A crazy week

Decorating for the holidays with Shelby and Sarah... They really enjoyed helping decorate the tree with me. They only got to help with the nonbreakable ornaments near the bottom of the tree (yep, that's how you trim a tree with kids, in my opinion, all of the important, breakable ones at the top, the indestructable ones at the bottom). I did come to understand, however why my mom always felt the need to rearrange the ornaments my brother and I put on the tree each year (at the time very annoying) as I did the same things with the girls this year. Shelby had a habit of placing them all together in a clump and it made me crazy. :-)And now...meet the newest member of our family (can you say Aimee must be crazy?!?). This is Bailey, our new chocolate lab. She is our family's Christmas gift, and we brought her home last Friday. I was not quite ready for a puppy, but Nate has really missed Alga since we had to put her to sleep last year and he's been asking me lately how long we had to wait for another dog. I had originally told him that I didn't want to potty train a puppy until both girls were potty trained. No, Sarah is not yet potty trained so I lost that battle. She really is a sweet puppy, but of course she is into everything.

To top it all off this week, Nate has been down with an ear infection. At least it started that way. After 2 trips to immediate care and 3 different kinds of medication (don't even get me started on how useless they were), it became a ruptured ear drum and sent us on a trip to the emergency room. Poor guy, he really was in a ton of pain, and I didn't know what to do for him. He is on the mend now, but still can't really hear out of that ear. We are seeing an Ear specialist next Friday to recheck him.

The end of the world and being ELFED

The world may be ending...


Last night Sarah went to the daycare at the YMCA during Shelby's swim lesson and she DIDN'T have a screaming meltdown while I tried to take off her coat and hand her to the lady.


THEN, Shelby did not scream poor Dr. Geddes out of the office today at her 3 year check. She was actually quite pleasant to him. Daddy is taking all the credit for that one since he joined us this morning, but I am crediting her maturity and the talking and role playing we did before the appointment. All of that trust may have been ruined when the nurse returned to give her the flu shot. Shelby had a serious case of hurt feelings about that one, but an extra sticker cured that quickly.

On a totally unrelated note, I just elfed the girls. My friend Jaime did it with her whole family and sent it (so funny). I, unfortunately, couldn't find pictures of Nate and I to include so I just did the little ones.

Hope everyone enjoys this Thanksgiving weekend with some loved ones.

Highs and lows

Ever feel like life has lots or irony? I sure do after the past week. For those of you that don't know, my grandma passed away last weekend. It was sudden and has been a very tough week for us all. What makes this ironic is that she passed away on Shelby's birthday, a great and happy time for us. I felt torn all of last Sunday between the joy and happiness that my little girl was turning 3 and sadness about my grandma. I told Nate that I felt I had taken for granted before that I am 31 years old and still had all of my grandparents. It hadn't even occurred to me that I might lose one anytime soon, after all, they were all fairly healthy. Then, BAM! Out of nowhere... So, that's our life in a nutshell lately, and believe me I don't want to experience anything like it again.

I don't want to bum all of you out totally, so I have included some pictures from Shelby's birthday party last weekend which we had in spite all that was going on. She didn't know the difference (ah, the innocence of childhood) and has a great time.

Shelby blowing out her candles and enjoying our singing "Happy Birthday" to her.

Sarah really wanting to help out with the present opening. Shelby did let her help, good big sis that she is.

Shelby opening a monsterous set of Play-doh from Uncle Ryan and soon-to-be Aunt Susan. Both girls are really enjoying that gift!

On a side note, I have to share a funny exchange Nate and I had the other night. He has been falling asleep lately by 7:30 or 8 at least a few nights a week (light weight), and says to me the other night "So when did having kids make you such a night owl?"

My response, "Since when is being awake at 8:08 considered being a night owl?"

He said "Yeah, I guess you're right."

Then he feel asleep.

A little bit of everything...

I know, it's been a while, but all I can say is end of the quarter, 45 progress reports to write, parent teacher conferences, a cold and lost voice, and Halloween, it goes on and on...

I have a bunch of assorted pictures here that I haven't had a chance to share yet.

These were our kitty cats (for full effect, you should know that Shelby substituted a 't' for the 'k' sound, hilarious!). Nate brought them home from a friends house and they were to live out back and catch mice for us. The girls took a huge liking to them and we were really enjoying feeding them and playing with them everyday. But then one day last week we couldn't find them. We were sad but knew they might wander away at some point. This is where the story gets interesting because a couple of days later, we're sitting at the kitchen table and Nate says, "There are the kitties." Sure enough they were next door coming out of the neighbor's house with them! I was so mad, they took our kittens! Nate was trying to calm me down and remind me that we didn't buy them and we were letting them wander outside so they were really just animals that lived here when one of the idiots next door KICKS one of them out of his way! Are you kidding me?!? I was so mad, and again Nate told me to calm down.

I guess Shelby really does watch everything I do because after I told my parents the story Wednesday night, she re-enacted it kicking motion and all for my aunt on Thursday (as she said "The boy, he kicked the kitty!"). I had to vent about this one last time before I let it go. I really am so mad though.

This is the princess pumpkin that Shelby and I created from a kit that my grandma got for her. Turned out pretty cute and she had a great time helping out.

The hat girls...just chillin' before bed

In our Halloween shirts

Shelby the princess (reusing her flower girl dress from a couple of weeks ago) and Sarah as Elmo. Happy Halloween!!

The hit treat of the night...little flashlights.