More on Christmas!

Here's a picture of Aubrey opening her last batch of gifts on Christmas afternoon. She was really sweet about the whole thing. She would wait to be given a gift and then rip off small pieces of paper and hand them to you. She also made gasping noises as the gift was uncovered. Towards the end she wasn't as dainty, but the end way a full day later.
The day after Christmas the Sandwisch family came over to visit. This is a BIG deal as they live in San Diego, California. Steve and his wife Jen (Mike's cousin's) are in town visiting Jen's family for the holidays and we got to steal them away for an evening. The last time we saw them was Christmas day last year! Andrew, two and a half, was pretty content playing with a play broom most of the time. I think they will have some hockey gear in store for him in the years ahead. Katie, four and a half, was such a little mommy. She would take Aubrey to play upstairs and make sure she was safe on the stairs. She also taught Aubrey how to make fudge with her new kitchen. I asked Katie if she would stay with us, but she's pretty fond of her parents so she declined. The kids are finishing up cookies at Aubrey's new table compliments of Grandpa Keyes! The table that is, the cookies were from our neighbors across the street.
And last but not least, the kitchen! Note the food all in front of it. Oh yes, we did buy a 117 piece food pack to accompany the gift. Yesterday, Aubrey spent hours dumping all of the food out, and putting it in her shopping cart, dumping, handing it to me, dumping, setting all the pieces on the table. I think Mike and I will also be spending hours putting it all away in the months ahead! I did confirm that the low price we paid ($40) was due to the lack of pre-assembled pieces. My friend bought a Little Tikes kitchen and it came pre-assembled. So it looks like it costs about ten dollars an hour to assemble these things. The table above only took about 15 minutes to assemble. That is much more reasonable for tired parents to do!

Wednesday, 7:36 pm

Rachel: Aubrey, did you poop?

Aubrey: Yeah. (walks over to the stairs to go up and get her diaper changed).

Rachel: Aubrey, do you want daddy to change it?

Aubrey: No, mama! (Heads up stairs).

Mike: (Laughing) You heard her, get up there!

Just because you think it is stupid...

doesn't mean someone else does. This is how you feel sometimes when you are giving a gift. You think things like, "Why would someone want this?" or "When are they ever going to use this?" But the truth is, when you give a gift it isn't about you! Mike and I did a great job of this this year. We bought what the other person wanted regardless of how trivial or useless we thought it would be. And to be honest, in five Christmas' together it was one of the best. My sacrificial giving was an XBox 360 game. Seriously, I know when he gets wrapped up in a new game that he stays up to all hours of the morning playing it... And I hate that. But Mike loves it, so I made a sacrifice.

Mike sacrificed a lot. He got me several things he thought were ridiculous including hot rollers, a pedestal cake plate with lid, and a roaster oven. To his surprise, he loved my hair all done up yesterday, enjoyed the pork roast cooked in my new toy, and I bet he will even have a slice of cake the next time I bake one! I did bake one yesterday but it was in a rectangular cake pan. Next time I will know better! We had a wonderful holiday and really enjoyed spending it together and experiencing it at our own pace. It was kinda nice not having to rush over to someone's house. (Sorry to all the family members reading this whose house I used to rush over too). That's it for now, I just needed a little break from cleaning :)

Merry Christmas

I have 15 minutes before my cake comes out of the oven so I thought I would do a quick post. We started opening presents at 3 on Christmas Eve and finished up at 8:30! We had a break for dinner, but that was it. Crazy Aubrey wants to play with each toy before moving on. She actually has another round of gifts waiting for her after her nap, but we have done all we could do for now. After we got Aubrey to bed, Mike and I finished our Christmas together so we could enjoy the moments and not entertain a 18 month old.

At nine we began to assemble her kitchen. At eleven, we finished, with us both working hard the entire time. I am convinced that no child after the first is conceived on Christmas Eve! Did I mention we got another 2 inches of snow yesterday? I guess you knew that if you watched the Broncos game.

This morning Aubrey came downstairs to her kitchen, a yummy breakfast, and a trip outside to play while Mike shoveled snow. Back to breakfast, my mom got us an electric griddle with dual temperature control, so we had to try it out. Mike made bacon, pancakes, and eggs over medium. It was topped off with orange juice and very full tummies. Well, except for Aubrey's. She has been boycotting food lately and is living off of milk, cheese, fruit, and the occasional bowl of yogurt. I'm sure it is just a phase, but it's very strange to see your child ignore a pancake nicely dressed with blueberry jam.

We have had a great day so far and are excited for the rest. The Hoskinson's are joining us for Christmas dinner tonight and hopefully some games after Aubrey hits the hay. I hope you are all having a wonderful Christmas wherever you may be!

I just noticed that we do not have any after pictures of the kitchen, so that will be included in my next post. Aubrey is on our driveway in these pics and you can see the start of Mike's shoveling.

Update of craziness!

Last mail delivered... Tuesday. Last trash pick up... a week ago yesterday. Last time Mike had to walk nearly a mile to get a ride to work in below freezing conditions, through feet of snow... Never. Probably the closest he ever came was tackling the hill in Santa Ynez to catch the bus for school. That's right, this morning Mike walked to the nearest plowed road to get a ride to work. Craziness! We still are not sure why anyone would make a trip to the bank today, but... Mike reported that within the first hour of being open they had to push four cars out that got stuck at the ATM! What a fun job my husband has. Needless to say it is quite a change from seven years of being self-employed and being his own boss. Here are some pictures of our winter wonderland. Oh, and as I type this several residents are hand shoveling the street in hopes of getting out today. Again... Craziness!

Here's Mike outside our back slider. He made a path so we had some perspective on what was out there.
Here's an example of one of those crazy drifts. 9 news reported that we got 26 inches of snow. Ummm, that would make Mike a midget. I saw another report that said neighborhood levels could differ in feet. We had at least three feet consistently throughout our property.
Some friendly neighbors trying to pioneer a trail for others to follow. Nope, he just got stuck in front of our house and ended up driving in reverse after about an hour and a half of digging out. His car is a little more beefy than the Accord too.
Aubrey and I exploring the damage. Yes she is warm enough! No this is not her snow suit. We were just coming out for a quick look around. She wanted to stay and play, but I had cookies to make and that would have required a costume change for both of us!

Life in Alaska!

Wait a minute. We don't live in Alaska. Oh yeah, well you could have fooled me. I am looking outside to anywhere from 3-4ft of snow which has fallen in the last 24 hours. So THIS is what a blizzard feels like...I don't like it. It is very pretty however and I coincidentally have the day off today which is helpful. So far, it is the 4th worst storm in Denver's history. So if we survive this one, we should be all set.

I worked at a different branch yesterday which is about 6 miles from home. I spent the first 2 hours of the morning just shoveling the snow around the bank sidewalks. About noon, FirstBank decided to close at 3 pm so people could get home in the light. I left about 12:45 because it was looking pretty bad and am all too glad that I did. It took me the better part of 45 minutes to travel the 6 miles home and I was fish tailing all over the place. Through many areas in the neighborhood I was hitting snow drifts with the hood of my car and just trying to power through them, the whole time thinking, "please don't stop...please don't stop". I didn't stop until I got to my driveway. I went out a few hours later to plow a path into the driveway which took about an hour and withing a half an hour after I got parked, the wind and snow had removed all proof that I had even been out there. We are still expecting snow through the day, but the wind has calmed down a bit which is good. So we are going to stay inside, stay warm, and possibly knock down a few Bailey's and creams. :) Enjoy the pictures and enjoy your warmth.

A good day to stay home

Denver is expecting up to two feet of snow by noon tomorrow! Castle Rock usually gets more. I'm glad I made it to the store yesterday and can hunker in here for the day. Mike has tomorrow off, so we just have to get him home safely tonight and we are set!

Legomania

Yesterday at our weekly trip to Walmart (at least during December) I found the last Christmas gift for Aubrey from her list. I had given up as they have not been on sale since Thanksgiving weekend, and I refuse to pay full price for most things. Luckily Mega Blocks were under $10 and made the cut! They are even the girls set with pink and purple instead of blue and green.

When I got home, I saw the hoards of gifts under the tree with Aubrey's name and decided we would celebrate Hanukkah too. So the blocks were dumped on the floor and she got to work. Needless to say, she loves them.







This is her own creation, no mommy help at all. Well, as you can see her structure is a little wobbly so I did hold it together while she was building. She even matched up colors on parts. She would hold the orange one and start to put it on the red, see the orange, and move it. What a big girl she is becoming. I was reminded of that again this morning while I was vacuuming. I turned around and she was sitting on the couch playing with her stacking cups. How did she get up there? I forget that she is a monkey in disguise.

What will become of this block building kid? Will she be structural engineer? Or maybe an architect? Or maybe she will put her self through college with a job at Lego Land. Which she will have to do if she decides to go out of state! One things for sure. I love her to pieces and enjoy watching the world through her eyes!

tri-pods, printers, and stamps, oh my!

We have been trying to get a decent picture for about a week now so we can mail out our Christmas letter. It has been a series of unfortunate events to say the least. I got ANOTHER fever blister the day my mom arrived and had to get that under control before I would step in front of a camera. Then, whenever Mike and I were ready, Aubrey would smear spaghetti or yogurt or something super sticky into all that hair of hers. I had Aubrey all ready to go another day, but Mike didn't realize I was feeling a time crunch and hadn't shaved that morning. Grrrr... We were finally all presentable last Sunday and gave it a try. Yeah, this was the best one and not that great. So we were back to the drawing board. Tuesday night we tried again and ended up with a cute picture and decided to stop the insanity!

Last night we were printing out our letters and getting all of our ducks in a row, when... You guessed it. No more ink in the printer. Just another snag. So my new goal is to mail them out Saturday. Hopefully I'll meet it. That of course pushes the stocking project back until Sunday at the very least. 'Tis the season, right! Here's to getting something done today!

I wish it could always be Christmas.

Not because I want to give and receive gifts all year long, but because I love our house when it is decorated for Christmas. Maybe someday I will decorate for every season, but for 2006, it is all about the winter wonderland. Our tree has been up since Thanksgiving weekend and I have been slowly adding to the Christmas chaos. I still have some garland and wreaths to add to my staircase, but they might be a better fit for next year. I have a very long to do list and the garland is not as big of a priority as making Aubrey's stocking as well as her sister's, writing our Christmas letter and getting it sent out, and tackling Mike's birthday that is fast approaching. My deadline for all three is the end of the week so wish me luck!

Mike tackled the outside lights on Friday and survived his roof top adventure! Our roof was still covered with snow so working on it was understandably scary. I was only asked once to retrieve something that slid off, I am thankful it wasn't my husband's remains. We decided to go with the old school large ceramic colored lights. Our neighborhood is covered in white bulbs and icicle lights, and as beautiful as it is, we wanted to be different. After all, we are all living in the same house more or less, we can differentiate a little with our Christmas decor. We (Mike) kept to the first story this year. We don't have a ladder tall enough and we haven't worked out all the details like where to run all the extension cords. The downside of the old fashioned lights is that you can only connect two strands together before you need a new outlet.

My mom returned home yesterday, but left in her stead many a gift for Christmas morning. We look forward to seeing Aubrey tear into the gifts. She is now saying "lights" and "bows" and is very aware that something magical is at foot in the Heldt household. She continues to say "no" as she tries to pull the bows off of all the packages! She doesn't touch the ornaments because she got pricked by the tree when we were setting it up. She does like to look though as long is she is a safe foot away.

Let it snow, but also let it melt!

So we had some snow about a week ago. And for whatever reason, our house has maintained the snow fall even though the entire neighborhood melted off days ago. We are also at the low point on our block and everyone's runoff tends to back up in the street in front of our house if the drain is blocked by frozen water. This makes for a frozen pond that goes a few feet out. Mike spent several hours Friday trying to break up the ice and make a path to the drain. Sadly, it was almost 60 degrees on Friday and it did little to help him out. Aubrey and I came out to root him on! We walked around for a while and had a great time. Unfortunately, little munch wanted to step in the snow and aimed for the ice patches on our walk. I decided our time would be better spent playing inside. So I persuaded her to the front door and headed in. Mike came in shortly after that too. Just another snap shot of how we spend our time together. I was kinda hoping for a movie!

Lucky I live in Colorado

My mom is in town Christmas shopping and hanging out with Aubrey. Last night after dinner at TGIF my mom and I continued on our shopping quest and Mike took Aubrey home for the evening. There was this certain Little people toy my mom wanted to get Aubrey that happened to be out of stock just about everywhere. So our quest ended at Walmart. This was a fortunate coincidence because I needed milk anyway and it saved me from an unnecessary trip to the store today. The lines were long so we decided to do self check (which also had a huge line, but it was feeding into four registers). They had a cash only line and my mom was the only cash only person so we got to take cuts! Yeah! By the time we got home, Aubrey was fast asleep so I parked in the driveway, we took what we could carry and cozzied in on the couch for some down time before bed. Well, I just woke up realizing I left the milk in the car! Hah, it never got over 35 last night so the milk is colder than it would have been in the fridge. See how lucky I am to live in Colorado in winter, err... I mean fall!!!

On a side note, it was our first time ordering a kid's meal for Aubrey at a restaurant. In fact I cannot remember the last time I was at a restaurant, and am convinced I haven't been to one with Aubrey since she has been alive. So I think my last kid free experience was Ruby's for breakfast on my birthday a week before she arrived. Ummm Belgian waffle combo, I remember it well. Anyway, she had mac and cheese and mandarin oranges. Yum. She also had milk in a cup with a straw with a pretty tight lid. I have to admit I was a little teary watching her drink her milk out of a real cup. When did my baby get so big? She was a little overwhelmed with the huge ceramic bowl and let me feed her a lot of her mac and cheese so I did get a glimpse of her baby side.

A toy timeout!

Since Aubrey laughs and smiles when she gets a timeout we tried something new this morning. She was playing with a very heavy plastic monkey and she began to throw him. I gave her a warning, to which she smiled and said "noooo" and did it again. I told her Monkey had a timeout and put him on a counter in site, but out of reach. Ahhh...Progress. She cried for three minutes and reached for him. We then talked about playing gentle and I told her Monkey could only come down if she would be gentle. Yeah she threw him immediately, but he went back in a timeout and Aubrey saw the cause and effect relationship and more importantly consistency from me. Maybe we are getting somewhere.

nooooo...

I never realized how much I say no until this week. Aubrey has been showing me exactly how much and when I say it. Last Thursday while I was making dinner, Aubrey opened all of the cabinet drawers. As she did she would say "Noooo" in a cute low continuous sound. Hmmm... I do usually tell her no when she opens the drawers. Later I was using the restroom and Aubrey began to pull on the toilet paper saying "noooo" again. The next day she pulled her stroller on to the couch and began to walk on the couch and push it singing "no, no, no, no." But my favorite was this morning when I took off her diaper. She grabbed her, well, you know, and began the melodious sound again. That one took me by surprise. I don't say no for that, I say not right now. Apparently she can infer what I really mean. She clearly knows what I do not like and is letting me know that she knows as she does it anyway. It is so stinking cute, I just laugh and say "That's right Aubrey, that is a no." and try to redirect her to something else. Her Yeah's and Yes' are pretty darn cute too and much more appreciated.

Halfway Point

What a surreal experience this pregnancy has been. With Aubrey, every minute of every day was consumed with the thought of being a parent. It was a lot to take in. We knew it meant leaving my job for a career at home, leaving the security of our family, friends, church and state so we could afford the life we wanted for our children, and giving up just about every freedom that is afforded to married couples who haven't yet been blessed with children.

This pregnancy is much different, the only thing that is obviously changing is the size of our stroller and the amount of time it will take to get out of the house. It isn't that we aren't eagerly anticipating this baby, of course we are, it just isn't as all consuming as our pregnancy with Aubrey. Little miss sassy pants provides me with little time to think of anything else besides her.

So with 20ish weeks left we are left with a few key elements to work out. 1. Deciding if Aubrey will be in a big girl bed or kept in her crib a while longer. 2. Figuring out all of our backup plans if our labor happens at an unexpected time. Isn't it always unexpected? Where does Aubrey go? How does she get there? Do we have people lined up to come here if it happens in the middle of the night? Do we have back ups in case our plan and God's plan do not coincide? O kay, that seems like more than two... 3. Figuring out the perfect name for our next little girl.