++Back to the homeland++

We took a trip back to Minnesota (we can call it the homeland because 50% of the members in our family were born there) for Thanksgiving.  We were super-duper busy visiting all the people we wish we could see more often. 

First stop was my aunt and uncle's house.  The kids warmed right up to Uncle Dick.

 Wyatt was so glad to see his favorite dog Sophie.

 Next we visited the Dusoskys.  Before we went on the trip Wyatt was fully convinced the sole purpose of our trip was to see Emily and Meredith.  There was no talking him out of the idea that we weren't staying at their house either.  He thinks they are family.  And Emily is his girlfriend.  We won't go there.

 Mark and I were able to sneak away to a few events.  The first being my high school reunion.  They said it was 15 years but I think they were lying.  It might have been a little more fun if more people had shown up.  We had fun catching up with a few old (young) friends though.  They next day we headed to the new Gopher stadium.  It killed us to leave Minneapolis just as the Twins and Gophers were finally getting new stadiums.  It was COLD and I only planned to stay for the first half but believe it or not...they pulled out a win!

 Claire and Wyatt had lots of fun staying at Aunt Taylor and Uncle Matt's house.  Grandma and Grandpa came into town to visit as well.  I don't have a lot of pictures because I spent so much of my time gallivanting all over town AWAY from my kids. 

 Mark introduced Matt to Angry Birds on the Ipad.  We won't ever get those 20 hours back...

 My "girls" arranged a playgroup so we could all see the kiddos.  It was so fun but also a little bittersweet for me.  I want to be there for that playgroup every week!  It was fun to see how Wyatt seemed to fit right in.

 We also visited the Molepskes and our kids did their best to teach their kids how to be crazy. 

So fun.

++Twenty and Twenty-One++

In last month's blogging hiatus, I missed Claire's twenty month recap.  Gasp.  I will also confess that her baby book, lovingly purchased before she was born, remains unopened.  Okay, confessions aside.  Let's get on with a little update on our favorite little sweetie.

I feel like I say this every time but with each passing month her personality shines through more and more.  Claire is silly and sassy and all girl.  I love it when she leans up against something and crosses one leg over the other.  Such a grown up pose for such a little one. 

She loves to adorn herself with all sorts of things.  "Neeeccckkkklace" "bray-let" "glasshas".  She eats up all the attention she gets as a result.  But keeps a straight face all the while.

The baby obsession continues.  Everything is about babies.  She moves them around, lays them on things, reads to them.  So cute.  I picked her up at the gym day care the other day and they told me she was going to make a great mommy some day. 

For some reason out of nowhere Claire's hair started growing with reckless abandon.  No complaints (it's about time) but it's actually quite unruly.  I want so bad to get it cut again but after being ridiculed for getting her ten strands cut last time, I'm trying to hold out a little longer.  We opt for barettes or bows.  Claire calls them all bows.  She doesn't seem to mind them but she likes to take them out and bring them to me so I can put them back in.  Over and over again.  Fun!

Her talking has also taken off.  She will do her best to repeat any word you ask her to.  Most of the time she is pretty close.  She parrots everything her brother says.  Lucky for us, last week it was "stupid babies".  Over and over and over again.  She is doing a great job with stringing words together too.  "Daddy read stories",  "No watch Dora", "I see truck".  It's so fun to learn more and more about what is going on in that little head. 

She still LOVES her music class.  We hear her on the monitor in her room singing "clap hello, hello".  She does a pretty good job with words to lots of songs.  We play kids music when we are in the car and both the kids seem to love it and absorb so much of it.  I was even rocking out to the Veggie Tales CD we had home from the library a few weeks ago.  I'm also a closet Raffi fan.

She is still obsessed with Cora.  We talked about Cora, and Soozoo, Bett and Lahson (and their kitty) all the time.  At bedtime we have to go through the list that all of them, and Nana and Bompa and Grandma and Grampa and Busha are sleeping too.  I think in about six months these girls are really going to have fun together!

I'm also kind of glad to report that she may be showing signs of being slightly more into Mommy than Daddy.  With Wyatt there is no doubt who is favorite is (to the point where we have behavior issues when Dad travels), but it seems the little one doesn't think I'm so bad after all.  She still smiles like no other when she hears the garage door go up when Daddy gets home. 

She's a pretty fun little peanut.

++Snow!++

We had two happy kids today.  There must be Minnesota in their blood after all.  This was all new territory for the little one.  It took me a while to convince her to stop calling it rain.  I had so much fun taking photos.  More later.  Off to bed.  Tomorrow=SNOW DAY!

++Ten on Tuesday++

I have all these random thoughts bouncing around in my head.  I thought I would share them with someone.  You can pretend that you care.

1.  We are hosting the boy's book club here on Thursday.  We're having a Dino Dig and reading Harry and the Bucketful of Dinosaurs by Ian Whybrow.  I'm making homemade dirt play dough (you add coffee grounds) and we're hiding little dinosaurs in it for the boys to dig for.  Wyatt is excited.  He informed me that he wants to sit by me when I read the story so everyone knows it's his time.

2. Yesterday I cleaned out my freezer.  I have three words: Shame on me.  I think I need to be reminded that there are people in other countries (and our own for that matter) who would have loved to have had all that food I wasted.  I am vowing to be better.  The good news is that now the freezer light is actually able to do it's job.

3. I'm finally emerging from feeling totally and completely overwhelmed by all the optional obligations I opted for.  Between Wyatt's school, Mom's Club, MOPs and now getting involved in preschool ministry at our church I think I overdid it.  I was just tired of feeling new and like I didn't know anyone.  I've now made lots and lots of friends.  Just still waiting for those call anytime for any reason best friends.  I think those just take time.

4. Mark took the kids to the zoo on Saturday and I cleaned out three trash bags of toys.  We donated them to this wonderful local organization that I volunteered at last month (see #3).  This morning Wyatt was playing with his flashlight and found a piece that belonged to one of the toys I donated and was determined to find it to put it away.  Oops. 

5. I finally caved and bought some skinny jeans.  I don't really have a skinny jeans figure but I was tired of being the only person anywhere I went that wasn't wearing my boots on the outside of my jeans.  Fashion has that crazy effect on us, doesn't it?

6. I was somehow cajoled (see #3) into taking family photos of my friend's family for a fundraiser for MOPs.  I learned a lot (mostly I learned how much more I have to learn).  And, of course, it was blue sky sunny that day.  One of the ten days of the year we get like that.  Here are a couple of my favorites.

7. We had our own family photos done the day before Wyatt's birthday.  The kids were less than cooperative.  The results were ok.  She did the best she could with a girl who was scared of her and a boy who wouldn't keep his tongue in his mouth.  She even offered to do a re-shoot of Wyatt.  I declined.  I made him come out with me one Sunday after church so we could try again to get something grandparentable.  Wanna see what I get to deal with?

8. We are still dealing with bears in our neighborhood.  We have an all neighborhood email list and people like to send out bear spotting emails.  The chain went around yesterday again.  "Three bears in our driveway digging in our trash, they just stared at us when we opened the garage door" my NEXT DOOR NEIGHBOR replied "They were at our house an hour later.  Got up on the car to get a better angle at the compost bin."  Needless to say I have been running on the treadmill and reviewing my bear encounter safety tips (make yourself look big, walk backwards slowly, make a lot of noise, etc.)  Those raccoons aren't looking so bad after all.

9. Wyatt had his preschool conferences yesterday.  They even sent home little report cards.  I'm happy to announce that he passed with flying colors.  He knows his letters (capital and small), colors, shapes and how to write his name.  Ironically, he knew all but the writing his name part before he started preschool last year.  A little review never hurts.  More importantly (to us anyway) it appears that his behavior is good at school and he is well liked by his peers.  He did get a "Needs Improvement" on "Wears costumes when necessary".  Just kidding.

10. I'm having a super-fun time planning a baby shower with my friend Tiffany for our friend Sara.  Remember them from this weekend?  We're having High Tea at the Hotel Ivy.  If that isn't fun enough it's going to be with all my girls from Minnesota.  Can't wait to see them!  I'm sure I'll take a photo (or two) of the event.  Stay tuned.

++October recap in 13 easy steps++

I decided I just couldn't let October pass me by without saying SOMETHING about it.  So here is the Cliff's Notes version of what happened last month. 
1. Wyatt is super into puzzles.  He also has been having play dates with his buddy Owen quite a bit.  Secretly it's a pact between Owen's mom and me to get a peaceful afternoon while our younger kids nap.  But after all, isn't that what all play dates are about?

 2. This was Mark's requested addition to the blog.  We finally Container Store-ized our front closet.  Warning: it's addictive--we've done 5 now.  We now have two walls with deep shelves and just a little bit of hanging space.  Anyway, Mark was working on installing it and wanted to take the picture of all the "help" he was getting.

 3. Whenever the kids are doing something cute together Wyatt asks to have their picture taken.  I would NEVER turn a request like that down.  Believe it or not, Claire likes this.

 4. The Boys Book Club went on a tour of the local fire station.  This is how our diva chose to roll that day.

 I loved it because it was a small group and the firemen really interacted with the boys.  Usually he chickens out when it comes to getting into the firetruck if there are fireman around.  Not this time!

 5. More photos of two kids being cute together.

 6. October=Pumpkin Patch Month!  This year we went to a great patch at a camp that is for kids fighting illness.  What would a pumpkin patch be without Alpacas? (or llamas??)

 And in this photo I will unashamedly brag to all my Midwestern friends about the gorgeous view at our pumpkin patch. 

 And in this one I will unashamedly brag about my gorgeous girl :)

 6. Wyatt's class took a field trip to a farm.  This was the boy's reaction to the pig pen.  The one in the orange is his best buddy two-years running, Isaak.

 7. We also had a visit from the class dog "Murphy".  We took him on a fall leaf hunting outing.  I think he had fun.

 8. October was also the month of butterflies in our house.  Larson gave Wyatt this butterfly house for his birthday.  We ordered the larvae, watched them turn into crysilis' and then emerge as butterflies.  We failed to pay attention to the fact that it would be too cold to release them so we had to keep them on our kitchen table for two weeks.  I felt kind of guilty wishing death on butterflies.  Kind of.

 9. Sometimes general craziness takes place in our house and must be documented.  Ironically I don't even recall the circumstances of this general craziness.  Still makes for a great photo though. 

 10. The "Boo" craze swept through our neighborhood.  These were my helpers heading out to deliver their package under the cover of darkness.  Note Claire's attempt at thumb's up.  We were a little nervous about heading out because our neighborhood had been inhabited by a family of black bears.  Darn.  That would have made a good blog post.  Too late now!

 11.  We turned our little bike into a rickshaw.  Claire sits in it and yells "Wyatt!  Push!"

 12. I went to the gym and returned to the largest double-decker fort ever made (in our house at least), and three proud builders (notice that fort building requires a Home Depot apron).

 13.  October was capped by Halloween for us and pretty much everyone, I guess.  We had a really cute strawberry this year.  Here she is showing me which pumpkin is "MINE."

 Wyatt decided to abstain from Halloween this year.  Even our promise of "No costume, no candy" persuaded him to wear his costume (which will remain unnamed so that when you, hopefully, see it next year you will think it's new).  He and dad watched the Mom's Club costume parade.

 Claire worked it.

 She loved all the attention she got in her costume.  I kinda did too. 

So I guess it was 14 steps.  Did you notice there were two #6's?  I'm sure my mom will so I have to come clean.  I'm too lazy to fix it now.  Consider it extra credit.  

++Me Again++

It's not secret to anyone who visits this blog that I have been a little slack in the blogging department recently.  I would be lying to you if I said I haven't lost my steam.  I'm trying super hard to regain it.  It was starting to feel more like a chore than something I did because I enjoy it.  And SAHMs do not need more chores.  So, I took a month off.  I'll start out all caught up rather that post-dating stuff and try harder to blog as the days happen rather than huge recaps.  Feel free to comment once and a while too.  It's nice to get some feedback from those of you who stop by. 

After all.  The whole point of this whole thing is to not keep moments like this one to myself: