December 2008

After recovering from our Thanksgiving stomach flu, it was time to get full swing into the holidays.

The month started out normal enough. We went to North Bend with the Neels again to pick out our trees. Becky took the kids to Alderwood to get their pictures with Santa. She's convinced that Alderwood's Santa is the best one in the area though you can see from the picture that Blake didn't agree (those fancy outfits they wore were made by Grandma Jan). Kyla finally got to tell the big man that should wanted to get a Barbie Diamond Castle, which she'd been pining for for quite some time.

Then a week before Christmas, the snow fell. School was canceled and for the most part we had to stay home. On the plus side we had a blast playing in the snow and sledding down the hill, at least until one of our cranky neighbors complained to the city to keep the road sanded.

Fortunately we were still able to keep most of our Christmas schedule. On Christmas Eve we were at the Chambers'. The next morning the kids got to open their gifts from Santa (who delivered on the castle) and later Linda, Casey, Jody, and Jen came to our place for breakfast. That night we went to Dot's to
celebrate with the Pritchards. Next we spent a couple of days in Ellensburg where the kids were excited to see deer come visit and Becky was able to sneak away to do some skiing with Cassie and Brian. Finally we had dinner at the Hovenkotters' with the Bouchees.

On Becky's birthday she went to see the Nutcracker ballet with Linda and Kyla. On New Years Eve I took the kids back to the Chambers' to play and do some fireworks while Doug took Becky to the mall to do a little birthday shopping (and Christmas returns).

Overall I would say that the holidays went pretty well, however there were a lot of forces working against us. I had a big deployment that ended up happening on December 22nd, so I had to put in a lot of hours leading up to my vacation. The kids really enjoyed all of the gifts and spending time with friends and family, but doing so much within such a short period was pretty overwhelming and resulted in some crankiness and late bedtimes. Then of course there was the snow that overstayed it's welcome thanks to cold temperatures and kept us at home more than we would have liked.

It's fair to say that 2008 was a pretty good year for our family, though it had some ups and downs. The dismal economy hasn't had much of a direct impact on us (yet) as I have remained employed, we don't intend to sell our house any time soon, and I refuse to look at my 401k statements. Hopefully 2009 will be better still.

Holiday Message 2008

On paper (or on screen, who writes on paper anymore?), 2008 seems like a pretty uneventful year for the Hovenkotter family. For the first time since Brett and Becky met they had an entire calendar year with no moves, new jobs, weddings, pregnancies, or births. However to us, 2008 was anything but boring.

Kyla now goes to preschool three days a week and has learned to read and write short words, do simple arithmetic on her hands, and manipulate her parents with sweetness. She has participated in a number of activities including gymnastics, swimming, and soccer, but her favorite is now ballet, for which she begged Becky to sign her up for two months.

Over the past year Blake has gone from crawling to walking to running and definitely keeps us on our toes. We've lost count of the number of words he's learned to say and is even dabbling in complete sentences. He's also developed this strange obsession with turning the lights in the house on and off. His interests are more traditionally male than Kyla's which thrills his father who thus far has been a good sport when he's been asked to play Barbies.

Becky still excels at full time motherhood (she's had a lot to do with Kyla's reading and writing), but her favorite hobby is long distance running. She often trains and races with her sister-in-law Cassie and thus far she has done several trail runs, three half marathons and two full marathons. The first marathon was on the hottest day of the year (over 90 degrees!) and the second was in Portland. In her negligible amount of free time she's been going on dates with her husband, reading the Twilight series, and whacking newbies on Mob Wars.

Brett continues to enjoy working in the software industry and has been on the same Internet video delivery project for the whole year. When the latest iPhone was launched he was again there in line on the first day, and ever the master of romance he bought one for Becky on their anniversary (and she loves it!). After the stock market plummeted he even bought some shares of Apple stock so that he could get some return on all of this money he gives the company. Other than his geek interests, Brett also became very interested in the election and watched a lot of The Daily Show from the elliptical.

Hopefully everyone this message finds is having a wonderful holiday and that all of this snow hasn't afflicted you with cabin fever. We look forward to seeing you all soon.

Sincerely,
Brett, Becky, Kyla, & Blake

Kyla's Brief Trip To The Police Station

After spending the afternoon at Grandma Ruby's, Becky took the kids back to the car, but Kyla started throwing a fit and wouldn't get in her car seat. After considerable effort to get her buckled in, Becky finally gave up and started driving.

Kyla began screaming that she had to stop driving or should would die (we've done a good job instilling in her the importance of car seats and seat belts). Becky told her to get strapped in but Kyla persisted in her refusal, so she drove them straight to the Renton Police Station (which was only a few blocks away). Once there Becky told her that if she didn't put it on that she would go get a police officer to come and explain to her that she needed to wear it.

Not wanting to get the law involved, Kyla reluctantly gave in but she cried the whole way home "get this thing off of me!" Despite her protests, Kyla left it on.

Kyla's First Attempt At Cooking On Her Own

Kyla was watching TV in the afternoon and got a jonesing for some Mac and Cheese. She'd watched Becky do this a dozen times, so she figured that since she was a big kid now, she wouldn't bother Mommy.

She emptied a box of Macaroni into a plastic bowl (forgetting the water) and put it in the microwave. She punched in 3 minutes like she remembered, pressed the start button, and returned to her show.

The only problem is she punched zero one too many times. Becky was upstairs when she smelled something funny and came running to find a smokey kitchen. Fortunately no damage was done, except for that burnt plastic odor that lingered for a couple of days.

Kyla has promised not to cook solo again until she gets a little bigger.

November 2008

November began with the end of the election. This year, anticipating a favorable outcome, we had a small party at our house to celebrate, keeping the guest list to people we knew were of the same political persuasion so that we wouldn't have to tone down our jubilation.

While the month may have started out great, it didn't end particularly well. The night before Thanksgiving Becky came down with the stomach flu and had to spend Turkey Day home alone while I took the kids to her Dad's in the afternoon and my Aunt's in the evening. On Saturday she started feeling better, but then both Kyla and Blake caught it. Kyla's recovery was swift for the most part, but Blake was pretty lethargic for days. I finally got it Sunday night.

Fortunately my mom came to visit and helped us get through it. She ended up staying with us for five days and I'm not sure how we would have managed without her. For all of her generosity she was rewarded by coming down with the bug herself, though she only dealt with it for a day or so.

Kyla is now learning to write words. She started with "Mom" and "Dad" as well as her own name. Since then she's been able to write a number of short, phonetic words.

Blake's sleeping habits have shown some improvement, though it doesn't take much to cause him to have a bad night (teething, illness, etc). As with Kyla, these advances have tradeoffs in the form of being more difficult to get to sleep in the first place. Basically what Becky and I have gained in sanity we've lost in free time.

The holiday season has officially begun (to me the official start is Thanksgiving, which means that is the first day I will listen to Christmas music without cringing). Despite our being hit with sickness right off the bat, I think we're in pretty good shape. Becky has a big jump start on the shopping and I don't think we're too overloaded with commitments. Becky and I have been a little afraid of the holidays after last year was so difficult, but was when we had to deal with my grandmother's death, planning a big 30th birthday bash, and some very snowy weather during a time when a good night's sleep was impossible to come by.

I have faith that this year will be better and I'm looking forward to enjoying the end-of-year festivities.

October 2008

The weather has been uncharacteristically nice for October, but the days are getting shorter and the leaves are changing colors, so autumn is in full swing.

For a while now Kyla has been bugging Becky about wanting to take ballet classes. A new dance studio opened up in our neighborhood and she would point it out whenever they'd drive by. Becky, realizing that this wasn't just a fleeting interest, signed her up for a class that teaches tap dancing and ballet, and Kyla is really enjoying it.

With the holidays just a couple of months away (it sneaks up on me faster each year), we've been receiving catalogs in the mail, and Kyla loves looking through the toy sections. She has circled every item that she wants on her Christmas list, which basically consists of every princess looking thing in it. I tried to encourage interest in more gender-neutral toys, but to no avail.

Blake on the other hand is more interested in the boy toys. I tried to convince Becky that he needed the massive Millennium Falcon we saw at Costco, but she didn't go for it. He will play with Kyla's dolls from time to time (usually when she is), but his current toy-du-jour is trains.

So of course he also likes Thomas and Friends on TV. Yes, Blake has started getting exposed to the evils of television, though we work to keep it to a minimum. Unfortunately his other favorite show is Barney, which for some reason grates on my nerves, though I can see its education value.

Blake has been teething lately, which has led him to chew holes in his pacifiers. Once he punctures one, it no longer sucks quite the same and he rejects it. As a result, we've been making almost daily runs to buy new ones (including one run I did at 2 am). Each pacifier costs about $3, which doesn't sound like much but when he goes through a few a day, it really adds up. I'd estimate that we've spent about $200 on them just this month.

On a more positive note, he has started to learn the names of various body parts. He now knows the words for the parts of his face, his hands, his feet, and of course his butt.

Becky and Cassie ran the Portland Marathon this month. They drove down with Blake and my mother while Kyla and I stayed home. Becky found this run to be much better organized than the ones she's done before and was much happier with her time.

As always October ended with Halloween, which like Christmas has become an event that spans several days. The kids wore their costumes to a birthday party, an autumn fair in the Highlands, Stroller Strides, and of course on Halloween night. Kyla and Blake went trick or treating down our street and up the one behind us with some of their friends and brought home an impressive haul. Blake was a little too shy to walk up to the front doors of strangers' houses, but it's no big loss since he is allergic to most of the candy they were handing out. The Candy Monster arrived again to displace Kyla and Blake's least favorite pieces of candy with toys.

Now we begin the holiday season, which I hope we weather better than we did last year, otherwise it will be a lot scarier than Halloween.

September 2008

Summer is over and September was a mix of good and bad weather, as it usually is. Many people claim that fall is their favorite time of year, which I don't really understand; isn't warmer weather better than cooler weather? On the other hand, fall isn't typically as busy as summer.

Kyla started going to a soccer club on Sundays. One of the large fields in Central Park gets divided up amongst the various teams and there are easily over one hundred kids there. Of course she has several buddies on her team and it is a big social event for the parents who can chit chat with each other on the sidelines. There aren't any real games though at the end of practice the teams will usually divide in two and play scrimmages.

On the 20th Becky and the kids left to go camping with Linda in Winthrop for a few days. They relaxed, went swimming, and roasted marshmallows by the campfire. I stayed behind to do some chores and enjoy the quiet house (though I did miss them).

Kyla's interest in death has abated a bit, though it still comes up from time to time. She explained to Becky that if I were to do then she'd need to learn to drive so that she could go to work and make money for the family. She's pretty sweet in a morbid kind of way.

I may have dropped a notch or two on the pedestal children put their parents on. Kyla came home one day and explained that she figured that her Uncle Casey, who is a gymnast and with a burly physique, could lift about 10 giants, and asked if I could lift that many too. Trying to be honest and show a sense of modesty I confessed to only being capable of lifting eight or nine giants.

Her academic talents now include some basic arithmetic. Kyla can perform addition and subtraction on her fingers so as long as the numbers don't go higher than 10, she's fine. I suppose our next objective will be to get her to include her toes.

Blake's new favorite activity is turning lights on and off. He'll walk up to one, point at it and yell "on!" over and over until I pick him up so he can work the switch. I wonder if children in the 19th century found candles this exciting.

The election season is in high gear and is dominating the news. People are talking about it constantly (well some people are anyway). We haven't seem much of the presidential campaign directly since the primaries because Washington isn't a swing state, which must help prevent North-westerners from getting too sick of it.

August 2008

Ah August, the last full month of Summer when we enjoy good weather, light traffic, a bit of leisure time, and Kyla's birthday.

Early in the month Becky's Aunt Laura and cousin Bryanna came to visit for a week and we all went to Jetty Island for a day, which is a park in Everett. Becky and Linda packed a nice lunch for us though the seagulls scavenged through it whenever we'd walk away from our set up. The kids loved playing in the wet sand and building a sand castle. We went for a walk to the edge of the shore and by the time we got there our feet would sink almost a foot into the mud with every step.

In the middle of the month we traveled to Chelan to hang out with my mother's family. The temperature climbed above 100 degrees every day we were there, but it made the lake feel far more tolerable than usual. Kyla swam in her life jacket and would jump off the dock to me. Blake stayed on the beach playing with the sand and throwing it all over the place. By the time we headed home we had all darkened a bit, I even had a section of my back that had burned (take my advice, get someone else to put your sunscreen on your back).

Thus far jealousy hasn't been a big issue between the kids, but Kyla has been asking Becky if she loves her more than Blake. Becky answers by explaining that she doesn't love either of them more than the other, but she loves them each differently. Kyla still seems to feel that there should be a quantity to love and she explained to me that she loves Mommy more than me, but she misses me a lot when I'm at work.

Apparently Blake does too because he's been getting very upset in the morning when he knows I'm about to leave. This is kind of a new thing for me, usually this has been Becky's problem. I've been working on trying to slip out, but he knows my routine and after he sees me get dressed he clings on.

Blake has made some advances with his vocabulary having learned about a dozen words (or close approximations), which is really nice for us because it is a little easier to figure out what he wants. His favorite toy is a stuffed dog my mother made for him that he refers to as "Gaga." This apparently means "furry thing" because this is also his word for dogs and cats.

I remember this phase with Kyla and every month for the next couple years I'll be tempted to generically state that I'm amazed by how fast Blake is picking up new words. The nice thing about going through this a second time is that I'm already good at watching my language.

Kyla's 4th Birthday Party

In the past Becky and I have enjoyed having a big function at our house for Kyla's birthday party but after attending a number of other birthdays at Little Gym, Build-a-Bear, and Pump It Up, I knew that our tradition was going to end this year.

Kyla picked Kidz Bounce in Preston as the venue. Because Asher's birthday is only two days after hers, we combined our party with the Neel's so we had the whole place to ourselves.

The kids had a great time bouncing, climbing, and sliding on the inflatable play toys, and so did several of the adults. We fed everyone pizza and when it was time for dessert there were candles spelling out "Happy Birthday" across both cakes. When they opened presents both Kyla and Asher had their own big blown up thrown to sit in, and they were joined by whomever's present they were unwrapping.

After we got everything packed up some of the guests came to our house for to help finish off the leftovers and watch Kyla's new movie (yes I'm still making those).

The nice thing about having a party at a venue like Kidz Bounce is that there is a lot less preparation and cleanup work, though we're still looking forward to having a couple more parties for Blake at home.

July 2008

July was a nice summer month. The weather was pretty nice and we weren't too busy.

On the 4th we went to a neighbor's house, the Mullets, to play and eat some barbecue. They had a wonderful view where Kyla and Becky were able to see several fireworks displays (Blake pooped out so I took him home).

Becky and I decided it was time for a little family vacation so we went on a short camping trip to Port Angeles. We stayed at the KOA there in a small cabin for two nights. Becky finally got to use the propane stove that we received as a wedding present and kept us all well fed. While we were there we visited the Olympic Animal Farm where most of the animals are free-roaming and you feed them bread out of your car windows. Needless to say the kids loved it.

Blake is clearly understanding more and more language. On one particular night I asked Kyla if she wanted to take a bath and he immediately walked into the bathroom, pointed at the tub, and spoke some gibberish that clearly translated into "fill it up, Daddy." These developments have their drawbacks as well since Becky and I now have to spell out certain words when we don't want him to know what we're saying.

If you offer him something he will usually shake his head, but then a second later he'll decide he wants it after all. If we ask him a question he usually says, "no," not because he really means it but he hears the question in your voice and believes that this is always the appropriate response.

Kyla has developed an odd interest in death. She once told Becky "I don't want you to die," and Becky tried telling her she wouldn't, but Kyla replied "well someday you will." Becky decided not to lie and explained that that won't happen for a very long time. Kyla was put somewhat at ease after she told Becky to ask me to take care of her if Becky were to die (though she isn't sure what she'll do while I'm at work). She has also informed me that I should be healthy so I will live longer.

Apple released the new iPhone this month and of course I was there in line on day one to get mine. This year I was about 15th in line because I went to the Bellevue Square Apple Store instead of the Issaquah AT&T store (the geek quotient was higher in this line, which made it more fun). Becky was happy to take my old iPhone as a hand-me-down and is enjoying being able to play Sudoku and Scrabble as well as having constant access to her email. Kyla not wanting to be left out has asked, "when you die can I have your iPhone Mommy?"

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

June 2008

We've been going almost non-stop for the entire month of June, something we haven't really been through since December.

We went to Ellensburg for a few days to attend Lexie's high school graduation. It was the first commencement Ellensburg has ever held outside, so of course it rained. On that trip we also went to Yakima to see Grandma Marian, where my Uncle Mike's kids Katie, Allysa, and Trevor came over and played with Kyla and Blake. The following week we made another trip to the 'Burg, this time just for the day, to attend my mother's retirement party. Then two days after that was Kyle's graduation from UW's architecture program (this time Becky and the kids stayed home).

For Father's Day Becky took me to see The Incredible Hulk (normally it isn't easy to get her to see movies like this) and to Chevy's for dinner while Linda watched the kids. She also made me a nice breakfast for me the next day.

On the 22nd, the day before his 60th birthday, we rode on Bill's last commercial flight from Seatac to Spokane and back. We were a little worried about how the kids would do but Blake was fine for the most part (we brought lots of food with us) and Kyla really seemed to enjoy all of the hoopla surrounding Grandpa Bill. Before we took off from Spokane the fire trucks came out and shot their hoses over the plane as we left.

The final big event of the month was Becky and Cassie's marathon, which they've been training together for for months. Unfortunately on the big day the temperature reached 90 degrees. Amazingly they were able to actually finish the entire thing, however Becky isn't satisfied because of how the heat slowed her down and is determined to run another marathon soon for a better time.

The biggest development of the month is that Kyla can now read three letter words. We were up in the bonus room one night and Becky wrote C-A-T up on the chalk board and Kyla sounded the letters out a few times and declared "cat!" Thinking that Kyla may have just memorized that one Becky wrote several more, and she got them all right.

Blake is gaining a stronger grasp on words. When I was getting ready to leave one morning Becky said to him, "let's go wave to Daddy," (without any visual cues) and he immediately started to wave at me. He seems to know what Dada and Mama mean (though the meaning of Mama seems to be overloaded) and says "Ba" whenever we pass the garage door button because he loves pushing it.

He also has an odd obsession with opening and closing doors. He'll open it, close it, then repeat the process over and over again. His favorite doors are ones that go outside, but he does this indoors as well.

Last month I complained about the lack of warm weather, well that weather has arrived in force. Our schedule for the rest of the summer is a little more relaxed, so hopefully we'll enjoy it.

May 2008

Well Blake figured out that he can walk. He came to this realization at the beginning of the month and within a couple of weeks he had pretty much stopped crawling.

This is definitely a good thing for Becky and I because we couldn't let him crawl in a lot of places where it is fine for him to walk (e.g. sidewalks, the garage, in the grass when it is wet). It is encouraging to think that our lives became just a tiny bit easier.

Kyla is really interested in letters and their sounds. One of her favorite games now is taking her toy letters and trying to make words with them. I've had to explain that you can't just throw a few together randomly and make a word. Occasionally when she says a word, she'll enunciate the individual sounds (e.g. "fff-ee-tuh" for feet). She does all of this on her own initiative; Becky and I are being careful not to pressure her to learn to read so that the process still seems fun.

Kyla's preschool class had a musical performance called Song Fest. They sang some cute songs about counting, the continents of the world, the five senses, and even one that was in an Indian language.

For my birthday Cassie came over for dinner and Becky made Indian food (which I love) for all of us. For Mother's Day I kept the kids busy playing and going out for dinner while Becky went running (she's training for a marathon) and took some much deserved time to relax.

Ruby, Linda, Becky, and Kyla all took a trip to Tillicum Village together, making it a four generation event. They had a good time riding on the boat, eating a salmon feast, and watching the Native American dancing. Surprisingly, Kyla seemed to remember the place from her last visit a year ago.

At the end of the month Becky took the kids to the Oregon coast near Seaside with Linda from Memorial Day through the following weekend. I stayed behind during the week to work, watch movies really loudly, and go to my mother's Teacher of the Year party in Ellensburg. I joined them on Friday and we played along the beach and did a little sight seeing. The favorable adult to kid ratio allowed us all to sleep fairly well, though Blake had a cold that didn't help.

Spring has been pretty chilly so far so I'm hoping the summer will finally bring the sun out.

April 2008

Blake is now a yearling. The past 12 months have flown by as fast as any others in my life, which is surprising because I've never spent so much time awake before.

He's pretty much mastered the art of walking, though he doesn't seem to realize it yet. He'll just walk around and pull me behind him holding my finger and refuses to let go. On occasion we've tricked him into walking on his own which he does perfectly until he realizes that we've let go.

I believe this illustrates a fundamental difference between him and his sister. Kyla really had no fear at this age and was willing to risk injury for the thrill of walking, but Blake is more cautious. As a result he may experience less bruising during his toddler years than she did.

More and more Blake seems to be understanding the meaning behind the words he uses. "Mama" is generally uttered when he wants Becky and "Dada" when I'm around, though he isn't entirely consistent. He does seem to understand how to clean his room, putting laundry into his hamper and diapers into the Diaper Champ, however he doesn't care whether these items are dirty or not. Also, if you hold your hand out to him he will give you five.

Kyla reached the all-important milestone of getting her first bicycle. The weather hasn't been consistently nice enough to take it anywhere yet, but we often back the cars out of the garage and let her ride around in there. We have to make sure that we've cleared a path for her because she likes to ride fast.

She's also returned to swim class after a three month hiatus. We actually scheduled her class right after Blake's on Sunday, though this has proven difficult making one kid wait while the other one is in the pool, so I think Becky and I will start taking shifts.

My big news this month is that I spent a couple of weeks on jury duty, which I've written about on my personal blog. This didn't have too big an impact on the family as I was able to get most of my work done during the day (thank goodness for courthouse WiFi), but it did drive Becky a little nuts that my mind was occupied at night with things I wasn't supposed to talk about.

Having made it through a full year as a parent of two young children I can definitely attest to the fact that two is a lot harder than one. It's been a difficult year, but I know that it will get easier soon, because I've watched Kyla become more independent and a much better sleeper than she used to be, and Blake will eventually follow suit. Please knock on some wood for me.

Blake's 1st Birthday Party

Blake's first birthday party was a hit, I believe we had roughly 40 people in attendance. The weather was pretty nice that day with the temperature rising to over 60 degrees.

The theme for the party was sports, so Blake and Kyla wore baseball outfits and we had various ball-shaped balloons. Grandpa Doug brought over his inflatable plastic ball pit and we set it up in the bonus room along with a dozen beach balls for the toddlers to jump around in.

In a departure from how we typically feed guests at big parties we used Qdoba's catering, which was appropriate because Blake is a big fan of rice and guacamole. Becky even made him his own vegan cupcakes (he's allergic to eggs and dairy), though everyone else ate cake from Costco.

Continuing the tradition I started for Kyla, I created a movie that highlighted the last year of Blake's life (which so far is his only year of life). I feel like with this movie I reached a milestone as it was the first one where I lived up to my guarantee to Becky that it would take a lot less time to finish than my previous movies. This was due mainly to some of the time saving features of the latest version of iMovie and being able to upload it directly to AppleTV instead of burning DVDs.

This was the fifth big party that we've thrown at our house and it was probably the easiest to prepare for. I think Becky and I are starting to benefit from some experience, and outsourcing the main entree helped. I'm not sure that Kyla and Blake will always want to have big parties at the house; many kids have their birthday events at a park, Little Gym, or Pump It Up with just their friends. Becky is great about coming up with fun party themes, so maybe we've got a few years left.

March 2008

It seems that we've left the cold and flu season behind us as we were all able to stay healthy for the entire month.

As a result we got to see Blake in his natural state as a happy, playful little boy. And then the teeth came. His entire upper jaw seems to be sprouting them, including a couple of molars. All together he's got six up top and two on the bottom now. In a way it's nice to know that his crankiness is caused by something and not his natural demeanor, but between sickness, teething, and his allergies the poor guy doesn't get to enjoy that natural state very often.

When he is in a boisterous mood, he really likes to hit things. He'll pull himself up to a table and then just start slapping it. We have some glass coasters we had to put away because of the loud noise they make when Blake hits the end table with them. His new nickname is "Bam Bam."

Blake went to his first swim class this month. He started out a little scared sitting there on the side of the pool with me and cried a little in the pool, but I think this was due in part by a number of other babies who cried throughout the entire class and Blake found this a little disturbing. He's been to the pool before and enjoyed it (especially after learning how to splash), so I'm confident he'll grow to enjoy swim class soon.

Kyla has been learning the concept of money. She participated in a UW study called "self control and the preschooler" and received $10 for her effort. Becky took her to Toys 'R' Us afterwards and told her she could buy anything she wanted with her money, but that she was limited to the $10, so she bought a doll of Ariel, one of the Disney princesses.

We've explained to her that Daddy goes to work to make money. Now she keeps reminding me to bring quarters home from work so that she can ride the little rocket ship at the North Bend mall. I'm not sure yet how to explain direct deposit.

She has also developed a strategy of being indirect when she wants something. For example when we're out shopping she'll tell me, "well I really like to go to Starbucks Daddy," or when we get home she'll proclaim, "Mommy always let's me watch a show when we get home Daddy."

Easter made for a very busy weekend taking us from the Chambers' on Saturday to Linda's for Easter brunch and then to Dot's for Easter dinner. The Easter Bunny initially put plastic eggs with candy out in our back yard on Saturday night, but the next morning it was raining hard and a few of the eggs had been opened by animals, fortunately the Easter Bunny got up early on Sunday morning to gather the uncompromised eggs, clean them, and then re-hide them in our living room.

Milestones for the month include: Blake can now takes steps on his own, he can crawl up the stairs and down the stairs backwards, he claps when he's happy, and Kyla can write her own name unassisted.

Spring has sprung and Mother Nature rewarded our long wait by starting the season with several days of snow. Oh well, this is the Pacific Northwest, what do you expect?

February 2008

February was not a fun month for us. For the majority of this month's 29 days, at least one of us was sick.

I believe it started with Kyla, who got a cold. Then as she started feeling better, she went to spent the night at Linda's and spent four hours throwing up again and again in the early morning. This flu lasted a couple of days, subsided, and then returned. Needless to say she missed a lot of preschool.

Blake seemed to get the flu and a cold at the same time, recover, then catch another cold. Our jovial little baby was replaced by this unhappy, uncomfortable little wreck who often lost his appetite. Thank goodness we can get infant Tylenol in bulk at Costco.

Becky caught most of these illnesses, but each had a pretty minor affect on her compared to the kids. Somehow I survived unscathed.

We weren't literally sick the entire month. Kyla learned to play baseball in her sports sampler. Again she had a lot of fun and was very eager. The running of the bases must have been a little confusing though because instead of rounding second, she just kept going straight and the instructor had to chase her down.

Kyla continues to have some epic tantrums, but now she seems to feel remorse for them after they're over and apologizes without prompting. One morning when she was throwing a fit in the car and wouldn't let Becky get her out after they arrived home, Becky unbuckled her from her carseat and told her to come in whenever she was ready. Kyla spent a good 30 minutes in the garage, then came inside and started cleaning up as a peace offering.

Blake has been showing signs of having allergic reactions for several months now, so Becky took him in to see an allergist. The poor guy had to get poked 20 times in his back with different potential allergens. His reactions were so strong and numerous that the doctor and nurse were pretty surprised. He reacted most strongly to eggs, salmon, and cashews. The doctor issued us EpiPens and told us to keep him (and Becky while she nurses) away from eggs, dairy, fish, and nuts.

He has a good chance of growing out of the dairy and egg allergies, but the fish and nut allergies are probably permanent. I can't help but feel really sorry for the guy having to go through life always worrying about what he can and can't eat. Fortunately most food labels highlight potential allergens and fish and nuts shouldn't be too hard to avoid (at least compared to milk and eggs).

I feel like this post is very negative, but we weren't miserable for the entire month of February, it's just the negative that is standing out to me as I write this. I'm willing to bet that March will be a good month because we are due.

January 2008

January was a very welcome return to our routines. The chaos of the holidays are behind us and we can enjoy being casual again.

Blake is really getting comfortable with his newfound mobility. He's started exploring on his own and getting into things. We get after him whenever he pulls himself up to the new TV, but for the most part our house is already pretty baby-proof.

He's also talking more and more with consonants and says "Mama" and "Dada." I doubt he actually knows what they mean but he does tend to say "Dada" when he's happy and "Mama" when he's sad, which for me is awesome.

I think we're starting to see some boy-specific characteristics in Blake. After he's done eating his food he likes to take his leftovers and throw them. He also hits at things from time to time, something I don't remember Kyla ever really doing. I don't think we've encouraged this behavior in any way so it's obviously nature and not nurture.

Kyla has started a sports sampler class and she loves it. This month the class learned to play soccer. She is very eager, and when the coach asked for a volunteer to be goalie during their first game, Kyla was the first to raise her hand.

She has also started to regularly spend Saturday nights with Linda. This works out for every one as she enjoys getting a little spoiled by Grandma once a week and Becky and I get to enjoy a more favorable parent to child ratio for one night. Sometimes Linda even takes both kids for part of the evening and Becky and I get to spend some quality time together for a couple of hours.

Winter is not my favorite time of year (which is true of just about everyone save the hardcore skiers and snowboarders), but I think that 2008 has gotten off to a good start. Becky and I have a new division of labor strategy and so far I think it's been working out well for both of us. Plus we got a new computer (an iMac for the den), which makes for a happy month as far as I'm concerned.