don't blink!

i heard this song the other day titled 'don't blink'. ummm...what happened here? when did i blink? when did our baby grow up? 17??!! i took her for her driver's test this am (yes, 7:10am-now that's love) and we walked out with a little card that says the state of nj is going to let her out on the unsafe roads without her mommy...do they have ANY idea? my father-in-law says he already took out addt'l insurance on his car-just in case! not a bad idea....
she came home from school today saying that she was lonely driving by herself on the way to school-now if THAT doesn't sum up her personality!
on saturday night she had some of her really amazing friends who came to spend her birthday w/her ok, brendan came for the free food but, whatever!
for those of you with little kids-enjoy it because it goes WAY too fast! (i always HATED that when people said that to me when my kids were little-i figured they just didn't remember or if they did, they only remembered the times when they were dressed up all cute and forgot what brats they could be. i don't remember that much either, but who wants to? plus, senility is creeping up...

meet lancelot

our baby has a car!!!
lance has officially joined our family-isn't he cute?
he's a 2001 chevy cavalier with 31,000 miles
on it...all for the sweet deal of $3400-cash.
i'm so proud of her that she bought a car within
her budget. for a long time we've been telling her
she's wearing her car because she bought more
clothes than she saved-who DOES she take
after??!!

she's just a little excited about it...she
gets her license on mon. sept 29-the day
papa & beppe come!!!-but for now she
just keeps moving it around the driveway-
i guess picking the perfect parking spot.




and the best part...wind-up windows!!
at first she hated it, but then
she found out that some of her friends
have roll-ups so now it's not so bad..when did
she start caring what other people thought??!!
and the good part is the exercise reaching over
to unlock the passenger side-it almost counts
as a whole day of aerobics, don't you think?!


typical keys of a teenager!! i'm
sure she has plenty more to add!
thinking back, i'm surprised i didn't
pull out the steering column with all
the ones i had on mine!

we miss you, lynden family!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

yes, take a good look...it's me-in overalls!!! who woulda thunk it?!

mommy, sissy & me

oh, how i love this man!

my sweet sam


love this pic of jackson!

back at you, crazy eli

zach &max-c'mon...smile for aunt lori

my mighty man max


does it get any better than this?!

2 of my favorite people

welcome to lynden aunt lori (i could go for this a LOT more often!!)

beautiful bailee

hang on, bo! (riding the mattresses down the stairs)

our favorite canadians...yes, we love our ottenhuises!!!

for our holland friends-pics from july (have no idea why these are posting all in a row up and down...springin' is right and left hand pages...

my new hobby-art photography

my hubby bought me this awesome canon rebel xt and it opened a whole new world for me! i've always loved taking pictures but now they call me (& my friend, laurens) paparazzi-he's just as camera-crazy as i am!!

family picnic

nieuwenhuis family picnic

yep-mom still taking those 1st day of school pics!

ok-jake's had enough! it was so stupid that i still do this. and do i still have to do it in front of the front door-can't i pick a new spot??!! but he had the last (non) laugh-he didn't smile-whoa!!