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Happy New Year's Eve! Time for the annual survey! ^_^ (Go here to see past surveys.) 2011: In The Beginning Where did you bring in the New Year? In Michigan at Mike's parents' home. Who were you with?  Mike, Kristy & I watched How To Train Your Dragon with their mom & step-dad. :) Did you make any resolutions? According to last year's survey, it was to "Be adventurous and touch my toes." However, I also recall resolving to exercise more, drink more water, eat healthier, dress more creatively, and push my photography skills to the next level. And touch my toes. I really thought I'd get that one... 2011: Your Love Life Did you break up with anyone? Nope! Did you get anything for Valentine's day?   Heck yes! I got season tickets to the Peace Center's broadway series! Did you meet anyone special? Not romantically. This is dumb. This answer will never change. Did you fall in love? With a camera... 2011: Friends and Enemies Di...

If you haven't already, go check out The Küchen Blog . Küchen = kitchen. Can also be spelled "kuechen." Look familiar? It started out (a few days ago) as a blog about things in the kitchen. Namely, food we cook. But Mike suggested today that we might go a little broader than that and have it be about living in our community, and being good stewards with that with which God has blessed us. There are only two posts so far, but I'm trying two new recipes today and tomorrow, so be on the lookout for those! :)

I have to start with this one, even though it was already posted on my blog. :) This photo was taken at my dad's annual white elephant Christmas party. Someone brought a "man kit" that included these mustaches. Somehow, by the end of the evening, all the Heusers had mustaches for a family photo op.   This is my Christmas card display this year. I don't have a mantle and I wanted to display my cards in such a way that didn't, you know, get in the way. Also, I needed something on the walls of the dining room. I just love looking at everyone's Christmas cards each year!   The G kids on Christmas Adam. This my 5th year taking Alex & Lauren to see the St. Francis Festival of Trees and Davis's 4th year. Its one of my favorite Christmas traditions and they get so excited to hang out downtown for a little while. :)   After the looking at the trees, I was going to grab some hot chocolate. Instead, the kids wanted to go to Panera for lun...

Merry Christmas from the Heuser family.

Every time I go on vacation, I have this big plan to take all these SMP photos and then fail almost entirely. Well, going to Cabo was no different; I only remembered to take these photos one of the days. Oh well! I'm not a true fashion blogger and I see no shame in wearing the same outfit more than once. ;) I seriously loved this outfit. Top? Super cute and not something I would ever buy on my own. Thank goodness I have a boss with better fashion taste who bought me cute tops for my birthday. :) The jeans, I can forsee, will be my go-to jeans in mid-summer because they're loose-fitting and cute. I'll probably get them hemmed though, so I can wear them with flats. Not gonna lie--I love my hair in these photos. My natural hair color seems so one-dimensional, but I love the highlights that a bottle of Sun-In can bring. (No, I'm so not kidding. I heart sun-in.) I actually felt a bit nervous being on this ledge. I was on the third floor and I'm a bit of ...

I have so many pictures to show you from Mexico. In the mean time, enjoy this photo of a confused fish underneath a glass bottom boat.

stargirl- I got fish! I thought they called it crabs? - fraukuech stargirl- :(

I may or may not have used the clone tool to make my tree look more full and less see through...

vs.   I have often wondered what our children, should we ever be so blessed, would look like.  Creamy white skin vs. perpetual tan.  Brown hair vs. almost black hair.  Very tall vs. very short.  Blue eyes vs. brown eyes.  I'd just love it if my kids had Mike's eyes. My dad's got blue eyes as well and that's always been a factor when I tried to work out those Mendel squares in my head.  Well, I (kind of) have the answer to at least on of those questions. In my blog readings the other day, I read on Conventional Bliss about this cool website that will tell you what eye color your children are likely to have.       So, of course, I plugged in all the info and low and behold....  Blue 37.5%  Green 12.5% Brown 50.0% Any offspring of ours have a 37.5% chance of having BLUE EYES! Of course the highest is brown because that's the dominant gene. But I didn't know that blue would be qu...

For those of you who are asking me what I want for Christmas/Birthday, I've thought about it and here are a few things that I have my eye on. Each picture is a link that will take you to item. I've been wanting these three CDs for a while now. Cute artwork AND some of my favorite Christmas songs by some of my favorite artists. December birthstone jewelry. There is a bunch to choose from on Etsy and these are just a two examples. A Canon Lens mug. I know, these are SO COOL. And I could stick it in my camera bag and pretend like I have an L-series lens. ^_^ A camera necklace. They have LOTS to choose from on Etsy and I just think they are all so adorable! This is what I really really really want. A Jo Totes camera bag. I love the Rose bag in Sugarplum! A goat, a mosquito net, a playground or safe water for life. I really want a pair of TOMS! And, honestly, if I don't get any for Birthday/Christmas, I'll be buying some for myself....

I just got off the phone with my doctor and I'm positively giddy. I have an answer. I know what is up with my body. (Background info here ) And, honestly, I never thought I would be so excited to hear that something is wrong with me. As it turns out, I have polycystic ovary syndrome or PCOS for short. When my doctor said that, I said, "I KNEW IT!" Okay, so I didn't know it. I had a hunch. A hunch that grew and grew everyday. Especially when every single OPK came back positive. I'd stand in the bathroom, staring at that little stick. Squinting. Turning it in the light. Shaking it. Staring at it again. I'd test in the morning, afternoon, and night. Always positive. I can't possibly be ovulating every single day. Well guess what? If you have PCOS, you have excessive LH which is what the OPK is testing for. So they come back positive. What is PCOS? Well, for starters it's the most common cause of female infertility (according to womenshealth...

Instagram photo taken by Mike So, I know I already posted my Christmas blog....but I forgot to blog all about Thanksgiving! Mostly because I felt icky the day of and the day after Thanksgiving and then I felt streppy on Sunday and Monday. Anyway. Mike and I hosted Thanksgiving this year! I called my dad up the week before Thanksgiving and asked him if he had planned anything yet. "Well, it's not the day before Thanksgiving. So, no." I knew he was going to say that. :) And then I offered to host and he just LOVED that idea. I had planned on some cute centerpiece decorations, but I'm glad I didn't bother with that. At Thanksgiving, the food is the centerpiece! ^_^ Everyone brought a side AND I bought a fully cooked smoked turkey from Publix. This meant I could cook a few really delicious sides and not have to slave away in the kitchen all day long. :) Oh yeah, and we had crème brûlée for dessert! I was kind of intimidated by it, but it wasn'...