Tis the season

The "collect as many Reese's peanut butter cups for Mommy as you can" season, that is. What? That isn't a real season? Well, it should be.

Okay, Halloween it is, just don't tell Mallory - she still believes in "collect as many Reese's peanut butter cups for Mommy as you can" day. Each time I asked Mallory what she wanted to be, I got a different answer, although all answered centered around a theme. "princess" "fairy" "butterfly" "princess butterfly" Here you have it.

Grandpa Don came to visit for the long weekend. He actually came to help us do some remodeling work on our new veterinary clinic building. Mallory and I interrupted his work staining and varnishing doors and trim before we deserted him and went trick-or-treating. (Don't worry, I'll share my peanut butter cup haul.)
Hope you all had a happy Halloween filled with lots of peanut butter cups!

The sickies

Isn't she just the cutest, most pathetic thing? The crud that's making the rounds has found our house. Mallory spent most of today alternating between the big rocking chair, the floor and the couch. She was still running a fever (even with Tylenol) when she went to bed tonight, so no daycare tomorrow. I hope she feels better soon!

Scary spiders

I like to think of myself as adventurous. I might not actually be adventurous, but I like to think that I could be. Anyway, I had all three cousins at my house this morning (Tera, Damien and Mallory) and decided to have them help me decorate cupcakes. I made the cupcakes last night (I'm adventurous, not crazy!) and got them frosted while the kids played (see previous remark). I think we did a darn good job - no huge messes made (Damien's face is the exception) and all the cupcakes got frosted. Go me.

New spring coats

Just in time for spring. (Happy spring, everyone!) I got ambitious this year and decided Mallory needed a couple new coats. Okay, maybe not "needed". In fact, her little corduroy coat from last fall still fits perfectly fine. But I wanted to make them. Good enough for me!

This first one ended up a little bit big. The pattern is out of a European magazine called Ottobre that I discovered thanks to my new friends at Sewingmamas. I decided that since I was going to put that much work into something, she better be able to wear it for a while, so I went with about a size and a half bigger than what she wears now. There's definitely some growing room. This is going to be her "special" coat for church and things like that. No playing in the mud in this thing!

This one fits a bit better. This pattern is from My Favorite Things and is called, aptly, The Little Hooded Jacket. The outside is a laminated cotton fabric, so it's waterproof, and the lining is a jersey knit to keep it a bit warmer. I adore this jacket! It was my first separating jacket zipper and first time using piping. I wish I had one in my size!

Now, I just need to decide what to sew next. No worries...I have plenty of ideas! :)

Little dancer girl

A week later than planned, but dance class has begun! Mallory wasn't so sure about it, though. She got dressed happily enough, but during the car ride there she kept telling me she wanted to go home, not to dance class. Fortunately, once we got there, she was okay and joined the group with no problems. It was a nice little class for two and three year olds. I'm guessing Mallory was one of the youngest there and it did show a couple of times, but overall she did great.


Here she is with her new little friend, Amelia. Amelia's mom is also a veterinarian - we work together one day a week. Don't you love their little matching tutus?
Making the circle "really, really small."

Banging on "drums" - I can't believe how well these kids listened! They actually all waited to start playing until the teacher (Miss Erin) had given everyone a drum and told them how to beat on them. They played loud and soft, fast and slow.

I think they were supposed to be touching their toes with their "bumpers" in the air. That didn't work quite as well as the drums. Or maybe they were jumping like frogs, I can't remember for sure. The frogs would explain the picture better....

And here's a nice big circle.

Of course, a half hour of dance class isn't terribly tiring for little kids. So we hung out at the school for a little while afterwards to let them burn off some steam. The little boy in red is Austin, another co-worker's son.

Happily, the school had a nice long cafeteria for the kids to run up and down. Mallory and Amelia spent most of the time holding hands...and clothes-lining poor Austin when he ran between them.

After twenty minutes of running, Mallory was ready to head out. She was pretty disappointed when I told her we were heading home and not going to dance class again. I guess that means she had fun. Unfortunately, it sounds like Miss Erin would prefer no parents in the room for the rest of the classes...no more cute pictures. Guess we'll have to wait for the recital in two months.

By jove, I think she's got it!

Going potty on the toilet, that is. I figured that in and of itself deserved a mention on this oh-so-neglected blog of mine. I was beginning to think that my precious daughter would be in diapers until kindergarten - even though people swear that never happens! Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a tad. But, if you remember...I mentioned oh, almost a year ago, that Mallory had peed in the potty a few random times both at home and at daycare. We definitely haven't been working on training this whole time. In fact, as recent as last Thursday morning (ten-ish days ago) she flat out told me that "I wear diapers, no wear panties." Try arguing with that. However, that night, she told me she wanted to wear panties. So on they went. I'll spare you the nitty gritty, but she has done really well! The first few days I had to make sure she was on the potty at least every 45 minutes. I even found some of those oh-so-fashionable Gerber plastic undie covers to try to contain the accidents. By late this last week, she's started telling me when she has to go potty, holding it a bit longer (depends on what she's had to drink), and even managed to hold it for two miles (after she said she had to go) until we got home! Yippee!!

That's pretty much the excitement around here. I did enroll her in a little dance class that was supposed to start last Thursday. It's a community education type program and they actually have a class for two and three year olds. It meets just one night a week for half an hour, but at the end there will be a recital. May 14th for any of you that may want to mark your calendars. However, since we had a nice snowstorm last week, we didn't have class. I'm a little concerned how this will affect the recital. Just kidding. I can't wait to get some cute pictures in her little leotard and tutu (yep, I made her one!)

Since I don't have much other news, I'll fill the rest of this post with some random pictures. I know that's all you come for anyway, right?

My niece, Miriam (she's in the center below) turned one the end of last month. Well, actually, January, I guess that's technically two months ago, now. We spent the weekend visiting, managed to not catch the tummy flu that made the rounds, and brought our ice cream freezer to make homemade ice cream. Joshua and Mallory were in charge of that.

Superbowl Sunday found us trying out the local ice-skating rink. Fortunately, it was pretty quiet, probably due to the big game. They had these cute little walker things for little kids to push. I still spent most of the time half bent over to help Mallory push and to make sure she didn't fall over and crack the back of her head on the ice. She had a blast - laughed everytime she fell down. We haven't gotten back yet, we really should.

My multi-tasking whiz kid.

Believe it or not, there was actually a weekend around here that was nice enough to play outside for a significant length of time. We played at Grandma Deb's house with Tera and Billie. Mallory was practicing for when she's older and in charge of the winter sidewalks.

We tried to get a group picture. Yeah, that worked well. (That's Grandpa Larry's dog Jake that joined us.)

More sledding.

Still more.

Did I ever mention that Mallory is in a big girl bed now? She transitioned pretty well. We did end up getting a baby gate (toddler gate?) for the bedroom door after she drug her quilt all the way UP THE STAIRS and stood outside our bedroom door whimpering. Gave me a fright. Up went the baby gate. Actually, since then, she hasn't tried to get out of her room. *shrug*

And, as promised way too many weeks ago, cow pictures. Isn't it nice they're all showing their good sides?

Nothing like ice cream in January

Woo-hoo, my camera is here! It's so wonderful, and I'm guessing will be even more so once I figure out how to work all the buttons. For now, I know that I press the silver one on top to take a picture. :) In case you're at all curious, I got a Canon Powershot SX110 IS. It's easy like a point and shoot, but does have some manual settings that I hope to try out someday.

So, in order to get the camera broken in (I hope I didn't just jinx things), I brought it along to Matt's mom and dad's this weekend for ice cream making. Yep, you read that right. It's about 10 degrees outside and two plus feet of snow on the ground, but they made ice cream. Must be a Minnesota thing.

Grandpa was in charge of the ice cream maker, but Tera and Mallory helped put the ice in the bin. Genuine Minnesota ice.

Then, we wait. And wait. Fortunately, Bambi II was able to distract most of the waiters. It's a good thing that it's actually a pretty decent movie, as we've seen it way too many times.

Finally, there is ice cream. It was a long wait for some of us.

Very delicious!

What, is there something on my face?

And finally, just to show off how well my new camera takes close-ups....

I'm so excited to have a camera again. I'm trying to remember to keep it (and charged batteries) in my purse so that I can catch more candid moments. (There's a post with cows coming up!)

A new year

Maybe I'll be able to keep up with the blogging this year. Or maybe not. Time will tell, I guess. No lovely pictures with this post as my camera is officially toast. Mallory was so excited to show Grandpa Larry the picture of her with Santa that she dropped the camera on the linoleum floor. Twice. Cameras don't like that much. Apparently I got my updated wish list to Santa a bit too late, so a new camera did not appear under our tree. That's okay, I've taken matters into my own hands. Thanks to amazon.com and the power of the internet, a new picture taking device should arrive at my doorstep in about a week.

That was just my quick update. I hate to leave all my loyal followers (follower?) hanging like I did. I hope to get a nice fat pictured post up real soon. See ya then!

Here you go, Tessa

First of all, I need to admit, I'm a terrible blogger. There. It's out. Not like you didn't know this anyway, right? Anyway, my sister emailed me to oh-so-politely ask me to get my butt in gear and update with some pics. I've been pretty bad at getting pictures, and it's only going to get worse. Mallory was so excited to show her grandpa and daddy the last picture we took, that she dropped the camera and broke the telephoto lens. *sigh* Guess what's on my Christmas list?

Here's the picture that caused all the excitement. Funny, she was way more excited about the idea of Santa (and showing off the picture afterwards) than she was here!

Happy (late) Halloween

Rather than dwell on election results - and we've all had enough of that, haven't we - I thought I'd play a little catch up again. Much less likely to provoke angry debates and much, much cuter!

Our "celebration" started the Sunday before Halloween with a pumpkin carving party at our friend Katie's house. (Yes, this is the same Katie that took Mallory's pictures in the park.) It was actually supposed to be a "work" party for the employees at the pharmacy I used to work at, but since they apparently still love me, we were invited. Well, it actually helps that my mother-in-law still works there....

Anyway, Mallory wasn't terribly gung-ho on digging out pumpkin guts, but she did help a little. She also told me that our pumpkin had to be happy, not crabby.

Halloween night itself was lots of fun. Both Grandma and Billie had to work late, so Mallory and I picked Tera up from daycare and the three of us went in search of tricks and treats. The little (and I mean that "little") mall in town held a trick-or-treat event for the kids in the late afternoon, so we hit that first. Mallory in full kangaroo regalia (black nose courtesy of Jojo) and Tera as a sheep.

We then headed out to visit Paula at work and grab a bite of real food for supper. Well, if pizza counts as "real" supper. Can you guess what Paula was dressed up as?

As luck would have it, Jojo was working too, so Mallory needed another picture.

After our "real" supper, we headed out and made a round around the new section of town. It was absolutely gorgeous outside and perfect weather for trick-or-treating. By the time we made our loop, it was getting dark (thank you daylight savings time!), so we headed to Grandma's house to show off the costumes and drop off Tera.

We also made a quick trip to great-grandma's house. Angie and Damien, Billie and Tera, and Mallory and I converged on her home. Unfortunately, she had already run out of treats, so we were given apples instead. Or, maybe that was a good thing -they were really yummy!

Finally, we made it home and Mallory crashed. I can't say I blame her, it was almost two hours past her bedtime and even I was tuckered out.

Oh, and Paula was construction Barbie.

Another Saturday

I actually still have a few pictures from last Saturday to share. My friend Katie hosts a hayride at her parents' farm each fall and this was the first year that it worked for us to join in the fun. Just a little tease, though - I'll show you those pictures another day. I figured I'd try to stay on track and actually post todays pictures...today. Shocker, huh?


I've been pretty good about getting Mallory's pictures taken for each of the big "milestone" months. You know at 3, 6, 9, 12, 18....well the two year pictures didn't turn out so well. They never happened at all. We got to the portrait studio (okay, Wal-mart) and she would have absolutely nothing to do with sitting on their little table thing OR looking at the camera. We ended up leaving with no pictures even taken! Enter other friend Katie. She took Mallory's first two sets of pictures at her home for us, which had turned out quite nice. Her family was going camping at a nearby state park this weekend and she invited us to join them this morning and offered to try to get some pictures of Mallory that I could call her two year shots.


Mallory still wasn't terribly cooperative, but since Katie's 3 year old son, Gus, was there to play with, it went a little better. I don't have her shots to share yet (she has a much nicer camera than I), but I thought you might enjoy my quick point and shoot pictures anyway.






We were at Camden State Park for these pictures - I've actually never been there, even though it's less than 15 miles from our house. It's really pretty with a neat little river/stream that runs through the park. Here's my try at scenery.

After we were done with pictures, Mallory and Gus had some Froot Loops for breakfast/lunch (it was about 11am - Gus hadn't eaten breakfast yet, Mallory had eaten about three times already). Mallory was pretty tuckered out, and this is what I saw in the backseat.

After a nice (long) nap, we headed out to take lunch to Daddy and Grandpa in the field. They were just fininshing combining a field of soybeans and were able to take a break for a late meal. Mallory had eaten her lunch on the road, so was able to keep Daddy's seat warm.

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful. We did make yet another batch of cookies - cereal crunch this time, mmmmm. After Mallory was in bed, I worked on something that I was hoping would be Tera's birthday present for tomorrow. However, the instructions made it look much easier than it was, so I had to scrap that idea. I did have a bit of a back-up, but we'll be making a gift-buying stop tomorrow after church. Big birthday party at Grandma and Grandpa's house tomorrow - Tera will be four - so hopefully Mallory will be nice and rested.

How we spent our Saturday

I've created a monster. A cookie monster. Mallory and I have made more cookies in the last couple weeks than I have for quite some time before this. It started out as a way to keep Matt quiet - apparently I don't keep enough cookies in the house - but has now transformed into a wonderful distraction.

We even used sprinkles! Messy, but probably not nearly as messy as frosting would have been!

Finally, some more pictures

It's about time, isn't it?

Mallory and (cousin) Tera riding the ladybug at the county fair. There were exactly two rides appropriate for these guys...the other was the big slide.

Tessa, Joshua and Mallory lazing on the couch waiting for the birthday festivities to begin.
Can you believe she's two? Please don't mind the stained t-shirt - there were popsicles involved. Makes me happy that I didn't make her a special birthday outfit!
We had a nice little picnic to celebrate. Sure beats last year when it rained and we were all stuck inside!

Getting a little Miriam fix.

I think I shared this picture before...but it's so cute you get to see it again!

The nice sunny weather we had today reminded me of the weekend we spent at the lake (that I never showed pictures of). Here's Mallory and I going for a boat ride.
My dad bought this awesome two seater monstrosity to pull behind his boat. It's nearly impossible to tip (although he has tried)...and so far no one has fallen out. The only casualty so far has been my prescription sunglasses which currently reside at the bottom of the lake. Anyway, Mallory and Joshua wanted a turn, too.

Okey-dokey, that about catches me up with the pictures that I have from the summer. I really need to get my camera out some more....