Merry Joyous Happiness!

Well, we survived Thanksgiving and are coming up fast on Christmas!

Happy Holidays from our family to yours! 

The past month and a half have been pretty busy. We've had a few opportunities to get together with friends from both near and far, and have had a great time! Birthday parties, boozy Christmas parties, and let's-just-chill-and-chat get-togethers.

This year, we didn't make a traditional visit to Santa. Instead, we tried a few new things. We bundled up and saw fireworks in Nekoosa. We did Breakfast with the Grinch at the Y Camp. 

Iris didn't like The Grinch at first. 

Fireworks!

Iris had a daycare holiday program last week. She played the role of Martha is her class's recreation of the book The Gingerbread Baby. So cute! I seem to have two little hams in the family.

Felix had his program this afternoon. He's been practicing his four lines of the class poem for weeks. They sang many songs and I got to take him to work with me afterwards, where he drew up some road plans for the toy cars I have. 

Nick and I have started up curling again, and our team actually won recently. It only took 4 or 5 weeks... :P Brand new brushes do not a well-oiled team make, apparently. But onward and upward! 

I, for one, do not mind the fact that I haven't worn my snow boots once this year. I know it's inevitable that we'll get a few big snows before the season ends, but I'm savoring the traction my car has right now.

And, speaking of roads/traction/weather, one of my side job duties is to be on call every 4-10 weeks. "A traffic engineer on call? WHY?" you ask. It's our job to help maintain traffic in the event of an incident on state highways. Helping to find decent detour routes, getting inspectors out for bridge hits, notifying people about infrastructure damage and incidents with several fatalities. In short, a necessary PITA. Since my last post, I've been on call twice, and been involved a pedestrian crash in Merrill, a fatal wrong-way crash in Waupaca, another crash in Wood County, and an incident where a firefighter was hit attending a scene on the interstate. I only went on-scene for one of these, and it's not pleasant, yet there are others who do it every single day for their job. But here's my point in writing this: Please be careful when you drive. If you're the driver, that's your job, so do it well, with your full attention. It's just mindboggling that a person would miss the flashing lights on a firetruck at dusk, and yet it happened. I just want everyone reading this to have a safe 2016. *steps off soapbox*

Felix: 6 yrs & Iris: 3 yrs

Basement: Finished

It's done, it's done, it's done! Can you tell I'm excited?! It's finally done! Our blank-canvas of an unfinished basement has been given a brand new look! Gone are the cinder blocks and cold concrete floor. Hello year-round space! Work started on September 21st and the last pieces of trim were installed on November 16th. If it weren't for some delays on getting the right pieces (we have strangely sized doors, apparently), it would have been done a few weeks earlier.

While we might be missing some wall art (it's so hard deciding where to put things when you can do anything!) and some furniture pieces, all the contractor's work is done and the rest is up to us.

Fun fact - before they put down the flooring, I traced each of our hands and put the date on the concrete by the stairs. Our own little time capsule to be discovered when we swap out the carpeting.

Here are some pictures of the transformation:

Prior to buying the house

 Framing complete

Midway through drywalling

Mudding, day 1 of 3

Textured, ready for paint

Paint and carpet!

Lights!

Trim, doors, furniture and TV

Looking the other way.
This area is now the kid zone.

Bathroom to be finished later

Shelves!

Future bar/beer area?

Guest room

Bam! Fall!

Wow. Looking back, October was a pretty busy month for us! We had a LOT of work done on our basement (soooooo close to being done - just need doors and trim), went to a Badger game without the kids, went to a family wedding with the kids, attended a few social functions, and did stuff involving pumpkins. You know, the usual: selection and carving of the perfect pumpkins.

Felix has been doing very well in school. I'm impressed that his teacher has been doing units on bats and owls, and so Felix has come home peppering his speech with words like nocturnal and echolocation (and reading these words as well). With the basement project, he's been confined to his room with his Legos, and it often looks like the box exploded. But his imagination has been running wild. Lately, he's been been building monster trucks.

Iris has been acting every inch of 3. She's chatty, funny, energetic, and prone to throw a tantrum if things don't go her way. And when there's candy in the house, make that double. She likes to say "I need to tell you something!" She just finished her first session of swimming lessons (actually taking them twice, because the Y offers them for the daycare kids). She's so little in the pool - head barely above the water when standing on tip-toe in the little pool. Except she is so independent, constantly telling her teacher "I can do it myself!"

The kids had a good time at Halloween. It was a rainy day that thankfully ended prior to going out, but even so, the kids only were interested in going to 8 houses. Fine with me!

Did I mention I spent some time the morning after Halloween putting up Christmas lights? Neighbors, I'm so sorry, but I didn't want to be up on the roof when it was 40 and/or icy. I promise not to turn them on until after Thanksgiving. I'll also do a separate blog post on the basement as soon as it's done!

PS - END THE TIME CHANGE NOW!!! Seriously.

Felix: 6 yrs & Iris: 3 yrs

"Onerous"

Iris turned 3 at the end of August, and oh, what a Thomas birthday it was! She got several Thomas track sets, which have kept her occupied and playing by herself consistently. She and Felix like to put all 5 of the trains she has on a short loop of track and wait for the inevitable crash. Then she comes out and tells us we have to see the "huge crash!", and proceeds to break down what happened like a no-nonsense crash reconstructionist. Iris has also started swimming lessons and has moved up to the pre-school room at daycare. I'm glad, because the kids get to do a lot more at the facility when they get older. Do your kids watch Peg + Cat? Because they should. It's an awesome show to which Iris is addicted, and misery loves company when it comes to earworms... :o)

Felix has started 1st grade and is doing very well. He seems to be transitioning to it a lot easier than it was last year. He flies through his reading and math homework, and he's learning to he can read just about anything with a little help. And Common Core math is just fine with me, especially if it helps Felix finish his homework so quickly! He's also been playing soccer again this fall, this time on the Spiders with two friends. Oh, and he got hand, foot & mouth disease last week. Thankfully, it was very mild and only kept him out of school for one day.

We went down as a family to Madison for a football game. That was... interesting. We drove down Saturday morning, tailgated with my parents, spent some time chasing them around Badgerville, and went to the game. All well and good. And then we left at about the end of the 1st quarter because it was too loud for Felix and too boring for Iris. We should really know better by now. If we (the grown-ups) want to enjoy ourselves, we need to leave the kids at home. We headed back to our hotel for the night with tempers flaring, but a family swim in the pool helped to make everything better. The next day, we took the kids to the zoo and had some fun, but playing on the playground seemed to be a deal-breaker for Iris, who threw a tantrum until she passed out and we drove home without lunch. Sigh. I don't want to stop trying to do things with the kids, but they sure have a way of making me wish I could go back in time and stop myself. On the plus side, Nick and I are going to another game this weekend, sans kids.

I'm glad the kids have been able to play in their bedrooms with something, because our basement is currently off-limits... due to getting it finished! We're very excited about the prospect of having additional space to play and unwind. It's already framed up and plumbed, and getting the electrical installed in the week or so work has been done. It's on track to be done by the end of October, perfect for when we don't feel like being outside anymore.

Various adventures:

• We finished off our summer bucket list with a trip to the National Railroad Museum with grandparents. The kids had a blast, and we dealt with only one tantrum (bonus!).

• We had some fun with the "super blood mood" when it rose on Sunday night. Felix got to see the start of the eclipse before going to bed.

Good or bad, it's always an adventure, isn't it? Enjoy the autumn weather!

Felix: 6 yrs & Iris: 3 yrs

Summer Flying By

This past month has flown by! We started of with 12 items on our summer bucket list. We have only one to go, and a plan to do that next week.

Summer 2015 Bucket List

• Go to the train museum
• Go to a zoo (8/9)
• See classic cars (8/2)
• Go swimming in Lake Wazeecha (7/26)
• Go to the Chain o' Lakes (7/25)
• Hit some balls at the golf course (7/22)
• Watch lightning (7/13, 7/18)
• Go out for dinner and eat outside (picnic at Nepco, 7/17)
• Sprinkler slide (7/11)
• Go to a Rafters game as a family (7/4)
• Bike all the way around Wazeecha (7/3)
• See a rainbow (6/26)

Since the last post, Felix has turned 6! We had two parties for him - one with friends and one with family - all on the same weekend. Some class friends, some neighborhood friends, some faraway friends. It was nice to see everyone! And have some peace after the chaos. He got so many Lego sets for his birthday... many of which are now currently scattered on the basement floor.

Two weekends later, we went to a family reunion, where the kids had fun, and I got this great picture. It looks like they get along sometimes, right? The weekend after that, it was classic cars and tantrums. Uff-da. And then last weekend, we were invited to a couple of get-togethers and went to Oshkosh. Nick and the kids went to the zoo, which Mom, Dad & I went to the Paine Art Center to look at the Downton Abbey costumes on display. Busy, busy!

We've seen lots of friends lately, too! We had a playdate with friends who have kids the same age as ours, and saw them again at the community picnic (among many, many others). We made new friends at a housewarming party. We got to meet the 2-week-old baby of friends visiting from Colorado. We have neighbor kids coming over all the time. And we hope to see more soon!

Iris has let me play with her hair lately. Most of these creations were at her own request, which is a huge difference from "Don't touch my hair!" of a few months ago. She is in full-on 2-/3-year-old mode, though. The speed with which she can throw a tantrum if you say "no" or "wait" to her is impressive. Oh, and the screaming/shrieking. (Yeah, you miss those days, don't you.) Plus, my wonderful little sleeper has turned into a night-waker. At least once a night, she'll wake me up so I can tuck her back into bed. I'm hoping this is one phase that ends soon!

We hope you're having a great summer as well!

Felix: 6 yrs & Iris: 2.5 yrs

Happy 4th

We've had a busy few weeks since my last post!

Felix was in T-ball for the first time. It was a lot different than I expected, having never played T-ball (I jumped straight into softball in 2nd grade). The coach pitches to the kids and the tee is only used when a kid has swung at 10 pitches or so with no connection. Once the kid gets a hit, they run to first... and so on for about 5-6 kids. The last kid up gets the equivalent of a home run, clearing the bases. It doesn't matter if it truly was a hit; everyone gets to run the bases. And all kids get to field. All 11-12 in the infield/outfield. It looks pretty cute, but crowded out there! Felix enjoyed it. He starts off being pretty tentative in sports, but seems to develop confidence as the season goes on. He only got to play in 5 games (one rain-out), so we'll see if he wants to do it again next year.

Iris is potty trained! They say if you wait long enough, you can do it in a weekend. That's what happened with Iris, unintentionally. She's been using the potty regularly at daycare since last fall, but was too comfortable wearing pull-ups to stop on her own. So the first weekend in June, I just let her go bare-bottomed for a while. And it clicked! She had no accidents when she was not wearing a pull-up in those first two days. And then we sent her to daycare in undies the following morning and haven't looked back. She's been very good about going and has been accident-free for a few weeks. I'll ask her if she has to go, to which she typically replies "Not yet!" or "Nope!" Yay! We graduated her to a "big girl" bed last weekend (my old daybed), and she has been diaper-free since Friday night.

We got to spend a night up north at Nick's uncle's cabin in Woodruff. The kids weren't thrilled about the car ride, or the dog, or the cold/wet weather preventing them from swimming. They did, however, really get a kick out of fishing for the first time. After the morning's rains, the fish were practically jumping out of the lake. It took about 30 seconds after every cast to catch a fish - I think we caught 10-12 total before we ran out of worms. The following day dawned equally chilly, so another round of fishing and playing outside before we left. Hopefully we'll have a chance to go back again in the fall!

I was on call for the week preceding and the weekend of the 4th, so we stuck around Rapids this past weekend. We still had a lot of fun! On Saturday, we all went to the Rafters baseball game with my parents. The kids had a lot more fun in the bouncy houses than watching the game, but that was to be expected. :o) We went to a neighborhood party, where the kids swam and stayed up very late watching the fireworks. I had Iris on my lap, her head drooping on my shoulder, eyes half open, mumbling "another one" through a few fireworks when I finally called time for bed. We hope you had a fun weekend, too!

Felix: 5.5 yrs & Iris: 2.5 yrs

Kindergarten Done

Whoosh! That's the sound of this past school year flying by. Felix finished up his Kindergarten year on 6/4. I took a day and a half off last week to spend some good goof-off time with him before he started summer club.

I took a day off recently to be a chaperone on the Kindergarten end-of-year trip to Pizza Hut and a dairy farm. It was nice to share the experience with him - he was a bit nervous about getting too close to the cows, but as you can see from the picture, he handled it well. :o)

A few reflections on the school year:

• It's amazing how much he grew this year (physically and mentally).

• His behavior started off a bit rough (found a number of like-personality kids who couldn't quite figure out how to play with each other), but got progressively better.
• His report card showed improvement in all areas from math and English to keeping on task from the first quarter to the end (yay!).
• He's gotten into reading. Though reading books on his own still overwhelms him, having read him Harry Potter at the end of the year got him hooked on longer books with complicated storylines. And he's starting to realize that he can sound out words all around him.
• He tells fantastic tales with his drawings and the stories he writes on them. I loved seeing the "draw a picture and tell a story" schoolwork he brought home.
• He has most recently expressed interest in being a train driver, a chef, and a writer.
• We're hoping that it's only a matter of time that his listening skills improve like everything else.
• He tends to police Iris, even though we're in the same room. He's like an overzealous sheepdog.

Felix played in rec soccer for the first time in May and enjoyed it. He seems to have a defensive mind, which we can try to nurture if he decides he wants to do it again in the fall. The kids played in five games over the course of the month, and during the last, a very rainy affair, Felix scored his first goal. It was a very proud moment for us. Go Purple Beetles!

It was a pretty quiet month for the rest of us. Iris has been her delightful, headstrong, chatty, daredevil self. She's starting to play pretend, which I've been anticipating for a while. Either Duplos or trains - it's nice to hear her making up her own little worlds. I picked up a little bicycle for her, which I assumed we'd put away until next year. Nope. She saw it and had to ride it NOW, even though she just learned how to pedal her trike a few weeks earlier. We can't get her off it now, and have to make sure she doesn't try to emulate Felix and cruise down the street instead of staying in the driveways.

Nick and I took a little getaway to Door County for our 7th anniversary over Memorial Day weekend. Left the kids in GB, went to Egg Harbor, enjoyed uninterrupted sleep, took a trolley tour to four wineries, and sampled wines galore. Every so often, it's nice to not have to be constantly vigilant or picking out a dinner based on a five-year-old palate.

We hope you have a great summer!

Felix: 5.5 yrs & Iris: 2.5 yrs

Tummies & Tantrums

We've been dealing a lot with this blog's title subjects lately. And, as you can imagine, not in a good way.

For fear of spreading more of the evil, I'm going to say little about the tummy woes we endured. Suffice it to say that Iris had a tummy bug that took her nearly 5 full days from which to recover. Nick and Felix each had their own bouts. I, miraculously, escaped (cue me getting it any second now).

Boy howdy, whoever introduced Iris to tantrums, I'd like a word with you. They may have started before, but they sure gained steam after Iris was sick. On her first day back to a normal routine after the tummy bug, she had 3 epic tantrums lasting a total of 1.5 hours. All based on some minor thing (I told her it was time to get ready for daycare / I wouldn't let her go down the slide one more time / it was time for bed). Last week, I dealt with getting her rigid, screaming little body into her car seat - all because I gave her a mint that SHE DIDN'T TAKE OUT OF THE PACKET HERSELF (note: she threw the tantrum instead of asking me if she could do it). I'm a terrible parent. There, I said it. It's moments like these that make me repeat my parenting mantra: it's just a phase... it's just a phase...

Nick's grandpa on his mom's side passed away last week. Nick and I went up to the funeral today. Nick gave a killer eulogy (figuratively speaking).

There. Bad over. And now, on to the good! We signed Felix up for rec soccer, which he'll play in May (he's on the Beetles). He's excited to give it a try. Look at that game face! This is the summer we'll have him try soccer and T-ball, then see what he'd like to keep playing next year. Felix also lost his first tooth! It happened when the kids were left with a sitter, so we couldn't make a big deal about it. :o( But he was very proud. He had a shark tooth for over a month, so the tooth was loose for a while. And it's not too jarring now, because the big tooth has already grown in so far. He also had his first school program. His classes sang three songs about farm life. He looked so nervous!

First lost tooth

Felix is 2nd row on the right

More good: I've been thinking about donating my hair to create wigs for women with cancer for a while. It got to the point where my hair was finally long enough and I desperately needed a haircut, so I made the cut last week. I chose to send my locks to the Pantene Beautiful Lengths program. Win-win! I'm getting used to the new look, but it was amusing to get double-takes and compliments my first day back in the office. Although I'm being asked for my ID again to buy liquor... Yay?

Felix: 5.5 yrs & Iris: 2.5 yrs