Maybe boys don't have cooties!

Well I lost our camera for a few weeks there so I haven't had a chance to update with new pictures. Thankfully, I found it. If you're wondering what we've been up to, I will tell you. We've been playing with lots of boys. I think Nora is destined to have lots of friends that are boys. I even joined a Mom's Club here in Onalsaka and there is not one single girl in the club-can you believe that!?!? Good thing all the boys are so nice and fun!

Nora playing with her friend, Owen, at the Faithwalkers Conference we attended through our church after Christmas. A fellow thumb sucker! Yay, I thought I had the only one! They had a blast playing behind curtains and trying to run away from me and Owen's mom, Beth.

This is Nora's new friend, Niyanth. We met him and his mom, Lavanya, at Mom's club. Nora loves to play with Niyanth. She says "Nee-yan, pay". She is also obsessed with his bottles and always tries to drink them. See above. Go figure, she never took bottles well for us.

Nora probably sees her friend Hurshle the most right now. He is the only other child down here from our church in Eau Claire. We are now neighbors with him too. They moved into the town house 2 doors down from ours. Here they are in the kitchen, somehow both sitting in a tupperware container and a moment before, laughing hysterically. Nora always wants to know where Hurshle is and what he's doing. She always asks me, "Ursh, go?". (Where did Hurshle go?) Also, when she goes to sleep, she tells me, "Ursh, nigh-nigh." I tell her that, yes Hurshle is going to sleep too. If I ask her who any object around belongs to-the answer is always-"Ursh".

Owen and his parents are next from our church team to move down here. They are moving in a few weeks. Then, Megan and Ben Holmen and their daughter Emma will be moving here in March. Both families will be in the same neighborhood as us. It will be so fun to have more kids in town, and especially another girl. Yay, Emma-we miss you! Boys are great, but sometimes you need someone to play dolls with-the right way! We'll need to have a tea party to celebrate!

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.