Our Christmas!

Playing with Uncle Jim

Tammy, Alex and Thomas...bellies full and ready for bed!

My niece Andrea and Jason...btw...he popped the question and she said yes!! :)

How does this thing work??

Oh My! Look at all these Build A Bear clothes!!

Ha...I see those pinkies up!
I think you're making fun of me!!

Paintball anyone??

At least her hands and feet will be warm...naaaa NEVER!!

Brian LOVES his t-shirts!!

Joseph helping me empty my stocking of all the Dove Chocolate!!
Ahhh, Santa knows me well!!

Anna's favorite gift...a DS and games...from her big brother!!
The kids "regift" to one another....
it's always cool to see what they come up with.

Go Speed Racer...Go!

Can you find the two hidden kids in this picture??
Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!!

Over this holiday season I got for myself a little present. I have been wanting to upgrade my computer skills and have been watching www.churchmediadesign.tv Brad is an amazing teacher has really produced some great stuff. I have been inspired, so I'm jumping in. Adobe is really much more complex than I thought. This suite has some really great programs in it.

• Adobe Illustrator CS4
• Adobe Photoshop CS4 Extended
• Adobe Flash CS4
• Adobe After Effects CS4
• Adobe Premiere Pro CS4
• Adobe Encore CS4
• Adobe OnLocation CS4
• Adobe Soundbooth CS4

I'm starting with Illustrator, Jessica is excited about Photoshop. I'll keep you updated on our progress as we learn. It's my goal to be cranking out some great looking church material here in the next few months. Oh yea, along with my churchmediadesign.tv lessons I received a few 30 day trial to a website called lynda.com. I've got 30 days of free lessons to soak up from them too. Should be fun, and who said you can't teach an old dog new tricks?

What Could Have Been...

Our computer had taken a dive so we ended up taking it to our trusty computer repair guy...who just happens to be a good friend also!! It was in dire need of some updating and we had pretty much maxed out all the memory. I don't know all the specifics (that's Brians dept.) but from what I hear our hard drive was going out. Which to me means I almost lost ALL MY PICTURES!! Thankfully, Brian bought an external hard drive some time back and had dumped all our pictures on it. It looks like he had done that in September...so I've only lost a couple months. Even though that was the b-day months here in the Holland House, I'm not gonna get greedy...it could've been a lot worse! BUT...I still think there is something to be said for printing them out and storing them in shoeboxes in the closet. Although other disasters could occur...it wouldn't be computer related!! ~Jaye

Anna Graduates!!

Yeah!! Anna graduated from IWU with her Bachelors in Accounting.

Does that mean she'll get a job in some far off town...away from us!! :(

Love ya, Anna...we're so proud of you!! :)

Christmas Give-a-ways

Check this out and maybe you can win. But I really hope to get the ipod myself.

I'm Not Holding My Breath...

We have internet...tonight!! woo hoo! I will be on tomorrow to update!! I know you all have been on pins and needles awaiting the latest from the Holland House!! Hang in there...we'll getcha all informed!! :) ~Jaye

Sorry

Sorry for no updates....as you may have guessed we are having internet problems at the house....again, or still however you want to look at it. Have any of you ever tried to blog using dial up? I'm thinking about switching back?