Growth

Six months ago when we'd drive by a park (or really, someone's swingset even) Heidi Jean would yell out "Park! Park!" Today when we drove by a park Heidi Jean yelled "Mama, I see a park!"

Six months ago Heidi used to sing random words to random songs (like, say the Dora theme song). Today there are three songs that she'll sing parts of the chorus of. The winners of the three catchiest country songs to a toddler are:

Little White Church by Little Big Town [Heidi loves to sing "Take down, take down, take down white church!"

Undo It by Carrie Underwood [Something about that "un-uh-un-uh-un do it!"]

And the third and possibly most ironic of all three...

Lover, Lover by Jerrod Niemann [not sure what my reaction should be to my 2-year old sing "lova, lova, lova!"]

Six months ago Heidi had just started getting addicted to carrying her "BABY" dolls around the house. Today, Heidi said "hold baby Emmett" and then she did.

Edited to add, I forgot this one from tonight. We talked about how we are going camping tomorrow with our aunts and cousins and gramafarm and how much fun it was going to be. And then, since she hasn't had a good nap in days, she had a major meltdown when she realized we were going home instead of going camping. I said "Heidi, you don't even know what camping is!" and she said (I swear to God I'm not making this up) "I do! sleeping in a tent!"

Relay for LIfe 2010

This year's Relay was so different from last year's in so many ways. Last year we were all so fresh in our grief over losing Keagen. We didn't even start planning for Relay until a month or so beforehand, but our team was large and full of love. That hasn't changed.

This year we started fundraising a lot earlier and through a lot of different methods. We continued our fundraising right through Relay night as we sold Jimmy's To Go beef sandwiches and ran a bounce house for the kiddos. We set up early in the morning on Friday and were all gathering around 5 o'clock to start the festivities. It was so hot and sticky, but we enjoyed walking around and looking at all of the booths and Heidi Jean especially enjoyed the bounce house. She must have bounced for 4 hours on-and-off and was still talking about it as we walked to the truck for her and Daddy to go home at 9pm.

Unfortunately this year's Relay was cut short by thunderstorms. By 9:30 the lightening was starting to fill the sky and by 10pm nearly everyone was loading up their tents and heading for home. Disappointed doesn't even begin to describe it after all of the work that we put in to get ready for Relay. I really missed that 3am quiet time when you're just walking with your loved ones, thinking about the ones that aren't there, enjoying the night and the quiet and the experience.

The silver lining was that I did get to go to the closing ceremonies this year, since I slept! We were so proud of our team as we won the Most Improved Team award for nearly doubling our fundraising from last year. And so proud of the Reedsburg Relay for raising over $99,000 to fight cancer.

Here's Heidi and Kaileigh trying out the bounce house after set-up:

Jayme introducing Laura who served as the honorary chair and gave a speech about her experience as a cancer mom:

Laura giving her speech. We all got our cry out by 6:15.

Heidi and Ethan riding on the Merry-go-round

More bounce house, Daddy "pushing" Heidi so she fell down

Seth trying to tame one of the lounge chairs

Heidi actually brave enough to ride the train all by herself. She didn't smile though or release her death-grip on the steering wheel.

She's under all that hair somewhere!

On to Relay 2011, I guess. Bigger and better things await!

Menu Plan Monday

If you were previously unaware, I'm a menu planner. I lag at times, but I really enjoy doing it, spend a lot less money on groceries when I do it, and we eat a lot healthier. So it's just perks all around.

This week's menu includes:

Monday: BBQ Chicken Pizza (leftover chicken from last week) on Wildtree whole wheat crust

Tuesday: Grilled salmon w/roasted broccoli and cauliflower

Wednesday: My Birthday :) Possibly pizza (Digiorno's were on sale) and salad

Thursday: Grilled Pork Skewers w/ some kind of potato and cooked carrots

Friday: Relay for Life munchies! I'm taking Tostitos and Fiesta Dip and possibly something else, if I get around to making more. Maybe Jigglers!

Saturday: Grandma and Grandpa's Anniversary party

Sunday: Homemade chicken tenders, macaroni and cheese, green beans

I'm hungry now :)

How to break Dad's Heart

Conversations this morning:

D: What's a daddy deer called?

H: MOOOOOOooo!

D: Moo? Not Moo! What's a daddy deer called?"

H: [Pause]

D: What's a Mommy deer called?

H: Doe!

D: What's a daddy deer called?

H: Doe!

You could say we asked for it

I'm cooking dinner in the kitchen the other night. Josh is...I don't know, doing something. Heidi was puttering around near my legs (as always). Probably carrying a baby doll and asking for milk, which would by typical.

So I'm just cooking or emptying the dishwasher or something and I hear Josh going "Heidi? Heidi? Where are you?" He comes into the kitchen "where is she?" I'm like, "I don't know, she can't be far." I glance to the stairs and see the gate is pulled shut. The patio doors are both closed. Neither of us hear anything. He goes down towards her bedroom yelling her name and looking for her. Then comes back through the kitchen and into our bedroom and bathroom looking for her.

I sense a presence nearby. I crouch down. There she is. Sitting on the kitchen floor, under the table, in front of a chair. Quiet as can be. We exchange a smile. "Honey, I found her." He comes out, doesn't see her "where is she?" Spotted.

I suppose this is what we get for naming her Heidi.

This isn't the first and won't be the last. Other memorable hiding expeditions include:

--Hiding in mom and dad's shower

--Hiding under a stool in the kitchen

--Hiding under the pool table

I told Josh we should have played along to see how long she could be quiet for :)

What (almost) 2-year-olds do

They Pretend Play in the car...(featuring dollhouse mom and dollhouse toddler girl)

DH Mom: "Do you want to go to the park?"

[Pause]

DH Mom: "uh-huh, you do?"

They hum "thank you" instead of actually saying it. As in "hmmm-hmmmm, Mama!"

They Pretend Play at home with their babies by taking them on a "bumpy" ride to Londontown.

They like shoes. They particularly like to take their shoes off and then try to get them back on. And then say "hep! Hep! Shoes! Hep!"

They like to spot animals while in the car. Then they like to spend the rest of the car trip saying "where deer go? Where go? where deer go? Mama deer, baby deer, where go?" "Tweet tweet! where go?" "cow! baby cow! where cow go?"

Their favorite foods are "choc-it" "O-njiz" ""nanas" "fwa-fwies" "chi-chin" and "MEK!"

They name their baby dolls "baby signing time."

They love to go the Papafarm and grandmafarms to see the "GOATS!" "PIGS!" "COWS."

They get T'd off if you say you're going to Grandma and Papa's, but then you go home first. Or say you're going to the store but forget something at home and turn back. Or promise you're going to Aunt Laura's and then make them go to sleep first. Apparently the concepts of "after we have dinner" and "tomorrow" are not yet developed.