Taylor and AJ Christmas!

So we just had Christmas time, and it was a lot of fun and a lot of driving.  We're also doing all the hoops and steps to buying our new house.  We went up to Nicky's families house on the 24th and spent time there until the 25th...then drove to my families house, where we stayed until the 26th.  So 3 days, 2 nights away from home with a Taylor and an AJ...

Boy were we glad to be home.  We had a weigh in, and things went ok for me.. I weighed in at goal, Nicky weighed in 10 pounds over goal... So not such a good week for her.  It's ok, we'll get her back on track as long as she's committed.  We took pics and did our weight measurements... I'm anxious to see the over-time progress.

For Christmas, Taylor got an awesome red Tricycle and AJ got a fun blue ride on toy.  They also got clothes, books, dolls, and trucks.  At home they got a 'boom box' that is virtually indestructible so they can listen to music out back or in the play room during the day.

Feeding Himself

So tonight I was feeing AJ and he started getting upset.. I couldn't figure out what he wanted.  Nicky to the rescue.  We put the food I was feeding him into a bowl and gave him a spoon..he wanted to feed himself!

So cute, and he's just about 13 months old.

Updates few...

Well, lately the big focus has been getting a house.  We've looked at quite a few places, found one we liked, and got an accepted offer.  Now it's time for inspections and appraisals and loan documentation and the like.  More updates as we get them but I'll show you the listing.



Very exciting.  Also, over the weekend, Nicky went to her mom's house to help clean in preparation, and I had both kids on Saturday... Nicky is a strong person, I couldn't do this day in and day out... a day here or there is ok, but on the long term I'd go insane.

Aj's first birthday party, Buying a house

Soo AJ had his first birthday party on Sunday, we had Linda and her Mom, Natalie and her 3 boys, Steve and Si, Nicky's parents, Aunt Krista and Uncle James, Star and Tim all show up... It was very cute, AJ loved looking up at the streamers.  We played Pin the nose on the Elmo and made S'mores.  All in all Nicky is very good at party planning.  When you read this, I'll have put pictures on here too, I just know if I don't write this now I won't get it done and another day will go by without an update.

We're also looking at buying a house, putting an offer in on the first one tomorrow.  They're asking 300 and we're bidding 250... to try to get a conversation going.  The house looks nice, and I hope we get it, but I'm being realistic.  Very exciting and yet sortof nail biting while you wait for the process to proceed.

Home buying, and kids!

Firstly, I'm getting bad at updating this thing regularly.  We've had a slow couple of weekends and just not a lot to write about.  Weight training continues, I'm still stuck at 6 chin ups, but my squat and bench numbers keep climbing.  We're only running 2x per week, 35 minutes per run.  We decided that between the cold weather and the fact that we're on a weight training cycle, we wanted to do a little less running.  Our Ironman jog stroller is really working out well, I'll try to remember to take pictures tomorrow when we run.  Nicky is still struggling to get a chinup, but she gets closer every time.  We're planning to buy a door mounted chin-up bar.  If we 'grease the groove' I know we can get her there.

Recently we started talking about buying a home, so we've started talking with a realtor and a mortgage guy.  Hopefully soon we'll have some cool stories about houses we've seen and want to buy.

It snowed here last night... but Nicky had a big bucket of fail and I don't have any pictures to show you.  AJ picked up a new phrase.. he says "GO GO GO".  He's walking really well and learning to feed himself with a spoon.  He's stopped drinking 100% formula, and we're mixing 50% formula with 50% whole milk.  It's funny, when Nicky changes him he twists and turns and rolls.  When I change him, he lays there peacefully while I change him.  HA HA!

The other day, I was laying down the law with Taylor, and she started to argue.  I replied "I love you to much to argue".. without missing a beat she replied "No you don't love me to much to arg-me".  Sigh, she's going through that phase, everything is no, you don't, and no I don't.  She's able to turn on the computer and navigate to her Nickelodeon flash games all by herself.

Killer Workouts!

Nicky and I have started a new weight training routine.  It's called the "Stronglifts 5x5" and you can find information about it here.  We're on the 2nd day of the new routine and it's kicking our butts!  We're lifting more than we ever have before and we're moving quickly from lift to lift.  It's a lot of fun, and the really cool news is, I've never been able to do a chin-up, and now I can do 6 of them.  I know that's not much to a seasoned lifter, but for me it was a huge mental barrier.

The great thing about it is it tells you exactly how and when to up your weight, which was always a stumbling block for me with previous routines.  I love simple workouts that aren't complicated and keep things changing so it stays interesting.  Nicky is soooo close to doing a chin-up I know she's going to be stoked when she does it.

It's very weird eating more now, because we're hungry more often.  I don't want to jump back up in weight, but I know SOME weight gain is required if I want to progress.  I just am super paranoid about not gaining a bunch of fat and undoing all the progress I made.  I just have to keep reminding myself that I know how to do it now, and if I find my body fat % going up, I can make adjustments.  I'll keep this updated as to my progress as a way to keep myself honest.

Thanksgiving! (and AJ gets a cake!)

So we had Thanksgiving, and it's my favorite holiday!  I ate lots of turkey and hung out with the family.  Nichole's parents joined us for Thanksgiving this year, in what I hope is an often repeated new tradition.  We played some Tennis, Nicky's dad loves to play tennis, I can't wait till the kids are older and we can all go and play Tennis.

Nicky's parents were in Arizona all month visiting Nicky's Grandpa, and it was good to see them again.  They came and picked us up to drive to my family's house.  It was cute picking Taylor up from preschool, she said "I am thankful for my toys, my mommy and for raindrops that fall from the sky"... very cute.

AJ turned one, and he's walking pretty well.  He loves looking up at the moon, and he's starting to say "Nigh nigh".  He also thinks it's funny when you're feeding him to take all his food up into his mouth and chew it up, but not swallow it.. very not-funny!

Anyway, incoming picture dump, with 2 videos at the end.

No Pictures

So it's hard to make a blog post when there are no pictures, and there are no pictures because I can't get Nicky to take any during the day. I know that sounds like an excuse... well... it is.  I've been playing lots of LOL.  Also, I completed my enrollment for a masters.  I got an invite to Google Wave... it's very interesting.  Lots of potential for a cool tool that could replace IM/email, but very beta.  It crashes a lot and there aren't many gadgets for it yet, but what is there seems very cool.

I find myself more frustrated at Taylor than normal, she says NO a lot to me, which is very annoying.  On the cute side, she always wants to help when I'm making something in the kitchen.. Today I was making a protein shake and she wanted to help at each part, from pouring in the mix to peeling the banana.  She loves going to the gym with us, and has a lot of fun in there while we're working out. It's so great to have a good gym that she likes going to.  We pay a lot of money for our membership but feel like it's worth it, California Family Fitness is great.

AJ is really walking all over the place.  What's funny is when he walks he holds his right arm up at a 90 degree angle to his body.  Like he needs it for balance or something.  He has this cute little tuft of hair on the top of his head, kinda like an alfalfa.  He says night night.. and he's so cute when we put him to bed with his tigger.  He hugs it close and loves being warm with his blanket at night.  I know some parents have a hard time with bedtime, but we're lucky, both of our kids love going to bed.  If only they liked to sleep in a little later.

Walking and Talking

Today AJ walked from the kitchen all the way the the hallway bathroom, almost 30 feet.  He's starting to say things like "yeah" and "night".  He's doing this thing where if you're distracted, he comes in and stares you right in the face, from like 3 inches away.  And he's just starting to bug his sister.  He'll pick up a toy she wants and he'll wave it infront of her and tease her with it.

Taylor has started being very difficult when it comes to sharing.  She won't share and she gets mad when AJ wants to play with her toys.  I have to say I'm really disappointed, I thought they would be older before this started.  She is also being very sweet when AJ isn't involved.  She says "Yeah, I am" and "No, I don't" instead of just yes and no... hard to describe the tone but she's very complete in her answers.

Really looking forward to Thanksgiving, I love Turkey!  Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday.

Slow news day

So not much special in the last few days.  AJ continues to practice walking and Taylor is a little sick.  I decided I'm going to start taking classes again, work on getting a Master's Degree.  We hit our target weight, we're able to run 30 minutes straight now.  More training for the biathlon.  We've started spending more time on teaching Taylor basic reading.

I look forward to AJ getting old enough to play games with me, Taylor too if she's interested in it.  Nicky often falls asleep very early, so it means that I end up gaming alone... Kids are great for that kinda stuff!

AJ is learning to walk

So AJ is almost 1 year old, and he's starting to walk.  He stands up all unsteady, then takes a few steps before plopping over.  He loves to hold a single finger for balance and walk around the room.  He also loves to look at the moon.  When we're outside, he stares up at it, and when we're inside he loves pictures of the moon in his book or on the mattress in his room.


The other day, he went out on the patio and got stuck inbetween the playhouse and the window... here's what that looks like!

When I got home from work today, Taylor wanted me to come outside and play with rock people with her... Rock people is drawing chalk circles around rocks... very strange game.  She loves to ask us to tell her stories.  The stories she wants to hear always include "Once upon a time there was a little girl named Taylor" and then we follow it with random things she has done or hasn't done.  Very funny and cute!

Halloween!

I love the fall, the trees turn great colors, the weather starts to cool off, and we get a whole bunch of holidays.  Having kids means I get to relive all the cool old holidays again.  Taylor was a peacock this year, and AJ was a pumpkin.  We decided to go trick-or-treating up by Linda's house.  Linda is Taylor's best friend from preschool, and it's really funny to watch them together.  Whenever they see each other, it's "Hiiieee Taylor!" then "Hiiieee Linda!" and they give each other hugs.  Anyway, Taylor was so excited to get some treats, and I think Nicky was pretty excited to poach a couple of treats of her own.

Taylor dressed up as a peacock - I'm really impressed it still fits from last year and is still in good condition.

Taylor meeting up with Linda - She calls Linda's shoes "Fairy Mary Janes"

A little video of them trick-or-treating together.


Unfortunately, Halloween doesn't lend itself very well to lots of pictures, but we had a lot of fun.  On the way home, we stopped by Uncle David and Aunt Leah's house to say hello.  Nubs was dressed as a turtle and Diablo was dressed up as a pumpkin.  I've always thought people that dress up their dogs were crazy, but seeing a Turtle-dog and a Pumpkin-dog was pretty awesome.

Carving Jack-o-Lanterns...scary stuff

So, we got home from a long weekend, and realized - it's the last weekend before Halloween!  We have these pumpkins sitting out back that needed to be carved.  So we carved.  It was a huge mess but lots of fun.. After we were done, Taylor wanted to go see her "orange thing" and we ended up letting her sleep with her lantern in her room.

AJ kept wanting to touch everything, stick his hands in the pumpkin goo, and rub it all over his legs... YUCK

The kids were totally entranced by the carving and gutting of the "orange things"

Every time we looked away, AJ was grabbing the pumpkin tops and throwing them on the ground.  I wonder what that translates to when he's an adult...

AJ loved playing with the scooper and splattering me and Taylor with goo!

Taylor is at this age where she doesn't seem to ever want to smile normally.  Every time we try to get her to smile, we either get a half wink or this weird hugely open eye look.  It's hilarious to watch.

Here it is again...her "smiling eyes" - Such a nut!

The best way we can get her to smile for a picture is to quote commercials.  Sometimes we say to her "moisturizing and comforting" or "knobby knees" or "skinny minnie" or "it's a bonus".  No idea why these things make her laugh so hard, but I know I like to watch infomercials, so maybe it's genetic.

Here we are, final product.  Taylor's pumpkin has 4 eyes and a sad mouth.  It was a lot of fun, in the past, we had bought the pumpkins and not bothered to carve them.  Also, it's impossible to find a good pumpkin carving knife.. maybe I just don't know what to look for.