Current Projects

Blankets for my girl's. Savannah's - top, Bella's - bottom.
I sewed together two pieces of fleece and then clipped the edges.

Fabric that will become my kitchen curtains.

This is the fabric for curtains for the girl's room. I am super excited and really hope they turn out like the picture in my mind.

My mom came out to visit for a week. We had so much fun. We were able to visit all the sites in Palmyra, NY. Of course one of the favorites is the Sacred Grove. We were also able to visit the beautiful Letchworth State Park. The picture of the waterfalls comes from that park. We took Grandma to the zoo for the fun Zoo Boo fun. And of course some yummy Halloween sugar cookies were made and enjoyed. It was so nice to have her here with us. Thanks for coming Mom.

Halloween

Introducing.....

Goldilocks and Baby Bear

I once again was lucky to be able to pick the costumes for this year. I think next year Savannah may have another idea.

Saturday morning we carved our pumpkins, but I forgot both times I went to the store to get candles so they remained dark Halloween night.

Savannah chose which shapes to use, but sadly (for her) we helped with the carving.

Seth's Pumpkin

Bella's Pumpkin. She was napping at this point, so she didn't make the pictures.


We met up with some friends for trick-or-treating. So much fun! So much Candy!


A sucker in the mouth, candy in both hands, one happy girl.

The next group of pictures are some of my favorites from when my mom was here.

My very first pie with homemade crust. YUMMY! It was an apple pie.

Super excited to make sugar cookies with Grandma.

Letchworth State Park in NY.

My favorite picture. This was taken at the Smith Farm in Palmyra, NY. The Sacred Grove is in the background. We are only 30 min away from Palmyra.

Before and After Photo's - Living Room and Office

Here are the before and after photo's. The house is coming along, slowly but surely. I am determined to make sure everything has a place or we don't need it. I want to start off organized so that it will be easier to maintain. That being said, it takes a long time to get everything put away especially when I have to be creative in how we store stuff. Also, this whole decorating thing does not come very easy to me. This is a major learning experience, one I hope turns out positive.

THE BEFORE

This is how the old carpet looked. It was supposed to be a light blue, but it was more brown than blue except where the furniture was. We were lucky to be able to paint before the carpet was replaced.

This hardwood floor was under the carpet. We knew it was there, but did not know what condition it was in. It wasn't too bad, but would have needed to be refinished.

THE AFTER
And now the new carpet. We opted for a neutral color, not to light, but not too dark. Don't worry, the teal curtains on the window will be changed, probably to a chocolate brown.

Fireplace view

The carpet went all the way up the stairs as well.



This is our office / treadmill room. The door leads out to the sun room and the backyard.

So there it is, the new carpet. We love it. It is so soft and clean. There will be more photos to follow as I finish more of the house. I am not kidding when I say decorating is not easy for me. It all got a little overwhelming so I just stopped trying for a while. Now I am back to working on it little by little.

It's About Time

I figure it is about time to actually sit down and start posting some of the many things on my list. First of all we made it to Rochester, a month ago, but we are here. So far so good. Seth loves his job, YAY! He was really nervous that he wasn't going to like Radiology, but the work day seem to pass very quickly, so that must be a good sign.
We are enjoying our house. It is pretty fun to have our own space. I do have to say this, there is so much to do. I am sure all you home owners are nodding your head in agreement. It seems like the to do list is never ending.
Most of the moving in has gone smoothly except for one major item. We knew moving in we were going to have to have our carpet cleaned, the background to which I will share later. Knowing this we put everything that needed to go in the office or living room in the basement or sun room. We had Chem Dry come to clean the carpet and the first words out of the guys mouth was, "I can't clean this." He went on to say that it would be a better to put our money toward new carpet. For some reason I was not suprised, but did not want to hear that. I was very impressed that he would tell me the truth instead of charge me knowing it wouldn't come clean. It is pretty bad. We were pretty frustrated, and still are a little bit. We definitely did not plan to have to buy new carpet. It is so expensive. We do have hard wood floors under the carpet, but after much discussion, we are still going ahead with carpet. We found some carpet we like that we think (hope) is good quality. When I can let my mind get passed the price, I am actually very excited. It is going to be so nice to start fresh and know that my carpet is clean. Right now there is a very weird, gross smell in our house that I really hope leaves with the carpet. So any way, we are only partly moved in, main stuff the couch, entertainment center and computer. I feel like I am constantly going through boxes to find things. It is driving me crazy. We finally made the appointment with the carpet installers for a week from today. So from start to finish it will be 4 1/2 weeks. Maybe it always takes this long, but I am so tired of living on really gross, stinky carpet.
So because we are replacing the carpet, we decided we better paint while we still have the old carpet and don't have to worry about any spills. We painted the office a medium brown, actually called Mississippi mud and the living room a green (I can't remember the name). I will post pictures later when we have our new carpet. Right now the carpet is a light blue, except for the huge areas, where it is down a brownish blue, and it doesn't look very good with the paint colors we have. Our new carpet will be a light brown and I think it is going to all come together nicely. At least I am really hoping it will. Picking out paint colors was a bit of a stress, I am not very good at that kind of thing.

We also painted the girl's room pink. I am still in the process of putting their names on the wall and flowers as such all in a chocolate brown.BEFORE

AFTER - I will post another picture when it is all done.

Here is our very first home!

The door is to our sun room, or three season room, which also leads out onto our patio!

This is our back yard. I love that it is already fenced in, already has flowers and such, and most of all that it is mostly grass for us to play.

Now the next picture I did not know we had until we moved here and it is my most favorite thing about this house.

RASPBERRIES!!!
I was so excited when I found out. It is a pretty big patch of raspberries, and what do you do when you have many, many raspberries?

You make raspberry freezer jam!!! Right now we have 24 cups in the freezer and more raspberries coming. I love it. YUM, YUM!

Whirlwind Weekend

Last weekend was a crazy, crazy weekend. First of all I have been packing up everything we own for the last month while Seth was practically living at the hospital. Luckily he did have a few days off before packing the truck to help with the last stuff.
Friday afternoon we picked up the truck. Friday around 4 pm our help started showing up. By 7 pm the truck was pretty much packed. Saturday morning we woke up and I started cleaning and Seth was packing the stuff we needed the last night and rearranging some stuff in the truck. We left Cooperstown for the last time around 11 am. I was definitely feeling some sadness as we drove away. I really enjoyed the year we spent there. We reached our home in Rochester at 2:45 pm and help came at 3 pm. Our truck was unloaded in an hour. It was amazing. We had such great help on both sides of the move. I am so grateful for the church. We couldn't have done it without all the members who came to help. THANK YOU!!!
We then returned the truck and went to dinner. We put the girls to bed and then made sure we had everything ready to go to Utah. We woke up the girls and 5 am Sunday morning and drove to my cousins house so she could take us to the airport for our 7:30 flight. Thank you Seleta for waking up so early. You are the best.
After 7 hours of travel time we arrived in Utah. I am so glad to be here. We are having such a great time reconnecting with family and friends. It has been two years since we have been home. This trip was much needed. We will be here in Utah for a month. Seth is working at Logan Regional Hospital with a radiologist and has a great schedule. It was pretty weird to move in to our house and then lock it up and leave for a month, but I am very happy to have the break.

Easter Weekend

Even though it has been a while since Easter, here is our Easter celebration time line.
It all started with a super fun package from my mom and sister. Savannah and Bella were so excited. They each received a bag full of Easter goodies and of course the following Sunglasses.

Movie Star for sure

Bella loves being like her big sister.

Seth didn't want to miss out on the fun.

Thanks for the fun packages Mom and Traci.

Saturday we had a fun little Easter party with our friends the Harry's. We decorated sugar cookies and had an Easter egg hunt. Seth had to work that day so it was so nice to celebrate with friends.

Here's the clan after all the eggs were found. They wanted more of course.

Since Seth was at work on Saturday we changed plans and did the baskets on Sunday morning. I definitely prefer Saturday morning. The girls were pretty excited which is so fun. When I was younger the "Easter Bunny" would hide the baskets and we would have to find them. I am excited to do that as the girls get older.

Savannah and Bella checking out their stash.

This is the best picture we could get of the girls in their Easter dresses. They didn't want to stand. They looked so cute.

Here is a full picture of this year's Easter dresses. I love having girls to make dresses for.

Sunday afternoon we decorated Easter eggs.
We had a dozen of these happy eggs to look at.

My Busy One Year Old

Do you ever feel like you are so far behind that you don't even know where to begin? That is how I feel about blogging right now. There are so many things I want to blog about with so little time to do it. Even right now I am trying to type while my one year old tries to type for me.
Whenever I think life is busy it just seems to get busier. We have once again started the crazy process of moving. We have 6 weeks left in Cooperstown, then on to Rochester. We are in the process of buying a house - very exciting. I will blog more about that later. If all goes well, we will be moving on May 30th and flying to Utah on May 31st. I can't believe it is that time already. But first things first.



Our beautiful little Isabella turned 1 years old on Feb. 4. She is such a sweet girl. She is walking all over the place and just loves to explore. Her smile and laugh can turn a bad day - good. We are so excited to get to Utah so that our family can get to know this little girl. Most of the fam and many of our friend have yet to meet her in person.
I have noticed that I am able to enjoy each stage more with Bella than I did with Savannah. I was always so stressed with Savannah and trying to figure out how to be a mom. I don't think I have completely figured it out but I am able to enjoy it more this time around. Of course it helps that Bella is my little mama's girl and loves to snuggle.
We had a low key birthday celebration with our friends the Harry's. Once Bella tasted the yummy frosting, she dug right in. The ice cream was also a big hit. All was well until we heard a weird sound in the middle of the night. Seth went into Bella's room and found that she had thrown-up everywhere. We thought we had probably just stuffed the poor girl with way too many sweets. Then two days later Savannah started throwing up and it lasted all day long. We were very glad when that stomach bug left our house.
Here are some more pictures and a video of our sweet little Bella.

I love this girl!

Bella loves to wear Savannah's bike helmet. The funny thing is it almost fits her.

Looking cool in my new sunglasses.


I love seeing this face every morning. She wakes up so happy.

Snow, Snow go away

Today it is official. I am done with winter. Winter and I are no longer friends. I have been trying very hard to stay positive about winter because we will have long winters the next 4 years, but today I am done. I am done with getting all bundled up. I am done with dry, dry skin. I am done with car doors frozen shut. I am done with bad roads. I am done with the cold.

WINTER, I AM DONE WITH YOU!!!

Now I know I can't make spring come any sooner so I should probably change my attitude. Maybe tomorrow we will become friends again and I will be able to see your beauty. Until then, I am done.

Husband Tag

1. What is your husband's name?
Seth Henry Iverson. I know him as Seth, but to some of my cousins he is Hanky Baby. He always says he would like to go by Henry.

2.How long have you been married?
4 1/2 Years

3.How long did you date?
We officially dated 6 months before we were engaged. Then three months and then married.

4.How old is he?
31, almost 32

5.Who eats more sweets?
Definitely me! He is all about the dried fruit, trail mix kind of snacks. There have been many times when I will be eating ice cream and he is eating a grapefruit.

6.Who is a better singer?
We both can sing in choirs, but never any solos

7. Who is smarter?
I would say Seth

8.Who does the laundry?
Me, every Monday!

9.Who sleeps on the right side of the bed?
If your sitting in the Bed, I sleep on the right side.

10.What does he do in his spare time?
If he had spare time, he would spend time with the girls, read, ride his bike, or finish on going projects.

11.Who cooks dinner?
ME, although I do believe he has some hidden cooking talent. Every once in a while I hear about something he has made, but I don't see it very often. I do have to say this, he makes a very delicious chocolate cake for my birthday.

12.Who wears the pants?
I think we both do.

13. Who is always right?
I would love to say it is me, but then I might be wrong! Seth does say that he is learning more and more to listen to me. Those are his words, not mine.

14. Who said "I love you" first?
Seth did. All I said back was, "I don't know what to say". Real romantic.

15. Does he snore?
Occasionally, mostly when he is stuffy.

16. Who kissed who first?
Seth kissed me first.

17.Who drives?
If Seth is in the car, he drives which is perfectly fine with me.

18.Who asked who out first?
Our first date just kind of happened. We had planned a hike up the Wellsville mts. with a group of people and everyone else decided not to go for one reason or the other. So we went together anyway and had the best time. We were pretty much together from then on, so a few weeks later we decided that was our first date. We even have a picture of us on our first date.

So that is just some of what I love about my husband. I am so thankful that we were able to find each other. We love each other and the wonderful little girls that we have. We miss him when he is away, but we are so grateful for all the hard work he puts in at the hospital. He is doing such a great job. He is simply amazing!

I tag, Jen Isom, Sarah Smith, and Andrea McClelland.

All Things Christmas

The end of 2008 and the beginning of 2009 have been great for us. We had a wonderful Christmas. Seth had a week off starting Christmas Eve. It was so nice to have him home. Savannah was much more into it this year. I loved seeing the excitement in her eyes. Bella didn't really know what was going on, but she did love the paper Christmas morning. She loves to play with any paper, mag. etc. she can find, so we didn't put any presents under the tree until Christmas Eve. Here are a few pictures from the Season.

Playing in the snow with Savannah and Bella. Bella didn't last very long, but Savannah had a blast.


Santa had his own little house on Main Street here in Cooperstown. He would come a few days a week to visit with the kids. Mrs. Claus came with him. She also did story time on Mondays. Savannah really enjoyed that.

Bella was not very excited to be handed off to a man in a red suit, no matter how jolly he was. He actually did a really good job with the kids. Yes, his beard is real. He does this every year with his wife.

Christmas Eve Dinner. I cooked a ham, funeral potatoes, rolls, corn, blue jello (Savannah's idea) and sparkling grape juice. The ham cooked for 13 hours, overnight, so easy and so delicious.

Savannah and Bella were lucky to open a present Christmas Eve - pajamas. They say "What Santa doesn't bring me Grandma will.

I couldn't resist posting this picture. I just love this little girl. She is always so happy.


The Sunday before Christmas church was canceled due to snow, so the girls wore their Christmas dress after Christmas. They looked so cute. Savannah actually even let me do her hair. That is a rare occasion these days.




These last two pictures are of the presents I made for my girls. I made the doll for Savannah and the bears for both of them. It was originally supposed to be Goldy Locks and the Three Bears, but I used too big of yarn for the doll, so she kind of towers over the bears. I was pretty excited to see the finished product. Of course I do hope they keep them for a long time, but we shall see. I love making things with my hands. This project taught me a lot about knitting.