Baby steps for Holly, Leaps for "Momkind"

About a week and a half ago, Holly started taking baby steps, but she would always fall by third step. In that week's time, she has upped the number of steps. This first video is when we were excited about the first little 3 steps and we tried to video her. As you can see, she was not in the walking mood.



I tried again the following day and the result was much better. I think her motive was to get the toys that Andersen was playing with.



Because I am a persistent mom... I filmed her again the next day and this time she made it across the whole room (OK, only 2/3's of it, but that was her best stretch yet.)



CONGRATULATIONS HOLLY!

HELP! HELP!

So this morning I took Holly upstairs with me while I got dressed. I left Andersen downstairs watching TV. I barely make it into my closet and I hear Andersen's cute little voice saying, "Help, mommy, Help!" He didn't sound too distressed, so I casually walked out of my room and headed for downstairs to see what he needed. This is what he needed help with:


Why is it that they can figure out how to get up, but they can't figure out how to get down. I'm just glad that he called for help before he got any higher.

I Won!

I haven't "won" very many contests in my lifetime (excluding basketball games). My sister, Layne, e-mailed me a drawing for the Utah Chocolate Show. Layne has been to the show before and said it is awesome and her friend Colleen has won tickets a few times, but not this year, so she was really bummed. All I had to do to enter the drawing was forward the e-mail to 5 people. I LIKE chocolate. So I did it. Low and behold, a few days later I got an e-mail back saying that I had won 2 tickets. (I think you the tickets are only $7 to get in so it's not like I couldn't go otherwise, but now I'll go instead of just thinking it would be fun to go to.) I figured most people win tickets, but Layne told me they just select 15 winners each week for 2 weeks. I guess that makes me one of the lucky few. Since Layne is the one that allowed me this opportunity...we'll have a sisters day out and enjoy chocolate.

Earlier I mentioned that I haven't won tickets to many things, but I did win tickets to something else before. Back in 1995 I wanted to go to the AT&T Challenge tennis tournament in Atlanta. Andre Agassi was playing in it and for all who know me, know that I love Andre Agassi. My dad was working for AT&T and said I could get discounted tickets if I called a certain number. I waited too late and it was either sold out, or they no longer had the "discounted" tickets available. I was explaining to the guy on the phone how badly I wanted to see Agassi. With his help, we analyzed the draw and figured that Agassi would most likely play Thursday night in the quarterfinals. I really wanted to go to that match. After quite the long discussion, he finally says, "I'll tell you what. I don't have any tickets I can sell you, but I do have 2 box seat tickets in the 7th row that I can give you...what is your name and address?" My heart was beating I was so excited. Luckily, I did get to watch Agassi play in that quarterfinal and he went on to win the tournament. So fun. So lucky.

I Finally have Christmas Stockings

I really wanted to buy Christmas stockings last year, and the year before, and the year before, but the only ones I really liked were from Pottery Barn and they were between $26 - $36 EACH. That adds up, so I kept thinking how hard can it be to make them. I figured I could buy material for $50 or so and make quite a few. The problem with my plan is - I DON'T SEW. I have my mom's old sewing maching that sits in a closet...I don't even remember how to thread the bobbin. We'll I never got around to doing anything last year, or the year before, etc, and now that it is the holiday season again, I began searching for stockings again. So I bit the bullet and went a fabric store and walked out with $65 of cute fabric. Thanks to Layne I now have 2 christmas stockings with 4 more on their way.

These are mine and Charl's. Layne is still working on the kids'. When she's done, I'll add a picture of them. We may try to monogram them somehow, too.

Tonight's Drive Home

Today we spent the day at Layne's house. Charl helped Rich hang their Christmas lights and Layne and I sewed (I cut, she sewed) my Christmas stockings (we finished 2 of of 6). Anyway, we headed for home at 8 pm and the radio station was on KSL (we listened to the BYU game on the drive to Layne's house so it was still on that station). Playing on that station was the Doug Wright show. We tuned in during the middle of his rant about playing Christmas songs before Thanksgiving. He would play snippets of songs and say, "I definitely can wait until Thanksgiving before hearing that song. The first song we heard him rip on was, "I Want A Hippopotamus For Christmas". As soon as the song began to play, Andersen pipes up in the back, "Hippo, Mommy" and procedes to sing the song. Sad for Andersen because he only played a few lines, but he sang right along with it. Then Doug Wright comes back and starts in on his lead for the next song that should not be played until after Thanksgiving. I say to Charl, wouldn't it be funny if he does the "donkey" song next? Ten seconds later we are busting up laughing because sure enough, Dominick the Donkey plays next.

The reason this was so humorous to us is because last year at Christmas Teresa discovered the "donkey" song and intoduced it to us at her birthday party. Nearly every Sunday after that, we have watch the You Tube video of Dominick the Donkey and when you go to that video the "Hippo" video is the next one in line. Now, whenever Andersen sees a computer, he shouts "donkey, Mommy" or "hippo Mommy", and continues to shout until he is singing along with the video. HE'S HOOKED...thanks, Teresa!!

Halloween 2008

It's 9:45 pm on Halloween night. The kids are in bed. We turned off the porch lights to ward off the last of the teenage candy addicts. I just completed a "movie" of the pictures from the day using Picasa, but I was disappointed at how blurry the pictures turn out. So, I'll leave the "movie" on here for you to view, but I'll also add some of the "not blurry" pictures, too.

Here is how the afternoon and evening unfolded. Charl came home from work around 3 pm. We put the kids in the car at 4 pm and headed off to granny Louw's house. The Pews met us there around 5 pm. Andersen knocked on granny's red door and said "trick or treat". He spent all morning watching Halloween cartoons and he got very well schooled on the ins and outs of Halloween. After hanging out with cousins, we got back in the car and headed back home. When we got back at 6:15 pm the neighborhood kids were out in full force and Andersen couldn't wait to join them, despite the light rain. Somehow, I (katie) got nominated (by Andersen and Charl) to take the cute elephant around the neighborhood. Charl stayed home with Holly and handed out the treats. We went up and down 2 streets and it seemed like we were gone forever. Andersen would walk up the driveways saying "trick or treat" and then he'd say it again while knocking, but as soon as the door was answered he wouldn't say anything. If he knew the people he would invite himself in. He made his way into the Hoskins (his former nursery teacher) and left with a toy car. They loved his costume and they love him so he got the VIP treatment. When we got back home, we ate pizza (frozen from Target and it wasn't that great), but it was food. All in all, it was successful, however next year it is Charl's turn to walk the streets! (Good thing it was warmer than last year.) Enjoy the pictures.

This year Andersen was an elephant. He loves elephants, so we had to get this costume when we saw it at Costco. The size is for 2 -4 year olds...Anders is a short 2 year old and look at the floods! We just got him out of the car so he could go trick-or-treating at Granny's house.
Trick-or-Treating. He's thinking...Granny, where are you?
So, I got lazy with Holly this year. I put her in the dinosaur costume that Granny Annie made about 7 years ago for Rylan. Andersen wore this costume last year. It was a little big and she didn't really care for the headpiece when it was on her head.

Andersen posing with the Jack-O-Lantern in he pre- trick or treating Halloween outfit.
Holly posing for her first "pumpkin" picture. What a cutie!

From Movies

Picture Tag

This is the 4th picture in my 4th folder. It was taken in August of 2006 at Park City. We (granny and grandpa, teresa, rachelle and tim and gang, and our family) rented a nice town home for the week and had a Louw family vacation. (Keith wasn't able to make it.) This was Andersen's first real "vacation". We played tennis, went swimming, walked around the town and got ice cream, went shopping at the outlets, and went down the alpine slide. This picture was taken just after we made it safely down the slide. Charl had been before and went faster than me. I was a little cautious because Charl scared me by telling me I could fly off the track if i went too fast. Hmmm...did he just want to make sure he beat me??? None the less...it was still fun. Anders was 3 months so he waited at the bottom with grandpa and Rachelle (who was 7 months pregnant with Gwen). We'll have to take him when he gets a little older. Fun times!

My face looks fat in this picture.