It's here, it's finally here!

*late night/ early morning post*

Yes, Christmas has arrived! It is very odd for me though. There is absolutely no snow. Not one single flake. It feels like it should be spring break or something! I can't remember the last time I had a snowless Christmas. I kinda wanted to crush our ice cubes and just through it on porch to capture a moment of what Christmas should look like....But besides that, the Christmas spirit is in the air. All of the Isenbarger Crew (seventeen people in all) are all together and I love it! So much fun, food, and games. We know how to celebrate the season. And to be honest, who really needs snow as long as you are surrounded by the people you love? Besides, I only like snow for one day, I love my family for eternity.

It also very strange for me. This is my first Christmas away from my brothers, sisters, and parents. I feel like part of me is missing. I really do miss the Cramer traditions, the caroling, the skits, and the celebrations. I miss everyone and I want to tell them that I love them so much. I am so grateful for being able to live so close to them and share so many memories. I have the greatest family in the world. They all have such unique and wonderful personalities. They make my life so much better and have taught me so much. I love you Mom, Dad, Logan, Carli, Breanna, and Ryan!


I hope everyone's Christmas day goes amazingly!

*5 hours till we have to go to wake up. Good night!*

Christmas All Day, Every Day

Okay, so maybe we don't have Christmas every single day, but it sure feels like it! On Monday we celebrated two things:

1. My not so baby brother returned home from BYU Idaho Sunday morning! It was soo great to see him and have him back. He really does add a lot to the family & we missed him a lot a lot. Because we missed him so much, we surprise attacked him with SILLY STRING. That is how my family expresses love. If you get silly stringed...you definitely are a loved child. And we got him good, so Logy, YOU ARE VERY LOVED. We are so happy you're home!
2. Since Curt & I won't be with my family this Christmas, we celebrated Christmas early!

All of us siblings did a gift exchange which was a lot of fun. My sister and Curt both had each other which was pretty funny. Carli definitely hit the jackpot with Curt. She gave him a pack of vintage coke bottles. He absolutely loved it. He loved it so much that he pretty much tore up all of his fingers trying to open the darn things. Apparently we need to invest in a cap remover thing-a-ma-bob. But they look pretty dang cool!

She also surprised him with the Shrek series, which we thoroughly enjoy (the fourth one is the best surprisingly). Curt is definitely appreciated (and so am I)! Thanks Carli!

Ryan had me and was such a sweetie! He was so excited to give me my gifts AND he wrapped them himself, which I think is very impressive. He surprised me with a photography book I REALLY wanted and a set of matching bracelets, which I loved! He told me he picked them out all by himself and that he thought I would love them. He was definitely right. He is just too cute. No wonder he's the favorite in the familly....JUST KIDDING, kinda :).

After the exchange and opening my wonderful gifts from my parents, we had a divine "homemade" ice cream mint chocolate mint cake and then watched Kung Fu Panda 2! Which was hilarious and artistic. Curt asked during the movie if we are getting old because we think Kung Fu Panda is funny. Are we really getting old?? I hope not!

Anyways, just a few more days until we have Christmas #2! It's really great being married :) JUST KIDDING...we love being married because of the great amazing people in our lives and how much they love us! But in all seriousness, getting hitched was the best thing ever. Not only are Christmases better, every single day of our lives are better. No joke.

Spread it like butter...

Merry Christmas everyone! 

We want to share this little holiday card with everyone,

and spread the holiday cheer (like it's butter on a nice, crunchy piece of toast).

We love you and are thinking about you!

One Year Photos & advice (a little overdue)

I know, I know...our anniversary was in August, but I just want to say that I am married to the most wonderful man out there. He is my best friend and if I could I would spend every single waking moment with him. We enjoy so many things together, and it is only getting better. I really never expected marriage to be this wonderful, but it is! A lot of people have asked me what's our secret to achieving our one year of marriage, so I'll tell you:

1. The primary thing that ties our marriage together is the gospel in our lives. We both have strong testimonies of our Savior Jesus Christ. Loving Him has only brought us closer to each other. It has also taught us the importance of marriage and what a commitment means. We love each other no matter what. Through the gospel, we have learned to put each other first. That is what is key. 
2. Another important aspect of marriage is to participate in activities you both love. The mister and I both love being active and playing sports. Throughout the year, when the weather permits, we play soccer, swimming, volleyball, basketball, and tennis. It's exciting and very intimate to have such active activities to be involved in. 
3. We are honest about everything. If we have a problem with something, we will vocalize it in a respectful way. We then will work together to overcome these issues, however small they may be. The key to disagreements is to have a loving heart and an open mind. You must be willing to understand where they are coming from and be slow to anger. It definitely takes time and patience to master this (I'm still working on it).
4. We share responsibilities. We don't have on designated cook or cleaner or worker. We both help out with everything, that's the only way things can work out around here. 
5. We both encourage each other to become the best people we can be. Curt has always supported me through school and work and is always helping me with my new projects. I really appreciate that. We grow in each others successes and help each other out when we trip up sometimes. And try really hard to avoid criticism or hurtful remarks. Those things can only tear a relationship apart. 
6. Lastly, be happy and loving towards each other. Remember the small things, like holding hands or kissing when one returns home from work. Make everyday a special day.

I know y'all love the kissing pictures so much!

And another one!

Photos taken by Kim Davis Photography.

smart phone lust

Are we the only ones in the world without smart phones?
I keep wanting one more and more. Is it really worth it??

Share your coat...

One of my good friends posted this and it made my heart full. I hope we all can find ways to give a little of what we have.

Christmas delight

Celebration Perhaps?

We are doooone (with classes for this semester)! Gosh, I really can't believe it. It hasn't really set in yet, which is why I think we need to CELEBRATE. I'm not exactly sure how, but we need to. Any suggestions? A cruise would be ideal, but I don't know if that will work out right now....so maybe something a teensy bit smaller....


Another reason for celebration.....
JESSICA & ANDREW are getting hitched! It's about time don't you think? Curt and I had our bets that they would get engaged in October, but they proved us wrong. They get engaged last Saturday! We are sooo soooo happy for them. They are just too cute, so funny, and very photogenic..I mean look at these photos:

Congratulations you two!

Another reason to celebrate:
Curt's car is out of the shop! Yayyy....for the past week we have had to survive with one single car. Surprisingly, we did quite well. I would either drop the mister off at work and then pick him up at 6:00 or he would take the car and I would walk to work and then he would pick me up at 8:00....or he would be stranded at home all day while I was at work, had sessions, and dinners. It definitely was tough. I am very grateful we have our little mazda back. We love you Mazda. We hope you live on forever with us....

Saturday Stories

These past several days have been CRRRAZY busy. I have lots to tell you.

First Story:

Saturday was a great & loaded day. I woke up in the wee hours of the day to shadow one of my good friends during one of here photoshoots. It was a neat experience and I am so so grateful that she brought me along! I think that is the best way to learn and become a better photographer..to watch how someone else takes their photos. Anyways, I love Kim. She is so great.

Second Story:

This past Satuday was Trinity Mission's 75 cent sale! How could I pass that up?? Well, I couldn't. A friend and I headed over there to check the goods. I ended up purchasing two blouses, 2 skirts, a belt, and a ballin' watch...ALL FOR FIVE DOLLARS. Are you kidding me! I love deals like that, and I absolutely love this watch...even though the battery is dead.

Story Three:

Purdue Federal took Curt's whole branch (+ everyone's sweethearts) to Dave & Busters for a Q-loop celebration on Satuurday. We had a great time. We first ate dinner there and then got our game on. Our favorite games were (in no particular order):

1. Trivia game: where you competed against 5 other people and tried to answer these ridiculously hard questions correctly & fastly. I think my average was 1 correct answer (except for one time, when I one the entire round). Curt rocked it everytime (he's a genius).
2. SKI BALL: we had to fight a group of kids for ski ball, but it was worth it.

3. Football: I totally killed this one with a whoppin 199 points.

4. Dance Dance Revolution: So normally we aren't really a fan of this difficult game, but we loved it here! Curt caught on quickly and burned quite a few calories.

5. Jump Rope Game: I don't think it's actually called this, but it was my fave. You have to jump this red line that keeps spinning faster and faster and faster and faster. It's a work out

Well, as you can see...we rocked those games and won lots and lots of tickets. After everyone pooled their tickets together, we all had over 3000! That is a great achievement. With those tickets we bought:

Mr. Banana Man!

Mr. Banana Man is the branched newest employee, so I suggest you head over to their branch and say "Hello!"

Breffy with Santy!

All children love actually meeting Santa, and telling them all of 

their wishes. But wouldn't it be 10 x better if they could eat 

pancakes with him too! The best part is that it is absolutely FREE. I 

love free things, so I want to share this with everyone and I will be 

the photographer for Santa...so if you don't like Santa,

come to see me! 

Here's the details: 

Saturday, December 17th 

Ivy Tech Community College-Lafayette 

In Ivy Hall 

9:00AM-11:00AM 

There will also be Arts and Craft, and an Inflatable Obstacle 

course for the kids to enjoy! 

This is a FREE event, pastries and juice are provided! 

This is run by the YMCA and is meant to get the community involved 

with IVY Tech. So spread the word and invite family and friends! Hope 

to see you there! 

Small, but exciting accomplishments.

First Accomplishment:

So, I was given an invitation the yesterday. It wasn't just any invitation, it was an invitation from one of my Professors (not in a creepy kind of way). Let me tell you about this professor and this class. His name is Josh Boyd and he is known at Purdue for how hard his classes are and his rigorous grading style. He always wears a bow tie. Actually I found a picture of him...

As you can see, he definitely is not an ordinary, boring professor. I feel like I have learned more from him than any other professor, so good job Prof. Boyd. Anyways, he began his class by telling us that only 10 students out of the 150 students taking the class will receive an A. Pretty scary right? Well.....I am one of those ten! Check this out...

                           

That was pretty dang exciting & has never happened to me before. Whoop Whoop!

Second Accomplishment:

Last night I was in the Christmasy mood. We had our first snowfall this week, and it was about time to get in the mood. I popped in the old film "Holiday Inn" (which is a Isenbarger favorite...especially Lisa). Most people would say, what?? That isn't an accomplishment! Oh, it is. I have actually never seen this film. If you are apart of the Isenbarger fam & have never seen Holiday Inn then your in trouble...So YAY, I've finally seen it! On top of that, I made a 12 day Christmas Calender Advent. What? You've never heard of a 12 day Christmas Advent? Well, that's what's in these days FYI. Jussst kidding. I haven't finished it yet, but today is DECEMBER FIRST. I had to get something on our wall! Hopefully I get the rest of December made by Christmas....but it still looks very cute!

Third Accomplishment:

We are listening to the Christmas album by She & Him, which we purchased for only ONE DOLLAR AND 99 CENTS. Holy Cow! That, my dear, is a good deal. We must thank Amazon for this accomplishment. 

I think that's all our accomplishments for now. Hopefully more to come!

Wall Decor

This photo collage is going right about our bed.

<3

On to the next break...

Ah, Thanksgiving. We truly do love you. Not just because of the amount of amazing food that is readily available, or even the number of football games on ESPN. We love you Thanksgiving because of the joy you bring, the people you gather, and the memories you create. 

We spent this Thanksgiving with the Cramer fam + the Langfoss fam hollering and cheering for the great Packers. It definitely was entertaining. I am just glad they won...otherwise Thanksgiving may have not gone so well over at the Cramer household. After their win, we happily stuffed our pie holes with lots of turkey, mashed taters, rich gravy, the traditional pound cake, rolls lathered in butter, pickles, salad, and then about eight different pies. SO GOOD. Can we do it this Thursday again?

After the wonderful food, the men returned to their football and the ladies got their CRAFT on (my favorite part). The craft for this holiday was Martha Stewart Style slippies, fabric earrings, and flower rings. I really can't get enough of these slippers and earrings. I love them and they are fairly simple to make! For the earrings, all you need is 

Buttons

Earring backs

Cute Fabric

Glue Gun

You then cut a small circle of fabric, enough to wrap around the button and glue the fabric onto the button. You then glue the earring back on to the fabric covered button...and TA DA. You have extremely cute earrings. 

So that was Thursday -- just the beginning of our holiday adventures. We left early Friday morning for Madison, WI. YAYY Madison. We love it there. I mean look at it!

Very beautiful. But the reason that we headed up there is because of my amazing grandparents, fun uncle, and sweet great aunt (who is like a second grandmother and just turned ONE HUNDRED YEARS OLD in October). My grandparents put our stomachs to work the moment we arrived. They stuffed us with delicious tortilla soup and then later that evening with salmon loaf (like meatloaf but with salmon), seven layer salad, and cranberry bread, oh yes and then triple berry pie. And they don't ever let us have just one serving. It's more like three or four servings. 

Then Friday evening we hung out with my uncle, helped him with his new iPod, and then went bowling. I really am not good at all, but Curt and Tom were pros. I was just happy to get a score about 75, but I still had a ton of fun. And I know Tom loved it, he whooped the crap out of us!

The next day we woke up to the smell of pancakes and porkies (a Cramer tradition). I think we both had six pancakes and at least a dozen porkies. Again, they stuffed us like empanadas. We then went over to my Aunt Inez's apartment and spent the morning with her. She is the sweetest lady I have ever met. I love her and I am so glad that Curt has been able to meet her as well. She doesn't remember things as well anymore and says the cutest things. We were talking about her birthday party and she asked us how old she turned. When we told her she is 100 years old, she replied, "What! How awful!" But in reality, it's a great achievement. 

Afterwards, Curt and I browsed around at the mall and Savers (a nice resale shop). It's always fun to window shop and walk around with your favorite man in the world. We tend to head to the mall in Lafayette when we have nothing else to do, but it definitely is not as nice at the malls in Madison. We then met up with some of our good good friends who were driving by...Brooke and Phil Sadler! We love them so much and then are soon to be expecting their first baby! I am soo excited for them. They moved to Minnesota this summer and we miss them a lot. We went to this great pub and ate more food (WI mac & cheese and Brat burgers with bacon and cheese curds). So that was definitely a highlight. 

Later that evening, grandma, grandpa, Tom, Curt, & I headed to Outback and enjoyed delicious foods there. (I think I was still full from the night before!) Then headed to Tom's apartment and played cards. He again came out on top and ended up with a pocket full of quarters. Then we chilled and watched a movie. Another great great day. 

We then drove home Sunday morning and had to face a lot of annoying traffic. But Curt and I remedied this by a little game I invented. I would whistle a Christmas tune and he would guess the song. We discovered that either I am a horrible whistler (probably not) or Curt is just a darn stinky guesser (most likely). It probably doesn't help that I can only whistle in one tune...but still. It sounded great. We then ended up creating our own Christmas songs and hope to release an album by next holiday season.

The End.

We Still like Vampires.

So, we just got back from Breaking Dawn. And we approve. We just wanted to let the world know.

Beautiful moments & jolly old bus drivers

It was tough waking up this morning at 6:15 for work. It was even tougher being happy and cheery all day as I greeted  members coming in to the YMCA. But something happened today that really made it worth it.

Let me back track to last Christmas break.

There is a bus route that runs by our apartment and around campus. It's called the Bronze Loop. We get on it every morning and get off it every afternoon. You tend to learn who rides the bus, where people get off, and you get to know the bus drivers pretty well (whether they are grumpy or quiet or nice or jolly). We had a particularly jolly bus driver who always was happy in the morning. It didn't matter whether it was sleeting ice or if he was almost done with his shift. Every time you walked on the Bronze Loop, you saw Mark's (the bus driver) bubbly smile and you couldn't help to smile with him. It really made my day and I enjoyed seeing him every morning. I mean bus drivers can impact a lot of people's lives. They are often times the first person we see in the morning and the last person coming home from school. If they are happy, you tend to be happy. If they are grumpy, your tend to be a grump. Well, Mark really made everyone happy. (Mark is this happy man with a white beard and large in stature -- he would be a great Santa Claus).
I wanted to show him how grateful I was for what he does and how well he does it. I made him a small Christmas ornament out of blue and red cardstock paper that looked like the bus he drove with the license plate reading "Mark's Bus". On the back I told him what a wonderful bus driver he is and that I appreciate all he does for us. I wrapped it up and tied it up with a little bow. Very small, very simple. I waited at the bus stop the morning before Christmas break and gave him this small gift. And I never saw him again...

Until today. Mark came up to me asking if there were any basketball games going on (his grandson is on a team and unfortunately there weren't any games today). I recognized him immediately and asked if he drove on the Bronze Loop once, and he did! We had a nice little chit chat and then him and his wife left. About two minutes later he comes back inside and asked me:

"Are you Vanessa, the one who gave me that bus ornament?....I cannot tell you how much that meant to me. No one has ever done anything like that for me, something so heartfelt. You made me feel like I was making a difference in the world, or at least here in Lafayette. I really have been praying that I might run into you so that I could thank you for that. I have never been as happy as I was when I saw that small little handmade bus...thank you..."

Often times you forgot what a small thank you can mean to someone. What a beautiful and wonderful moment that was today. It reminded me how much small things like that can impact another person's life. I hope to continue to find people like Mark and thank them for their happiness. Everyone needs to hear those words in their lives.

Lots n Lots of ideas

On the way home from Iowa, the mister and I had 5 hours to concocted brilliant ideas. There was one in particular that we latched on to. I start a photography&design business so I can make lots of babies (in the far far future). All I can think about is this idea and the possibilities it brings. I named it PEARL photo&design and am specializing in senior portraits, portraits, homecoming & prom portraits, and photo invites. I am very, very excited. I'm thinking I should drop out of school even........JUST KIDDING. I would never do that....

Anyways, I cannot believe that we are HALF way through November and prepping for Thanksgiving. Where the heck is time going?? I seriously cannot believe this. I need to start doing my eating exercises NOW to get ready! We're gonna bump up our meals to 4x a day (which doesn't include our usual midnight snack). Thanksgiving, here we come!

Friends & Fam & Tramps

That's what our entire weekend involved.

One of Curt's good friends was married this weekend, Hurray! 

It was great to see his Urbana crew again,

they are all such great guys. 

After dancing a few songs, eating delicious foods, and talking to fun people

(namely Curt's old school counselor, Mr. Furrer. He is a VERY funny guy. He definitely loves the Isenbarger family)

We ventured over to North Liberty, Iowa.

We ALWAYS have a great time there 

& are so glad we were able to make it this weekend for the Primary Program.

But these pictures illustrate what our Sunday morning look like over at the Coleman Casa: 

It was TRAMP time for us. 

Trin & JC definitely know how to get my heart rate goin early in the morning. 

We also played the best Wii game invented:

Wii Party.

Loads of fun games that all ages can enjoy. 

If I had a Wii, I would be playing that game right now. 

After the great primary program,

Sarah made her famous CAFE RIO and it was delicious. 

Thank you Sarah,

my belly was happy the entire way home.

Curt & I arrived home at 10:00 tonight,

I just finished up some studying for my exams tomorry,

and now I'm pooped. 

Time for bed for this girl.