MSG Fun

All trimmed out

2012-02-14T15:30:00.001-06:00

The trim got put in this weekend! It had a few issues along the way - height compared to the toilet supply and the cabinet edges, but Brian got 'er done.

Trim still needs some nail hole fill and paint - touch up on the baseboards and the works on the door trim. I think, now that the trim is in, we could place the toilet whenever we get around to it.

We held up the mirrors and wondered if they are big enough. Coming from the whole wall mirror concept in all previous bathrooms, 2 clean cut rectangles (1 over each of the sinks) seems kinda small. We also decided that with the cabinet in place, we could hold up the light fixtures in place and see where they might go - that means a call to the electrician to finish the job! When we held those up, we discovered that we got what we paid for... They were very cheap fixtures and they were bent such that the glass looked all crooked. We're going to try to get back over to big Orange this afternoon to trade them out for a non-crooked lights.

I'm fighting the mid-winter yuck right now - my throat hurts so bad I cry whenever I swallow. The worst part is trying to sleep at night. Happy Valentine's day to me... Speaking of which, Noah had a grand old time making little cards for his Valentines. I should have gotten a picture, but we were too caught up in the moment. There is a party with his friends at daycare. I have to get better by the weekend! We're going to Frostbike to talk about starting high school bike teams in MN. It's going to be awesome and I'll need my voice! What do you take for a sore throat? I gargled salt water a few times last night to try to ease the pain for sleeping (along with ibuprofen to reduce swelling). I think I got 4 hours total... I drink lots of tea also, hot liquids seem to be helpful.

Stripping!

2012-02-12T17:17:00.001-06:00

I tried my hand at paint stripper. We're trying to take the 37 coats of paint off the bathroom door prior to adding a nice clean coat of Swiss Coffee (our trim white). It's not going too well...

What a mess

After 2 passes with the paint stripper

I'm not even close to the original wood. Part of me wonders how much better the stuff would work in the 65-85 degrees recommended range, rather than the 35 degrees in our garage that I was working in, part of me wonders if really old paint is just that resistant to removal?! The sticky, goopy Behr paint came off resonably quickly, but it was taking a LOT of the paint stripper to get very far. Brian says if it doesn't work, we'll just buy a new door, but I'm all about making it work! Right now, it looks like the kind of thing you might find on display in an antique or craft shop with some berry wreath hanging over it! Maybe we should embrace the antique look?!

On a different note, we've shown our house to a couple of realtors and an interested party. Everyone agrees that our living room doesn't feel very large. Could it be that we have "suburban gigantic" furniture in there, since it was purchase to fit in our previous house (and never made it to the top of the to-do list). So we're working on a solution to try to open the place up. We've pulled 2 of the 3 tables and have our throw blanket in there pretending to be a rug right now. It definitely feels more open. Seems like this week we're going shopping for an area rug and a tiny accent table. Haven't decided yet how much of the old stuff is going on Craigslist, but most likely the end tables, possibly the whole room. Know anyone who might be interested?

Here's the rug of interest so far... Target rug

Fitting together

2012-02-05T13:00:00.001-06:00

Two special orders arrived this week! The first was the cabinet. We were able to pick it up - it fit just perfectly in the back of the car. Yeah outback. Fit #1 was a success.

Fit #2 was to get the holes in the right places for the plumbing to go into the cabinet. Cutting holes into our fancy new cabinet was a bit nerve-wracking! Measure twice, cut once!

Fit #3 was to actually get the 60 inch cabinet into the room with a 60.5 inch clearance! And it had toilet plumbing to maneuver around. Success! We got it in without scraping off any wall surface or dinging up the cabinet. It's in and fits and looks good!

There's a sample of the counter we're settling on up on the corner. It's not absolute black, which we were originally looking at. It has a bit more variation and interest (which would hopefully hide some water spots better). The cabinet has to come back out in order to trim the back/side walls, ugh. We're making progress...

The other special order that came in was the shower glass!

Woot!

The tile guys came back and finished a couple last details that they had to finish including putting up the shower shelves. Everything is starting to look great! Brian is going to work on trimming the room next and after the trim (once the cabinet is finally placed), we can install the toilet.

As far as the crazy number of crazies going on at our house... We've settled on the mantra of "just say NO", at least for a few weeks and for the "deals" that we've been considering recently. Now that our house is cleaned and de-cluttered to be "show-ready" we're liking it even more.

Sand or Snow

2012-01-31T17:05:00.001-06:00

Busy scooping and dumping, we have to have all the toys out.

Sand toys make great snow toys too!

Irons in the Fire

2012-01-31T17:00:00.001-06:00

Whoa! We've got too many irons in the fire. We're keeping very busy with:

Family - raising Noah, being married, etc.
Jobs - we both are experiencing unusually busy periods at work right now
Home Improvement - I'm trying to keep you all updated on the bathroom project as it crawls along
Business Dealings - more on that later
Moving? - Buying, Selling, Cleaning, Showing, Negotiating, Financing, Marketing - more on that later too
Bike Team - there are a few meetings and promotionals that we are involved in during the off season

I can hardly keep up with it all!

Business Dealings and Moving-
We were working hard a few weeks ago to get a particular pizza deal to happen. We got word that it was not going to happen and we closed that deal, cancelled the contract. While we were "under contract" with that business, another one popped up that was interesting to Brian, but we were unavailable to pursue it. Shortly before the pizza contract went south, we discovered that we were simultaneously drooling over a house on an acreage very close to the bike trails and a good ride to work. We decided to go see it when we heard the pizza deal wasn't going to happen. Fell in love. It's not a perfect house (because we haven't "made it our own" yet), but the land and location are fantastic. We heard that they had an offer, but it wasn't reviewed or negotiated yet, it was simply on the table. Yikes! We don't like to make decisions fast, but this couldn't be helped. We would both mourn the "SE Farm" if we let that one get away. So, we spent 4 days fighting to get the sellers to make a contract with us. We are, of course, in the middle of a major bathroom remodel, on top of this all. We have a contract now and it looks like we'll be singing "Welcome to the Farm" in mid-April. On Sunday we did a "home inspection", made it a family affair, so it was fun and we had helpful feedback from a few other perspectives. We need to make sure that we don't buy another money pit. We still need to summarize our findings and decide if the known fixes are worth the expense and challenge of starting over and the price we settled on paying. On Monday, we heard 2 business related things... The pizza deal could be revived if we want it to be (Corporate changed their minds and decided to approve us even though we won't quit our jobs??!). The other business of interest to Brian is still available and worth a real consideration. It would work nicely from the "Farm" and we could easily make the deal work into the finances associated with moving, as long as we sell our downtown house. We're listing "by owner" until the bathroom is complete, so there is quite a bit of work to be done with that as well. We made a flyer, have told everyone we know, have shown the house to a few buyers agents. We are showing the house to a potential buyer on Friday. It's just a single showing, but we want to be as prepared as if it was a full-fledge MLS open house. It only takes one!

We aren't sure what order to make these major decisions in. We're just praying for clarity and that the puzzle works itself out. We aren't even sure how we ended up in this tangled web. Maybe we just need to pray for contentment, learn to say no, and not look for trouble (aka - houses or businesses), but that hasn't really been working too well for us for the past few years...

CXC better make room

2012-01-28T14:59:00.000-06:00

Noah's getting the hang of this skiing thing!

Bathroom Progress

2012-01-28T14:53:00.001-06:00

All the shower is missing is the glass door!

We have accumulated all the little things that need to go in to finish the bathroom. Brian has spent hours making the door to the room work and getting it trimmed out. We'll paint soon, then call the electrician out to do the final electrical! We're only about a week out on the glass shower door and cabinet at this point. We still need to figure out the vanity top, we know what we want to get, we just aren't convinced that we can install it ourselves... We won't actually place the order until we have a better idea of how it's going to get from the car to the bathroom! We estimate that it will weigh over 200 pounds - whew!

Bathroom design concept

2012-01-18T14:55:00.000-06:00

When we were starting to figure out what we wanted our bathroom to look like, we had a bit of help from some friends. Everybody who commented agreed that we MUST do white subway tiles in the shower. Most of the images that we looked at had bathtubs and pedestal sinks. We wanted to eliminate the bathtub due to the size constraint (to replace the tub, we would have to get one that was "mobile home" sized, doesn't that just scream luxury!). This was the first image that got my attention. Obviously, it has a bathtub and pedestal sink, but style-wise, it's definitely moving in the right direction.

I like the flooring strips. Black and white work well. We could do something like this.
I kept looking around on the web for inspiration pictures and finally stumbled upon this.

Love it! It takes the black and white theme into a glass-door shower concept. It feels like a pretty big space because of the glass door and color continuity in on the floor and walls. By the time I uncovered this picture, Brian had already brought home the black spa rocks thinking they might make a nice shower floor. Combine all these features and...

Here it is! Never mind the fact that the white subway tiles look a little yellow in these pictures, they are gleaming white in real life! I'm really pleased how the tile job turned out. The vanity and shower door glass are both ordered. We'll be ordering the vanity top this evening as well as buying a lot of the rest of the stuff that we need to finish up the job. I'm starting to feel like we'll have a functioning bathroom by about the end of February... Most of our special orders estimate the product to be delivered in 4 weeks, they better not be late on that estimate!!!
Our latest debate, a small detail that we haven't yet decided is the metal color/type. The vanity comes with satin nickel hardware, so we're leaning that direction. We had discussed defaulting to chrome because it works with everything and we could re-use the towel bars from before, but that would require replacing the brand-new hardware that comes with the cabinet and we aren't sure if we will be able to find an additional matching towel bar for the other sink. The vanity is white and the vanity top is "absolute black" granite. We like oil-rubbed bronze, but think that it might disappear against the black surfaces, and it costs more. What do you think? What's the best metal for a really old space made new again?

Continued bathroom saga

2012-01-14T11:27:00.000-06:00

We originally thought that we could easily wrap up the bathroom project within the fall, so have it done by about Thanksgiving. When you are dealing with structural changes, hundred year old plumbing and electrical, and very un-square, un-level, settled-old-house surfaces there are some things that are best left to professionals. Even the professionals didn't always know what to do. Between the time that the permitting process takes, getting people lined up and scheduled, and figuring out the order of these items, it's been slow going. In addition, we weren't really able to settle on a design theme for quite awhile. We figured, if we took it apart and forced decisions, we'd finally make them and get it done. We settled on white subway tiles for the shower walls - it's a bright, clean, classic look that just fits our space and has the bonus of being relatively cheap!

They did a nice job with this (with the waterproofing/shower floor factor and the crazy angles, we decided to hire out the tile job as well). Here it is before the grout went in. They did the walls of the shower first because of the shape/profile of our choice for the shower floor: black spa rocks!! I'm really excited for that shower. It looks really good, photos coming in the not too distant future.
Since we chose black for the shower floor, I didn't want to break up the visual feel of the room (which will have a glass door separating the shower from the rest). We needed to find an appropriate black floor tile as well. Spa rocks over the whole bathroom floor would be a bit too much for me! Here's the freshly laid black 6x24 strips that we settled on. I'm really happy with how it turned out! Black and White is the theme now. We just ordered a painted white cabinet, after MUCH deliberation. We talked about building our own because we were not happy with those available. We debated between stained wood and painted. We groaned at the plastic-y look and feel of the "white painted" ones available in the low cost category. Finally, we went back to the same cabinet we picked every time we went to Menard's. AND, when the procrastination ended, they happened to have a nice sale going on!! We scored the cabinet we wanted for the price we wanted. While we are waiting the 4 weeks for it to come in, we'll try to work on getting all the fussy little details cleaned up and picked out. Brian can start doing some trim. We can order the shower glass, buy a toilet, and pick out light fixtures for above the sinks. We need mirrors (which we'll probably buy cheap ones and build some frames for them ourselves). We did save the bathroom door and towel bars, but they need some re-hab if we'll be happy to re-use them. While good progress has happened, there's still lots to do!

Goaties!

2012-01-09T09:20:00.005-06:00

Noah got fences for Christmas (inspired by http://ana-white.com/2011/11/plans/play-fences-3). I really like the idea of simple toys to inspire imagination play and creative development. We played "goaties" for awhile last Friday morning, then, since it was so nice out, I took him over to see the real "goaties" at Oxbow. It was a fun morning!

While playing Goaties, Noah made me, the momma goatie, a nice meal. He went over to his pretend kitchen (the slide), and prepared a "grass and leaves quesadilla", because goaties like to eat grass and leaves (and quesadillas are probably his favorite food!). He also grabbed some blankets and made me a nice rest place in my corral. Sometimes he was the shepherd, sometimes the baby goatie, and sometimes he was just Noah. He didn't usually know what to do when I got out of the fence (because he left it open). I was hoping to see some herding behavior to get me back in, but he just hopped around and said,

"No, you have to stay in the fence!" We have a long ways to go before he could be a rancher or shepherd!

I think these are his favorite animal at Oxbow. We did stop by the otters' place to say "hi" and he was a bit disappointed that the bear was hibernating. The "farm animals" area is always where we spend the most time, especially the goaties.

Noah 2011 development

2012-01-06T14:45:00.005-06:00

In reverse order, just for fun... Noah making a silly face for the camera at Halloween. He got to play Thomas the train, it sure was fun! After just a couple of houses, he wanted to head back to Grandma and Grandpa's house to eat the yummy treats that he received.
After the big birthday party, the weather held up good enough to use the new toys out in the canoe. We had a number of fun outings in the canoe this summer. Noah's favorite is playing Walnut ball with Nate - finding walnuts floating in the river, and throwing them back and forth between the boats.
Noah insisted on having a "Scoop" cake for his birthday, since he's almost the worlds most dedicated Bob the Builder fan. It was a big challenge for mom, but managed to be pulled off successfully. At the end of the day, we asked what the favorite part of his birthday was, "My Scoop cake!" Worth every minute of it.
Noah enjoyed lots of rides on the big red bike this year. He got up to about 20 miles on a day and often asked for more at the end of a ride. We didn't end up doing a tour, couldn't figure out how to keep him happy either in the trailer or on the bike for that length of time (and didn't want to bring both!).
The neighbor boy outgrew his little pool, so now Noah gets to play with it all summer long! He had lots of fun floating his crocks in the pool and splashing in it!
Noah was a pretty good supporter of mom and dad's mountain bike team work. He came along with his bells and clappers to the races, ate the snacks, and had a good time. He liked to visit the dogs in the crowd.
We got a freak late snow in April that we were able to scoop up into a mini-snowman! There was lots of snow for winter fun this year.
Noah completely outgrew his hook on chair (among many other things). He now is able to carry full size stools around the kitchen to reach whatever he needs.
Noah loves to go to the river (or lake or pond) and throw rocks into the water! He spent quite a few "daddy and Noah days" playing outside like this.
Noah went to 2 year old gym classes in the late winter and spring to run off some energy and have fun. He also enjoyed going to the "jumping place" and many playgrounds.

Looks like he gets his camera face from mom and mom's side of the family... It's rare to catch him with a natural smile, so we'll make an effort to take MORE pictures this year and see if we can develop a more relaxed presence with the ole camera.

Story of an ugly bathroom

2012-01-06T14:08:00.008-06:00

This room was scoring the ugliest in the house award, so we decided to do something about it!

In August, one weekend, we decided it was time. We started pulling it apart, taking everything out and breaking down the walls. We knew that if it was going to happen, it had to get done outside of heating season - spray foam insulation and radiator moving really can't be done when it's nasty cold outside.

It was yuck, gross, disgusting (Noah's recent phrase) behind the walls - at some point in the past, there had been a fire up there somewhere, therefore, in addition to 100 years of dust, there was nasty soot inside the walls.

The demolition seemed like it took forever! We just kept working and taking things out and working some more. How could such a little space have so much packed into it?? We took something like 6 carloads over to the dump, in addition to filling our weekly garbage for all of August and September.

This room was one of the first that we changed up when we moved in, we painted it to go with our towels and bathroom accessories. Unfortunately, we used Behr paint, more appropriately referred to as glue paint. Any place where the shower curtain touched the paint, it peeled off and looked nasty. The room is so small, that I don't have any

really good "pre" photos, we just couldn't get in there to take pics, not to mention that the bathroom isn't really a place where a lot of great photo-ops take place! The whole room was on an outside wall when the house was built, and had the gabled ceiling thing going on. There was only one sink on that 5 foot wall because the gabled ceiling would take up the headspace for the other sink (if there had been one). 50 or 60 years ago, another bedroom was added making the gable by the sink useless - it sloped only because nobody bothered to raise it up when the new roof went past it. The biggest motivation to tearing everything out was to get more headroom in this space, so we hired ourselves a competent framer (and we interviewed a few that left us wondering) and raised the roof!

You can see in the picture here the new studs heading straight up from where the angle started. The shower is still an exterior wall, so it gets to keep its unique angled ceiling.

We got spray foam insulation on the exterior wall, always a must when you only have 2x4 walls

and live in a drafty old place like this! Most of our projects start because we want to make our house more efficient (aka - reduce the heat bills), or at least include an insulation component.

With this small of space, we couldn't find a sheetrock crew that would meet our $$ expectations. They would have to come back to our house 5 times, but not for long enough to make it count for them. So, we ended up installing that ourselves. Good thing Brian is getting good at taping and mudding drywall. And, look at how patient he is... He welcomes a little learner in to "help" him with the work!

Update of pictures

2011-01-09T11:29:00.013-06:00

I haven't posted for awhile, and even longer since I posted pictures. Here's a bunch to keep you interested...

Coloring with great focus.

Playing outside in the snow; first time out sledding with dad!

Christmas highlights - a new Cookie Monster and my very own skis!

My buddy Alexis got the same Elmo slippers for Christmas that I did, here we are showing off our best Elmo sleepwear and slippers before bed on mom and dad's Bible study evening.

I was lucky enough to get an ice cream cone for a special treat! Yay!

September!

2010-09-02T15:30:00.000-05:00

We're looking forward to Noah's second birthday. Here's his list of needs and wants, all in one convenient location for your shopping enjoyment!

Needs:
long sleeve tops
socks
winter boots
slippers
snowsuit/winter coat
lightweight pjs

Wants:
toddler snow skis
Duplos, duplos, and more duplos! These are currently his favorite toy and he asks to play with them multiple times every day! He, of course, calls them tractors (?!), train cars, and towers. I don't think he would know what you were talking about if you asked about playing duplos.
Books about nature, transportation, or sesame street.
All things ELMO or sesame street! He knows all of the characters by name and likes to sing "C is for cookie".
playdates with friends - he told me a couple of nights ago, "more friends house". He loves his people, who used to be just family members but are expanded to the kids from daycare and church. This is quite challenging for mom and dad because we can't quite interpret his friend's names - 'Lexis sounded like Jacket for the longest time and didn't make any sense to me.

Counting down to the 24th!

Noah's measures

2010-08-14T20:06:00.002-05:00

We're getting ready for that big 2nd birthday with a list of some needs and decided that measurements might be useful. Noah thought it was good fun to have me measuring him, so we took far more measurements than anyone would need. Here's how BIG my little buddy has gotten!
33.5 inches tall
27.5 inches heel to shoulder
10 inch long arms - shoulder to wrist
11 inch legs - inseam
19-21 inches belly circumfrence
19.5 inches head circumfrence
32 inch wingspan - fingers to fingers across his back
5.5 inch long foot

I can't believe how much he has grown from the tiny bundle of 2 years ago!

Tour of America's Dairyland re-cap

2010-06-24T10:48:00.003-05:00

Chocolate milk really is as good as they claim! Appleton was my best race to date and I'll claim that it is because of the chocolate milk and banana that I ate before the race (before warming up, actually). Or maybe it was the 1500 calorie Applebee's pasta dish that I ate the night before? I definitely felt like I had the right energy for that race and my relative results backs that up! It was a flat and fast course, which made it easier as well.
Grafton was hilly and the wind was in my face during the downhill sections so that there was never really a break. I felt pretty rushed to get lined up for that one and ate my Nature Valley bar at the starting line.
The road race on the Elkhart Lake Road America track was fun for the first 5 laps. I thought I had a good chance at placing as well as I did in Appleton. Then on the 6th/final lap, this girl who was forgotten about behind us (I was riding with 2 other ladies) came out of nowhere and passed. This caused some sprinting and re-grouping and I didn't have anything left to give. I fell off from that group and struggled to haul myself to the finish line. My hotel breakfast that morning was NOT a breakfast of champions and there was no chocolate milk hand-outs at the registration table that day, boo.
I'm working on sprinting for the next few weeks, that is clearly the area where there is the most room for improvement. I also need to create a workable pre-race routine that includes a proper warm-up and fueling!

Genius child

2010-06-23T14:33:00.003-05:00

This stage of development has got to be the most fun! It's awe-inspiring to see the new things that Noah is able to do with each passing day. He's combining words to make sentences and ideas now. He's getting really good at adjectives, "orange truck"! Every time I turn around I catch myself thinking that Noah has to be the smartest little guy ever - I suppose every parent thinks that though.
We were playing at toddler class in the little kitchen. Noah got out a pot and lid. I offered him some different pretend foods to put into the pot. He put the pot into the little pretend microwave, made a motor sound, took the pot out, lifted the lid and looked at his little food items. Then he put it back into the mircowave, made his motor sound, and took the food out again. This time, he opened the lid, said "steam" and waved his hands over the top of the pot. Then he said "hot" and moved the pot to the table. What a little genius!! He made that up all on his own!!!
He can't quite get the word motorcycle, but he knows how to identify them. He points them out by imitating the sound that they make, it's so funny! I can't even begin to phonetically write out the sound he makes, but he repeats it enough that we know when he is talking about motorcycles.
I have several more examples that I could comment on, but no more time to write this afternoon!

Noah Bikes!

2010-05-30T21:25:00.003-05:00

Noah got up on his special seat on the bike and went for his maiden voyage on Friday! You'll notice that there is an empty seat in front of him, Mom decided that running along side seemed like a better idea than getting on and riding with.

After all that effort, a cool treat!

Vocabulary

2010-05-18T10:26:00.006-05:00

I've been having so much fun, I haven't made time to blog about it! I'm going to share a partial list of Noah's words, he is so funny sometimes!

In the transportation category:
bus
truck
garbage truck
car
taxi
ambulance (ambi, for short)
tractor
beep, beep (the sound they make when they back up)
watch (as in, I want to go watch the trucks)
bike
walk
brown (that's the UPS truck)
choo choo (it's easier to repeat it's sound than to call it a train)
boat

Other things found outside:
bird, tweet
puppy
squirrel (it doesn't come out very clear, but he can sure identify these!)
grass
tree
ball
shoes, coat, hat (things you must wear in order to go outside)
stroller

Personal care words:
socks (pronounced hocks)
shirt
brush teeth (something he HATES to do)
wash
hot
hands
nose
eyes
mouth
soap (pronounced hope)
jammies
zip
poop
toot
juice, mine (these are what he calls his pacifier and blankie, very important!)

Foods - these are important!
milk
juice
water
apple
applesauce
strawberries
cracker
rice krispies
cereal
cheese
cheese stick
chips
eggs
peas
broccoli
corn
pop, pop (for popcorn)
sandwich
french fries
waffle
toast
cookie
pizza
yogurt
fish
sucker (pronounced hockey!)

Action words:
more
up
down
ride (I want a ride down the stairs)
book
help
out
yes
no

Animals and/or their sounds:
duck, quack
moo
meow
puppy, woof
Ooh-ooh (the sound the gorilla makes)
bird, tweet
fish
ant
roar
horse
baa
buzz (the sound of a bee)

People he loves:
Noah
Mommy
Daddy
Gramma
Papa
Mimi
Hannah

I'm sure I missed a few. He has an impressive vocabulary for his age.
Enjoy! Sorry I'm such a slacker for posting.

Hugs!

2010-03-16T12:26:00.003-05:00

Aw, sweet! Cousin Miriam gives Noah a little hug. We are loving the pleasant spring weather; it's fun to play outside now.

I'm working hard at getting my bike speeds ready for racing. It seems like I have a long ways to go and only a few weeks to make big improvements. We took the tandem out for a Sunday afternoon ride and went 18 miles doing intervals. I went out last night for a short hills circuit, 7 miles, 4 big climbs; I thought I was going to die!

Happy Spring!

Sick - not fun

2009-12-15T19:30:00.003-06:00

I got the flu and Noah got pink eye. Not fun.

I'm going to start practicing my "new years resolution" now. I've picked Philippians 4:8 to be my "theme" verse for next year:

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.

So, here goes...

Brian and Noah haven't got the flu (yet) and the worst is over.

All this coughing is surely building some fabulous ab muscles.

"Protocols" are awesome when they save you a trip to the germ-infested doctors waiting room and $$$ for the visit. We had our pink eye prescription in hand by 8:30 Monday morning for less than a 10 dollar bill.

Brian and Melissa haven't got pink eye (yet), and you can barely tell he had it.

Yes Man in the Snow

2009-12-15T19:06:00.005-06:00

Here's Noah's first time for "playing" in the snow this season. He didn't want anything to do with it - sticking with the sidewalk for awhile. I finally gave up waiting for him to voluntarily venture into the white piles. I plopped him into the snow (second picture). He just sat there and looked at it. His dad took him out for a second "play" in the snow the next day. Brian wasn't much more successful than I was. It seems our occasionally cautious little guy finds snow something to be wary of.

Climbing to intriguing places does not bring out the cautious side of Noah. He will put his best attempt at getting onto the window seat, or reaching up to the kitchen counter or into the desk drawer.

Noah has got his "yes" and "no" words mastered, and he prefers "yes"! Anytime I need a "yes man", I just ask him my question and he will reply "yeah".

Bathtoys = Fun for anytime

2009-11-16T15:21:00.003-06:00

Here's another "before" haircut shot. Noah likes this bathtoy so much that he goes in there when the bathtub is dry and plays with it!

First Haircut

2009-11-16T15:12:00.005-06:00

Before - Set up with a cracker, waterbottle, and a distraction to look at. His hair is so fine and blonde that you can't tell how long it really is in the pictures!

After - Looking handsome and a bit more boyish. Didn't even finish the cracker, it was so easy.

Halloween Sailor

2009-11-16T15:04:00.002-06:00

Better slow than never. Here's Noah at the big daycare party. He's looking cute in his sailor suit! He really liked the balloons; he even got to bring one home.

Fast learner

2009-10-21T10:22:00.003-05:00

Now that Noah is walking, he explores more of the house. He walked on into the office and sat down at the bookshelf. I caught up with him doing a little reading. He must have gotten bored with the kiddy books, so he pulled "Elementary Statistics" off the shelf and opened it up. He's so smart, he chose to start right at the beginning of the book. Next thing you know, he will grab a pencil when he sits down with the text books, so he can work a few problems!

A little Fruit

2009-10-21T10:12:00.003-05:00

This is how Noah prefers to eat his fruit! He is so independent and stubborn. Can you see how much of it he consumed? I put away the camera before he was finished, he ate close to half the pear.

Noah on the Shore

2009-10-16T20:43:00.002-05:00

We stopped at Split Rock for a leg stretcher on the way home. Noah likes to stand anywhere there is a place to help him balance. He found this big driftwood tree to play at. It was a great place to pick up rocks, put them on the tree, then sweep the tree clean again. Of course, tasting the rocks just in case they are good is a requirement!

Grand Portage

2009-10-16T20:34:00.007-05:00

We hiked to the top of Mt. Josephine, the views were awesome! Good thing we packed lots of warm clothes, the hike started in the snow. Brian carried Noah for about 2 minutes during this hike, on the flat area. Going up that hill with an extra 25 pounds on your back is hard work! There was a really cool "fort" at the top of the hill, we think it was the foundation for a lookout tower.

Little Monkeys

2009-10-05T10:29:00.003-05:00

I thought these little monkey faces would be perfect for Noah's birthday. He's pretty much a monkey himself. I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out. They were pretty tasty too, at least the day of the party, the cookies and cereal got soggy pretty quickly afterward.

This was my fun, creative endeavor for September. What's up next?

Happy Birthday Noah!

2009-09-23T08:03:00.002-05:00

Noah has a message that he wanted me to give you all about his upcoming birthday:

My Birthday Wishlist
Here are a few of the things that I want for my birthday...

a splatmat - I really want to control my own food and sometimes that means watching how it lands on the floor when I drop it over the edge. It would be really cool to have a target to practice hitting. Besides, messes cause mom and dad stress, so maybe that would help them to chill out.

slippers - I expect that dad won't turn the heat on until it is plenty cool, so I need something warm and fuzzy for my feet.

plug covers - I'm starting to get curious about those little holes in the wall and I keep getting told NO, so let's just cover them up and not worry about it.

cups - I only have 3 right now, one for water, one for juice, and one for milk. What if one of them is dirty or if I want to have one for travel... When my friend Malachi was over last weekend, his cup looked really cool and I tried to take it away, but mom kept giving it back to him, she's no help.

toys, lots of toys - I really like it if they make sounds when I shake them or have parts that spin or spring. The ones I have are getting pretty boring, so new ones would sure be fun.

more time outside - I really like to taste the leaves and rocks and chase the squirrels and rabbits. Please just take me out there and let me get dirty!!

I realize I'm giving you this message pretty late, so you might already have great gifts planned for me. I'm sure I will love them, especially the packaging that they come in. I hear that it will be colorful and crinkly and I can tear it. Ooh and boxes, I hope I get some boxes!

I'll see you soon for the big party!!

Noah

Going to be a walker

2009-07-15T11:02:00.003-05:00

This is Noah's favorite toy right now. He runs that little thing all over the house. He can't steer it yet, and he's pretty tippy, so we follow closely and catch him or turn him when needed. I love his facial expressions, you can tell he's intense!

Purple Cauliflower

2009-07-15T10:59:00.003-05:00

This stir-fry looked so good! We got a purple cauliflower in our veggie box so we chopped it up with the fresh broccoli, summer squash, added a couple of carrots and chicken, and served it over a bed of rice. It was great! So colorful!

Playing in the yard

2009-07-15T10:52:00.005-05:00

These are my "Noah as baby cover model" photos. He wasn't in the best mood that morning, but the coloring and lighting are right on!

Great and Easy Cookies and an invented bread recipe

2009-06-10T14:12:00.006-05:00

Since Brian kept going back for more, it seems like these cookies are blog-worthy. I found the recipe online somewhere. It's all over the internet.

1-1-1 Peanut Butter Cookies

1 cup peanut butter (I used chunky this time)
1 cup sugar
1 egg

mix together, drop spoonfuls onto baking sheet, bake 375 degrees for 10 minutes.
That's it. EASY!

I had to make cookies because I needed the oven on to create some warmth in the kitchen to help proof my bread from yesterday. I whipped up some bread to go with dinner. I couldn't find a recipe that used wheat germ and didn't use 10 other ingredients that I didn't have on hand, so I invented my own recipe and it turned out great.
Here's what I learned/did: I looked at several bread recipes that I like and found that they all use a flour to water ratio slightly over 2 and one was as high as 3, and slightly less than one teaspoon of yeast per cup of flour. Add to that the following facts:
whole wheat works best with a "tenderizer" ingredient or two
milk and honey are both tenderizers
bread really only needs water, flour, yeast, and salt
most bread also includes a bit of sugar
That's all I needed... Here's my (approximate) mix, I'm not big on measuring. :)

1 1/2 cups warm water
1/4 cup dry milk powder
2 T honey
1/2 T kosher salt
2 cups white flour
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup wheat germ
2 T vital wheat gluten
2 t yeast

Mix ingredients. Let rise an hour or so, form into loaves, let rise again for 40-60 minutes, bake at 375 degrees for 40 minutes. Tastes great, holds up well to spreading butter.

We got our first CSA veggie box last night. I'll be looking for good ways to prepare some lesser known veggies and possibly sharing some of the highlights.

Take a Hike!

2009-05-07T08:43:00.003-05:00

We went out to the nearest piece of the Richard Dorer State Forest last Sunday for a little hike. Noah wasn't nearly as big a fan of hiking as he is of biking - probably the inability to fall asleep in the carrier... We won't be doing that again unless we can time it to go when he is very well rested. When he gets tired, he shrieks, and when he is that close to your ear, it's painful!

Noah's Teeth

2009-05-07T08:38:00.004-05:00

Not the greatest picture, but I think you can see those little teeth on the bottom gum! (Try clicking on the picture to get the full size version.)

Noah sure talks a lot lately. I'm not sure if that is a response to having foreign objects (teeth) in his mouth, or the pain of teething, or if he has just hit that point in development?!

Crafty Fun!

2009-05-07T08:34:00.003-05:00

I had the pleasure of creating a diaper cake recently for our friends from small group. It was fun to make and well received. My favorite part was the little sock roses. Ha ha ha, now Lindsay has to unroll 80 diapers before she can use them!

Babies like Milk

2009-05-02T14:22:00.003-05:00

Noah has not taken to real food at all yet. That's probably because Brian says, "Babies only drink milk, Babies like milk". The faces this kid makes when presented with a spoon full of other good stuff are funny!

He got his first tooth! Maybe now that he has teeth, he will decide he wants to eat...

Sleep baby

2009-04-27T15:54:00.002-05:00

If you asked me 5 years ago about having kids, I would have told you that I'm too much of a sleep baby to sign up for that yet. If you asked me 5 months ago about having kids, I'd tell you that the amount of sleep that Noah allows me to have is just not enough. You would think that with my particular interest in getting enough sleep, I would have planned ahead and read about training your child to sleep well! That's my latest topic of reading, and boy is it great! Noah has increased his sleep by almost 2 hours per day in the past week and we might have conquered sleeping through the night.

RECOMMENDED READING:
Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child by Marc Weissbluth
Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems by Richard Ferber

I haven't finished reading either of these, but just the first chapter of each of them gave great information that I was able to implement right away.

Have a good night sleep!
Melissa

Bike Club - First Ride 2009

2009-03-16T15:29:00.004-05:00

Yay for Spring! I'm really liking the weather we've had the past few days. Less bundling and less hiding out indoors. Brian wishes it was still ski season, he thinks that the Chariot is easier to pull on skis than on bike. I think that it's easier for him to "keep up" pulling the Chariot on skis than on bike since he only has to keep up with me on skis! We'll probably ride with the Easy Riders when Noah comes with this year, otherwise babysitter?? Dave from bike club took these pictures (thanks!), I stole them from the bike club bulletin board. The first one is from before the ride when everyone was gathering, the second is from near the end when we were coming back into town. Noah's first bike club ride chalked up at 40 miles, and it was a tough 40 miles pulling that load!

Artesian Bread and other baking

2009-03-04T09:52:00.004-06:00

You may know that I enjoy baking bread; you may have enjoyed some of my fresh baked bread at a potluck or progressive dinner. I found a new recipe for Artesian Bread that I tried out yesterday. The results were great, and it was a pretty easy one to make. Doesn't it look tasty??

Feeding Noah has made me a VERY hungry girl. On my days off, for fun, I bake. It adds a some interest to a day full of laundry, feeding the baby, and changing diapers.

Last week I baked cookies. I didn't get around to taking a picture of them, so they didn't get their own post. Ever since last summer's family reunion, I've been baking cookies with "Dad's Special Secret Recipe". I don't think he'll mind if I let the secret out to my small handful of blog readers... Here's the story. Mom set out a stick of butter for his cookies, just to be helpful, with the understanding that they use a stick of butter plus shortening for the full amount of "fat" called for in the recipe. He didn't know that she only set out part of the "fat", so he didn't add anything more than the one stick of butter (recipe called for either 2/3 cup or 3/4 cup, I don't know exactly). He thought they were a little different when scooping them onto the tray, but didn't know why. The cookies got rave reviews at the family reunion. They weren't greasy and thin like they can sometimes be. They held their shape well and had great texture. So, now whenever I bake cookies, I round down the "fat" ingredient to the nearest easy quantity of butter. I've been pleased with the results every time.

Let me know if you try the cookie trick, or if you have a great bread recipe that I should try. I'd love to hear from you.

Weekend with Grandparents

2009-02-26T11:37:00.003-06:00

Noah got to do some excited playing in the exersaucer last Sunday (as pictured, thanks Grandma) and some quality lap napping with his grandparents.

While he was having all that fun, his parents went skiing - first time of the season that Brian skied without pulling the Chariot. He didn't know what to do with his extra layers when he warmed up! We need the Chariot to slow Brian down, he could have skied circles around me. The snow conditions were atrocious since we only had 2 inches on the ground, but it was nice to get outside for a little while.

Here's a few things that Noah has been up to lately:

He must have something soft and fuzzy to sleep with. And a full belly, but that makes anyone sleep better.

He explores his body with his hands - those ears are pretty neat to grab onto; when his belly is uncovered, he finds some little baby fat rolls to grab onto; and it's always fun to check out what's inside that opening between his chin and nose...

He rolled over! Either clothes or hardwood floors have made that an extra challenge for him, when dressed in nothing but a diaper on a carpetted surface he rolled right over and gave us a big gummy grin.

Waterpark fun

2009-02-11T09:18:00.002-06:00

This past weekend we went to the Dells with Nate & Irene and Joe & Jenny. It was supposed to be more of a ski trip, but for a variety of reasons, the waterpark was the main attraction. Here's Noah's first time at the pool. I was glad that they had life jackets available to use. Noah seemed to enjoy his time in the water. He stared at the large objects in the kiddie area, and enjoyed floating in the wavepool.

We did get out skiing while we were there. There are 2 WI state parks within a short drive, so we spent one day at each. Mirror Lake is a skier's park, Devil's Lake is not. The warm weather made being outside pretty comfortable, but didn't do much for the ski conditions. I'm afraid that our season is pretty much over, boo. We'll have to drive north for a few more ski outings, and start thinking about biking for local fun.

Black River State Forest

2009-01-21T08:27:00.003-06:00

We got away for a ski weekend at Black River again this year! Noah made the uphills extra challenging and the downhills fast. The weather was great, 20s and sunny. The trails were well groomed and well used - we saw half a dozen people while we were on the trails and a bunch more cars in the parking lots. Here's some shots of the fun. Brian found a creative way to "park" Noah and the chariot when we stopped for a rest break.

I took a turn pulling Noah this time (for more than 10 strides). My goodness! It's like molasses going up the hills. I'm not sure if I should be impressed by Brian or disgusted at myself that we are pretty equalized when he is pulling the load.

We actually saw another chariot in use for skiing while we were there! We've gotten lots of comments from other skiers about Noah's sweet ride. Since most people who ski are quite a bit older than us the comments go something like, "Back when our kids were little..." "...nothing that fancy..." etc.

Skiing

2009-01-05T15:30:00.003-06:00

We've been out skiing 4 times so far this season. Rochester is off to a good start for snow this year. Here's Noah's first outing. Brian is getting super workouts towing him!

Back to work

2009-01-05T15:25:00.004-06:00

Today is Noah's first day in daycare. I hope he has a good day. Here are some photos of the little guy - since I've been so bad about posting...

These are the first time I tried to get smile shots. He's pretty good about smiling whenever we ask him to now.

Noah's first trip

2008-10-17T19:40:00.003-05:00

We took the little guy down to Great River Bluffs State Park yesterday and enjoyed some great fall colors, a picnic lunch, and some short hikes out to panaramic views over the Mississippi River. What a great day!

Old stuff

2008-10-17T19:36:00.003-05:00

Mid August we took a short backpacking trip up in the Gooseberry falls area. The weather was fantastic for us. We had lots of time to enjoy our campfires since we did pretty low-miles hiking days (seven months pregnant doesn't say "sure lets go put some miles on the hiking trails). Brian spent some time trying to "get artsy" with the camera, this is his best fire shot.

Photos of Noah

2008-10-17T19:30:00.003-05:00

He's awake! These are pictures of 3 week old Noah. His shirt says Handsome Baby - wouldn't you agree?

A little bit of an action shot in the last two. He's busy learning about his arms and legs, he swings them all over the place when he's laying down.

Meet Noah

2008-09-28T19:15:00.007-05:00

Noah James was born on Wednesday, September 24th at 9:40pm. He weighed in at 7.5 lbs and is 19 inches tall.

He's absolutely perfect, look at those tiny toes!

We got to go home on Friday around noon, of course we walked the few blocks. Noah rode in his soon-to-be favorite method of transit - his Chariot.

Sleeping like a rock star!

False Alarm

2008-08-28T09:08:00.004-05:00

The little guy certainly made us think he wanted to come early this past weekend. I had the privilege of staying in the hospital for a few days and being treated for preterm labor. There are 2 things that I really don't like: IVs and know-it-all residents. In order to give everyone a fair chance at the guessing game (please join!), I'll share a few facts or comments from the docs.

1) He'll be okay even if he's born tomorrow. It's not too early for good health.
2) Some women who deal with pre-term labor end up being induced when they are overdue.
3) I'm among the lucky 20% of first-time moms who feel contractions before labor.
4) The treatment I had stopped labor at 3 cm, they commented that they have patients going around for weeks at 1 - 5 cm.
5) There is no statistical difference in outcomes for people who are put on bed rest vs. everyday activity regarding preterm labor.
6) I don't believe the baby has "dropped" because breathing is still somewhat challenging.
7) They think he weighs at least 4 pounds at this point.
8) Is my sense of urgency about getting ready for baby because of the "false alarm", or is this "nesting"?

That's all I can think of that might be helpful. I'm not going to put a guess out there because I don't want to falsely convince myself that he'll be coming in any particular timeframe. We'll be taking it one day at a time! I don't know if the game image will work to link you to it, so here's the real link... http://www.expectnet.com/games/falsealarm

He likes to eat...

2008-08-07T08:55:00.002-05:00

Cheese, Fruit, and Chocolate are the top 3 foods of my pregnancy. I suspect the later two are just my personal preference, but I look for them regularly for snacks, etc. We are getting to a point where every time I sit down to eat a meal, the little guy thinks that is great play time and he should kick and wiggle. Maybe he is celebrating meal time. Maybe my stomach is that loud when processing food that he wakes up and fights with it?! Maybe I'm just too active/busy/distracted to notice all of the kicking and wiggling during the rest of the day, but I notice it at meal time (and bedtime, but that's a different story!).

I don't have much for adventures to report on lately. We're trying to come up with a weekend getaway for this weekend, but are having a hard time deciding what to do. I'm thinking about getting extra sleep, putting my feet up, eating some good foods (see above). Brian's thinking camping, hiking, biking, the usual outdoor adventure outing. We'll see what ends up happening!

Bad about keeping up

2008-07-23T16:17:00.003-05:00

I haven't posted about our May vacation, June travels, Niece's birth, or our July vacation... Here's a picture of an elephant that I visited at the National Zoo in DC when I was there in June on a business trip. The elephants were particularly easy to take pictures of because they came near the front of their playground and they are large. The hippos didn't want their pictures taken- they hid underwater the whole time.

Our home internet access is gone now. We'll get it back around the time the baby comes so that I won't have to be cut off from the world when I'm home on leave. Until then, don't expect much here...

Have a good one!

Winner

2008-05-08T19:37:00.006-05:00

Random Number Result = 1 (from 1 to 8).

The winner for the "guess the gender" contest is Sarah Carlson! Sarah was the first to comment and she guessed correctly.

Here's her prize:

This is a set of 4 that all have the same design, but different messages. The background on the coral is stamped with Papertrey Ink stamps and the messages are stamped with Stampin Up! stamps. I'm going to have to learn to make less girly crafts! Anyone want to have a little boy card party?

Thanks for playing! Now you can all go buy something blue ;)

He waves hi!

Ramblings

2008-05-03T13:09:00.005-05:00

Hey! I know it's been awhile. We haven't had any good vacations or outings recently to report on. Here's a picture of the new hairdo I got cut in mid April...

This week is the final time to post your gender guesses - see previous post. We have our big ultrasound appointment on Thursday morning. I've been working on the prize... Sorry men, I'm not sure how many of you would love to win a set of Melissa's special cards, though I'm sure they were entering my contest for the competition and bragging rights only! Hopefully I'll post a picture of the prize before I give it out. If you haven't posted a guess, get it in here soon (Hint, hint, Mom)!

We do have a vacation planned soon, so I will have some material to put up here. Look for little European-like villages from SW Wisconsin. I would put some pictures from James and Allie's wedding, but I'm sure that they are going to take care of that on their webpage: http://www.allieandjames.com/.

Have a good week! I'll be back to post a gender game winner at the end of the week!

A little contest...

2008-04-06T10:57:00.000-05:00

For those of you who haven't heard yet, we're going to have a baby! We are planning on finding out the gender whenever we can - we both like to plan ahead and be organized...

In the meantime, I'd like to see what our friends and family have to say?? Do you think we'll have a boy or a girl? I'll also make this your one and only opportunity to make suggestions or comments about naming this child... Leave a comment to enter.

You are free to ask any questions about my pregnancy so far if you believe in one of those old wives tales and want to use that as a measure, I'd love to hear it!

When we believe we know the gender, I'll close the contest and do a random drawing from those who guessed correctly for a little prize...

More Craftiness

2008-04-05T14:25:00.001-05:00

This is the gift I created for my sister-in-law for her baby shower this past weekend. The "roses" are baby socks, hats, and onesies planted with kabob skewers into a piece of styrofoam in a little tin pail. The yellow wrap around the base is a sling for holding the baby - close and cozy for baby, hands free for mom!

I did a little stamping on the onesies. These monogrammed outfits will help the volunteers in the church nursery know who "baby A" is!

Ski Season Wrap-up

2008-04-02T14:02:00.000-05:00

We've started the bike season now, so I thought I would post the final pictures from our fantastic ski season. In March, we skiied in northern MN twice. The first time was with the church young married couples group at Giants Ridge. The weather was great, the trails were nicely groomed. It was fun to ski with others for a change. Brian was pretty excited to be cruising around on his new "fast" skis.

Easter weekend, we rented a little cabin in the woods at Tettegouche camp. It was fun to keep the fire burning in the woodstove. The challenge with these cabins is that you have to hike in everything you need for the time you are there. We skiied in, but would plan in the future to hike or snowshoe instead. We hiked out... By this late in the season, the trails were groomed, but the snow was very icy and fast. Not the best conditions to get used to new "fast" skis!

Crafting

2008-02-28T09:12:00.006-06:00

Some of you know that I'm a bit of a crafter. Since I left Stampin' Up! I've found that my new favorite stamping company is Papertrey Ink. Nicole (the genius behind the stamps) posted the suggestion yesterday of using patterned paper and a square punch for a card layout. I had a little time last night and found her suggestion to work perfectly for this card. It is made with some retired(?) Stampin' Up! designer paper, pretty-in-pink, and old olive cardstock and an old sell-a-bration set "So Very". The inside has some other various sentiments to complete my thought...

Sorry about the photo quality. I'm working on that...

Thanks for stopping by. I'll probably have more vacation photos next week after our ski weekend at Giants Ridge.

Black River Skiing

2008-02-26T18:59:00.006-06:00

I am a wildcat...

We had a great time skiing this past weekend at some of the best trails we've ever skiied. Black River State Forest, WI was perfectly groomed and has really fun hills! We skiied about 2 hours each day, completing almost all of the "intermediate" trails in the system.

Forestville Cross Country Skiing

2008-01-27T20:55:00.000-06:00

I got a chance to try out my new tripod and the camera timer. I barely made it back to the railing with Brian before the 10 seconds was up!

The weather was fantastic! We saw numerous people out enjoying the nice day. This was taken at the overlook point.

Merry Christmas!

2007-12-24T12:46:00.000-06:00

Check out my silly husband! :) That's a plunger stuck to his head...

I'm back...

2007-09-22T12:39:00.000-05:00

I'm slow, I know it. We finally have an unscheduled weekend, so I can tell you all about the past few weekends.
Labor Day weekend was the Midwest Tandem Rally in Appleton. I thought the most fun part about that was seeing some of the unique bikes - especially the "family bikes". I snapped this at one of the rest stops.
The next rally that we will probably attend will be in Rochester in 2009.

Superior National Forest

2007-08-05T14:21:00.000-05:00

This past weekend we spent 4 and a half days tenting and mountain biking in the Superior National Forest. It was a really nice time, the weather was perfect for tenting, and the bugs weren't too thick. We had a full or nearly full moon that glowed above the lake most of the nights. I tried to capture the moonglow with my camera, but it was too dark, it just confused the camera. The water was still as glass. At left is a picture of Lake Harriet, we heard there were great blueberry patches in the camping area there, so we went looking. We only found raspberries and lots of great scenery!
I love the simplicity of being in the woods with only the stuff you need for survival during that time. We had some great campfires in the evenings.
The mountain biking was pretty bad. The Superior National Forest is not exactly a mountain biking destination. We got out for a ride every day, but the trails usually left us wishing we had gone to Wisconsin. The 2 biking shots are an example of what good riding is in the SNF and another of the worst trail we'd been on. The trails there have a tendency to hold water, so there are mud hazards regularly. They don't have any established single trail riding, it's all just minimally maintained roads that are open to ATVs, bikes, Jeeps, etc. These pictures are from the Pancore Lake loop, one of the recommended routes.