To nap, or not to nap?

That is the question. Lillian used to be a really good sleeper; she went down without a fight say 95% of the time, whether for a nap or overnight. But these last couple of months, she's started to fight nap time big time. She cries and cries when I say it's time, and often is still crying when I leave her room. Some days she ends up sleeping up to two hours, other days she never does go to sleep. We can hear her in there, talking to her stuffed animals and moving about. Regardless of whether she actually sleeps, I'm going to keep giving her (and me!) that quiet time for as long as I can. Bedtime in the evenings isn't as much of a fight, but she has started stalling a bit, and being defiant when she's told it's time to clean up her toys so she can get ready for bed. We give her warnings that if she doesn't help clean up then there will be no story time with Daddy, but then that punishes Daddy too! I know what you Moms are thinking. You're laughing inside, because you know this is just the beginning. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Most of the time Lillian is just really entertaining. Her vocabulary is growing exponentially, and she surprises me every day with some new word or grouping of words. One of her latest hobbies is "cooking" with her foam letters. She uses some bowls and pans and spoons and mixes them up, then puts them in the "oven" - a little nook in the coffee table that Gramma showed her. She even warns us that it's hot, and blows on the letters before we get to taste. Love that :)

New outfit from Oma... ta-da!


Checking out the flower...


Ooooo - dots!


I made a batch of 50 cards to send to Operation Write Home (www.operationwritehome.org), a volunteer non-profit organization that supports U.S. armed forces by sending blank handmade greeting cards to write home on. I've never made so many cards in such a short time! It was fun, and nice to be able to put a bunch of my supplies to good use.


A question on that note for those of you that make your own cards - or anyone else who wants to weigh in. What do you think about me re-using the handmade cards I've received over the years and sending them to Operation Write Home? I keep them all because I can't bear to throw them away, partly because I know what goes into making them and partly because they're so cute and pretty! So I have a handful, and I was contemplating cutting off the card fronts and attaching them to blank white cards to reuse for OWH. On the one hand I think it's great to give the cards some new life, but on the other hand they're not my own work so I'm not sure what the makers would think of their cards being used that way. What do you think?

The other day Sally went through a cedar chest full of wonderful old things. She had been holding onto some things that belonged to a local man that passed away some time ago, because although she knew no one to pass them on to, it didn't seem right to throw them away. There was a mix of her own things, like blankets her mother had made (I LOVE those), and a few things belonging to this man. Well Sally finally got in touch with a relative of the man who said she'd be glad to have those items, so everything got unearthed and sorted through. There were some really cool items that I had never seen before, like World War II ration books - and tucked in the back of the folder holding those books was a note, something that has really stuck with me. It was a handwritten note written in 1936, with a newspaper clipping pinned to it. The clipping was a death announcement. The note was written by the mother of her now deceased son, expressing how heartbroken she was. I was close to heartbroken just holding this note in my hands, knowing that 74 years ago that woman wrote these painful words as she grieved for her son. But aside from the sadness of it, I was amazed at the piece of history that had been kept in that little folder all these years. I'm not much of a history buff, but seeing first hand such a personal piece of it was pretty amazing. I have a much better understanding of why Sally loves doing genealogy so much. Finding these personal items and stories is more interesting than I thought!

Well I've been all over the map in this blog. Better cut it off before I meander in some new and strange direction!

Ooo ooo but P.S. - 15 weeks down, 24 to go!

Howard made more furniture!

Check out the amazing big girl bed Grampa made for Lillian!



Isn't it gorgeous? I love having the drawers underneath. And knowing Howard's work, this bed ought to last Lillian for years and years... maybe her own kids can use it one day! And check out that wonderful colourful quilt that Lillian's Great Grandma made (Sally's Mom). So beautiful!

Even though there is no mattress yet, it seems it's a great place for story time with Gramma (or "Amma" as it is currently pronounced).



Also seems comfortable enough to nap on, sans mattress.



Don't worry, we'll find a mattress soon! She still sleeps in the crib for now, and we have lots of time for the transition before the new baby moves in.

In other news... Lillian fell head over heels with a new lovey earlier this week. She and I were browsing a second hand store that had plenty of kids' stuff, when she spotted Ernie (of Sesame Street fame - she LOVES all things Sesame Street, which I am actually pretty tickled with). I lifted him up to check the price, then went to put him back, opting not to splurge. Well of course since I got to hold him, Lillian wanted to also. I let her shake his hand to say goodbye, but instead she snatched him into a big hug and followed that up with a big kiss. So, we bought Ernie. Now she has four lovey friends that she must have in bed with her and often plays with throughout the day: Baby (from Santa), Elmo (the one dollar find at a church bazaar), Annie (as in Raggedy, from Oma), and now Ernie. I'd love to find a plush Abby Cadabby for her someday, but I think even the big girl bed would be a little crowded!

And on a totally different note I'm going to do something I don't think I've ever done before - share a recipe! We had this for dinner the other day and it was soooo good I decided I shouldn't keep it to myself. Sally had the grand idea of trying to copy the White Spot dish called "Chicken, Broccoli & Cheese" that's baked with a bit of curry in the sauce. I found one that seemed similar online and tweeked it only a little. We served it over rice so it would soak up the sauce, and mmmmmmmmmmmmm. So, so, so good. Here you go:

Ingredients
4 single chicken breasts, cooked and chopped
2 heads broccoli, cut up, cooked and drained well
1 1/2 cups sour cream
1 1/2 cups mayonnaise
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
2 teaspoons curry powder
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
Parmesan cheese

Directions
1.Preheat oven to 350F.
2.Put the chicken in a greased casserole. Top with the broccoli.
3.In a bowl, whisk together the sour cream, mayonnaise, chicken broth, and curry powder; pour over broccoli.
4.Bake 20 minutes or until hot and bubbly.
5.Sprinkle with cheeses. Broil 5 minutes or until top is crispy.
6.Serve over plain rice - remember to spoon on extra sauce!

This quantity (with rice) fed 4 Yarbrough adults plus Lillian at 20 months old, with leftovers to serve two.

Tell me if you try it!

One last sidenote - I tried an online photo processing site for the first time this week and FYI, it was great! After doing some price comparisons, I went with Winkflash (though I was looking at American prices, not sure which site would have one if I were looking at Canadian prices). I ordered 122 photos for $11.04 including shipping after using a coupon for 50 free prints, which is definitely cheaper than what I usually pay at Wal-Mart. And I received it in just under a week, which is fine by me. Quality is good too. Hooray for a new money-saving easy service!

TTFN!

Already!

Wahoo! Only a week and a half between posts!

Time to brag about our girl genius (Why is it that "boy genius" is a common phrase but "girl genius" isn't? Double standard!)... We got video of Lillian saying the alphabet (okay, repeating it, but it's still damn impressive if you ask me), counting to ten (same deal), and shuffling around in Gramma shoes, as she so often does. Enjoy!







And a cute Lillian story... Last week at Costco, after checking out Sally and I hit the restrooms. I went first, while Sally stayed with Lillian and the two carts (yes, two, yikes). Apparently while I was gone, Lillian went on and on about "Mommy peepee" to every person that passed by. Then when we switched, she did the same for Gramma. So nice of her to make announcements on our behalf! Looks like potty time isn't too far off!

Just about 13 weeks along with the little one - hello, second trimester! Not much new to report. I still get nauseous when I get hungry, so I need to remember to space out my snacks and meals. Having to get up several times a night to "peepee" - oh joy. Limiting evening beverages doesn't seem to help any. Ah well. Looking forward to a baby bump so I can have something to show for all this!

Short and sweet this time... TTFN!

Happy New Year

I'm just going to skip right past the part where I apologize for how long it's been since the last update and go straight to the good stuff... in no particular order...

Christmas was awesome!



At 20 months old, Lillian "got it" this time around - a leap from last Christmas and even her birthday last April. She watched other people ripping open the wrapping paper and soon caught on that the pile in front of her was actually FOR her. She was giddy with every package.





I think she got a nice mix of stuff without going overboard - perfect. She's latched on tight to a few things... her new baby doll (which replaces the dollar store one she literally wore out), her foam letters and numbers (with which she makes alphabet soup and feeds to us), and the memory game I made for her using photos of the family. I'm pretty stinkin' proud of how quickly she's learning to identify letters and family faces since she started playing with those two new toys. I'll try to post video of that soon.

New Year, New Rooms!
We changed things around just a tad at the house. Once again, Howard and Sally have been super flexible and helpful to us, this time going so far as to renovating a room for us! Lillian had been sleeping in the spa room, with a hot tub sunk into the
floor right next to her crib. Don't worry, we took all the appropriate precautions of course, but still the room wasn't exactly child-friendly, especially with the anticipation of Lillian learning to climb out of her crib any time now and with the room being pretty drafty and cold, which meant using a space heater at night. So, our former bedroom is now Lillian's, and Howard has built a floor over the hot tub and Ray and I have moved into that room. The transformation was complete on New Year's Day - how appropriate!





Halloween
I'm not all that big into Halloween myself, but last year I was pretty tickled with the super-cute ladybug costume we got for Lillian's first Halloween. The bonus was how many costumes we conjured up out of the black tights and onesie she wore underneath - remember the scrapblog?



I got such a kick out of that, I was looking forward to doing something similiar this year. Until, that is, the time actually came. My imagination failed me on the costume part, and when I did make a half-assed attempt at it, Lillian wasn't nearly as cooperative (I'd forgotten that last Halloween she wasn't yet crawling, and this year of course she was walking like a pro). I took a ton of video, hoping I could get some useful clips to edit and maybe a few stills to use in another scrapblog. But, no luck. Ah well. We'll see what happens next year! Here's a little glimpse of the 2009 effort... I dressed her in all white, so that I could edit the photos to make her look like an angel, a ghost, Mr Clean... you get the idea.



PS - Grampa planted pumpkins in the garden just for Lillian, and boy did she like that. And I liked the baked salty seeds mmmmmm.

Stomping!
One of Lillian's favourite (side note: you can take the girl out of Canada, but you can't take the Canadian spelling out of the girl) activities is stomping stomping stomping! It's sort of her version of dancing; she loves to do it, especially on her little red stool like a stage, and lately she lets her friends Elmo and Baby join in.



In early December, Lillian got some brand new shoes, and she fell absolutely in love with them. She was pretty enamoured with them for several days, and even now asks to put them on frequently throughout the day. In this video, she was showing off her new shoes for Grampa and Gramma, having a grand time stomping in them for everyone's enjoyment.



There a few other videos to check out of our little girl if you like, including some more dancing, some showing off of vocabulary (which was outdated as soon as it was filmed), some dusting, some driving, and of course some giggles. http://www.youtube.com/bosco79

Funny Face
Uncle Loren gave Lillian some ultra-cute overalls and red shirt, and she just loves that she gets to wear overalls just like Grampa - who, by the way, has become "Papa" lately. On her first day proudly wearing this outfit, Ray gave her one of Loren's had to model and of course we had to take some pictures. Unfortunately, we hit two snags - first, she wouldn't stay still so most of the shots were pretty blurry, and second, she has started to make the "fake" smile for the camera, so the only shot that somewhat turned out was this one... still pretty darned cute, if you ask the Mama.




Announcement Time!
Okay so maybe it doesn't really qualify as an announcement when so many people already know, but what the heck, it's still fun to put it out there into the world without any hush-hush: WE'RE PREGNANT! Yay! Baby is due July 23, but it's likely we'll have a planned c-section about a week before that. Ray is pretty tickled at the idea of sharing a birthday with the little one, so we're aiming for July 16. Just before Christmas, we saw the doctor and had an ultrasound at about 10 weeks along. The baby started off in the classic profile position, but while we were watching it shifted to face us, so to speak - that was pretty cool to watch. It already had little arm buds and leg buds, and when it turned the doctor noted how cute they are at this stage, looking like little Teddy Grahams! I just love that! Here's one of the shots she gave us, so you can play the Where The Heck Is The Baby In This Picture game.

style="width: 320px" src="http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c202/bosco_79/PregnancyNumberTwo/BabyNumberTwoatTenWeeksjpg.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket">

So hopefully the pregnancy will light the fire under my butt to get on here and blog more often. If you're really lucky, maybe you'll get more glimpses of my bare belly. I know you miss those shots. Remember this one? My favourite. Maybe we can try to duplicate that one again this year, and try to get Lillian in there somehow.



Well, I think that about does it for today. I'll leave you with one last photo of our beautiful girl.



Ok just one more.



Ta-ta!

P.S. - Shout out to my Mom who has had a rough few weeks. Hang in there Mom, we love you!

Well howdy there! A month goes by fast! Let's jump right in to some photos, shall we?



I love that one. She looks so serene.

So, I promised photos of our travels around Oregon this summer, didn't I?

Ocean World, where the Landy kids tried their darndest to teach Lillian how to pose for a photo. They are very well trained in the art, but Lillian needs some practice.



Would you look at the size of these trees?!? So amazing. If you ever get the chance, definitely make time to drive through Stout Grove in the Redwoods National Forest.





Lillian was a little disinterested (hello, thumb), but Ray and I were glad we took Sally's advice to stop and see some of the falls on the way home from visiting Michael, Sarah, and the kids in Sisters. So pretty.



Speaking of Sisters... I was terrible at remembering to take photos of the kids while we there, but I did get this one at the quilt show in town.



Yup, that's a PT Cruiser covered in a quilt. In the stamping I do, I've come across the phrase "I'll stamp anything that will sit still long enough." Well I guess quilters have the same feeling! The quilt show is a HUGE annual event and there more quilts than I've ever seen before. Main street in Sisters is actually a main highway, and they actually shut it down for the show and the thousands of pedestrian lookie-loos. There were more quilts than I could photograph, but here are a few that I liked, including ANOTHER quilt-covered vehicle (a minivan this time)! Such detail in these beauties.









Hey, look! It's Brianne at Crater Lake!



Hey, look! It's Trent fishing with the guys!



Hey, look! It's Ray being icky!



Ewwwww.

More recently, Lillian has taken up some computing.



And she has started helping Grampa make coffee in the morning. What would he do without her? She shows him step by step... First, scoop...



... then, dump...



... then, find a snack in the cupboard!



We've started going to the local library for story time. On her first visit, Lillian got to make her first work of refrigerator art!



I tried so hard to get a photo of her proudly holding up the artwork with a great big smile - but if you can believe it, she doesn't always cooperate!

Ok, before we overload on photos I should call it quits. I'll leave you with a video of Lillian doing one of her favourite passtimes - chatting away on the "telephone."



Oh, there is so much more! Hopefully I'll find time to post them before another month flies by :)

Summer of Fun

Ok, so it's been a while. Again. Which means I have LOTS of photos and videos to share to catch up, so I know you'll forgive me :) There are so many, I'm going to have to pace it out over a few posts!

Lillian continues to wow us every day with her awesomeness, cuteness, intelligence, and quirkiness. She brings us shoes and socks when she wants to go outside (especially Gramma). She mocks our coughing or sneezing or throat-clearing noises while covering her mouth, whether we've made the noise right in front of her or from behind closed doors. She makes a similiar noise for snoring, thanks to Grampa's living room naps, and uses that sound any time any one is sleeping or lying down. Occasionally she'll laugh so hard she snorts, which cracks me up. A few times I've caught her swaying back and forth for no apparent reason - I think she's working on her Bouwman Rock. She likes to play in the cupboard where we keep the potatoes, and once she decided it would be great fun to bring every one of them to Grampa in the living room - one at a time, wiping her hands clean after every trip. A few months ago, we introduced her to blowing bubbles with a wand, and shortly after that she surprised us all with this imaginative display:



Lillian loves spending time outside, and she's done plenty of it this summer. She'll play for ages in the front yard, gathering fir cones and finding sticks to stir in Johnny's water dish. And she has even warmed up to Johnny lately - not only does she not shy away from him as much as she used to, but sometimes she even approaches him on her own to pet or even kiss him.







And sometimes she gets just a tad bit dirty:



When Lillian's playing indoors, one of her recent favourite toys is this tunnel thing that Lori gave us that she just loves to play in with a buddy. I think she gets a kick out of one of us rolling and crawling around on the floor with her for a change - she pats the ground with her hand when she wants me to come on down for "tunnel time." I love this picture Sally snapped - a lovely shot of me, and Lillian is such a whirl of excited motion she can't even be captured by the camera!



Lillian has become a master horsewoman, a trick rider even. She used to like to ride on the horse that Grampa made for her only if one of us was with her and rocking it for her. Then during the Landys' visit here, Emily showed her that she could do it all by herself - and man does she ever! Just a couple of days ago she even learned how to climb on board on her own, too. One more video for you today...



Stay tuned for next time... I think I'll post all about our travels around Oregon. Look forward to adventures with Aunts, Uncles, cousins, natural wonders, and a quilt-covered PT Cruiser!!?!?!?!?!?

TTFN

Okay okay... just one more...

Home Sweet Home

The other day Sally was telling me about a conversation she had with Trent during our visit to Ladner. She was asking if he liked riding bikes, and if he'd like to borrow one when he comes to visit us in Oregon. In case he did want to, Sally also gave Trent a heads up that we don't have any pavement to ride on, only dirt and gravel. She told me that he gave her a kind of look, like he was politely taking part in the conversation but didn't have a clue what she meant by "no pavement."

So it has occurred to me that those of you that have plans to visit here for the first time this summer don't really know what you're coming to. I thought I'd share some pictures of our home and property so you have a better idea.

Here is the house - it's a little cramped for space with 5 of us living here, but it has gotten much better since Loren moved out.



And here is the guest room - where you guys will be staying, unless you'd prefer to camp out under the stars.



This is the wood shed - have to have lots of room for all that wood since fire is the only way we can heat the house.



Here is our clothes dryer, where we hang everything up after we've handwashed it all.

Oh and of course here is our pet turkey, who happened to walk by while I was taking all of these pictures. We call him Tom.

Well everybody should know what this is! It was an adjustment getting used to going outside to "do my business" after enjoying indoor plumbing all those years in Canada.



This is the garage, but as you can see we can't store much in it like you guys do, since the rain and wild animals can get right in there.

There's the gravel driveway, just like Sally said.



Howard keeps a pretty big vegetable garden, which is great since the nearest grocery store takes a few hours to get to.



Well I hope you enjoyed the grand tour! We can't wait for your visits, everyone is so excited!