Cousin Shout Out

So I realized I've talked about how awesome of a photographer my cousin Dylan is but never posted a link to his blog so you all can ohhh and ahhh over his work.  So, here it is.  Dylan Heuer Productions - http://www.dylanheuer.com/ 

My favorite photo of his is the first shot that comes up under the "For Love of the Game" tab- check it out. Oh and this one, which is harder to find on his blog so I'll post it here, he actually got in the water to get this shot.  AMAZING.  Love you Dylan, I'm so very proud of you!

Noah Turns 21

My wonderful baby brother turned the big 2-1 today!  Hard to believe it really, seems like just yesterday he was a goofy 8 year old doing WWE wrestling moves in the living room of our old house on Dupont.  Time sure does fly...
We celebrated at Fogo de Chao, the Brazilian steakhouse in downtown Minneapolis.  The whole family was there safe for Jason and Eva.  Eva loves steak but Jason, no joke, actually asked for A1 sauce the first (and only time) I took him there.  He didn't get the whole good-steak-requires-no-A1-thing and the "gaucho" servers who are all actually from Brazil or Portugal were 2 seconds away from slapping him.  So anyway, he stayed home but everyone else had a great time.  It was a great day- love you so much Noah- happy birthday!

mmmm meat

Getting fancy with the camera- Baba's eye

Molten cake before...

Molten cake after!

3 generations of great men

Very Excite!

1) If you don't get the title of this post you probably haven't seen the movie Borat; it is hilarious, go and watch it as soon as you are done reading this post.
2) My cousin Dylan is probably my new favorite person! He's lending me his awesome Canon DSLR camera for the month so I can get used to it and I'm 99% sure I'll be buying it from him at the end of that month trial.  I've been itching for a "real" camera for some time now and the Sjolund family discount is too good to pass up :-)

I will need to get my arse to a beginners class ASAP since I don't even know what half of the buttons on the camera do but I plan to drive Jason and Eva crazy taking photos.  So look out people- the blog just got a bit cooler!

Mommy the Photog

Oh don't mind me, just working on my photography skills :-)

Psalm 139:14

For you are fearfully and wonderfully made...

Heaven blew every trumpet

and played every horn

on the wonderful, marvelous

night you were born.

~Eva Alexandra, 6 lb 6 oz & 19 inches long born at 10:30pm on April 3, 2008~

God, we pray this Christmas...

For all those who have a song they cannot sing,
For all who have a burden they cannot bear,
For all who live in chains they cannot break,
For those who wander homeless and cannot return,
For those who are sick and for those who care for them,
For those who wait for loved one and wait in vain.
For all those who live in hunger
And for those who will not share their bread.
For those who are misunderstood
And for those who misunderstand,
For those who are captives and for those who are captors,
For those whose words of love are locked within their hearts
And for those who yearn to hear those very words of love.

Merry Christmas

God jul. Frohe Weihnachten. Joyeux Noël. Buon Natale. Feliz Natal. Merry Christmas!
Christmas is here and again it was a fabulous holiday.  We spent yesterday at the Masonic Home down in Bloomington.  My great-aunt Marion has lived there for a number of years and my Grandma is there now too so we booked the party room and got the whole gang together.  We had awesome Swedish fare of svensk korv, köttbullar, boiled potatoes, rye bread, ostakaka with lingonberries, and- because no Christmas is complete without it- shots of aquavit!  Then we went to St. Stephen's for 10:00pm service.  I love late night service, it always reminds me of my childhood.  We got home pretty late and did some Santa work before watching a holiday movie and heading to bed. 

This morning we woke up to the biggest dollhouse Eva could have ever asked for and many other great gifts.  We are so very fortunate- thank you to all who sent gifts!  We then went to church here in Champlin and headed to Baba's house to spend Christmas day with my whole family.  More food, more gifts, more songs and laughs, more playing.... and now we're home to watch the Packers beat the Bears for the perfect end to a perfect Christmas. 

Coloring with great-aunt Nancy

The Bodell sisters! Grandma and great-aunt Marion in their stylish matching get ups

Prost!

Uncle Tom, the almost birthday boy Noah and myself

Eva taking my photo

Coloring with great-uncle Tom

At church

Coloring in the pew, so well behaved!

Doesn't he look thrilled to be at church?! ha

SANTA CAME!

Princess Tiana

Rapunzel from Tangled!

New dance and gymnastics leotards

Haskell's in Bloomington sells GIANT bottles of my Riesling- MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ME!

That is a normal size bottle of wine to the left of my bottle.... awesomeness

August, Eva and Violet- cutie patooties

Dylan's Canon

My cousin Dylan is a professional photographer and let me use his older Canon Rebel camera for the weekend so I can start getting the feel of a real camera.  Here are a few I snapped; keep in mind I still have no idea how to use the dang thing but I promise to save enough money to buy my own and to learn so I can upload great photos all the time for you blog followers :-)

Merry Christmas- more photos from my plain old camera to follow.