Fun Photos and a Funny Story

Thought I would share a few pictures from the Christmas season! Here are a few pictures we took for our Christmas card and such.

Here is Elise in a pair of her Christmas pajamas, bath robe and slippers. I thought she was so cute, but she wouldn't look at me.

Here she is wearing my high heels! She was actually walking around in them.

We decided to give her one of her presents since we won't be home for Christmas. We'll be driving and unable to take them with us. We still have one more to give her. We are waiting until we get in our new house for that one. Anyway, here are a few pictures.

She thought the microphone was an actually phone. She kept saying hello. It was so cute!

Okay, here is the funny story. We went to Chic-fil-a for dinner and they we doing free pictures with the Santa Cow. Elise liked the cow from afar and kept saying Moo! We tried for a picture and she wanted nothing to do with it. We tried one with me holding her. The cow put it's paw on my shoulder and when Elise saw it, she let out the loudest scream I've ever heard from her. She was so afraid and wouldn't stop fussing until we left. We did get a family picture. It's not the greatest, but I'll post it as soon as I get a chance to scan it.

Christmas Card and Letter

The Hease family has had a busy year! Two thousand ten flew by so fast; I'm having a difficult time remembering everything. I will attempt to give you the highlights without boring you. Hopefully I succeed.

Eric and I have always dreamed of living in Colorado. We love the outdoors and all that comes with it! We had been talking about miving since before we were married.

At the end of March we took a vacation to Colorado Springs, to check things out. We fell in love. We headed back to Texas and life went on. We were still dreaming of moving to Colorado and talked of moving there for about a month.

In May we decided to just go for it. We're young, and have savings; would there ever be a better time? We put in our notice with our landlord, and began making plans. We planned to move at the beginning of July! We celebrated Elise's 1st birthday with 3 (yes, I said 3) birthday parties! We had 2 in TX and 1 in MI to visit my family! Flying with a 1 year old was not quite as bad as I expected. I got to see lots of family including my Grandpa for the last time. We also learned that Eric's brother and his girlfriend were having a baby!

July finally arrived and we loaded up all our belongings and move 16 or so hours away. It was an interesting trip with Eric and Lilly (our dog) in the truck pulling his Land Crusier and Elise and I in my car. We did stop for 1 night, but proceeded to unload as soon as we arrived! By mid-July we found an amazing church where we felt right at home! Eric's parents came to visit at the end of the month and it was great to have family visit!

In October, my parents & sister came for a visit! It was so wonderful to see them! Elise loved showing off for them! Eric attempted to climb Pike's Peak, a 14,110 foot mountain here in The Springs, they had quite the storm and closed the top of the mountain before he could make it to the top. Eric also decided to pursue his photography business, something he has wanted to do for quite some time! Check out his website at: ericheasleyphoto.com.

November, I did a pretty large craft show for my business, Funky Sprouts and we had our very first Thanksgiving with just the 3 of us. We missed our family immensely, but enjoyed the experience of cooking the Thanksgiving meal all on our own. Our nephew turned 4 and Eric's brother got married! Elise turned 18 months! We can't believe it been a year and a half since she was born! At times it seems like it was just yesterday that she was born and other times I can't imagine what life was like without her. She is an extremely active child and keeps Eric and I on our toes every moment. She is quite the talker and is learning new words everyday! She loves being outside and is determined to hike right along with us when we go for a hike. We also learned that Eric's Grandpa's health is going downhill and his parents would be spending Christmas in MI with him instead of coming to see us. We understood of course and are planning to venture to MI ourselves before my sister and brother-in-law come to visit us! It'll be a wonderful Christmas filled with much needed family time! We can't wait!

We just signed a lease on a 2 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath house that we are very excited about. Let me know if you need our new address and I will get it to you.

As you can see, it's been a year of change for The Hease family. We've experienced many emotions and I know this will continue to be the case for quite some time. Despite the struggles, we still absolutely love it here and wouldn't think of living anywhere else at this point in our lives. We would appreciate any prayers you are willing to send our way. A few specific things are the Eric's photography business would thrive and that we would have a chance to develop quality friendships.

Our New Rent House & More

It's been an interesting week! Wednesday after I worked out, I started to feel bad, dizzy and such. Thursday, Eric, Elise and I celebrated Thanksgiving. Early Friday morning I became sick. It lasted until Sunday morning and was not fun!

Friday, Elise turned 1 1/2! I can not believe that it has been 1 1/2 years since she was born. She's growing so fast and learning new things everyday.

Sunday it snowed quite a bit, today we bundled Elise up and headed outside to play. She was so cute!



Thought I would include a recent pictures of myself.



Today, we signed a lease on a 2 bedroom 2 1/2 bath home. It is about 5 minutes south of where we are now. I am SO excited to move! We get the keys on the 15th! I am very excited to be out of this 3rd story apartment.

Anyway, here are a few pictures of the house!

A Time of Learning

There are a lot of things you learn when you move away from everyone and everything you know. I have moved several times in my adult life, but none of them have affected me quiet like this move has. Maybe it's because all previous major moves happened prior to The Hubs and Little One or maybe it was because I really didn't have any close friends before I moved. I don't know and I'm not sure I ever will. I have learned that when I do have friends, I need to be more thankful for them.

I feel that I am a very faithful friend. I have been hurt many times by people I thought were best friends who blew me off, or apparently didn't consider me as close a friend as I considered them. I'm not sure why, but I have been hurt more time than I can remember by people I thought were best/close friends.

I have had a really hard time making friends here. Our church is rather large, and Eric had a crazy schedule. Most people don't want to be close friends when they aren't in the same place in their life (ie: married, kids & age range). We also moved in the summer when most churches are just doing Sunday morning services. Then into fall and winter and lots of busy holidays and such. I also think that all those times of being hurt has had a big impact on the way I am willing to put myself out there.

I have felt pretty depressed at times and really missing our family. Mix that with not having any readily available babysitters with Eric's crazy schedule and this little Mommy is worn out and needs a break! I have the utmost respect for single parents! I truly have no idea how they survive!

There are many things happening with family, brother-in-law is getting married, future sister-in-law is pregnant, nephew turned 4 and my sister was at the end of a long stretch of medical issues, my Grandpa passed away. I had/have to miss all those things, not to mention, they are all missing Little E growing and changing SO much.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely LOVE it here in Colorado! It is our dream location to live! If only it was all of our families dreams as well!

I'm not quite sure if I'm making any sense at all. I just needed to get this off my chest. If you think about it, please keep The Hease family in your prayers! We could really use the prayers.

Family Comes to Visit!

My parents and sister came to visit for a week and Elise was very excited! We stopped at Target after picking up my sister and decided to eat lunch there. They have a Pizza Hut.



Relaxing before bed with Grandpa & Grandma!



We went to The Little Gym and Elise was quite the little show off. She was running around try to show them everything! It was SO cute and Aunt Amy got quite the workout, chasing her around and trying to keep her from hurting herself. We all had lots of fun!

So if you ever come visit Colorado Springs, you need to check out the Focus on The Family Welcome Center! They have an amazing play area for children! They have a room where you can dress up like the Adventures in Odessy characters, secret passageways, 3-story spiral slide and tons more. The best thing is it's free! They do have a soda shoppe where you can buy lunch or ice cream! These pictures are in a theater type room. They were showing Veggie Tales, Wonderful Wizard of Ha's!

They have this tunnel the kids can crawl through!

My parents celebrated their 34th wedding anniversary while they were visiting! We went to Front Range BBQ where you can get the best ribs I've EVER tasted! It is fall off the bone good and you have several different sauce options! Elise really enjoyed the corn bread muffins and baked beans!

We showed them the Garden of The Gods and took some turisty pictures!

There was bad weather in TX when my sister was suppose to fly out, so she ended up staying an extra day. Eric climbed most of Pike's Peak and we drove my parents to the top. No pictures though, it was FREEZING and super windy! We had a wonderful time!

October Continued

Elise's new fetish is to wear my shirts! There are 3 of them that she loves to wear and anytime she sees them, she wants to wear them. Here is one of them.

Elise loves the park! I try to got frequently. A lady at the park this day said that she looked like a little European baby! She had a jean skirt and white leggings that you can't see in the picture.

Our little one is taking after her Daddy already! She had to check out the REI Magazine before bed!

These are new products that I have made recently. I got accepted to my first craft show in Colorado! It will also be the first craft show I've done with just stuff that I made. It is Nov. 12, 13 and 14 here in Colorado Springs! If your in the area, come check it out! Any way, ruffle pants, jeans, design, or Christmas. Sizes newborn-4T.

The Hubs designed new business cards as well as a new banner for my Etsy site!

Here is another new product I've been working on. This is a reversible skirt. It has a Christmas design on one side and an everyday design on the other, so your little one can be stylish at Christmas and beyond!

This skirt is not reversible, but there are no raw seams. All seams are french seams.

Here is another new product! Necklaces that can be used as teething jewelry or just a fun necklace!

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I decided to dress up for halloween at the last minute. Here is the final product! What do you think?

Eric is beginning his photography business! He just created his website! Check it out here!

A Whole Month!

I can't believe it has been a month since I last posted! Life has been crazy! I feel like I felt just about every emotion possible this month. I'm going to have to do 2 post because of all the pictures I want to share!

There are good and bad things about my hubby being our family photographer! The good definately outweight the bad, but here goes. Good: always having someone to talk pictures, getting exactly the pictures that you want, it free, there are many more, but I'll just leave it at that for now. The bad: sometimes he forgets to give me the pictures. The next few pictures are from this summer, I can't remember when.

The Hubs decided we could participate in dressing up for Halloween this year and I got right on making Elise's costume! I decided on a Garden Gnome! I wanted it to be something girly, but not your typical fairy or princess.

Here she is trying on the hat!

Here is the full costume. We are doing a white shirt and leggings! Isn't she super cute?

Elise is loving the fall weather and so am I! I have missed having 4 distinct seasons for the past 5 years living in TX. Usually every fall, I start to miss Michigan. Although I miss my family and friends, this fall has been very different. I LOVE LOVE LOVE living in Colorado! It's the perfect place for our little outdoor family! There is a little trail right near our apartment and Elise really enjoys it! Here are a couple of pictures of a recent hike we went on!

Here is another wonderful picture from The Hubs! It's a favorite!

We went to the Eleven Mile State Park, which is about 1 1/2 or so from us! The drive is beautiful, you get to drive through the mountains! This is Elise eating lunch on the way.

Once in the park, dockey's apparently roam free and we had to stop and wait for them to get out of our way! I felt like I was in another country!

Alright, I will finish the month so far in another post. Stay tuned!