Funny Hunny

Well, winter is surely upon us here in Wisconsin. We have been experiencing sub-zero temperatures and big snowfalls. Here's Nora on her "new" used sled we inherited from friend's. Nice ride. When it's too cold outside, I've been pulling her around the house, along with her moose from her Montana grandparents and her dolly.

Here's my girly girl. I wonder if it's just a phase or if it will be part of who she is. She can not stand to be near clothes without draping them around her or putting them on. She digs through our dirty or clean laundry bins and will walk around with my pajamas around her like a scarf. In this picture, I was going through my winter hat and mitten bin and she put this hat on all by herself. I thought she looked like a Russian or Buckingham Palace guard, so I had to snap a quick pic. When I dry my hair, she runs up to me so that I can dry her hair too.

Here's a picture from last Wednesday's blizzard. I guess La Crosse is considered part of the "Blizzard Belt". Snowstorms sweep across Iowa and hit us before they taper off. We got almost 18 inches in this one storm! Yay, I love snow.

Here's Nora and her friend, Hurshle playing with her new Little People Nativity Set from my family in Oregon (Thanks, what a great gift!). You can see they both have Little People in their mouths. I think it's funny because Nora and Hurshle were combining from our other Little People sets, so there were pandas, giraffe's and also a farmer present at this nativity.

Nora has been doing a lot of new things lately. For one, she is WAY more vocal. In fact, she hardly signs anymore-just babbles. Too bad we can only understand about 20% of what she says. She is also trying to figure out who or what drinks. She will put food up to her sippy cup at meals and make eating sounds. She also tried to give Clifford a drink from her sippy in a book we were reading. It was so funny. I think this stemmed from an animal book we have where Zebras are drinking water from a pond. She was very interested in that page. I think it just clicked with her that things besides her eat and drink and now she needs to figure all that out.

She is also very interested in what things around the house are yucky. I think she's developing a mental list. So far-the toilet, toilet brush, mommy's coffee, tub drain, diapers, and bones. She will point to them around the house or in books and make a yuck sound, then laugh, smile, or look to me to make sure it really is yucky (otherwise she'd love to touch all those).

Finally, she's answering "yeah" and nodding to us sometimes. This is so fun! We ask her a question and then she thinks about it and says, "Yeah". So helpful-even though sometimes I don't think she really understands what she's answering yes to.

A Lovely Little Visit

Last weekend, my parents were able to visit from Montana. They had a blast playing with Nora and catching up. The joined us at Justin's parents for Thanksgiving.
The day after Thanksgiving, we threw a wine, chocolate, and cheese tasting birthday party for Jeff. It was so fun to taste each wine and cheese paired together. There was a lot of laughing as we tried to describe each wine's aromas and tastes.
Mom playing with Nora after breakfast.

When my step-dad Glen got lost on Justin's parents land during a walk, we had to send out the rescue team. Since it was deer hunting season, everyone needed to wear blaze orange. I never thought I'd see the day where my mom was in blaze orange-here's a funny pic Justin snapped at the occasion.

A Visit to Grandpa and Grandma Wise's House

Last week, Justin had another week of training in Arizona. Nora and I took the opportunity to visit Justin's parents. As a huge animal lover, Nora loved the visit. Justin's parents have a new puppy, Doc. Nora was hestitant to like him at first, since he would try to nip at her and take her toys-you know normal curious puppy behavior. Soon she warmed up to him. She loved helping Grandpa spoon water into Doc's mouth, below.

In think Nora still holds their cat, Maddy, as her favorite pet in the house though. Maddy is the best cat in the world-spoken by an almost cat hater. Really, she takes all of Nora's abuse and chasing. Also, she is the most snuggly cat ever. If you just sit on a couch with a book and a blanket, she senses coziness and wants to be a part of it, on your lap. It's just wonderful.

There was also a mouse in the house! Here's Nora in her Halloween costume. No trick or treating this year, but she had fun in her costume and looking at Grandpa and Grandma's pumpkin.

The highlight of Nora's week, and every visit to Justin's parents, are her rides on Grandpa's "tractor" which is really the riding lawn mower. She "asks" to go on it all the time when she sees Grandpa and she loves to "guide" the steering wheel and push the buttons.

One day, we went outside to get some raking done. Nora even had her own rake, but the helping didn't last long. Soon she was playing in the leaf piles and exploring the huge yard. It was so nice to let Nora get over 50 ft. from me and not worry about someone snatching her or her going into the street. I truly hope it is in God's plan for us to live in the country someday.

Happy Fall Days

On warmer days this fall, I've been trying to take Nora on walks to explore our neighborhood.

We have a little park about 4 blocks from our house, we both like to play at. Nora loves the slide!

And the swing! See the smile? I'm so glad since Nora used to cry every time we put her in the swing.

It's been great to get the exercise. Speaking of, I just snuck in a tough workout DVD while Nora was taking her nap. Lots of sweating happening. Have you done a workout where you've sweated this week? If not, you should try it. It's hard, but you'll feel great afterwards!

Tour De Rental-Part 2

Well, I think it was a bit of wishful thinking on my part to show you our upstairs the day after I posted our downstairs. I actually have about 4 posts written in my mind, it’s just that some days this mythical “free time” eludes me. So here I am madly hunting and pecking on my keyboard before Nora wakes up…

Okay let me show you the upstairs.

This is Nora's room. Her big closet, toy/bookshelf, and dresser. The flowers on her bookshelf are a dried compilation of all the flowers we received after she was born.

Nora's changing table and rocking chair-where we read books before naps and bedtime. Her window also lets in a lot of light-it's delightful. You can see a view of the beautiful leaves changing on the bluffs from that window which is a nice treat every time I close her curtains.

And Nora's crib. My, her walls are bare. Maybe someday we'll get to hang up our pictures. Oh well!

So between Nora's room and ours is the quaint, little bathroom. Really it's the perfect size. It has everything it needs and who hangs out in the bathroom anyway? Moving on...

Now we're in our bedroom. This is a view from our bed of our "new"dressers. We bought them off of Craigslist this summer and painted them black/added new pulls. This turned out better than our table since we've mostly finished them, save a few touch ups. For shame, what mother would have taken pictures of her house when her daughter didn't have any pants on-how embarassing!

And our bed, which Justin bought me this year as a 3 year anniversary present. Very lovely!

Tour De Rental

As promised, here is part one of the tour of our new place. We feel so blessed that God placed us here, right next door to our good friends Josh and Colleen Toltzman and with very affordable rent for the area.

So come on in...I'll show you around!

If you walked in our front door, this is what you'd see. Our living room-nice and bright. I love it!

Then you walk through the living room and see Nora on the kitchen floor in a bucket. Anyway, I included this pic, because did you notice the floor? Maybe it's not the greatest but it's like the finest tile to me, compared to my ugly 70's orange linoleum at our last place.

So, back to my kitchen. This kitchen is a bit smaller than our last place-less cupboard and counter space and still no dishwasher but I love it a zillion times more. I think this is because it is just so bright. I feel so cheery whenever I'm in it. Here is Nora tucked in her little spot between my coffee "station" and my food prep area. We have lots of conversations while I cut green peppers and such.

Here's the view of our back door and table. We bought that table for $5 and accumulated free or cheap chairs to surround it in hopes of refinishing all of them and painting them white before we moved-fools! We only got to painting the tables legs which now need to be repainted due to scuffs from the move. Anyway-that is now slated as a Spring project.

And here it my small, but adequate counter and cupboard space and appliances. Thank goodness I have a pantry!

That is the first floor. I will try to get the 2nd floor up tomorrow. We are also working on a signing video for Nora, but our little actress is caving under the pressure of performing on camera so it may need to be edited over a few takes. Either way, I'll post it here or on Youtube with a link on here.

Happy Fall

Well, I just don't know where September went! Sorry for the long time without updates. I still have to "show" you all our place. I've been waiting to get a few more pictures hung up but who knows when that will happen so maybe I'll have to do that soon.

Nora is now 13 1/2 months and definitely a toddler. In fact, I had to cherish these top two pictures of her standing still because that doesn't happen much anymore!

This is what she's usually like-exploring every little thing! BUT she is getting so fun and I've loved this past 1 1/2 months more than all of last year. I have so much to update you all who haven't seen her in a while. She has changed so much since she's turned one and literally learns new things each day. For example...

She is always imitating us now-facial expressions, blinking, coughing, throat clearing, blowing her nose with a kleenex (at least bringing it to her nose and making a sound), shakes her head no, dances to music, and pretending to sweep when I set the broom down.

She's starting to understand more of what we say too. When I say: "It's time for a bath"-she books it upstairs, "It's time to eat"-she goes to her high chair, and "Where's you water?"-she goes to the fridge and tries to open it up. I've also started asking her where animals are in books-she will point to bears and cats about 50% of the time.

Physically-she's walking backwards, spinning in circles, walking quickly, sticking her tongue out, giving kisses and hugs on occasion, covering her eyes and then uncovering them, and trying to open up anything with a lid. She also just got 3 of her molars, bringing the total up to 11 teeth!

Verbally-Her pediatrician said she's right on track with language development-yay. In fact, I don't think she ever stopped blabbing the whole time we were at her doctor's appt. This was a slight concern since we have been teaching her sign language for some time now and delayed lang. dev. is one of the criticisms. She says "Hi" (and waves), "Bye or Bye,Bye", "Mama", "Aba" (means Grandpa) and all other kinds of alien sounding gibberish. She also says "Ba" which can mean Ball, Book, Bath, Banana or Bear depending on what we're near-good thing she's starting to point too! As far as signing, can sign a bunch of words which is handy to decipher what she's trying to tell us. She signs: Water, Milk, Eat, More, Dog, Cat, Bird, Fish, Want, Baby, Bear, Grandpa, Daddy, Bath, Book, Ball and Light. I'll have to shoot a video of this to show you all before she completely ditches signs for talking.

Whirlwind

This last week has been bustling. I have been longing to write but haven't had time...

Last week my Grandpa Brown died. His funeral was on Friday. It was sad to know that last week when we saw him was the last time I'd see him, hear his laugh and memorable voice, and witness his spitfire nature. I find much gladness that he is in heaven and out of suffering now.

My grandma and grandpa had been married 59 years.


Even sweeter, we got to share our wedding anniversary date with them-July 22nd 1950 and 2006.

My favorite memories with my grandpa were playing croquet in our backyard together and him teasing me. He was a jokester. I'm so glad he got to meet Nora.

The evening we arrived home from the funeral, several friends helped us load up a trailer. We spent our last night in our duplex and then drove down to unload. Several friends came along to help with this too.


On Sunday, my inlaws came to see our new place and help unpack. My father-in-law hung up most of my curtain rods and pictures. I feel so grateful! It looks a lot more homey with pictures. Give me another week or so and I'll give you a virtual tour so those of you long distance folks can see where we live now.


Adventures of moving. I know how to get around on 3 streets. I got a little cocky today thinking I knew a back way to the grocery store. I was severely humbled when I found myself lost. I finally got there and thought I'd try to find a shortcut to Target. Lost again. So, I'm sticking to the streets I know unless I have my map!


Today, I also got my library card-yay. I'm checking our Little Dorrit by Charles Dickens for my fall read. It's over 800 pages so it might take me all fall. The children's section of the library has a live turtle which Nora liked and I loved since turtles are my favorite animal.

Praise God!

Update. Justin has been studying for 2 months to pass his Series 7 License Exam. He needs this license from the government to be able to do his job for Edward Jones. Anyway, he took the test today-which he only got one shot to take-and PASSED!!! Woohoo. Thank you to everyone who was praying. This is a very happy day for us, since failing would have meant him loosing his job immediately. We're so glad the pressure of this monster test is off his shoulders.

What's next?

The training for Edward Jones is a long process-like 4 1/2 months. Next, Justin needs to study for the Series 66 License Exam-another federal regulation. This is next Thursday. It is less material to study and not as high stakes, but still important. After that we will enjoy Labor Day weekend getting settled in La Crosse and then Justin is off to Tempe, Arizona for 1 week of training there. When he gets back mid-September, he has some intense training with a Field Trainer for the next 2ish months. Finally, in mid-November he goes back to Tempe, AR for a week where he will "graduate" from the training phase. Then he can come home and actually start doing his job. Whew, I'm glad this will start to level out as the busy Christmas season starts. Oh wait, that already started-I saw Christmas decorations out at Walmart yesterday...

Nora's 1st Birthday

Our baby is 1 and is technically a toddler now. This was a bittersweet day for us. It's sad to think Nora will never be a baby again even though we are glad the sleepless nights and much crying are over. Sniff. Anyway, here is a recap from her first birthday.



We had a low key BBQ and party in our backyard. Apparently on your birthday your parents let you crawl on your highchair.

Nora eating her first bite of cake. I was kind of disappointed that she was such a clean cake eater.


After cake, Nora and her party guests Ella and Hurshle went for a swim in the kiddie pool. Emma watched longingly from the side. They loved playing with the plastic silverware from dinner.

Then it was time for presents. This was a fun but crazy time since all the baby guests "helped" Nora open her presents. It was hard to keep track of which card and tissue paper went with which present. Nora has been playing with all her new toys and wearing her new pajamas and clothes. Thanks everyone!

In other news, we are starting to move down to La Crosse. We took one load down last weekend, will take another Sunday, and do our big move next Saturday. We have our basement basically packed. It's so weird to see empty shelves. Also, I've finished my projects. For those of you who don't know, we bought cheap dressers from Craigslist and painted them black and a cheap table from a Thrift sale and painted the legs white. They ended up being more work than I thought but I like how they turned out!

Pool Days

Yay for warm weather. It's been a cool summer here, so we haven't gotten to go to the pool as much as we'd like. Thankfully, this week is hot, hot, hot. Here's some of us moms with babies cooling off in the shallow end-the new in place to be this summer. Man, do I love the pool! Water, sun, friends-what a blast!

Getting a little towel time in. Basically, the babies just crawl around and eat each others snacks, try to drink from each other's sippy cups, take each other's toys and crawl/walk to random stranger's towels as they tan. It's comical thinking about it really.

Garden

I can't believe I haven't written about our dear little garden yet. Since we have no land/yard of our own, when a couple from our church offered to do a joint vegetable garden on their land we were very excited. Here's our garden in full bloom.

Nora in the entrance, by the wildflowers.

This is a common scene. I pick with Nora right near me and she eats handfuls of dirt. I try to stop her in time, but sometimes I look up and mud is streaming down her chin. Gross.

Here's one of our fellow joint gardeners, Chrissy, holding Nora. Chrissy and I try to get out to the garden once a week. She is married to Lance, Justin's best man at our wedding. We're also sharing the garden with our hosts, Jay and Deb Holmen and their son and daughter in law-Dan and Melissa. It's so fun when all 4 of us couples are in the garden together.

One fun thing about our garden is the bean teepees. If you look at the first picture, you'll see them on the left. Here's Nora inside of one holding some fresh green beans. Besides beans, we've also been enjoying picking carrots, spinach, lettuce, zucchini, green peppers, fresh herbs and cucumbers (turned into pickles). I am especially waiting for our sweet corn and squash to ripen, oh and the tomatoes. It's so fun and delicious to have a garden!

Catching Up

We've had a fun and busy last couple weeks. So I'm going to write a few posts to catch up.

Last week, we had a little family reunion/vacation with Justin's mom's side of the family. There were uncles, aunts, first and second cousins, great-grandparents, grandparents, etc. We stayed in the lake house next to Justin's grandpa's house with 2 of Justin's cousins and their respective sons. Here's everybody together after celebrating August birthdays in the group!

Here is Nora with Lydia, Justin's cousin. Nora and Lydia loved each other! Grandma Sue and the aunts watch on. You may remember Lydia from our wedding. She danced with just about everyone in a tuxedo!

Nora got some quality time in with Uncle Jon this weekend. He rode her around in this dump truck which she loved. You look like a natural Jon...I don't know about this no kids thing.

Meet Ethan. This would be Nora's second cousin and they are 2 weeks apart. It was so fun to have a baby Nora's age there to play with all week. Here they are playing in their pj's.