happy new year!!

from the 3 of us...

from the 2 of us...

and from the birthday girl...

happy new year

here is to friendship, health, and a little bit of silly!

merry christmas!

we took a few cheeseburger shots on Christmas day...

this is Christmas, right after we got zella up and before we left to go to grandma and grandpa's house. she was so excited to open presents.

i will start with Christmas eve.the pictures are starting with Christmas morning. (i need to fig. how to post pictures in the order that i want...). we went over to grammy and pappys house. we played for a few hours, then kim and keith and emma and justin got there. we just kind of hung out, helping grammy with dinner. leah had to work until 6pm, so we ate without her. (she would have already eaten dinner, we are not totally heartless!). the kids knew that we were waiting for leah to open presents. when she got there, there was alot of excitement.

this was the littlest pet shop toy that zella really wanted. the only two things she wanted to tell Santa was this and the pony bus. she got both. grammy got her the pony bus, and charlie and i got her the pet shop. this picture is on Christmas day. she was so excited to open her gifts. we had just come home from charlie's parents house. she also opened gifts over there. so this was round 3 for her.

i told her that she had to smile while she opened her presents so that i could take pictures of her...

ok, now it is time to back up to Christmas eve, here is zella and grammy. zella loves stuffed animals and is playing with grammy.

i love this picture of grammy, emma and kim. i can't belive that they are all the same height. well, actually it isn't too hard, we roberts girls are short!

zella opening her "pony bus". she was so excited! she played all night with it. and when leah showed up, she played it with her.

i really wanted some group shots of us. we took this pose last year, and i thought it would be fun to have the same pose again. maybe start something...

after we took some pictures, kim remembered that there was a photo studio upstairs in the loft. much better for a nice background. i love these two...the day after Christmas was their 43rd wedding anniversary! way to go.

and this is a little video of zella opening her pet shop. pretty cute...

i hope everyone had a merry christmas. and i am looking forward to the new year!

pictures with santa?

guess who is missing? yes, you guested it! zella is missing from the photo with santa. this is the 3rd year that we (my girlfriend, kim, and her kiddo's, zachary and taylor) went to have the kids photo taken with santa. last year, we went 3 times to try to get zella to sit by santa. and she was having nothing to do with it. so this year, we talked about the santa picture all of the way to anthem. she knew what she was going to ask santa for... my little pony bus and some littlest pet shop toys. when we got there, all 3 kids got quiet. and needed some coaching. we decided not to pay for the photo and just talked to santa. they changed their package pricing and it started at 24.95$! i knew zella wasn't going to like it so i brought my camera along to take pictures. the people working at the santa shop, said that we could take pictures, we didn't have to pay to talk to santa. taylor was pretty brave and asked santa for something, zack also asked for some toys. and where was zella during all of this?...

yep! she high-tailed it out of the santa shop! here she is in mid-fleeing action...

we then went to see the big Christmas tree. it was huge! it is probably 3 or 4 stories tall and just beautiful. the kids had fun running around by the tree. somehow zella was able to snag a reindeer hat from the santa shop!

only two weeks til Christmas! we haven't done anything to get ready. yeah, we are on the ball

jill b

thanksgiving round 2

we had round two of thanksgiving dinner at my mom's house yesterday. leah was working and keith has thrown his back out again, so it was just my sister, kim, emma, and justin. charlie b and zella. my mom and dad. charlie and zella started the day off with some games. i tried to take pictures of everyone. so this post will be photo heavy. this my mom and me.

my dad and me. he has been working in the backyard, moving dirt here to there. he has a method to his madness...

my sister, kim and i. notice her beautiful sweater, she made that herself...!

emma entertained zella for most of the afternoon. they started off playing on the stairs. it was hard to photograph them because of the constant movement.

kim was also trying to take pictures of the girls. here she is showing zella a picture she took...

enjoying the lunch...

after lunch exercise...

emma and zella playing on the organ... ok, just banging away....

and we end every lunch with a fresh batch of cookies...

yummy!

and now charlie falls asleep...

and pappy falls asleep...

and here i am trying to take a sneaky picture of my dad asleep on the couch. i don't know why it is blurry...

more attempts....

this time the flash woke him up...i love you dad!

i hope everyone had a great sunday. i know we did!

jill b