Thinking back on 2009

As I sit here at my friend's house just after christmas in 2009 watching one of my favorite tv series, i am starting to think back about what all happened this year. I will say this has been the most interesting year so far of this decade. First off the year started off fine, nothing truly majorly happening. Then February hit. Can't remember the exact day (all i remember is that it was the day of the oscars). I remember I had a kinda bad day at work with this one lady who drove me nuts cause I wouldn't let her in our back room (my purse is back there so no). It did get a bit better as mom and i went to go pick up our Olive Garden that we were going to eat as we watched the show. Then my mom says she has something she needs to tell me. We sit down and then i hear the words that i never imagined she would ever utter, "your dad and i are separating." It's hard to describe the emotions that I felt then, it was a mix of a lot and then having to hear that we had to give up my childhood home just threw me. I don't remember when I stopped crying and having to tell most of my friends was very hard. So after a few weeks everything started to sink in and i knew it was time to go thru all of my things at our house. I managed to find some great stuff and one time my friend, alec, found this story that I wrote maybe in first grade that I was laughing so hard I was crying. So things did get easier as time went on. I managed to go to a very fun convention with my friend, Erin, in may. We had a great time and I would easily go again. So we did some more packing and finally moved out at the end of June. It was a bittersweet feeling leaving the house I had lived in since I was 3. Now me and my mom are living with my nana. Most of the time things are good and sometimes can be frustrating, after all when you live with someone is 90 and is very rigid can be difficult. Especially when she is going deaf and refuses to wear her hearing aid cause she doesn't think it helps, WHEN IT SO DOES!!! *sigh* not much I can do. Despite all that has happened this year, I still stand by what I said at Thanksgiving. I am thankful for all the good little things in life. I got to see my favorite band live and in the second row. I got a great new nephew named Harland, who I swear is the cutest baby to date. I got to see my brother's kids at Easter which was great fun. But most importantly, I realized I am thankful for all of my friends who got me thru this difficult year and of course for my family who I love and adore so much. Hopefully I will have better sounding posts in 2010. See you all on the flip side!

I AM NOW FINALLY PUBLISHED!!!

Well I got something very exciting in the mail today. I won a contest about a year ago and they wanted to publish my photo in their new anthology book that was coming out so I said sure. I hadn't heard anything for a long time about when it was coming out or anything like that. So I was very shocked when I got a box in the mail today and it was from The International Library of Photograhers, they are the ones I won my contest thru. I opened the package and my copy of the book was inside!! It's so amazing and I am so thrilled to see my photo in publication. Makes me feel good to be a photographer and that I am good at what I do. Well here are the pics of the book and my photo!! Enjoy!!
Here is the book itself.



Here is my pic! I just love this picture!!

I LOVE BEING AN AUNT!!!

I seriously love being an aunt to both my nephews and my niece. I had the greatest and funnest weekend with them. Spencer is so cute and Ally is beyond adorable. And Harland is a cute little baby. Gotta love his little smile. Considering we didn't do a whole lot but just hung around the house, it still was fun and relaxing. It was fun to watch the kidlets play and see Spencer get entranced by that Sesame Street TV thing. That was too funny. Silly kid. They got some great presents for Easter and their birthdays. I also got some great stuff but it was way more fun watching Spencer take his eggs that he found and rehide them. He loved that game and thought it was hysterical. It was totally awesome! Well here are some pics! Will add a slideshow soon.



Spencer and his daddy....I love this picture



Cute little harland in his easter outfit...it's so adorable!



Spencer and his lovies...he is so cute!!



Our easter baskets



Awwww....spencer looks even cuter when he is sleeping....



Love love this picture...i had great luck!



Love this one of Spencer...totally adorable!

Sorry this took so long......

Yes I know I haven't posted in a while. Guess I have been just waiting for something exciting to happen in my life. Well with the economy going into the crapper, my hours at work have been cut but at least I still have a job. I just keep telling myself that I work for a company that went thru the Depression, they have been around since 1914. So I just hope that they know what they are doing and hopefully won't have to file for bankruptcy. Besides that, I got a great tax return this year and was able to pay off one of my credit cards. Nice to get myself somewhat out of debt. Also I now finally own a Nintendo DS that I have been wanting for like the couple of years. My awesome friend Joe just gave me his for free cause he just didn't play it. Now I play with it most every day. So far I have 4 games for it, Mario Kart, Animal Crossing, Brain Age and Personal Training: Cooking. If anyone is interested in it, I highly recommend the DS. Great little system! Other than that, life has been good in MN (despite some crisises i really can't talk about). I have started to convert our VHS to DVD. Thanks to my work for letting me borrow a converter in order to be able to do that. (Does it sound like i am babbling?) Well anyway, I guess the biggest news is my new nephew. Harland James Dombrowski, i love that name. He is so adorable and I can't wait to get my hands on that little guy! Here are a couple of my fave pics:


I love love this picture. I think it's so cute.



This has got to be the cutest picture ever. I love it!

Well look forward to future posts! I am going to do more posting from now on!

Christmas at the Mann's

This year's christmas was by far the most relaxing christmas in a long time. I had a great time with Heather and Sean and the puppies. Christmas eve was so fun with the joneses and tim and dorie. We had a fun time together. Christmas Day was great also. We took time opening up presents and i am so glad that i finally got the dvds done for my rents of us kids growing up. They were a big hit with everyone. I got some great
presents also. Thank you to all!! I love all my family so much. Have a great 2009!!!

Here are some pics (i will be putting the rest on facebook):
Aww.. Little baby Julien. So cute!


Our table at christmas eve


Me And Nana in our paper crowns

What is it about xmas season?

Ok. Do customers know when i am by myself in the morning? When there are 2 people, there never seems to be a ton of customers or the phone ringing off the freaking hook. We were so busy this morning, both my area and cameras. I was so frustrated cause I always had to put down what i was doing to get the stupid phone. I feel so bad for my customers when I have to do that because I feel like I have to ignore them because no one else will pick up the phone. I constantly had customers this morning, only one lady that was in such a rush even though i was with someone else interrupted me while i was waiting for my customer to decide that i was just thinking omg real nice. Luckily my other customer didn't care but I was still like come on lady i am busy enough, what the heck? You can't wait two minutes?! This is the main reason why I hate xmas season, people just get all nasty and so impatient. I know my mother will know what I am talking about. I was so beyond thrilled once my coworker nikki finally came in, i actually hugged her and almost started crying cause I was just so happy that someone else had come to my area. Don't get me wrong, I really like where I work but I will love the day that I finally get out of retail. Will probably be one of the best days of my life. Well I just wanted to share my thoughts and feelings about what happened to me today. Hope you all still have a good christmas season!

Thanksgiving In A Box

For this thanksgiving since it is only me, mom, nana and cleta (my great aunt), mom and i decided that we did not want to make a big meal so we got one of those premade meals from Cub Foods here in town. Comes in a big white box and has the turkey, mashed potatoes in a bag (yes in a bag), corn (also in a bag, man i wish i was kidding), turkey gravy in a can (sorry i am not making this up), stuffing in a tray and rolls. Mom and I just about died laughing when we saw the mashed potatoes and corn in a bag. Totally awesome but will be perfect for the 4 of us. I picked up a cherry pie for dessert and i am going to make my chocolate chip cookie pie also. Can't wait to just relax with these great girls and will let you all know how it went! Happy Thanksgiving all and hope your thanksgivings go well too!!


Here is the box of food!! Looks great, don't it?



Yes that's the mashed potatoes and corn in bags. Totally hysterical! I love it!!