thanksgiving 2009

this was the first year in many that we were not "forced" to eat two delicious meals in one day. now, I'm never one to turn down yummy food, but I also do not like having to cut back on eating at one place to save room for the next. we spent all of thanksgiving day at kyle's dad's house. miles was spoiled with some new tractors and an adorable john deere stocking hat. we dined on a feast of ham and potatoes and all the fixings you could desire. miles helped me whip up the green bean casserole on thursday morning...he felt the need to taste test it before giving final approval to present to the holiday table.there was a spread of desserts and we all vegged out on the couch afterward. couldn't have been more relaxing :) we then spent the next day...black friday...celebrating with my side of the family. [on a side note: kyle was the only one who woke up before the sun to run around town gathering the best possible retail deals known to man. he successfully saved us oodles of dollars, but definitely required a nap later in the day :)] the food was delectable and plentiful. nothing beats the smell of turkey roasting in the oven. I will admit though, that I particularly liked the turkey from the fryer this year...yum!

of course the holidays are not complete without a line-up of four legged friends
(tessie, sadie, beemer, and tinker)

casey was allowed to oversee the carving station - she seemed heartbroken and confused every time a scrap hit the trash can. (I'm not eating that for what reason????)

we spent time catching up with my cousin jerry from milwaukee. he has a bit of an obsession for our family's famous green jello salad. this year I was assigned to bring it and I delivered a hefty amount. we may all be eating it until christmas! we also tried our hand at some new games. I have to give credit to the person who came up with farkle. it's a fun one!

miles gobbled up his fair share of food and kept everyone entertained with his silly antics and ever-growing vocabulary. his drug of choice these days is either signing time or five little monkeys. "lucky" for us all are available on youtube.com- at least he is passing this obsession on to his cousin, josiah :)
we have much to be thankful for this year - most of all our health, our incredible friends and our ever-growing family. we are especially grateful to be able to spend the holidays with all of them! here are a few more photos from the day:

miles with uncle brian

pretty little nykkole (she got the memo to wear stripes too!)
josiah was all about burning calories...that makes one of us!

oh what a year will do!

p.s. beth and I did not, I repeat...did NOT plan on the matching sweaters. they are not even the same brand. so I guess it must be true: great minds think alike :)

too tired

on the way home from target the other day, miles fell fast asleep. we were about two minutes from home and he hadn't eaten lunch yet. I figured he would wake up to eat and then go down for his regular afternoon nap. no dice. we could NOT wake him up. my dad tells stories of how I was such a sound sleeper that he could hold me upside down and I would stay asleep. apparently miles has inherited this "skill" from me.

string 'em up

last weekend the weather was gorgeous by late november standards, so kyle took advantage and overhauled the yard. as part of his mile long list of tasks, he also put up the christmas lights. it's so nice to do this in the daylight and when you don't need to risk frostbite to get them to clip into those pesky little clips along the roof! miles was more than happy to lend a hand. he is a pretty good little helper and enjoys working along side daddy.

this is the newest favorite...BOING!
collecting the clips was probably the most fun
gotta love extension cords...perhaps an outlet on the front of the house uncle clayt?
no railing? no problem.
such a helper!
this looks safe. (don't worry, the power was off)
on a side note...during the decorating, we discovered that our house had been egged. kyle had to scrub it off before stringing up the lights. nice huh?

guitar hero

here is miles playing the "drum" (a.k.a. guitar). not sure why he insists it's a drum, but I'm thinking it has to do with watching people play beatles rock band at my mom & dad's. in any case, we were amused that he actually wanted to wear the strap and strum it.

the chute

even though miles is feeling a bit under the weather, he was gracious enough to be mommy's helper this morning while we stripped sheets off of the beds and put them in the wash. his favorite parts were trying to jump on our bed while I repeat, "sit down miles" and putting the sheets down the laundry chute. I just may regret showing him how it works when I start to find mysterious things in the baskets downstairs.

northwoods scrap-a-thon

while miles and kyle were busy entertaining ethan and scott, I had my buns planted on a chair at my own personal scrapbook station in poplar, wi. I arrived on friday afternoon with a mere 450 photos of miles. my goal was to get all twelve of his "monthly photo shoots with mom" scrapped and with the exception of month three (which I did not seem to order enough pictures for) - mission accomplished. I was joined by anna's mom, linda, and aunt mary. mary was gracious enough to bring along her extensive cricut collection. if you aren't a scrapper...you won't appreciate having nearly a dozen cartridges to choose from!! anna was a stupendous host and made sure that we were never without food, beverages, country music (sorry mary), and door prizes!

this is me on sunday...a special thanks to linda for the comfy chair!!
the hostess with the mostess - anna

the other goal of the weekend was to meet the newest addition to the harms family - miss addison karen harms (born on september 26th). thanks to her fabulous grandma bachman, she did not go a moment without some sort of girly outfit.

outfit #1 - look closely at those fancy socksoutfit #2 - with matching bib, of course

outfit #3 - ruffles? check. hair bow? check. shoes? check.
so peaceful

I think her photo was snapped at least 100 times and she spent lots of time getting spoiled by everyone. here is anna's mom, linda, taking yet another picture of princess addie!
it was a very fun and relaxing weekend. here is one more picture to prove that I did, in fact, scrap.

boys weekend

Robin was invited to head up north for the weekend to do some scrapbooking and baby-holding at the Harms house with Anna and Addison. this meant that Scott needed to escape, so he brought Ethan to Rochester to have a boys weekend. we took the little guys out on the town a few times to get something to eat, and we went to Grandpa Randy's to check out the tractors and cows. other than that, we stuck close to home and went to the park and also took a wagon ride. it was a good, long weekend and Scott and I think the boys had quite a bit of fun. check out our evidence below.

they're both a bit tired on Friday evening after their bath

on Saturday they discovered an issue with sharing

they seem to have the problem solved

on Sunday they got out of the house again and rode through the neighborhood

and after their adventure they needed a snack

then they wanted to hide underneath the chair cushions

finally, they burned off the energy they had left
(this is the type of supervision you can only get when dads are in charge)

dog walker

kyle & I both admit that our dogs are severely neglected when it comes to walks. I think we may have found a solution.

then again...maybe not?

hello third trimester

here's a brief 28 week update: first of all, I can't believe how fast this pregnancy is going. for some ridiculous reason, I have been surprised at how different it is to be pregnant with a toddler to chase after. I'm not sure if I expected to still be able to lounge around all day or what. I have to admit though, that all of the chasing and lifting of said toddler has helped to slow down the growth of my backside. thanks, miles! I recently passed my glucose tolerance test and got vaccinated for h1n1. due the shortage of the seasonal flu vaccine, I'm still on the list for that one. baby k.2 is clearly going to be some sort of gymnast. I was literally groaning in pain last night as he/she decided to do a variety of acrobatics. I'm pretty sure a complete 360 was successfully completed. ouch. I'm happy to know that all is well in there and am starting to get anxious to meet this little one. which reminds me...kyle and I should probably start discussing names. as you may have read in yesterday's post, miles is planning on calling his sibling "signing" - not really what we had in mind.

peace out

we had the video camera out tonight as dinner wound down and we caught Miles in his continued tomfoolery. this included his constant claim that his name is, "'Siah" (short for cousin Josiah) which he thinks is hilarious. we also asked him what the name of his unborn baby sibling should be. he says it should be, "Signing" (short for Signing Time, his favorite video to watch EVER). this was the last bit that we caught, requested by Sarah last Wednesday. at this point he was desperate to get out of his chair and finally watch some Signing Time DVDs after his bath and before bed.

**UPDATE** we wanted to thank uncle brian for teaching this to miles

boo!

we thought that we should capitalize on miles' nickname before he decides that he wants to dress up as some sort of cartoon character. so we dressed up our little monkey as, well, a monkey! he surprisingly liked his costume and put up with the multiple dressings and undressings (didn't fit in the carseat) as we hauled him around town to visit grandpa kroening, clayt & jess, and conrad & sara before eventually arriving at the annual becker halloween bash! he didn't get the concept of trick or treating and, frankly, didn't need the bucket full of candy. so we decided that we would hold off on going door to door until next year or maybe even the year after! lord knows I don't really need the extra calories either! he got a few treats from grandpa, auntie jess & uncle clayt, great grandma and go-go (daycare). grandpa gave him his first piece of chocolate. to that miles says "more!" and I concur!

woke up a little crabby and none too excited about getting dressed.
(can you blame him? check out the leggings!)

hey I look pretty cute!

trick or treat grandpa!

there were some pretty stellar costumes once again this year. we had a contest for "best costume" and my dad won. my parents were the maid and butler for "queen nykkole". so clever. the scary part was that my DAD was the maid. complete with make-up and fishnet stockings. you can thank me later for that mental image. I will try to scrounge up a better photo of him so you can get an actual glance at such a masterpiece. miles took 2nd in the contest, followed by my brother, brian. you will see that he was part of a foursome and they all looked fantastic! I am also on the hunt for a picture of beth, seth, and josiah. they were fire fighters and little josiah was a dalmation!

me (chiquita banana), miles (monkey), and kyle (zoo keeper)

the flintstones
(brian & blair, jen & marc)

seth's brother, noah

all of the guys (that would be my DAD in the middle)

queen nykkole

miles partied until after 10:30 at which time he crashed and woke up at 6:45 the next morning. good thing we had daylight savings time, because that means he actually got about 9 hours of sleep. he still hasn't really adjusted to the new time schedule. clearly this concept was not thought of by a parent. grr. in any case, here are some pictures from the party. when I get some other good ones, I'll post an update.

watching "SIGNING!" (a.k.a. signing time)

miles was intrigued by rock band

cousins - I found these pjs on uber clearance last year

goodnight nykki