a Missouri Christmas eve stroll

the pond

the walking stick

Mark's Aunt Gayle and cousin Brittany

the runway!!! wish we could have landed on it

Nanna and Papa --Mark's mom and dad ;)

yay for baking with nanna!!!

i'm always telling my kids "i'm not an octopus"--that i don't have enough arms to do all they want me to simultaneously, but nanna's amazing--deflecting over-eager dumps of salt and letting two kids be right up next to the bowl and participating. hoorah!

on the train

happy, touristy, zooming along
no, she's not doing the peace sign, she just thinks you should always hold your hand up for "cheese"
at the end i thought we were just heading mellowly back to the station, but instead they took us through this dark tunnel full of ten or more cowboys having a shootout. simon went all pale and his lips turned blue with fright--not his idea of a pleasant ending.

a green day with Nanna

we took nanna to our favorite parks--she endulged us with pictures of us smooching and ben and jerry's ice cream ;)

"Why I like Christmas."

Simon: "Do you know why I like Christmas so much?"

Possible answers? Many.

His:

"Because you get toys without even having to pay for them!"

He said it so full of hope and unbridled joy, and free of the worries of adulthood or even the weight of childhood (you know, having to jump through all sorts of parental hoops to get an occasional $2 toy)---it was great.

I was thinking about it later and this scripture came into my head where Jesus says: Come, my brethren, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters; and he that hath no money, come buy and eat; yea, come buy wine and milk without money and without price. (2 Nephi 9:50)

Merry Christmas!!! Merry Christmas!!! Merry Christmas!!!

Here comes Santa Claus!!!

At the church Christmas party they had all the kids come and sit together while the missionaries read "Twas the night before Christmas." Then at certain opportune times during the story sounds started coming from behind the curtain on the stage (reindeer landing, bells ringing, other various thumping); then, the kids spotted Santa backing out from behind the curtain). That's what you see above. ;) You can't see it, but I was grinning like a goofball behind them; it was the perfect Santa presentation.

Simon sharing the exciting news!!!

Side note: Alli was so excited to be over there with the kids she was hugging Simon with one arm and any other kid she could reach with her other arm.

Simon discussing R2D2 with Santa.

(Alli lost her nerve during the non-moving 20 minutes in line.)

By the way, our Santa sings opera--can yours?

It's time to be two!

For two days she'd been saying "I wahn buh-day cake. Blue cake." So it was mostly joy and rapture when the time came.

Mark had too much cake. . .

Allianna blew out the candles 3-4 times. Skills . . .

She's a good mother of twins. With help from a doting "uncle" (who thinks he's going to marry his sister someday, and name all their children Simon or Alli--but that's another story).



Fun in the new ladybug tent. I got in on the fun by setting the thing up. ;)

Saturday is a special day . . .

Mark smelled something stinky in our shed. Discovered one squirrel, on the floor between two shelves--rigor mortis. He suited up with a face mask and gloves and a double trash bag and took care of it. So brave, and how gross! He sprayed the shed with kitchen cleaner (our only anti-bacterial) and air freshener. Then 25 minutes later he went back out to put things in the shed and could still smell it. Enter fluffy tail on a high shelf, also rigor mortis. Theories:

1. male territory dispute gone really bad,


2. rodents taste-testing the electric wiring,


3. and Mark's real fear, BIG poisonous spider somewhere in the shed

Conclusion: not storing ANYTHING in the shed

Conclusion 2: Emily is not attempting any projects alone in the shed, workbenches and outlets regardless . . .

Meanwhile, Emily made sugar cookies inside. the shed. Just kidding. in the house. We should have taken pictures of both (instead I had to find some on google--I still have a good action shot in my head of Mark bringing down the second squirrel).

Sure was a special day.

A night out for snow.

I heard about a holiday festival this week nearby in B*. The proclaimed 30,000 lbs of snow was divided into two piles, "6 and older" and "5 and under." Here are the kids waiting in line for about half an hour . . .

Kids exploring the white stuff and parents using the digital stuff. Each group got about 5 minutes before they had to rotate out.
Thankfully, she liked it!
Here's Simon chopping away at his contraband chunk of show.

They loved their night out after dark, looking at the lights as we drove, seeing snow, sipping hot chocolate, and getting free balloons.

I skipped going to see Santa. It had another big line, and I was on my own with the double stroller and the belly (Mark was bummed to be at work preparing a big presentation). Glad to hear that Santa will be at our ward party though--that's the way I always saw him as a kid.

Good night, and good luck, and welcome back to my blog. Sorry about the hiatus, and enjoy checking out all the other stuff I've posted below. It's good to get it off my chest.

It's the holiday season, boo da boop de boo . . .

A nostalgic, blurry, dark action shot. ;) So fun to see each different ornament. When I met Mark during the holidays in '98 I didn't think there could be a person who would love Christmas more--but Simon, wow, he loves loves loves loves it! He brings so much cheer--I imagine this is a pretty widespread talent, but I love it.

Merry Christmas!!!!!
Raking is a new relished part of our domestic bliss.


Cute, yes.

It's not cold anymore, by the way. :)

It was fun to dabble in it for a week; we like the current t-shirt weather in our yard, too.

Ah, yes, Thanksgiving.

Mark and I roasted our first bird and really liked it. Carving was his favorite part of the day, though I think he was pretty spectacular on the spice rub for the top of the turkey, too.
Our fun company. Alli, me, (bean), Simon, Jean, Ji Yeon, and Mark. Ji Yeon is our friend from one of Mark's labs (I study English with her--she's from South Korea). Jean is our friend from church and he hails from the Congo. I thought I was pretty witty to realize that their names are almost the same when I slaughteringly pronounce them, even though they couldn't be two more different people. Both wonderfully nice. A fabulous day, of course.

A pretty happenin' house

We haven't got a dryer yet, so this is fun. I like nagging the kids not to touch the clothes when they wake up in the morning. We've been trekking to the laundromat as of late, and when I'm there I actually fold the clothes right when they come out of the dryer because there are all these huge tables to do it on. This is a good thing. Do I put them away right when I get home? . . . Well, hmm, I've already worked pretty hard. Oooo, and I discovered a Value Village near the laundromat (for all you northwesterners out there a.k.a Savers) ;) I was beginning to think I'd never find good thrift stores here.
These two geckos live on our front porch. You can see through their skin and they are neat.
We're flattered to have them as neighbors.


Alli's big dose of artistic genes are really exhibiting themselves lately. She doesn't just merely demand that all of her (prolific) works are immediately displayed on the fridge; she steps flamboyantly forward and back from the easel-fridge, selecting one color at a time from her little table behind her, and muttering out loud. She turns her head at all different angles to examine her work, then gets close to squint at it, then flails an arm into the sky with a satisfied air.

All's well--or I'm unaware--in pregnantville

Not a lot on my mind lately to blog about. Not that that's intentional or that my life is stress-free or there aren't in reality lists of things that I should be remembering and getting to--it's just this pregnant mind. It keeps going vacant. I'm forgetting basic simple conversation tools; here are two examples:

• I asked a relatively new friend at church whether she sings. Innocent enough, if I hadn't been practicing a song with her and 5 other gals in recent weeks, AND sharing music with her each time.
• Another new friend at church who's son has become Simon's pal asked for my phone number a few days ago so the boys could play. Fun! Then I realize this morning that I didn't even think then to ask for hers, nope, not until I wanted to call them today.

Okay, now a totally different topic. I see a lot of images I love on other people's blogs. I always just go to Google Images and hunt around (e.g. "pregnant head", "pregnant empty mind", and finally "daydreaming" for this post). I'm not exactly finding the quality or depth of choices that I'd like (though seeing this new-to-me Winslow Homer piece was nice).

So, what's your favorite image site??? Please, do tell!

Oh, and also I took my kids to Hermann Park for 3.5 hours today to wear them out and make up for spending a lot of time lately ignoring them inside while I try to manage all the insurance, bills, and mumbojumbo--with this pregnant mind, no less, it's quite a task. Anyway, I think my other intent was to let them just play themselves out so Mark and I could get them to bed easy tonight. The most frugal date I've thought of yet--since we can't quite squeeze a babysitter or going anywhere that costs money out of our pocketbook just now. It's called "Worn-out, happy, asleep EARLY kids" theme-date. But they're actually asleep right now in the car in the garage. Now isn't that a nice luxury???!!! Even though I'll have to change the date plan, it's nice to know that I didn't have to move them, they're close by (just in the other room, really!). A few weeks ago I would have had to move them, they'd wake up, be grumpy, and I'd wish I had had a safe place to leave the car where they wouldn't be kidnapped or look abandoned.

Okay, enough ramblings. Don't forget the image question! ;)

The new house--a rented bit of bliss!

Alli dug out Simon's old hat from a box and looks pretty outdoorsy sporting it.

Our friends that moved out left their swingset for us!

You can also see the neighbor's rabbit hutches on the other side of the fence. The kids are really entertained by them--Alli thinks they're hysterical when they just move around their cage.

This is the rest of the backyard and the shed (which is actually hooked up with electricity and a workbench, if I decide to try my hand at something). ;) There's also a square of more backyard to the back left of this picture; it has a little fig tree and it was interesting to see the shape of fig leaves in real life.

Just a happy moment--though there have been some playground spats too.

The covered patio spot

No shots of the inside yet--too many cardboard boxes still. But let's just say that rooms are seeming a lot bigger and things newer than we thought--we keep waiting for our parents to come and reveal that this is actually their house, we're too much of kids to have this much house at our disposal. Mark keeps saying that our bedroom feels like a hotel. I love having the family room; right now I'm working at the computer and I can see the kids out the screen door happily puttering around in the yard. That means I'm not working on this in my bedroom with kids climbing all over me or our bed or running away outside and having me holler after them. Hooray!

We found out about this house to rent from friends at church. A family that had just finished their PhD was moving out of it and invited us over and sold us on it. It's about 4 blocks from our church, so 20 minutes from work for Mark (he's planning on getting a bike and riding along the bayou most of the 5-6miles). The neighborhood is nice (and pleasant smelling . . .), zoned for a great school for Simon (either next year or the year after). More later . . .