Here come the winter holidays!

Well, it’s been a wonderful couple of weeks with beautiful weather and a change in the seasons. It’s finally feeling like fall around here with nice days anywhere from the 60’s to the 80’s. We’ve also had a lot more play-days in the park lately and have loved having the house open and airy…Ahhh!
Thanksgiving was nice for us (hope it was for you too). Kevin’s boss invited us again this year and Aanika was old enough this year to drive the kiddie Jeep all by herself. She’s got to get the steering concept down, but otherwise, she had a ball (it’s been decided that she’s not getting one any time soon).

She also helped me do some baking this year and we made pumpkin pies as well as a blueberry pudding cake. Yummy!
The day after Thanksgiving, Aanika was my little helper elf and we brought down the decorations out of the attic. We’re finally getting in the mood for Christmas and have managed to get the house decorated. It’s really hard to get in the spirit of things when you’re walking around outside without a coat on and wondering when it’s going to get cold!

Last Sunday we were able to get our lights up on the house because Kev was brave enough to climb to the peak again for me this year. It was absolutely beautiful that day and Aanika even helped put the lights in the bushes.

Whew! Too much happening

Wow, it’s been months since our last update. Things got crazy around here with hurricanes and such that I just got out of the routine of doing these. I’ll do my best to catch you up on everything. We’ve had vacations, hurricanes, a huge growth spurt, visitors from out of state (2 states, actually) and Aanika started school and goes two days a week. On top of that, we’ve got playgroup, playdates, Mommom’s functions with the MOMS Club (welcome committee chairmom) and the neighborhood women’s group (social coord.) and general fun days with Daddy when he’s home. Whew! That’s enough to keep anyone busy…and compared to other families, we’re not busy! Down here in Texas, we’re finding out that it’s all about ‘bigger and best’ and your kids have to be busy and occupied every day of the week. Thankfully, we deliberately keep ourselves from being too busy and are quite content with our nice peaceful family life!
Aanika is getting very tall, is learning sign language (at least 30 words already), and is smarter than a whip. She’s keeping us on our toes because she picks up on everything you say! She’s also developing a great sense of humor too. She was always quite funny, but now she makes jokes and teases and tries to pull the wool over your eyes with her tricks! Check out her sense of humor in the picture of her dinner plate....those are grapes in case you're wondering.

Little Hula Girl

Here's Aanika and momma after a women's group party - it was a Luau and momma was the party greeter.

This is Aanika doing her own version of the Hula!

Do as I say, not as I do

Aanika's really talking! Lately she is saying her name “Anka” in just about every sentence she uses. It’s really cute because instead of saying ‘I’ or ‘mine’ it usually comes out as “my Anka” and it’s almost always at the END of the sentence. Here’s a typical sentence if Daddy’s playing with her toy ice cream cone (see pic): “No no Daddy ice cream cone my Anka” – it’s not grammatically correct but she’s very clear on what she means!
Seeing it’s been so hot lately, it IS August in Texas you know, we tend to stay inside during the hottest part of the day and play in the morning or early evening before the mosquitoes come out. The picture here involves an after dinner shot of “the kids” playing in the backyard. The third kid that I have (you know the big one as Kevin) is an 8 yr old boy that we watch a couple days during the week, Cameron, and he loves golf. After a few crazy hits with the practice balls, they decided that they needed to be retrieved…hey, have you ever heard the phrase “do as I say, not as I do”? Well, Aanika was getting an early lesson in it!

Camping on the beach

This week has been relatively uneventful so I’ll give you a recap of our trip to Michigan and our recent camping adventure. We had a great time in MI even though the weather was unpredictable. It went from the high 50’s to the 80’s while we were there…we even had the heat on! June in Michigan…did I tell you that that’s why we moved? Well, winter’s the other reason!
Our camping adventure was just that. OUR part of it was fun and relaxing, but it’s those pesky neighbors that you can’t control. Between the 4 (yes, four) barking dogs on one side and the very intoxicated neighbors on the other with their late-into-the-night screaming/fighting, well there isn’t much else to say! Oh, I forgot to mention the mariachi music at 4a.m. – that was the final highlight of the night. All in all we had fun but one of the best parts was the water fun. We were camping in a county park and it was only a short walk through the campground to get to the Gulf. The water was hot like bathwater and you actually had to get OUT of the water to cool off. I guess that explains why there was a tropical storm this week!

The picture is at the campsite and Aanika on her way to the beach.

The little singer

Someone turned on the furnace down here! Ouchie…been in the high 90’s this week and it’s not gonna change for a while I think – we’ve had no rain for several weeks so it’s keeping the humidity low (for the time being). This is the time of year when you plan your afternoons around staying indoors between the hours of Noon and 3pm! Hot as it is, we’re planning an overnight camping trip to the coast today (Saturday) to see how Aanika does. We’d like to eventually take a week-long trip somewhere but we need to see how well she’ll adapt to a tent. She thought it was fun enough when it was set up in the living room (Kevin’s idea) but it might be a whole other issue when it’s surrounded by “nature” and other people. Actually, it could be interesting because of it being so close to the 4th – we’re hoping it won’t be too bad because the county we’ll be in has a burning ban enacted because of the dry conditions but time will tell!
This is one of Aanika's favorite activities lately with her daddy....FLYING!

Our trip to Michigan went well, but it was quite chilly and cool. We’ll do pictures and an update of that next time. I must say, the trip did nothing to change the still active obsession with Aurora (Sleeping Beauty). We’ve attached a short video clip this week of Aanika showing off her singing skills. In the video, they’re singing ‘Hail to the King, Hail to the Queen, Hail to Princess Aurora’ and it’s all done with much pomp and circumstance. Well, she’s been working on her singing and it’s the part about Princy A-Roar-Aahhhh (you’ll understand this spelling when you see the clip). Over and over and over…all day long…everywhere.

Thumb Sucking Solution!

Aanika is doing wonderfully since her surgery and is sleeping and resting much better. She’s even starting to lose the dark circles that were always under her eyes! Our ‘big’ event going on now is that we’re trying to stop the thumb sucking that she does when she’s waking up in the morning. Several months ago, Kevin got her to stop the nighttime sucking just by leaning over her and saying “Don’t suck your thumb”…she hasn’t done it since! The task for morning sucking is harder because we’re still in bed too, so we’ve come up with something that Aanika thinks is fun ~ she wears a sock on her hand. It’s so cute, when she gets up in the morning, she puts it back in her sock drawer and at night, she reminds us to put it on her. She’s just a hoot of a kid.
This week we had Aanika's first "lesson" in swimming....she loved the splashing!
Aanika and Mommom are off to Michigan next week (looks like it’ll be dreary and cool) for a visit. Kevin has a monster of a week with 2 large hospitals “going live” with their new computer programs in the Units. Needless to say, if we were still here at home, we wouldn’t be seeing much of him! We might even be going over to Grand Rapids for the Bethany International Festival, which is the agency’s big event of the year. This is who we used for her adoption and several of the families we traveled with to China are coming in from out of state. Oughta be fun!

Adenoid Surgery

What a time we’ve had since our last update! Aanika came through her surgery with flying colors (this past Thursday) and was back to acting like her old self by that evening. We are so pleased with the results…it’s amazing that her speech and sleeping have already both improved. We could hear a difference in her breathing immediately as well as hearing air movement through her nose when she spoke! It’s kind of strange though because it sounds like bubbles gurgling when she talks…hopefully that’ll go away when the swelling goes down.

Well, we’ve been here one whole year already (can you believe it?!) and we’re set for a record-breaking week of high temperatures (93/71 through Wed). The neighborhood fun pool isn’t open yet, and if you remember from last summer, a critter popped our little play pool so we went out today and bought a bigger and better model! It’s actually large enough for all 3 of us to lay in it and more than enough room for romping around.

1st Emergency Room Visit

The things going on at the moment is that Aanika is slowly getting over her separation anxiety, still growing like a weed and is scheduled for Adenoid removal surgery on May 19th. She has almost complete closure of her nasal airway. Her tonsils should come out too, but she is at least one year too young for that procedure. Hopefully this will help solve the sleeping issues that has bothered her for so long! The other thing that happened recently is that Aanika had her first trip to the Emergency Room. She popped her elbow out of place (Nursmaid's Elbow), just before bedtime, while teasing her Daddy. Luckily it was a quick and simple fix and 5 minutes afterwards you would never have known anything was wrong.

Happy Spring

Happy Spring! It’s been a great couple of weeks here – warm, sunny & breezy. Sorry for no update last weekend, nothing huge went on that week I guess! This past week was another one for projects. We’ve been wanting our back patio to be more ‘welcoming’ and comfortable but haven’t really been sure what to do back there. In the late afternoon and early evening, the sun makes the patio brutally hot and you can’t enjoy the space. Well, we were watching a program together and saw something we thought we could pull off – it took me a while to figure out exactly HOW to do it and only a few days to actually pull it all together. The sheer, white curtains you see in the picture can be opened up to make a wonderful shady area that blocks out the sun but still allows you to see through them into the backyard.
Events going on in Aanika’s life this week are kind of limited at the moment. She’s going through some separation anxiety and won’t even let us leave her at one of her favorite places, the kids play space at our gym. Seeing that we’ve never had to deal with this before, we’re kind of at a loss as to what triggered it (we think it might have something to do with Mama's grieving over Girlcat). The other day we were at the pediatrician’s office for an immunization and she stuck to me like glue when she saw the toys…I guess she thought it was another play place I was going to leave her in. It’s really kind of funny though because every time we get somewhere, she starts pointing at herself and saying “me me me” which, in Aanika language, means take me with you! Hopefully she’ll get over this soon…

Easter

Happy Easter! It’s been a quiet week for us here as Aanika has had a bit of a tummy bug that she decided she’d share with her momma. We’re on the mend thankfully and are looking forward to a wonderful week with the temps forecasted to be in the 70’s-80’s all week and mostly sunny. This week has also involved a huge jump in language use for Aanika. She’s starting to put together sentences that tell you exactly what she’s wanting. It’s so great to see the changes - I’m really looking forward to the days that I don’t have to be a mind reader or an interpreter!

We’re pretty excited that we were able to get Aanika’s tables completely finished this weekend. The picnic table is stained ‘Rosewood’ and has a nice varnished finish on it. The white play-table was quite fun to do too. I cut up a wallpaper border and did a decoupage technique with it (just a fancy word for tons ‘o glue) around all four sides of the table and down onto each leg. When I was thinking of how to decorate it, I could see it being fun and playful with a bit of a whimsical flair…mind you, this is a huge feat for me seeing that I like everything symmetrical and linear - we think it turned out great!

The picture is of Aanika wearing her new easter hat from Bompa Marx.

Furniture 101

Well, things are back into the groove again this week. Kevin’s brother and his wife (they’re from Kansas) came to visit us this past week for spring break. We went to Rodeo Houston and saw some awesome bull riding, spent an afternoon on Galveston Island and ate some fantastic seafood ~ basically we had a really great time. The guys actually managed to get in a round of golf on Friday before they had to leave. We’ll have some pictures later to show you. Aanika sure loved having them here!

The last two weekends were spent doing projects…Thankfully, Aanika is such a Daddy’s-girl on the weekends, I get to do the household projects with little interruption. Oh, in case you’re wondering, the bathroom is now Bullfrog Green (you gotta see it…very cool) and the office is almost the color of butterscotch. Both colors are very unique but they “fit” the rooms they’re in. Yesterday and today were Furniture Building 101. Kevin and I built, from scratch, a child-size play table that Aanika can use for drawing, Legos, or her little people village. The other item is a picnic table (just her size) that is absolutely adorable! Aanika was very helpful too! She would hand Kevin screws and was helping me with the sanding. We had to draw the line though when she wanted to play with the wood glue and paint!

Aanika is doing really well and is still just the sweetest little kid. We truly are blessed to have the opportunity to have her in our lives. The other day we were trying to remember what we used to do before she came ~ she has given us so much!

Girlcat

Aanika turned two and suddenly became a comical and funny kid. We always thought she was silly but it’s like something clicked and she knew she was funny! One event that really tickled me was that she was trying to stand like me one day as I was waiting in line at a store. I have a tendency to lean my hip into things and rest one foot on top of the other and, like I said in one of my other posts, she wants to do everything that Mommom is doing…well, after falling over a few times, she decided she couldn’t do it and gave up. It sure gave everyone around us a pretty good chuckle! She’s really quite amazing and continues to thrill us. Last night we were watching a movie that she had never seen and, as the music crescendo’d as the movie came to a close, she hollered out “all done” and looked to us to turn it off! We have no idea how she knew it was done, but she did…we can’t figure it out. Every day it’s something new!

On a sad note, another event that happened this week was that our sweet little kitty “Girlcat” unexpectedly passed away during the night on Wednesday. She was almost 15 years old and had been with us since she was only a few weeks old. It’s crazy how attached you get to a pet but, needless to say, Momma did not and handle it very well and cried for 3 days. She had a great year though and really seemed to enjoy it here. She was a sweet natured and lovable pet and will be terribly missed.

Salon de Momma

Wow, Aanika’s almost 2 years old already! We’re having a little party with some of her friends from church and we’ve ordered our first official theme birthday cake – The Three Princesses. This is her new obsession…Cinderella (her favorite), Belle, and Jasmine. We were shopping for ‘big girl’ diapers the other day and she started going crazy! Sure enough, there was a box with the 3 girls on it, which means that they’re also ON the panties. She was so excited, when we got home, she ripped the package open and was playing with the panties like they were toys! So, to sum it up for you, we have the diapers, the invitations, the cake and the decorations. What’s gonna be next?

This week we got haircuts at Salon de Momma. She saw me cutting mine and of course, being a 2 yr old, had to do the same thing. Well, you know I’m not going to turn the scissors over to her so I gave her a bit of a trim on her bangs. She’s looking so grown up now! Where’d that little baby go? The picture of the little sweetie is above.

On a funny note, after I cut my hair, it seemed very familiar to me so I went to check it out…yup, I gave myself my 7th grade haircut but without as much length! Check the picture out for yourself. Kevin thought it was amazing that after 27 years, I don’t look that much different - I’m just thankful that I have great genes!

Big Girl Bed

This week was kind of a quiet week in regards to what’s happening in Aanika’s world…only 1 real big event. I mentioned a while ago that we were trying to get her bedroom put together, décor-wise (it’s being decorated ‘adult enough’ to be a second guest room). No character theme rooms yet! Well, we’ve made a huge transition for her – she’s in a big girl bed now! We couldn’t really go forward with our plans for the room until we knew what kind of arrangement we would do with a real bed. So, about 2 weeks ago we made the leap and did it – the crib was taken apart and we did a few nights of a test run with a mattress on the floor to see if she’d stay in the bed without getting up (success!). She thought her new arrangement was pretty great seeing she could play on the bed with her best friend, Teddy, the big yellow bear. We did decide to put up some bed rails on it though because she’s a total wiggle-butt when she’s sleeping. It’d be quite a long drop if she wiggled into the wrong spot! So after a few practices of getting in and out, she’s become quite comfortable with it. It’s so cute, when she’s done sleeping, she knocks on her door until we come and get her! I have to admit though, I am NOT looking forward to the day when she can turn that doorknob.

Post-Holiday breather

Wow…it’s been over 1 month since our last posting! The holidays were quite busy around here and we were steadily accumulating pictures to send. Now that I’ve finally gotten a bit of a breather, I figured I better get to it! Sorry it’s a bit long, but hey, it’s been a long time…

After our last post, we went on a whirlwind weekend trip to MI for some final adoption paperwork (yea!) with Joy, our social worker, in Grand Rapids and an oh so very brief time of visiting family and friends. On the way home we avoided a snowstorm in Chicago (thanks to Continental Airlines rescuing us), we hurried back for Kevin’s office party that we hosted at our house a couple of days later, one final week of Christmas shopping, then we packed it all back up again and headed to Oma & Opa’s cottage on the mountain in Missouri for Christmas. WHEW! It was crazy for a couple weeks but it was worth it. On New Years eve, we had an early dinner out at my favorite restaurant and came home and relaxed until the new year rang in. New Year’s day was absolutely beautiful here and Kevin and Aanika decided they were going to wash Daddy’s car. Needless to say, she was completely soaked shortly into it!

The next weekend was warm and wonderful too so we decided it was time to do our winter plant maintenance. Aanika was a great little helper with her little mini rake and broom and she’s also a great stick pile builder. We’re enjoying the time that she wants to be around us to “help” because we know soon enough that we’re not gonna be cool enough for her to be around all the time!