Always something...

I swear, we are always changing something in our house... never happy with the way it is. I have seen some wood stairs in my designer mags with their risers painted white. I personally have never liked all wood (like it is now) and I think we should paint them white. We put white paper on all of the risers to see if we like it.

The above photo has 2/3 of the stairs done... what do you think?
Paint them white or keep them brown??

The photo below has all the risers done in white to give you a better idea.
Any input is welcomed!!

Emma and Dann got creative with her veggies!

We got out the exersaucer for a try. Ethan loved it... with a little help of some blankets to keep him from slouching over too far. He is pushing lots with his legs lately and holds his head up well.

Sisterly/Brotherly love!!

Ethan just hangin' out!

Enough is enough!!!

Like we did not have enough snow already... last week we got hit again with another snow storm. There is a crazy amount of snow around and there is no where left to shovel the darn stuff. Yes, our front snow bank is as high as the garage roof!

I must say I have had enough of "Old Man Winter" and it can go away any time now!!

Above and below are photos of Emma's snow fort she made with Dann at Christmas. Needless to say, this last storm covered the fort with new snow, thus it is no more. Emma was sad to see the opening of her fort was blocked by a mountain of snow!

Emma's swimming party was a hit. The kids were exhausted when it was time for pizza & cake, which ment it was not so crazy in the party room. Because they were tired, the kids just played with baloons, and no games were needed!

Ethan is 3 months old now!

He weighed in at 17lbs 12oz and is 26.5 inches long.

Before long, Ethan will be sitting and then crawling (yikes, everything is happening so fast the second time around)!!

Ethan still has crazy hair, so Dann now refers to him as "Kramer"

A present for both of us

We decided to step up into the new "T.V. generation" and bought a 42" LG flat screen plasma. It is too awesome and we are really glad we took the plunge! The HD gets hooked up next week and then there is no turning back. We got a great deal before Christmas and then saved some more when we found it cheaper on Boxing Day! Yahoo!

Movies will never be the same (especially Baby Einstein... LOL, for those of you with kids).

Happy Birthday

HAPPY 4TH BIRTHDAY EMMA!!

Hard to believe my little girl is four years old! We had a small get-to-gether at the house the day of her birhtday and this coming Sunday Emma will have a party with some of her friends!

There were no shortage of presents... Emma is loved and spoiled by many!

It appeared that "Barbies" were the theme gift this year.

I would have to say that Prince Eric is one lucky guy (darn good odds, even for a plastic doll)!

Here is Ethan sporting his "Bull Dogs" shirt that his cousin sent him from California State University in Fresno, CA. Jeannette is a Keeper for the ladies soccer team, and Ethan is her #1 fan... GO BULL DOGS!!

We decided to try Ethan out in the Jolly Jumper. He is a bit young for it, but he loved it anyway.

Just a shot of the big harvest moon (before the snow storm).

Dann dressing up his son for combat...

No More Excuses

Well the time has come.... and no it is not a "New Year's" thing!

I only have 10 more months until I go back to work, and if you saw me now, you'd think I was 4 months pregnant. In other words... "stop talkin' the talk and start walkin' the walk!"

I hopped on the tread mill today and it felt pretty good. I would like to say that is me in the photo, but I would be lying (it does look like our tread mill though)!

Anyway... Emma thought it was fun because she did her exercises on her mini tramp while I was doing my thing. I will repeat this process... oh, like a million times, in the next 10 months. Hopefully this will help the belly shrink!

Christmas Magic

Christmas morning was very magical around our house. Emma slept in until 7:30, which is magical in itself! She ran straight down stairs, past her stocking and gold dress, to see if Santa ate his snack and read his note. She then ran back upstairs into our room screaming in excitement that Santa had come, he ate his snack and he brought her a new fish named "Max" (Emma excepted the death of old Max the fish a few days before X-Mas, stating Max is in Heaven and Great-Grandpa is taking care of him. Santa figured she could handle a new fish now).

Emma was so thrilled with Max, she was happy leaving it at that. She walked passed her stocking about 3 more times before she saw the "Gold Dress" hanging on the railing. When she finally noticed, Emma was vibrating and could not wait to put on her new "Gold Princess" dress. It fit like a glove!!

Emma also received some gold shoes, purse and necklace to accessorize her new look.

Here is the new "Max"

Pat, a friend of ours in PR, told us a story about how the owner of a local pet store stated her Beta fish jump out of their tank all the time, and she just scoops up the crusty dudes and plops them back into the tank. I guess they come back to life??? Hard to believe, but should the new "Max" decide to become an Olympic high jumper, we will try this to see if it does work??

Ethan had a terrible cold over the holidays (still has the tail end of it). Considering how sick he was, he was in pretty good spirits during gift opening etc.

I guess he had enough at this point!!

Happy again with big sister!

Family Photos...

Big sisterly love...

Mommy having some one-on-one time with her little man!

2 Months and more....

This photo was taken December 16th - Ethan at 2 months.
He weighed in at 16 lbs 4 oz and was 25.5 inches long
(is it wrong to have your boy on steroids this early in life? hahaha!)

Emma loves helping out with Ethan and enjoys feeding him his bottle from time-to-time. Ethan loves anyone who gives him food!!

I found some camouflage pants for Ethan while we were shopping in Edmonton... they are so darn cute!

TUMMY

TIME...

Ethan actually enjoys it once and a while!

I know I have mentioned we have had a lot of snow the last couple of months, but this photo really shows just how much. The city crews were busy cleaning off the roadways this week and piled the snow up on resident's front lawns.

Dann got busy with Emma and they started making a snow fort with all the large snow chunks...

they did not come in until dark!!

While I was busy with Ethan, Emma and her daddy got busy writing a letter to Santa. Emma was pretty proud of her letter. She wrote out some of the letters in the words herself (she is growing up so fast)!

Our visit with Santa went well this year (it did last year too)!!

Emma loved talking with Santa, telling him exactly what was on her list and Ethan just hung out without any tears!

Grandma & Papa arrived on Wednesday and they are very pleased with their latest Grandson.

From our house to yours,

God Bless

and

Merry Christmas

Bye-Bye Max

May 2006 - December 2006

Our pet fish, Max, left us early this morning and has gone to "Fishy Heaven"

Here is the story behind his departure...

The last month, Max, has been acting a bit weird and not eating much but he seemed to be coming around this past week. Yesterday morning I changed his water and he seemed happy, swimming around. Later that morning, Emma and I were getting ready to make gingerbread men when all of a sudden, Max jumped out of his fish bowl and landed on the counter in front of me. I was startled but I scooped him up quickly and plopped him back in the water. All seemed okay with Max until... Emma and I were rolling out the gingerbread dough, Max was splashing around like a crazy fool? Too weird!

THEN...

Lastnight after the kids were in bed, Dann was standing by the kitchen sink and all of a sudden, Max jumped out of the water again and landed on the floor. Dann got the net and scooped him back into his fish bowl. Dann commented that it was lucky he was standing there, cause if Max would have jumped out in the middle of the night or when we are out, he would be dead. We retired for the night around 11:00 p.m.

About 1:30 a.m., Emma woke up screaming and crying. She begged us not to leave her alone and was very upset (more than she has ever been with a bad dream). It took Dann over an hour to get her to calm down and go back to sleep alone. We thought it was very strange and unusual behaviour for Emma (when it comes to bed and sleeping that is).

This morning Emma and I went down to the kitchen to make oatmeal at 8:00 a.m. and I went to feed Max but he was not swimming around in his bowl like every other morning for the last 7 months. I went around the kitchen island to find Max dried up dead on the floor. He had to have been there half the night, cause when I went to pick him up, he was stuck to the floor. Emma was devastated that her little Maxy was dead. She was crying and said she does not want Max to go to Heaven or in the garbage. She went on to say that he should just stay inside with us until winter is over. I explained to her that Max will start to smell and he cannot stay inside. I think we convinced Emma to put Max into a box she decorated a few months ago with macaroni & fruitloops and we will cover him up in the snow outside.

Unknown if Emma's bad dream (Karma) last night had anything to do with Max flopping around on the kitchen floor before he succumb to his injuries??? Maybe someone was trying to tell us something?? Things that make you go hmmmmm??

Bye-Bye Max...

Christmas Concert... NOT

Last night was Emma's first Christmas Concert at play school, and everyone was very excited. Emma has been practicing all her X-mas songs for the last two weeks and she got a pretty new dress to wear for the special night. I spent the afternoon making squares etc. for the little luncheon after the program while Emma played outside in the snow and this is where this story really starts...

Emma came inside from playing around 3:45 p.m. to get ready for her big night (concert was at 5:15 p.m.). She told me her tummy hurt a bit, but I did not think much of it. I gave her a pear for a snack, thinking she was a bit hungry from playing all afternoon. She ate the pear and could not wait to put on her new beautiful dress. She looked so pretty, but still was complaining that her tummy hurt. I asked her if she had to go to the bathroom, in which she told me she already pooped today.

Well... I got Ethan dressed and we were out the door @ 5:00 p.m. On the drive to school Emma was really complaining, asking for a a ice pack to put on her stomach. I asked her if she felt like she was going to be sick, but she assured me that she was not going to puke. I chalked her tummy ache up to nerves and kept driving. We arrived at school and Emma went to get her angel wings on for the performance. She was in tears and soon after came up to me asking to go home to rest. She could not even walk from the pain. I got concerned, think it was her appendix or something (even though the pain was not in the right spot for appendicitis). Emma said she did not want to stay to sing and the tears were pouring down her cheeks. I packed up Ethan, talked briefly to her teachers and Dann carried Emma to the van. She was very upset... thus I did not get any photos to post of the big night.

When we arrived home, Emma took off her pretty dress, put on her PJ's and watched a movie with a cold pack on her stomach. About an hour passed and Emma started to toot up a storm, followed by a long trip to the bathroom. After it was all said and done, Emma announced that her tummy ache was gone and that she just had a bunch of gas!! Emma went on to tell us that she pooped out a million pieces of poop and now she feels "WAY BETTER". I laughed about the million pieces comment. Emma wanted to go back to her concert afterwards, but I had to explain to her that it was over, and there would be another one next year. Nothing has ever been easy with Emma, not sure why I thought her first Christmas Concert would be any different!!

Since I have no photos of Emma's concert I thought I would leave you with a X-mas favorite of mine!

Galaxyland...

We went to the City this past week for a little get-a-way (shopping and visiting). We had a great time with our family and friends.

Monday we decided to head to West Edmonton Mall with the kids. Emma was very excited about going to Galaxyland this time. In the past she would get excited, but when she actually saw the rides, she would just watch the other kids. She would always say, "I will just watch, maybe when I get a little older I will ride the rides!"

Emma has been asking to go to Disneyland, but we told her we are not going to Disneyland to watch other kids ride the rides. This statement must have sunk in because Emma could not get on the rides fast enough this time around. With her friend Nicholas in tow, they ran from ride to ride, showing the operator their wrist band, then finding the perfect horse, car or seat.

Emma loved the little dragon rollercoaster and was prepared to go on the larger one (the junior one, not the huge one) with me, but Dann figured it was not a good idea. He thought it might be a bit fast for her and she might go back to watching rides again. I think she would have loved it, but I never pushed it (next time).

Nicholas and Emma on their dirt bikes

Emma saw the "Flying Galleon" ride and wanted to go on it with me. I was surprised she wanted to go on the Big Ship, after all, it is a big ride for a 3 year old. I forgot how high that ship really goes, especially when you sit in the very back row. My stomach dropped, so I can only imagine how Emma was feeling. I just kept laughing, encouraging her that we were having fun. Emma held my arm tight and said she did not really like the ship. Emma kept laughing cause I was (my psychology paid off) and after the ride stopped, Emma commented that the ship was a little high for her, but maybe next time she would like it more.

Ethan was a trooper the whole time at the mall. He slept and hung out in his car seat. We had to buy him a new outfit at Old Navy though, cause he had a big blow out (all the way up his back). Years ago a co-worker of mine in PR told me a story about his baby boy at West Edmonton Mall regarding the same thing. I believe he told me that his wife threw everything into the garbage and they purchased new diggs for Johnny... too funny.

Dann managed to get a pic of Ethan smiling... too cute!

We stopped at the petting zoo... the bunny was so soft!

This is Emma and her friend Abbey...
Two little Princesses

Emma took a liking to Nicholas' truck and zoomed around the basement.