD & I booked tickets for a four day weekend in NYC to celebrate our 5th anniversary. Grandpa & Grandma Schlueter are going to watch M!!

Well, my friends, that's all I can think of :) Hope that satiates you for another month or so ... until I get inspired to write again!

Hi....Hi....Hi

Yes, we still exist :) 2009 has been busy so far. I can't believe it's February already! In fact, I've already taken my first trip of the year - a baby-free weekend to Illinois for my sister Kel's bridal shower. It was so nice to not have Morgan sitting in my lap during the flight. I forgot how relaxing it could be just to sleep, read, or listen to my Ipod. My awesome husband made the weekend possible, and it sounds like he and Morgan had some quality daddy-daughter time together while I was away. Our next trip will be in March for Kel & Jess' wedding!!

Morgan keeps growing and developing. Just the other day I said to Jonathan as she was pushing a car around the floor making "vroom" sounds, "She's not a baby anymore." Sad :( However, on the up side, she is a blast nowadays. She is full of sparkling personality and goes everywhere in what Jonathan calls mini-high-speed with her chunky little belly leading the way! She is becoming increasingly verbal and communicative, and I love to hear her little voice. Here's a sample (though not very verbose):

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I'm a sucker for that funny ballcap on her. And look at all the hair she's getting! It's at the funny unmanageable stage where you can't really do much with it. However, the color is very similar to mine as a little girl.



And since it's been so long and you've been so patient, here are a few bonus shots:

Poor Girl - I just like her in hats!

What you're REALLY supposed to do with a bubble wand.

Oh and for my Twilight-addicted friends who've been waiting with baited breath to hear how I liked Book 1, I finally did finish it. The last seven chapters (which mainly comprised of a good vs. evil battle) vindicated the first seventeen lackluster ones. In the end, I decided that I am just not into teenage love (read: infatuation) stories. They make me sick. I just want to scream, "Get a grip. Oh wait, you can't; your hormones make rational thought impossible." And I'm sure being a vampire doesn't help either. So I'm taking a Twilight break and am reading something else for now. But I may still go back and finish the series just to have plot closure :)