Shopping with Mommy

Out at Ridgedale, Wally was keeping himself entertained by modeling the latest Sunglasses. Stylin'!!

Wally's "Golden" 2nd Birthday

Happy Birthday to my little toddler - you are 2 years old!  We celebrated Wally's birthday a few weeks after the actual date this year.  Wally turned 2 officially on January 2nd - it was a Wednesday.  On his actual birthday I asked him what he wanted to do, and he said "Outside.....Snow."  So that's what we did!  We had a wonderfully "warm" January day (mid-20's) so I bundled him up and we spent a fun afternoon outdoors shoveling snow, making snowballs and throwing them for Hazel to fetch, and walking down the block to the park and back. Wally loved it - and now asks to put his boots on several times a day!  We had scheduled his party for the following Sunday Jan 6th but unfortunately Wally was a little on the snotty side so we postponed the event a week.  Luckily the new date happened to work out for most of our family and friends!  So Wally's big party was Sunday Jan 13th!

Here is a little video of Wally I caught before the party started.

Food!

I made "cupcake towers" - found the idea on Pinterest!

We did a "Trains" theme this year - he's been really into train videos and watching actual trains coming down the track.  It was very fun to put together!  We had all grandparents, family, and lots of Mound friends attend. Wally's friends Juju, Chase, Landon, Drew, Brennen and cousin Ryder were all there (along with parents!). We were missing Colin and Will - down with the flu that weekend. I tried to keep things simple with kid-friendly snacks, cupcakes, and a few train-related activities.  It kept the stress level low because it is surprisingly a ton of energy to put a child's birthday party together when you're 8 months pregnant. I got all the kids little conductor hats and sewed their initial on the front and a red scarf - a Train Engineer dress-up!  Here is Ryder with his hat on (this is my absolute favorite photo from the whole party - isn't he just adorable!)

The big hit for the kids was Fred and Kath's gift of a large cardboard-box-style Train that they could actually crawl into, like a play house.  If the kids were a bit older I would have let them color it.  It was more like a clown car than a train car with kids pouring out the fronts, back, and sides.  Great fun to watch!  After I sent out the evite, Brian started doing that math and was not excited to realize I had just invited 30 people into our house.  Yes, it was packed and most people sat on the floor, but I think it was still a good time.  Maybe next year we could do Wally's half birthday and party in the back yard in June.....or use our church or another public venue if we invite lots of friends.  But for a 2nd birthday, we got away with it.  Here are some more pics - thanks to Kathleen for doing a great job documenting the day.  Lots of action pictures.  I never would have had the energy!

Gimme a kiss Grandpa with my blue frosting face!

A few friends enjoying cupcakes at the kitchen table

Hazel gets in the middle of the action.  The whole experience for her was half excitement to
 find food, half terror of getting poked and prodded by toddlers.

Greandpas are the best! They give me whatever I want!

The official cake-eating photo!

Anna and Brennen get a snack - yum

Tanya and Ryder playing trains

They don't mind crawling over eachother for toys!

Kids in the middle, Moms on the floor, Dads on the couch!

Yep, it's crowded!

Nanna and Wally taking a break from all that sugar

I thought a really sweet moment was in the middle of the party when Wally quietly walked upstairs, into his bedroom, and sat on the floor playing with his yellow Caterpillar truck alone. I think the noise and number of people in his otherwise calm home caused a little too much excitement, so he gave himself a good 30 minute "time out." I felt bad dragging him out to blow out his birthday candles, but as soon as he saw the cupcakes he was pretty excited to do whatever it took to eat a couple. We ended up skipping the whole opening presents thing and just did a couple at a time over the next few days.

I struck gold with the first present we opened - the  "Subwoofer guitar" from cousin Ryder.  He looovvvees it, and plays it all the time.  He even figured out how to put the strap around himself and hold it without me really giving that much instruction.  A natural musician!!!

Welcome to 2013 at the John Family Home

Brian, Em, and Wally in our back yard - taken mid-November 2012

OK, it's actually Jan 21st when I'm writing this, but I thought "hey... I'm not too late to start my New Year's Resolution".  Guess what it is?!?  I keep having these grand ideas of keeping a well documented history of our family both through blogging and a beautiful handmade scrapbook...and somehow after 3 years of marriage I just can't keep up... arg!  Maybe 2013 is my year.  Could I have finally hit that organizational peak in my otherwise highly unorganized life?  (Wally - if it's 2020 and this is the only post in 2013, I'm so sorry peanut!  I tried....but just not as hard as I should have :)

Quick recap on recent family history:  Wally is now 2 years old (I can't believe it!) and little brother is almost 38 weeks along due Feb 5th.  We just celebrated Wally's birthday last weekend, which I'll post.  He is (in my objective opinion) the cutest, sweetest, highly intellectual, curious, and most wonderful little boy.  Except when I'm trying to use the computer.  As I'm writing this, Wally is snuggled next to me on the couch watching youtube train videos on the left side of my computer screen.  It's the only way I can use the computer.  His current favorite is "Alphabet Train" which sounds a little more like "abet tane" when he says it but it's hard to "not" understand when he repeats it 20 times before I'm able to pull it up.  Other favorite videos include actual steam trains coming down the track, Elmo and Grover, "Wally videos" and "how do they make that: Firetrucks."

Today is Martin Luther King Day and we've finally hit winter.  I took Hazel out for a quick potty in 14 below temps.  It was the quickest potty all month.  Brian has the day off, and we are finally preparing for the arrival of little brother with little projects around the house.  Although tomorrow I will be 38 weeks into my pregnancy, due Feb 5th, we currently have not secured a name for poor baby among our 5-6 current favorites, have not yet installed the carseat into the minivan, just fished out and laundered the old newborn clothing over the weekend, and started thinking about supplies needed at home.  Needless to say, we've been a little more relaxed about welcoming our second child into the world.  I sure hope this little guy is laid back and patient!  But not too patient, Wally was 10 days early and I've been secretly hoping this second pregnancy will end in a similar fashion.

I am still teaching piano lessons and ended the fall/winter session with a beautiful recital back on Jan 5th.  Since then, Wally and I have been completely free to romp around town causing mischief   Brian continues his work at VMware.  After working from home from the first of October through the end of the year, he finally moved into a new office at the beginning of the month and has been riding the bus downtown again.

OK, more to come - mostly about Wally!  TTFN (says Tigger)

May oh my

May never fails to be the busiest month of the year.  It's hard to get back into blogging, and so easy to keep putting it off!

This month has been filled with wonderful little achievements.  Wally has started to feed himself with a spoon and fork.  It started with constant flinging and dropping, but each week he gets a little more food in his mouth.  It never fails though that he'll get an itch on his ear and try to scratch it with the yogurt-filled spoon. He's getting very bossy about his food - he'll grab the spoon out of my hand and not eat unless he is feeding himself.  Which results in many a meal like below:

Wally's also becoming quite the climber.  He's always loved sitting up on the window bench, but now he's figured out how to shimmy his way up there without help. He's very proud of himself when he can do this.

And he sits up there systematically checking the latches and handles.  This is one of the cutest little faces.  I just love it!

Here's a cute one I put into black and white.  It was nice to get a little catch light in his eyes.

Wally loves to play with anything that's expensive and not really intended for use by toddlers.  Hence my $120 resonater bell set.

May 12, the day before "the big day" - a perfect collision of Mother's Day and my birthday.  It was a wonderful day, the weather was beautiful and everyone was in a good mood.  Especially me when Brian said the magic words: Restaurant, my treat.  Yay!  We went to Sunsets in Wayzata and sat on the patio.  I had the tortellini with peas and proscuitto.  Brian had the Walleye.  Wally had a sampling of everything.

After Sunsets, we put Wally into the stroller and walked around downtown Wayzata.  There is a really cute old depot train station with a park behind it, so we hung out there for a while.  Wally was really trying hard to get down to the water.  He kept running straight for the reeds.

Wally visits parks

This summer I have a feeling we'll be doing lots of playdates outside at parks and such.  This week Wally's been getting lots of park time - first on Monday with Mariel, Kath, Mame and I and then walks on Tuesday with Mame.  We followed it up with 2 park playdates on Thursday, one with some of Wally's ECFE friends in Mound and another with Colin and Kacy.  It was a very fun day.  Needless to say, he was quite ready for bed at 6:15 that evening!

Backyard Remodel Stage 2: Bobcat and Sprinklers

The first stage of the backyard remodel has been very smooth and exciting to watch.  Chad, "the landscape guy," started around the east side of the backyard near the large trees and garbage area.  He installed edging and fabric around the trees to create a really cute curving pathway of grass.  The hope is that at some point this summer we will be able to build stairs into the retaining wall for house guests to use in the wintertime.

It's been a really cool transformation from backyard embarassment to tidy and beautiful!  Here is Brian and Chad shoveling gravel to install the pavers at the base of the stairs.

Bobcat at work!  Notice the white line where the landscape edging was put in, which Chad and I had to redraw several times before the shape looked natural.  Now there is plenty of space for a future sunny garden area!  I already put up the abalisk that Sandi and Kevin gave us as our wedding gift and I've been growing morning glories indoors that will grow up around it!

Pavers installed, yay! The bobcat raised up that area around the steps a good 6 inches, so I had to dig up all the plants in that center garden and transplant them once the dirt was leveled out.

Striking a pose for the camera!

Putting the landscape fabric and mulch down

Here is the sprinkler installation.  That process was actually really quick - there were about 5 guys here for maybe 3 hours one morning, and they put the whole thing together!  

Here we are 2 1/2 weeks after the sprinkler system and hydroseed were installed.  The grass is growing!!  Slowly, but surely!

Last pic, I promise.  This is my indoor seed growing operation.  It's the most basic way to do it - just a bunch of jiffy pots sitting on a few folding card tables by the patio window.  Wally has only gotten to about 2 pots of jalepenos, which I consider a huge success.  I've been growing peppers, tomatos, zinnias, morning glory, salvia, rosemary, basil, and a few other flowers.  We shall see what makes it outdoors!

Backyard Remodel Stage 1: Before

Since purchasing our home in July of 2008, Brian has engineered some pretty awesome remodeling projects.  Our first, and by far largest, was the addition of the garage, residing the house, and turning the old "garage" into a storage shed.  Oh yes, along with paving the driveway.  Next came the downstairs room into an updated TV/play room, which is a wonderful space.  Then we had some not-so-easily seen but much needed things done like spraying extra insullation into the attic and a recent radon mitigation.  I had never even heard of radon before Brian pointed it out - at first I thought it was a prank.

This winter, as we talked about all the projects that the house really needs (and that list is quite long) I won out with my bid for a backyard remodel.  Brian had already started getting quotes from contractors last fall, so he got back on that horse in February to get some contractors put together.

At first it looked like this would be a June project because there are weight limit road restrictions on Three Points which would prohibit those big bobcats and trucks from getting out here, but with the crazy warm weather we had in March the restrictions were lifted 6 weeks early.  So, things got started and have been rolling along at a good clip!

Here are a few "before" pics of the back yard.

We got some help from Fred and Kath a few weekends back and took a Saturday to clean up all the leaves and debrees in the back yard that we didn't get to in the fall.  It's not easy to see, but the ground in the back yard was very uneven and pocked with little divets.  You had to watch your step or risk twisting an ankle!

In the pic below, although you can't see it, right where Brian is standing were the remains of the old driveway.  It was class 5 gravel.  So that whole area from Brian down to the house and across to the shed (to the left of the pic) was pretty much crappy gravel with a few weeds and daylilies forging life from the sand.

 Wally was helping me secure my idea that we really need some kind of hedge between our back yard and the Mazurek's side yard.  Wally loves to step over the little strip of perennials and run down Joe and Julie's driveway.  The pic below is from the street, where they are preparing to put in some landscape edging to carve out some nice mulched areas around the trees.

 This next pic just makes me happy to see.  Notice the unsightly wood pallet that was a bottom stair (not the weatherd paint job on the deck....that's not changing anytime soon).  I hated these pallets at the bottom of the steps.  This one in particular occasionally tipped if you stepped on just the wrong spot.  It was embarassing for me to have my piano students use this every winter to get into the house!  This pallet is now gone forever!  Yes!

 Check back soon for the action shots of the yard being torn apart and put back together!