A Christmas Miracle?

I am still trying not to get my hopes up on this one, but I do think that it could be a Christmas miracle. Let me start at the beginning...

I took my one hour glucose test last week on Thursday. (Yes, the test that I failed in both previous pregnancies). I was fully expecting to fail again. If you fail the one hour test, you have to take the dreaded three hour glucose tolerance test. My record is 1-1 with the three hour test. With Ellie, I failed it. With Nathan, I passed it. So, I was preparing myself for the fact that I would undoubtedly fail the one hour, and maybe I could eek out a "pass" on the 3 hour again...
So, I gulped down the nasty orange drink (and for the first time, I didn't get light-headed or nauseas after drinking it...). I went in for my appointment and made sure that they didn't draw the blood until one hour had passed to THE minute (with my experience with blood sugar...every minute counts!). Considering my history, the doctor almost made me skip right to the three hour, but I convinced him to let me try the one hour. He said they should have the results back by the end of that day or the next day and that they wouldn't call unless I "failed." He added that if I didn't hear from them by Monday or Tuesday (today), I could assume that I passed. No phone call. Either they forgot to call me, or they are letting me enjoy Christmas with my sweets, or maybe... just maybe...it could be the greatest Christmas Miracle of all!

The first Omaha snow

I know, I know...Chicago has had a ton of snow already this year. Plenty of shoveling has already occurred there. But, here in Omaha - we experience our first snowfall of any significance this week. On Thusday night, we had the ice / sleet / wintry mix stuff followed by 3 or so inches of snow. I had a few interesting revelations as I watched this "storm" unfold...
1.) Omaha does not believe in using salt on the roads (or they refuse to pay for any). Instead, they come through and pour sand and gravel on top of the snow. What does that do? Absolutely nothing, in my opinion, other than make the snow brown.
2.) Omaha does not much believe in plows, either. This snow occurred 48 hours ago -- and I'm not kidding when I say I have not seen a single plow yet. No kidding. Parking lots are not plowed, our subdivision is not plowed... just packed down snow turned to ice from cars driving on it... with sand dumped on top of it.
3.) I don't know if this happens every time, but most schools in the area were closed for the following day before the first snowflake even fell. It's like this town doesn't know how to deal with snow, and they know it - so the whole place just about shuts down. Even ellie's preschool was closed... she was bummed - it was the day of her holiday program and party. The "chicago girl" in her couldn't understand why they could have school at 10 am when the snow had stopped at 4 am... it was puzzling for us all.
4.) We may need to break down and buy a snowblower -- the three car garage is all fun until you have to shovel that whole wide driveway! (OK, Frank has done most of the shoveling this year -- taking pity on the pregnant lady, I guess.)

Now the snow is done (but the memories of the packed down ice mixed with sand will linger on until May, probably...) and the weather has turned to bitter cold -- below zero for the next few days. ugh.

The kids are still all jacked up for Christmas! It truly is the day that the entire kid year revolves around, and it shows. I think this is the first year that they are BOTH aware of what's a comin' -- very fun...

Have a great week - Merry Christmas!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

We are (mostly) recovered from our bouts of strep throat (ellie), croup (nathan) and remnants of both of those "landing" on Frank and me. We have spent a lot of our spare time recently gearing up for the holidays. Ellie is beyond excited... very into the whole Santa thing. She's got a lot of questions, too... and not growing up with Santa myself, I'm not sure that I even know the whole "lie" -- it's a bad combination. She's a sharp cookie - I figure we've got like one or two years tops left with her "believing." And Nathan is still blissfully unaware... no list of "I wants" and he'll be happy with whatever shows up under the tree. His big thing this season is "ho ho ho...happy halloween." He's always at least one holiday behind. He didn't stop with the "happy mother's day" until like September - gotta love it.

We got our tree last weekend. Not at a real nursery -- at Lowe's. It's not our finest tree, but it'll do for this year -- and the price was right -- $35! We were paying like $75 or $80 in chicago from a local nursery. Between the Omaha factor and the Lowe's superstore factor, we got quite the deal. Sure, it's decidedly not as fresh, but whatever - we only have to leave it up for a few weeks. We will likely "take down" Christmas on the 26th anyways, so it doesn't have to last long. The kids had fun decorating the tree and seeing all of the ornaments again. I love the lower branches the best -- most of them have like 4 or 5 ornaments each - all clumped up together :) We didn't even "fix" it -- sort of sums up the tree trimming experience this year.

This morning we went to the club (la dee da) for "brunch with Santa" -- it was fun. We don't go to "fancy" places to eat very often. Ellie got a kick out of dressing up and putting her cloth napkin in her lap. Nathan was absolutely tickled to be drinking apple juice out of a big fancy wine glass. Both kids were happy with the "buffet style" set-up -- eat as much of whatever you want and don't choose anything you don't want. Ellie was also surprised to see the huge table of desserts. I mean, was this a dream come true? Unlimited waffles and bacon...and then a chocolate brownie? Santa and Mrs. Claus were just kind of fixed by the front door. Neither one of the kids was too interested in sitting on their laps, but we were "allowed" to take one photo (the one above) if Frank held nathan and ellie could just stand next to Mrs. C. Good enough... brunch with santa...it's a wrap.

Hope everyone has a great, stress-free week!

Back home again...ahhh!

We have been back (for almost a week) from our trip home for Thanksgiving. The whole family drove to Glen Ellyn on Saturday (11/22) -- even though Frank turned right around that night and flew back to Omaha... I guess that's a price we had to pay for going to Hawaii in October - no more vacation days for Frank! So, while Frank was back here working and tiling the upstairs bathrooms (no joke! that guy is motivated... and the tile looks amazing, by the way -- a big upgrade from the linoleum that was there, for sure!), the kids and I were "playing" in Illinois. The time in Glen Ellyn consisted of a lot of cousin time, a lot of Grandma and Papa time, a shopping trip with just me and Meredith (super fun!) and even a trip to the newly opened Too Toots restaurant in town -- a whole train themed restaurant. Nathan was in train heaven - the most well behaved he's ever been in a restaurant since Cheeseburger in Paradise. There was no live music, but trains might be even better when you're a 2 year old boy!

We also got to spend a couple of nights at the Hilts house - two nights of fun "sleeovers" for the cousins - complete with videos and popcorn - who could ask for more? We also had the annual "cousin" photo taken - they all did great - smiles all around (and from 4 kids...that's no small feat!). We did the traditional "double" thanksgiving on Thursday -- noon meal with the Dykstras in Michigan and afternoon meal with the Williams' in Cary. (This was the official "switch-over" point in the week - packed our bags and stayed in Cary for the rest of the weekend...)

The time in Cary also was very realxing - lots of visiting, lots of eating and even more shopping. Frank and I even had a date while we were there (awesome!) and we spent the evening eating (of course...Houlihan's - a sentimental favorite of ours...) and yes, more shopping. It was after this evening that Frank looked at the back of the car and decided we had better not make any more purchases in illinois or we would never be able to haul it all back to nebraska -- needless to say, we made a good dent in the holiday shopping, which is a good feeling!

It was great to be "home" for longer than just a weekend.... (Our families might say otherwise!) I am already looking forward to Christmas time -- we'll do it all again, and Frank can be there the whole week! Well, hopefully without driving through the hours of snow in both directions to and from Chicago -- seriously - I-80 in the snow is no fun at all!

I am always most homesick right after we get home...good thing there's this whole Christmas thing to keep me busy for the next few weeks -- we don't even have our decorations up yet - we are slacking! We are using the excuse that we came home to Ellie coming down with strep throat and the rest of us just feeling generally crappy -- we'll get the tree up this weekend, hopefully!

I can't believe it's been so long...

Has it reall been 10 days since the last post?? DOes that mean that Omaha is that uneventful...or could it be that we are getting busier here?? Either way - here's what we've been up to lately...

Last weekend, Ellie went to a birthday party for Maia, the little girl that lives behind us. I call Ellie and Maia the "2 best friends that never spend any time together..." They both act as if they are long lost buddies whenever they see each other (which has been like twice, for a grand total of 20 minutes...) Anyways, the party was at "My Gym" -- Ellie loved it -- two hours of organized running around and playing on equipment. Not a lot of party "hoop-la" either -- they paused at one point to eat a cupcake, but otherwise -- it was constant motion. At the end of the day, I don't know if Ellie really had fun at the "party" or just the "gym" - but either way, it was a success! She was so excited to tell us all about it... and then it happened...she crashed... absolutely broke down...sobbing...inconsolable. Frank was being especially patient (I didn't get it at all -- what the hell? She just got back from a party...what is she so upset about??). Frank explained that she inherited this genetic malfunction from him...in fact, when he was a kid, he also came home from almost every birthday party and completely melted down... Are you serious?" This is going to happen after every party?? Aw, geez... It was bizarre, but at least Frank knows where she's coming from!

Ellie is still loving preschool. We are doing some "friend work" there...yes, Ellie is by far our best social connection to Omaha, so far! There is a little girl in her class (also 4 years old) who has a little brother (also 2 1/2 years old) and they also have one more on the way (due one month after me) -- perfect, right? So, a couple of weeks ago, Ellie came home with a note explaining that someone in her class had a mom who was put on bed rest due to pregnancy complications (guess who?) and she needed help carpooling to and from school -- I was all over it -- ME! ME! Pick me! (Totally not my usual self... sad, right? I wouldn't normally be the first to volunteer to help out a stranger...it's a character flaw, I'm working on it!) Long story short, we've been acting as "chauffeur" for the last week -- Ellie gets a big kick out of it -- this girl is extremely shy and quiet and so it's pretty much the "ellie and nathan show" the whole way to and from school, but whatever... We'll have to call them and see if we're still "on duty" after we get back from chicago after thanksgiving... or if we've been replaced by other friends... :)

Well, I'm going to keep packing! Looking forward to our big trip to the "big city!"
More when we get home -

A few things we've discovered...

I haven't posted in a while and it's probably because we haven't been up to much...tourist-wise, anyways. We have ventured out a couple of times and discovered a few small things about Omaha...

1.) Sizzler! We finally made it out to Sizzler. Even though I was completely excited to try it again, I must say - it was better than I thought it would be. The salad bar was good, as long as you pretty much stuck to the salad -- they had a lot of other stuff (wings, taco bar,...) that didnt' look too good. Frank actually ordered a steak with his salad bar (for the price of only $2.00 extra) - he sadi it wasn't bad! And the kids were happy to see "cheese pizza" on the kids menu. A curiosity satisfied. I don't think we'll be rushing back every weekend or anything, but it was worth the trip.

2.) Pudgy's Pizzeria! We found it. We found a good pizza. Apparently this guy moved to Omaha in the early 70s from chicago and decided that this town needed a good pizza (so this pizza issue has been a long standing problem here!) Frank and Ellie stopped to pick up a pizza from Pudgy's on their way home from their "date" on Saturday (the went to see Madagascar 2). It was raining and freezing outside, and by the time the pizza got to our table, it was relatively cold-ish...and it was STILL the best pizza we've had to date here. Frank said it was a very "auggie's" atmosphere -- Pudgy himself was at the front counter, not really working, but he knew everyone that came in -- there were tons of people racing around behind the counter -- the most organized chaos that ever was! I can't wait to try it maybe at the restaurant... when it's hot and fresh out of the oven... nonetheless, I think we're on to something here!

3.) Conditioner. this one has nothing to do with omaha, but what the heck took me so long to get some conditioner in ellie's hair? Brushing her hair after a bath was like torture for everyone involved. Quick fix - conditioner - DUH! Smooth sailing every since, and we've shaved a good 5 minutes off the whole bath time routine...priceless!

Those are the discoveries of recent weeks... we're starting to run out of touristy things to do here, so we are turning our focus to restaurants - next up: Fazoli's -- haven't eaten at one of those since our Purdue days. It was "nice" fast food dinner back then - I wonder what we'll think of it now -- that's on the schedule for next weekend - full report to follow.

Have a great week - stay warm!

Halloween 2008

Our first Halloween in Omaha was festivity-full :) Here's how the week went down...

Wednesday, October 29th: Ellie's Halloween program / party at preschool:

After missing a few days while we were in Hawaii, Ellie's first day back to preschool was the Halloween party (good thing, too -- she was SO excited -- I think it helped tear her away from that swimming pool in Maui)! So, as we were all a little jetlagged from our trip, I had to wake Ellie up around 8:00 that morning so that we could get in costume and get to school on time. She was thrilled to put on that Ariel get-up (even the wig) and was even more excited that Frank and I would be coming for the program. Again, I gotta say, that's one good thing about Omaha - Frank works close enough to skip out for an hour to watch Ellie and her class sing their 6 halloween songs and make a mysterious "witch's brew" -- it was cute, and she was so happy to have us there watching her "hang out" with her friends. Very fun!

Thursday, October 30th: Carving pumpkins

We went to target and bought (probably) four of the last carvable pumpkins in Omaha (and a little one "for the baby," ellie insisted...). Usually, pumpkin carving starts off with a bang, but before the first one is completely gutted, the kids are off doing something else, and Frank and I are left to do all the "fun" by ourselves... This year, they both showed much more stamina! Ellie loved scooping the guts out of the pumpkins and was heavily involved in the "design" phase of the pumpkins -- instructing Frank on how exactly she wanted each face to look. It was fun - but I might advocate pumpkins only for the kids in future years, especially with three kids -- I mean, carving 5 pumpkins is a little excessive!

Friday, October 31st: the BIG day... Halloween!

Not a big hyped up day - the preschool party was done, we had a lazy afternoon...just waiting around to trick-or-treat, basically. We had heard that the hours here were 6 pm - 9 pm. OK, weird for us (I think in Elk Grove, we had many trick-or-treaters by 4:00, but whatever...) We ate dinner, waited around, and around 6:00, the kids were in their costumes and we were out on the driveway doing the "photo shoot." Still no action on the street...pretty quiet... At about 6:15, we couldn't hold them back any longer, so we headed out. Last year at this time, Nathan was not a great walker yet (can you believe it??), so this year was much better in terms of mobility! We headed down one side of our street and back up the other side -- about 20 houses in all --just about perfect - nathan was pretty tired - Ellie and Frank did a few more houses, but even they were home by about 7:30. So, halloween traditions are a little different around here. We were the only family out by ourselves. Apparently the tradition here is that the women all gather at one house and have some kind of cocktail party and answer the door for the trick-or-treaters. Meanwhile, the dads take the kids out, while pulling a wagon of beer (no kidding) and loosely supervise big herds of their own children begging for candy... it was strange. Big groups of men, drinking, and big groups of kids running from house to house... and there were TONS of kids... I had bought 3 big bags of candy (about 220 pieces all together) - we started handing out 2 to each kid, but by about 7:45, we had to cut back to one per customer... Frank couldn't do it. He didn't think it was right to give a kid one little mini package of starburst. I couldn't let him near the candy bowl -- I had to answer every bell. No sham in my game. I also took all the "lame" candy out of Nathan's bag and handed it out, too (goobers,... I mean, the kid can't eat peanuts yet anyways...) We shut it down at exactly 9:00 pm with no extra candy -- had we left out lights on any longer, we would have had to resort to handing out pennies or fruit snacks (just got a new big box from costco)... but we don't want to be THOSE people... not when there were three "full size candy bar" houses on our street alone... we don't want to get a bad reputation our first year here!

All in all, it was a fun week, albeit a little lonely on Friday. We usually host a little trick-or-treating party for the grandparents at our house on Halloween. We still bought pumkin napkins and we still made chili (and of course, it was nearly 70 degrees!), and the kids were asking if anyone was coming over. (I think it's a good thing that they still don't really get it that we live so far away from everyone!) Hopefully, we got enough good pictures to capture every moment!

Ahhh...Maui!

Well, Maui fails to disappoint again! This was our first trip to the islands in October and it was hard for me to believe that the weather would be as warm and sunny and consistent as it is in the summer months...but, it was beautiful (and noticeably less crowded!). Highs in the upper 80s every day - the evenings were cool and pleasant - lows around 70 -- it was great! Windy at times, which didn't always make me want to jump in the pool or the ocean, but... the kids were completely unaffected. Ellie would swim day or night, sunny or cloudy, even the morning it rained for a few minutes -- she wanted to be swimming 24-7! Frank was a good sport - he always jumped right in with them. (Ellie did tell me that "daddy was way more fun than mommy at swimming." Fair enough :)

We visited our favorite restaurants -- Cheeseburger in Paradise (Nathan's new favorite, too -- they have live music -- he was hooked -- best behavior from him at a restaurant ever!), Longhi's (Frank and I got to go alone...left Grandma and Grandpa in the pool with the kids...), Leilani's on the Beach (they got rid of my chicken teriyaki sandwich, but it was still good), and of course, Pizza Paradiso (ok, we did this one more than once!)

We tried some new places, too. We went to Kimo's (great location / view...food OK, too!), back to Longhi's for breakfast (always wanted to try it in the a.m. -- we were not disappointed), and the Cool Cat Cafe (yum - burgers!). Overall, we ate like kings (as the scale would indicate... I gained some weight last week in Maui, and a couple more pounds than can be accounted for by "baby"...) Home again, and time to be "good" and get back on track - bummer!

We also did a couple of "kid-friendly" touristy things while we were there -- a couple of boat tours. The first one was called the Reefdancer -- it was a semi-submarine -- the bottom half of the boat was under water - that's where we sat - there were big glass windows to look out. The boat sailed out to the reef and we enjoyed the reef-life. They also had divers go down to the ocean floor and bring up things we might not notice on our own -- urchins, octopus, etc. That was cool -- Ellie got a big kick out of it - especially the octopus! The diver stuck it right to her window and spread out all of its arms -- she was impressed... It was a nice alternative to snorkeling... all the views, without any of the actual snorkeling (which our kids could definitely not have done...) The other boat tour that we did was a "Dolphin Adventure" put on by the Pacific Whale Foundation -- it was a longer tour (about 3 hours) and it was very cool! We sailed out off the coast of Lana'i -- and once we found where dolphins were hanging out that day, the boat was surrounded by them. It was amazing (and hard to capture on film)! They were so fast - they were racing the boat, jumping into the air (yeah, like at the zoo shows). Ellie thought the trip was all worth while because she saw a baby dolphin swimming with its mommy and daddy. It was very cool to see this dolphin family swimming along together -- she called it "even amazing-er" than the octopus!

Besides the two boat tours, we spent most of the week, souvenir shopping, swimming (at least once, if not twice a day!), playing in the sand, and of course, eating! The week went by so quickly -- the kids were great (busy all the time - always ready to nap / sleep). Even the traveling was smooth -- Nathan had his "tunes" and Ellie was happy to watch DVD's and do dot-to dots. The 8 hour flight over was almost enjoyable! (OK, so after the overnight flight back to O'Hare -- nathan didn't sleep hardly at all -- we would have rather not had to wait 2 hours to get on another plane back to Omaha, but you gotta do what you gotta do...Nathan was asking for "no more air-panes")

We are still recovering from our jet-lag. The kids are a bit thrown off still. (the first morning we were home, ellie was surprised that when she woke up..."the sun was already up!") It has been a while since that has happened! We're getting there, though. The jet lag is all completely worth it -- we always leave Maui wondering when we will return, but it's never long before we find our way back.

A day of TOO much fun??

We were home the first weekend of October, and next weekend Frank is working "inventory" at the plant on Saturday and then we are off to Hawaii on Saturday night, so... that leaves us with THIS weekend to explore all that Omaha has to offer in terms of Halloween fun. Here is the fun-filled adventure for today --

Saturday morning: Vala's Pumpkin Patch; Gretna, NE

OK, we had heard that this was a "must see" -- people described it to us as "very commercialized" but "well run" and "constantly being improved," so of course, we decided to give it a go. Pricey, by Omaha standards (about $12 per person - kids and adults...Nathan was still free - whew!), but once you get in the doors, most stuff is included with the admission and the place is HUGE. We were there for almost three hours and judging by the map, I think we saw about a half to 2/3 of the whole place. Very cute stuff -- lots of familiar favorites from home -- the "How tall this fall?," lots of animals to feed by hand, lots of photo-ops where the kids could put their faces in the "holes." There were also a lot of free "shows" -- the pig-tucky derby races (groups of pigs running around in a circle), the pumpkin canon shooter thing (even cooler than it sounds), lots of robotic sort of entertainment (not dissimilar to the country bear jamboree at disney world only more halloween themed - skeletons and stuff like that) -- the kids loved these shows - music for nathan and ellie was just singing along and clapping at the end of each song. There were haystack rides and corn mazes and lots of cutesy little fall displays (storybook village, pirate themed "playgrounds") to walk around. After a few hours, we had had enough (mostly Nathan, who kept asking for "mommy's car car? go home?") On the way out we each chose our treat for later: Ellie and Nathan chose cotton candy (surprise, surprise after the cotton candy meltdown at Sonny Acres last weekend... and incidentally, Nathan chose a roll of smarties after lunch instead of the cotton candy...), Frank chose handmade fudge (very yummy - reminded me of Mackinaw Island Fudge) and I went with (shocker) the homemade cheese popcorn (also very yummy - reminded me of Garrett's popcorn in chicago -- it was a very samll bag, but it's just about gone already -- no shame in my cheese-corn game!)

Saturday afternoon: Children's Museum Halloween Exhibit -- Cobweb Castle

Since we have a membership to the Omaha Children't museum (and I think we've been enough times already to more than pay for itself...the kids love it there!), we decided we could jet "all the way downtown" for an hour or so to see their Halloween exhibit: the Cobweb Castle. The museum closes at 5:00, and we got there around 3:30 -- it was more than enough time. On another fortunate note, there was a Nebraska football game in progress, so we literally had the place to ourselves...worked out pretty well. The cobweb castle itself was more or less just a (dark) room with mazes, "stick your hand in the hole and pull out something creepy," and lots of tunnels and black lights and all sorts of "scary" things for little kids. It was cute, but we were literally in that part of the museum for about 10 - 15 minutes. But, the kids didn't waste any time making their way to their long standing favorites... the dinosaurs, the "ball room" (they call it the science center, I think), the giant piano, the craft room. Still, all in all, we were there for a little over an hour and we (frank and I) had had plenty of children's museum fun. And, of course, we were glad to satisfy the curiosity of the cobweb castle before we ran out of weekends before Halloween!

Saturday evening: Dinner at the Old Market

Since we were already "all the way downtown," and we were done at the museum by 5:00, we decided that it might be a good night for a family night out on the town, so we went to eat at a pizza place (I know, risky in Omaha) called Old Chicago. It's a chain down here (they must have them somewhere else, but who knows) and we figured with a name like Old CHICAGO, it must be good. And you know what? It really was one of the best pizzas we've had here -- pleasantly surprised by an Omaha pizza for once. We have a couple of leads on some other places, too (from the girl that cut my hair - consider the source) so our search will continue for the best pizza in town, but so far - Old Chicago has the lead.

We piled all the fun stuff onto today - tomorrow, it's supposed to rain here, so we will likely spend the day doing errands and oh, yes... frank continues to paint the trim upstairs -- only two rooms left!

The week of birthdays...

I haven't posted in a while, so here is the week of birthday celebrations in review...

Monday, September 29th (Frank's birthday):
Ellie had the day off of preschool, so we spent the day doing "birthday chores" -- we baked and decorated cupcakes, we wrapped gifts, signed and decorated cards, we dug through the "party cupboard" and found enough stuff to decorate the house - a few streamers, some confetti. The kids were really into it -- it was like a whole theme day -- it was great to have something different to break up our day. We also met Frank for lunch at jason's deli (yum!) and went out for dinner. Yes, basically, we ate our way throught the day. It was Frank's birthday, but apparently that means I don't cook -- works for me!

Thursday, October 2nd (My birthday):
I was geared up for a quiet day ending with dinner at Sizzler... you see, I haven't seen a Sizzler since the '80s and I just remember them having (although not the greatest meat...) THE greatest salad bar. So, Frank agreed (reluctantly, probably) and that was the plan. As the day progressed, I was really starting to second guess my pick -- I mean, should I really "waste" a dinner out on the Sizzler?? Why not, right? So, anyways, I had a few things to do before we set off for Chicago for the weekend while the kids were sleeping and I told myself that since it was my birthday -- if I got all of those things done, I would just sit and read a book until they got up. Well, while I was sitting, doing nothing but reading, the doorbell rings -- I was shocked to see my dad standing at the front door. After all, it was my birthday, and we "always" go out to dinner for my birthday.... I guess I just didn't expect the tradition to continue when we live 400 miles apart and we were planning to be in chicago the very next day. He surprised me for sure! We actually didn't end up at the Sizzler -- we went to a place called Firebirds (which I guess is a chain, but we didn't have them in Chicago) -- it was very yummy (at least I thought so -- I don't get out much!) It was a perfect birthday, full of surprises! My dad spent the night here, and rode to Chicago with us the next day....

October 3rd - 5th: The trip to chicago
My dad was a good sport, taking 2 turns in the backseat between the kids...he claims it was not that bad, but we all had our turns back there...it was pretty tight. Although, it was nice to have an extra adult in the backseat at all times to "fetch" for the kids. We made pretty good time (about 8 hours) and by the time we got to Glen Ellyn, the kids were just about tripping over their feet to get in the house to see grandma - very cute! They both quickly ran around, making sure all of their favorite toys were still in the same places and just generally checking the place out to make sure that it hadn't changed since we left. (Ellie was proud to announce that she remembered grandma's house - both the inside and the outside... I would hope so - we've only been gone a few months!) Shortly after we got there, Meredith and Kathryn and Lindsey arrived - holy cousin fun! The four kids disappeared upstairs and played for a long time, pulling either grandma or grandpa into their fun periodically. So fun to hear all of the laughs and "screams of joy" again... When Marc arrived after work, we ordered pizza.... mmmm... Chicago Pizza (of which I ate my weight). I hardly said a word during dinner - just enjoyed the taste! All four of the kids had a "sleepover" in one room (I don't think anyone slept until at least 10:00, but...) On Saturday morning, we headed out to Sonny Acres (the pumpkin patch) - ellie was so excited that we were going to be able to go "even though we moved to Omaha." It was very fun, despite the tantrum ellie threw all because we didn't get cotton candy like we did last year... ugh!
We ended the first half of our weekend at Augustino's Deli, another hometown favorite -- yum, again! how did I not gain weight this weekend??

After we left Glen Ellyn, we drove up to Cary to see Frank's parents. On our way, we drove past our old house -- Nathan recognized the old park from blocks away! I have convinced myself that our Omaha house doesn't look that much bigger than our Illinois house, but as soon as we pulled into the old neighborhood -- we were both like, "ok, these houses are smaller...and they all have (very small!) 2 car garages... and they're all so close together..." But, our old house looked pretty much the same (they have managed to control all of the dandelions that we spread for them before we left). When we got to Cary, the kids did their "check" of nana's house - found the favorite toys and made themselves at home. We walked up to the park to burn off some more energy (which must have worked -- Nathan slept for 14 hours that night...that's not a typo...that's a Nathan record!) On Sunday, all of Frank's siblings came over - so great to see everyone again! Ellie was nearly obsessed with baby oliver, and nathan didn't really even want to acknowledge that there was a new kid in town... hmmm... flash forward to march? I'll bet neither one is as extreme when the new kid in town lives at our house. We wish we could have stayed longer, but the long trek down route 80 was calling... we left around 2:00, and (despite running into THE slowest fast food dinner stop in Des Moines) and got to our house around 10:00 -- again, not bad time, but the kids were zonked - and so were we.

One benefit of me not having to be at work today was that we pretty much left the car as is and came inside and crashed. I spent today (literally the entire day) unpacking the car, doing laundry, putting stuff away. It was a great weekend - I am always most homesick right after we go home. Looking forward to going home again at thanksgiving, when we'll have more time to spend with everyone!

Whew! Thanks for reading all about the birthday week -- it was awesome!
More soon!

Oh, Baby!

Most of you already know this, but for those of you who are in contact with us by "blog only"...baby #3 is on the way! I guess no one will need Dr. Phil to break this one down for them...After going back and forth for like a year whether or not this would be a good thing, we got to Omaha - finally had our whole family in one place after one heck of a long year and it just sort of seemed like the right thing. Consider the built in "leave of absence" for me, and the timing couldn't have been better. We are excited -- well, Ellie is the most excited -- never mind the fact that she only refers to the baby as a "she"... we'll see what we can do about that! Due the first week of April, officially, but with the "luxury" of the planned c-section, we're pretty much advertising "the end of March." (And if they would do it in February, that would be even better!)

Everything is going well so far -- except that there are NO doctor's offices in Omaha that are open in the evenings or weekends (none that are affiliated with our hospital and insurance, anyways...) That has made scheduling appointments a little tricky - we've been trying to make them all for "lunchtime" - Frank comes and meets us in the parking lot at the doctor's office, takes the kids to lunch, and meets me back at the office...a great plan in theory, but when you're dealing with any doctor's office, you never know the kind of hold-ups you'll run into...even on a perfect day, he's away from work for over an hour. I guess he's the "boss" so it's all good. It's worked out OK, so far (don't know HOW we'll handle the 3-hour glucose test when I no doubt flunk the first one again -- maybe Frank can just take the whole day off!).

So, the upstairs bedroom that we had set up as an office (and had painted a nice shade of taupe) has since been painted a nice baby shade of yellow (it's called "cuddle" -- awwwwww) I know - who the heck paints a baby's room when you're only in the first trimester? But, as frank asked me "well, how superstitious are you? I mean, I'd rather just paint it again while the tape is all still up and the furniture is still in the middle of the room..." Solid plan -- and see? Now we're out of the first trimester, so it all worked out for now...

Had an appointment yesterday - everything is good. Baby is already measuring almost a week larger than its due date, so at least we know it's really our kid :) We'll really be sure when the head continues to measure large and the rest of the body levels off -- :)

Have a great weekend!

AppleJack Update

I am sure that most of you are concerned after the last post... let me assure you of two things:

1.) We are about halfway through the the 10 pound bag of apples that we picked - I found a recipe for apple muffins which took up a bunch. I am the only one eating them, however. Nathan says, "uh, this is not good..." and ellie said they were good "except for the apple part." Hmmm - at least they both enjoyed "helping" me make them (and we used up a bunch of apples...)

2.) Nathan's hair situation has been remedied - it was looking a little wild in the orchard picture. It has since been cut and he looks like a little boy again. :)

The AppleJack Festival and the Block Party

We got a tip from a co-worker of Frank's to head out to the Applejack Festival in Nebraska City this weekend. So, of course, we have nothing to do here and we're pretty much up for anything these days, so we went. It's about an hour drive from here - we didn't really know what to expect, but what the heck. I think that we really only saw one tiny piece of this festival. We ended up at the Arbor Day Farms, but from what I understand, the whole town of Nebraska City has events going on. We were most interested in finding an orchard (or as ellie called it "torch-ard") so that we could pick our own apples. At the Arbor Day Farm, we could pick our own apples and the kids were really into it - they had trees that were low enough to the ground that they could easily reach them... the 10 pound bag filled up pretty quickly! (Everyone has promised to eat apples every day until they're gone and you never know, I might be baking another pie pretty soon...) :) After we picked our apples, we set out on the "exploration trail" - very Arboretum-esque... nice trail, pretty scenery, lots of trees, and plenty of things to look at and read along the way. There were also lots of "nature playgrounds" and the kids found it "worth the trip." We ate lunch there - just at one of those "food tents" - burgers and dogs and chips - that'll be $30. Funny to say, but it felt kind of good to be ripped off for once (just like home!) :) We decided that it was a very fun day - I don't know that we would be driving all the way down there every year to do it, but it was definitely fun to try once.

Now, on to the Block Party...we were all pretty tired after the apple-palooza of the morning, but we mustered up enough energy to head out to the front yard for the Dickinson's Landing Block Party - quite the extensive affair. Maybe it's because we'ver never really lived in a neighborhood that did an official "block party," but whoa! There were three of those big inflatable "bounce house" things for the kids, a live band (the first song they played was "sweet home chicago"...the irony!), pony rides (right in front of our house, as luck would have it...there's still the ring of brown to remind us of all the fun...). As you can imagine, when the ponies pulled up (again, RIGHT in front of our house) the kids could not wait to get out there! There were a good two or three hundred people out there, and we were encouraged to see that there really are a lot of people with little kids here. Ellie and Nathan had a great time (Nathan, unfortunately, missed his last pony ride becuase he asked to go inside to go potty...major success!) He also requested to go to bed around 7:30 -- it had been a long day at the apple fest and all with not much of a nap...so Frank and Nathan headed in around 8:00. I thought the bounce house things were supposed to "blow down" at 8:00, so I told Ellie we could stay out until they were done...well, I waited and waited and waited and it never happened ... basically, I convinced Ellie to come in around 9:00 -- it was pretty dark - I don't know how more kids weren't getting hurt in those things! She was also pretty tired and agreed without much of a fight... when Frank and I looked out the window around 10:15...the bounce houses were STILL UP! yikes. Ellie thought the block party was the "most fun ever" and we met lots of new aquaintences, so it was a success all the way around.

The week in review

Not too much to report this week, but I thought I should update...

Ellie continues to go to preschool -- the first two days were "shy" days, as she put it. She would get in the car at pick-up time and say, "I have so much to say right now, because I've been so shy and quiet all morning at school -- I didn't talk at school -- and now I just have to talk a lot!" She comes by it honestly - exactly what I was like in school as a kid! (And Frank says she's gotten a "double dose" of it... he had a little bit of it himself...) Anyhoo, day three was "magic" as Ellie puts it -- she talked to her teachers and to the other kids and even took to comforting the ones who were still "crying and wanting their moms" -- She even made amends with one little girl (Tatum...now that's an Omaha name, huh?) that she alienated while she was being "shy" on the first day... so all is well at the Education Station! And for our Friday treat, we (again) met Frank for lunch -- at McDonald's this week -- it's just such a nice way to break up the day (and the kids are always in the mood for McNuggets...) Maybe we can make this a Friday ritual (and work in a subway or a panera once in a while...)

Nathan is also getting used to Ellie's preschool routine -- as soon as we get back from dropping her off (and whatever errands I drag him around to...), he drags ME down to the basement and commands my one-on-one time, which (of course), he has never had before. So, we play mostly with the train set and do puzzles and I desperately try to teach him his colors, but he is still "refusing." I'll say, "nathan, what color is ____?" And he'll just reply, "no." Hmmm - I guess a kid who didn't walk until he was 22 months old is marching to his own drum... he'll learn colors when he's good and ready - maybe when he's 12? :)

It's been a dreary week here in terms of weather -- lots of rain! Our nightly family game of freeze tag (oh, yeah!) has been rained out lately... can't say I've been too bummed out. How do you know you're officially out of shape? When you have trouble keeping up with a four year old! Man, she's quick! It's probably pretty sad when nightly freeze tag is the only exercise we are getting (and it's a pretty good workout, so far!)

Have a good weekend - more later!

First day of Preschool

The first day of school for Ellie was a smashing success! She woke up excited this morning, but I was still a little nervous after the princess camp experience -- she was excited that day, too... But, the whole drop off was seamless (and there were cryers there, too -- I was glad that it wasn't my kid this time...) :) She came home with the play by play about the whole morning -- lots of comparisons to Bright Horizons (the daycare in Illinois) - which kids reminded her of her old friends, which songs were the same (the weather song), which songs were different (the good-bye song)... and luckily, she was able to play with all of the toys that she remembered from Wednesday's Open House. As predicted, Nathan did want to stay and play -- and he was pretty confused all morning, "where's ellie?" "Mommy's car-car? Ellie?" He was glad to go pick her up (but again, he wanted to stay and play...) and then we all went and met Frank for a "first day of school lunch" -- one of the benefits of living in Omaha -- everyone is close enough to "lunch" together! Crazy to say, but it was good to have somewhere to go - a little structure to the day went a long way for us!

Preschool Open House

Last night we went to the Education Station's Open House - come and "meet your teachers and see your classroom." Ellie was very excited all day about going - we all were, actually...
It was a very positive experience for Ellie, I think. We underestimated how many kids were involved in this program, though. Ellie is in the MWF am class (20 kids), and there's a MWF pm class (20 more kids), a T/Th am class (another 20)... and that's just on the west side of the buiding -- that many kids will attend on the east side of the building as well! Needless to say, all of those kids plus their siblings plus their parents made for a pretty crowded event last night. But, nonetheless, Ellie enjoyed meeting her teachers - when I asked her if she thought her teachers were nice, she said, "all teachers are nice...duh..." All of the kids had different colored name tags on depending on what class they were in - she got really good at spotting the other "red circle" nametags and she was just going up to kids and saying "hi, I'm ellie, I'm new." It was pretty good (she didn't get that "outgoing-ness" from either one of her parents, that's for sure!)
Even though the building is pretty different from the daycare center they went to in Illinois, I think she was "comforted" to see that it was a lot of the same stuff - a rug for "circle time," a "housekeeping area," a "math center," etc. etc. etc. We were there for over an hour just checking it all out -- nathan was having fun, too. That will be the trick tomorrow moring, getting Nathan to leave...hmmm... we'll have to find something fun to sign him up for on MWF's, too!

First day of school tomorrow - full report coming soon...

The Williams' visit - Labor Day Weekend

What a great weekend! Frank's parents and his uncle charlie came to Omaha this weekend for a visit... we love visitors! Seriously, we do! Frank's dad and Uncle had not ever been here before, so we did a lot of the obligatory "touring" of Omaha (it doesn't take long - there's not much to see here...) :) We also hit the air and space museum, Boys Town, the River Walk and of course all of the "vacation" eating out -- dinners, breakfasts, ice cream -- yummmmm! We also used the club a couple of times, too - a round of golf for the guys and an evening swim for the whole group.

We all had a great time, and the kids are still "coming down" from all of the excitement - they both took HUGE naps this afternoon and woke up wondering what "fun thing" was next. Disappointed to be left alone with only their (totally un-fun) parents again, they lobbied for a "video night" and we just kind of chilled out.

And so the end of summer has officially come and gone...not that it has the same kind of impact that it did when I was teaching, but it is still a little strange nonetheless. Ellie starts up at her preschool this week on Friday - we are all looking forward to a little structure (and one more "network" to meet people, even if those people are only 4 years old!). A complete preschool update to come soon...

This weekend's tourist adventures

Well, we had another weekend of touring our new town. Saturday morning we headed to the Durham Museum -- it's a pretty cool building -- used to be Omaha's Union Station. The architecture is very impressive - weird to think that they would have thought to build something so vast so long ago. But, I guess Omaha was quite the railroad town back in the day... Actually, a lot of the museum's exhibits were related to railroad history - there were model trains, actual "antique" train cars that you could walk through (sleeper cars and all - the kids got a big kick out of that), a lot of general history of omaha. We were a little worried that there wouldn't be enough "kid stuff" to keep Ellie and Nathan interested, but there really was just enough. It's not the over-stimulation of a children's museum, but it wasn't crowded at all either, which was just what we were looking for that day... Ellie's favorite part was the recreation of the 1931 soda fountain and candy shoppe that was in the Union Station -- fully operational. They had all of the "olden day" candies and fountain menu items. A perfect souvenier on our way out -- and of course, a little candy makes any trip anwhere worthwhile to a 4 year old and a 2 year old...

Saturday evening we decided to go out for pizza (and I am beginning to think that it's true -- chicago pizza really IS better than most -- it is surprisingly hard to find a good pizza here. Your best bet is chain restaurant pizza - Pizza Hut, Little Ceasar's (yes, we have those still here) -- the biggest difference I think is twofold: the crust is real fluffy and bready and the sauce is skimpy and on the sweet side - maybe we'll get used to it...) Anyhoo, add it to the list of things that I need to eat when we go back home... OK, so after a stop at Sam-n-Louie's Pizza, we headed over to "Millard Days" -- your typical carnival that comes to any town every year. We didn't tell the kids where we were going -- we call them "secret adventures." They know that's a code word for "something that we don't usually do, but it's probably going to be fun for us..." So, as any cheesey carnival, you can see it from a mile away. As we're driving past, Ellie literally loses her breath -- "is THAT it?" Is that where we're going?? A REAL carnival! Oh my gosh - you're the best mommy and daddy in the world! I bet they have cotton candy..." Whoa - breathe! And, it was everything they had hoped for - cotton candy, a few carnival games (always pick the one that's a "winner every time" for the kids...) and a couple of kiddie rides... those carnivals are always just a little creepy to me and they draw a funky crowd (ourselves included) but overall, the evening was a success for the kids.

Otherwise, Frank has spent almost literally the entire weekend painting the trim and doors that he put up last weekend. Turned out to be a bigger job than we thought (of course). It looks really good, though and I think it will make a huge difference in the look of the second floor - opens it up a little - doesn't look so dark and small up there anymore.

We just got home from our Sunday night swim at the club -- we have started going after an early dinner. It's a lot less crowded if you go after 6:00, but it's definitely not as hot - the sun goes behind the clubhouse building around 6:30 and it get kind of chilly. Not that the kids notice - they are just splashing around, teeth chattering and blue lips -- it's been a fun outing to have here. The club is only open for another week or so for the summer season, so we'll have to try to get back at least one more time...

Not much on the schedule for this week - I'll keep you posted if anything exciting happens!

We got out!

Well, 2 months in town, but we finally got out of the house without the kids. Sure, it was for a work function for Frank, but it still counts! Frank's plant has 2 outings per year -- the christmas dinner (a little more upscale - a lot of the warehouse guys don't come) -- mostly caters to the "office" staff and then a summer something (this year was bowling and pizza - none of the office guys came, but all the warehouse guys were there!). So, on Saturday night, we went to "western bowl" (yes, country music was blaring!) and ate pizza and drank beer. Wouldn't have really been my first choice of a "night on the town" but it was a night on the town nonetheless. We met one of our neighbors who lives about 3 doors down from us and she mentioned that she had a daughter that babysat if we ever needed her... of course, we jumped on that and she came over to spend the evening with the kids.

Of course, our kids have never been left with a non-family member babysitter (should we even admit that?? ) Ellie was more than interested in this idea and she had lots of questions (shocker!) -- Would Rachael be bringing her kids? Uh, she's 13. Will Rachael be driving her car here? Uh, again, she's 13 and she lives 5 feet from us... Where will Rachael sleep? Uh, we'll be home by 10 -- she's not sleeping over... All in all it was a good experience for everyone. Except that we had no idea how much to pay a babysitter in Omaha. I think in chicago, we would have paid around $10/hour. I think minimum wage is somewhere around $7 / hour. So, I just aksed her what the going rate was (and of course, she didn't really want to answer this awkward question...) so, she himmed and hawed and finally was like, "I don't know, maybe like $5" $5??
that sounded so low to me - Frank and I went back and forth... I mean you don't want to over pay, but I would think that under-paying would be much worse. And afterall, this girl could be our ticket out of the house once in a while... Long story short, we went with $7 -- then we were up all night (ok, not really, but we did talk about it...) worrying that we had underapid her...
She called the next day and said, "um, Mrs. Williams..." [I told her not to call me that...makes me sound so old!] "My mom and I were talking and we think that you overpaid me..." CUTE! I assured her that she could keep the extra $8 and that we intended to pay her that much. Then, she says, "Ok, but next time you can pay me less." Ok, but we probably won't ... :)

It was a good change for us in our weekend plans - getting out of the house and all.
And on the home improvement front, Frank replaced all of the doors on our second floor. We just put in hollow-core 6 panel doors - not the highest quality, but certainly a big step up from what was here when we moved in and it LOOKS tons better - much brighter. (The old doors were very 70s wood-looking things...ick!) Now, it was a huge job for Frank, but I think even he agrees that it was worth it... Now, we just have to paint them all (there are 10 doors all together up there) and paint all of the trim on the second floor and we'll be on our way. I don't know how people flip houses -- even realtively small projects can be so time consuming and distracting!

Glenbard West is back to school this week, and I am not...weird... not all bad weird, but weird...
More later -

She finally broke us!

Starting early in 2008--
Ellie: Can we get a dog?
Us: No.
Ellie: Can we get a cat?
Us: No.
Ellie: A bunny?
Us: No
Ellie: A bird?
Us: No
...and this continues for several more animal choices...
Ellie: A fish?
Us: OK, a fish...but not unitl after we move to Omaha.
Ellie: Great!

Months pass - everyone is busy, no mention of the fish.

Two minutes after pulling into town... Ellie says, "so when are we going to get my pet, you know, the fish that we're going to get after we move here?" Geez, memory like a steel trap! Well, we did say that we'd get the fish - so we put her off for a variety of reasons for a few weeks, but we couldn't stand the guilt any longer - after all, we said we'd get the fish, so we did. Actually, we got two goldfish type things (they're not really goldfish, I don't think, but they are small enough to swim around in the fairly small tank that we got to sit on her dresser.

She is thrilled with her new "pets" -- remembers to feed them and is always looking for them and checking on them... it's cute. In fact, when Frank said it was time to go get the fish, there was much hollering and shrieking and (just like in the scene from Toy Story when Buzz Lightyear was the new and exciting toy for Andy) just left sheepy on the kitchen floor like a tossed aside "woody" doll. And for those of you who know how tight she is with sheepy, it was a major event -- Frank said she didn't even notice that he wasn't with her the whole time they were gone.

In other news, Nathan seems to be potty training himself -- I swear if we spent just one solid weekend with this kid on the potty, he would be "done." I'm starting to think that we harrassed Ellie about it way too much - always bugging her to go when she probably didnt' have to go (or want to go) Twice in the last couple of days, he has requested to go...then he requests "privacy," so we leave and close the door, and then he DOES go! Amazing... We'll put it on the short list of "to-do's" -- hopefully, it won't take long once we start...

Hope everyone is having a great week!

You win some, you lose some...

Well, as we continue to be tourists in our new town...we have embarked on two more touristy adventures this weekend. One was good, one, uh, not so much...

Friday night was Nebraska's "Balloon and Wine festival" - not too far from here (about 10 minutes from our house) so we decided to go check it out. I thought that it would be cool to see a sky full of hot air balloons and I knew the kids would get a kick out of it, too. (There was also a wine tasting part, but we really thought that the balloons would be a big enough draw for us...) It was advertised that "all balloons would launch by 7:30 and at 9:30 there would be a "balloon glow" - after dark, all of the ballons would turn on their fire at the same time and they would "glow" in the sky - sounded cool... We got to the grounds around 6:45 and there was a huge line of people watining to get in... as we made it to the front of the line, it was a little after 7 and we had seen a couple of ballons launch from just behind the building near the ticket stand. It was very cool to see them. We dutifully paid our $10 (for the whole family - cute, huh?) to get in and then we waited around. There were a few "kid" things for ellie and nathan - pony rides, big inflatable slides, live nusic (nathan LOVED that, of course). Most people were gathering on this hill to watch the launch (we thought). We waited and waited around for a while - at around 8:15 we overheard one of the festival workers tell someone that the 7:00 launch was "done...there were 4 total" and the next event was at 9:30 pm. As Ellie so eloquently stated - "this is the weirdest festival...4 balloons...come on...that's not a launch, right?" We had to agree - we elected NOt to wait around for over an hour to see 4 balloons "glow" at 9:30...so we headed home. They can't all be winners, and I don't think I would recommend the balloon and wine "festival" to a friend... :)

This morning, we headed out to the Wildlife Safari - where you drive your car through "natural habitats" and see wildlife indiginous to Nebraska, I guess. It was a lot of bison, elk, deer, cranes, etc. Not the most exciting animals, but sort of cool to see them so up close. there was even one part where you could get out of your car and walk a 1 mile trail to see wolves, bears, owls and lots of other animals. It was not a hot day here and it was very woodsy and forest preserve-y there. Some of the animals were hard to spot, but it was nice to walk and "hike" in some parts -- Frank led us up one trail that was kind of tough (especially for me and ellie in our flip-flops), but we were all troopers... come to find out on the way down that we were on the part of the trail labeled "most difficult" - man, we are like williams vs. wild! It was fun - I don't know if we'll be rushing back every weekend or anything, but it was different and pretty and definitely worth seeing.

Tourist attractions still on the "to-do" list -- the Durham Museum, the train (for nathan) at the zoo, and of course, a restaurant we have in chicago...Famous Dave's...(dream big!)
We'll keep you posted.

Nebraska License Plates

Don't tell the Nebraska authorities -- we were a couple of weeks late -- but we finally did it -- got the Nebraska plates on the Pilot. Ouch. What does it cost to get plates in Illinois? $75? So much for lower cost of living here -- the bottom line -- $475! No, that's not a typo - it's ridiculous, but it's done. Well, Frank spent half his day going back and forth to the DMV three times for various things that needed to be "fixed" or different. Now, we just need to get our Nebraska licenses and we'll be officially NE drivers... ugh...

Sweet Home, Chicago!

Haven't "posted" since we went home last weekend -- very fun! (And it felt so good to be on familiar soil... traffic jams and all!) We left here at the crack of dawn on Friday morning and headed straight for Gina and Kip's (and Oliver's) :) It probably wasn't the best idea to get into the city at 3:30 pm on a Friday afternoon of a Cubs game, but we survived. After a quick visit and some photo-ops with the new baby (very cute...they'll probably keep him...) :), we headed out to Cary to see Frank's parents and his uncle who was also in town. It was so nice to be there surrounded by people and laughing and eating and just doing what we used to do. We spent the night in Cary, had a leisurely morning at a neighborhood park (beautiful weather!), and left there shortly after lunch.

From cary, we headed to the Hilts for a (belated) birthday celebration for Kathryn and Lindsey - Ellie and Nathan seemed more than pleased to be in another familiar setting (with familiar toys!) We were there until way past their bedtimes, so I think a good time was had by all! (After 6 or 7 hours of party fun, nobody even put up too much of a fuss when it was time to go...) On Sunday morning, we went to the Arboretum - they have a nice children's garden, and again, we left shortly after lunch time. It was a whirlwind weekend, but very fun! And we made great time on the way back to omaha - 7 hours with a stop for dinner - and they both slept for 2 hours along the way - can't complain! We might even drive it again sometime!

We have been spoiled by all of out visitors here and our visit home -- maybe Omaha isn't so bad afterall!

Welcome to our newest cousin / nephew!

Congratulations to Gina and Kip -- the proud new parents of baby Oliver William!
We can't wait to meet him this weekend! (Ellie has convinced us that we should go out for ice cream to celebrate "baby Olive" -- that's her nickname for her newest cousin...) :)
Sounds like a plan!

The Dykstras visit Omaha...

...and claim to like it! :) It was a very fun weekend, at least for us. (You'd have to ask them if the 16 hours in the car was worth it.) They arrived on Friday and we didn't do much but hang out that afternoon. Ellie did manage to work in a few rounds of hide-and-seek with Papa withing minutes of their arrival. She seriously was planning out hiding spots for days before they came (after all, it was a "new house that Papa's never seen before -- he's NEVER gonna find me!") It was cute and the grandparents graciously obliged the hide and seek request. We went out to eat and did a mini driving tour of West-O (yeah, that's what they call west omaha around here...) and pretty much just hung out in the evening.

Saturday, we went "all the way" downtown to the Old market area - they do a nice Farmer's Market that we strolled around for a while. Ellie behaved herself because of the promise of the Children's Museum afterwards (also in the same neighborhood). That was also fun, especially for the kids and once again, the grandparents were good sports. After lunch, my mom and I headed to a quilt store in Gretna (about 10-15 minutes from here) called the Quilted Moose. I am not a quilter, but it was a fairly impressive fabric store! We left my dad with the sleeping children and his newspaper -- I think everyone was in a happy place that afternoon!

On Saturday night - my parents offered to watch the kids while we...wait for it... went out to eat! We were out of the house withing seconds of this offer --we headed "all the way" back downtown - ate a place called "stokes" -- a southwestern / american grill -- it was different, but good. Good to be out, that is! It was awesome - recharges us on the whole "find a babysitter" thing!

Sunday morning my dad and Frank went golfing - it turned out to be good weather for them (a little hot for me, but...) My mom and I and the kids went to Target (do we know how to entertain out of town guests or what??) and then hit one of the playgrounds at Lake Zorinsky that we have never been to before. It was a relaxing (except when Nathan was being a "crazy man" at target) morning. The photo above is of the gang right before they left (when are we going to learn to take these photos at the beginning of the visit?? Can you tell that Ellie isn't very good at good-byes?)

It wasn't a terrible good-bye - after all, we'll be in chicago next weeked to meet the new cousin and to celebrate birthdays with the other cousins! Can't wait!

We met our Omaha Pediatrician

Thanks to Nathan (and we all knew it would be Nathan, right?), we got our reason to find a new pediatrician...fast. Yesterday, we spent the morning running errands and playing outside. When we came in for lunch, I noticed that Nathan had a few (what I thought were) bug bites on his left arm. No big deal - he was rolling around in the grass and crawling around the garage, so I figured he just got into something buggy... By the end of lunch, his whole arm was covered with "bites" and it had spread to his back and sides. Before naptime, it had spread to his legs and face. And it didn't look like bug bites anymore - it looked like a red, sometimes bumpy awful rash. Of course, he did not seem fazed by his new condition at all. He seemed a little annoyed that I kept looking at him, but... We called a pediatrician's office that I had scoped out (luckily, all of ellie's preschool registration forms require the name of her doctor, so I had done some preliminary research...) and they were able to see us yesterday afternoon. Nathan slept his usual 2 hours at naptime and when he got up, he looked just as awful and was acting just as normal - weird. So, we went to see the new doctor (which Ellie was SO excited about - after all, it wasn't her visit...). The doctor walked in and instantly diagnosed it as hives. Sounds like something that I maybe should have recognized, but I have never seen anything like it in my life. It was a simple Benadryl fix (again, something I should have probably known...) and they were gone within a couple of hours. I was impressed with the office overall - I think it was a good pick "on the fly." The doctor asked me to call back in two days because she wanted to know how he was doing - I thought that was nice. In EGV, our pediatrician would always be like, "call us back if he's not better in a week." (And I really liked our doctor in Elk Grove, they just seemed more "don't call us unless something's wrong.") So, that was our adventure for yesterday -- leave it to Nathan to be the first one to need a doctor here!

Princess Camp Grand Finale

Ellie finished her week of Princess Camp -- it was mixed reviews all week long. One minute, she was practicing her "moves" at home and talking about all of her dance friends and the next minute she was saying that her stomach hurt because she didn't want to go to princess camp (sad, I know, but...) Even if the drop-offs were not always completely smooth - she always came home in a good mood, (and therefore, I kept dropping her off!)

On Thursday, she came home with an "invitation" to her dance "show" on Friday at the end of class. That would be at 11:45 a.m. -- that leaves 15 minutes for the "show." She was so pumped about this -- she could not wait to show off her dances. So, we all went -- yes, even Frank -- that's another score for Omaha -- When you work 10 minutes away, you can scoot out for half an hour at lunchtime to see your little girl do a couple of dances. Coincidentally, every dancer except two of them had both their moms and dads present -- that's omaha for you -- nobody works very far away -- even if you worked "all the way downtown," it's still not far away!

The last picture is of Ellie before the music started -- strike a pose, girl! The song was something about big hair and big sunglasses. So, the purple sunglasses she is wearing was actually one of the crafts they did this week - they are all bedazzled with rhinestones... pretty fancy!

And Nathan could not get enough of this dancing thing -- after they finished the first dance, he was whining / chanting for "all done? more music! more music!" He clapped the loudest of anyone... "Good job, eh-wee -- hurray -- hurray!" It was cute.

Ellie is all thumbs up for dancing and princess camp now. (I think, partly because she knows it's over...) :) It was a welcome diversion for us this week -- pretty much took up the whole morning -- really broke up the day nicely! It makes me look forward to the routine of the fall with preschool starting up -- a different routine to fall into.

This weekend, we decided to touch up the paint in the family room -- of course, the previous owners did not leave any of the right color to do that with. So, we decided that we would re-paint instead. That will be a big project, since our family room connects to our kitchen and our eat-in area and the back "hall" to the garage -- we're going to start with 3 gallons of paint and go out for the fourth if we need it... I guess it'll be a couple of late nights this weekend (but it will be nice to have it done!)

More later -

Princess Camp, Day One (...and the new TV)

Ellie has been waiting for this day for a long time - thank goodness it finally arrived. She was up early this morning, packing her backpack full of all of the princess camp necessities: tap shoes (still...why??), ballet shoes, etc. etc.

She had so many questions - "what will we do first?" "do we have to check in when we get there?" "What will my teacher's name be?" "What color will her eyebrows be?" OK, I was with her until that last one...

We left the house in plenty of time (becuase I am still not confident with where everything is around here...even though it's not tough, and also because I continue to overestimate the amount of time it will take to get anywhere ... not nearly as long as you think it's going to...).

We got to the dance studio and it was quite obvious who was there for Princess Camp -- although, one girl was wearing plain clothes... the horror! (I guess her mom didn't call ahead of time... I bet she'll be fully outfitted by tomorrow...tap shoes and all!) Well, everything was going well until I went to leave -- Ellie freaked out - crying, clinging and all of that good stuff. "don't go" "I've never been here before" "Don't leave me here" "I dont' want to stay here" "I want to go home" For a kid that's been dropped off at daycare everyday for the last four years (and loved it) and for as excited as she was about "ballerina class" - it really kind of surprised me. (I guess four weeks of being with no one but me sort of ruined any kind of independence she had...) I convinced her to stay and I watched from the behind the two-way mirror (must be a dance studio thing...) She was (of course) fine within five minutes of me leaving and by the time I picked her up, she was gushing about all of the fun that was had -- they did "acrobats", crafts, snacks, dancing, and "rocking out" (is that different than dancing??). Anyways, she had a great time and she can't wait to go back tomorrow... thank goodness, call me a cynic - but as she's holding on to me for dear life at drop-off, part of me is thinking -- "uh-uh - we bought tap shoes for crying out loud... you are going to at least try this!"

The most ironic thing, perhaps was that I had to practically restrain nathan from breaking into the dance class room -- between trying to get ellie to stay and getting nathan to stay out, it was kind of a stressful 20 minutes or so... Nathan wanted so bad to be at "belly class" (that's ballet class in nathan-speak) -- maybe someday... after we try soccer or baseball or something... :)

In other (more exciting, frank would argue) news is we finally did it -- bit the bullet and bought one of those fancy-schmancy-big-ass-tv's. It's been a long time coming - frank has been talking about it for years (literally) and we said when we got to omaha, we would probably have a room big enough to accomodate one, and we do, so we did. It's pretty nice - better picture qualtiy and all that (which is important when you watch shows like the bachelorette like me...) :) We went to our new favorite store for home furnishings -- the Nebraska Furniture Mart. We like it there (and they are probably starting to like us there, too!) They just make it so darn easy to buy things -- I guess that's part of their winninng formula. I knew that if we went to look at TV's, we would end up buying one (Frank pretended that he "didn't think we'd buy one today..."). So, we loaded up the 46-inch sony something or other -- it was a tight squeeze to get it in the back of the Pilot (Frank offered to leave the kids at the mart if he could get the tv in...) We made it fit and then drove home. Frank drove more cautiously than I have ever seen him drive before -- he likened it to driving home from the hospital with you first child.... really? It was cute to see him so excited -- he spent the day setting up the tv, which involved altering (i.e. "sawing apart" the built in cabinet in our family room -- it was touch and go for a while, but it's all good now. We stayed up all night watching stuff in HD (ok, not really - but we did spend a couple of hours finding all of the cool features -- found some "scene it" type trivia games, so we played those - weird, but fun...)

More later - gotta go watch TV! :)

Gearing up for "Princess Camp"

Just kind of a "normal" weekend here -- running errands, and plugging away at the endless list of projects around the house. There was (another) huge thunderstorm all night last night, and that kept us all up at different points - so we are all a little sleepy today, but...

Ellie starts "Princess Camp" on Monday -- it's just this week, Mon - Fri from like 9:30 - 12:00 each day. She is so excited! It's at a little dance studio here - Frank found it a few months ago when ellie was really hopped up on taking "ballerina clases" -- so, he foun this and signed her up. The flyer boasts activities like, "dress-up," "tea parties," "painting nalis" and of course, "dancing." Cute enough. So, last week, ellie keeps saying how she has to wear her tu-tu (her HALLOWEEN costume from last year) so that she looks like a ballerina. Of course, I don't want her look like a goof-ball, so I called the studio just to see if she should wear anything specific or bring anything with her. And, wouldn't you know. . . no tu-tu, but . . . she "should wear a leotard and tights (??) and she should bring both ballet shoes and (get this) tap shoes." Whoa! These people are serious about dance! I was seriously just going to send her in gym shoes and a nice sundress - glad I called, I guess. So, today, we went to a "dance supply store" (because where the hell else am I going to buy tap shoes??) and got the shoes. It actually wasn't too pricey, which was good -- I started to hyperventilate a little bit thinking about what an expensinve "tea-party" this could turn into, but ellie was thrilled and wore her "tap shoes" all day (I kept trying to get her to "tap" on the carpeting, but she was wise to that! No such luck...)

Otherwise, we spent the day cleaning - mostly bathrooms and those darn kitchen cabinets, still!
What a thankless job that is. I mean, the cabinets are so disgusting - even after they are "clean," they still are not "like new" -- lots of scratches and imperfections that you can't clean off. I don't think they look that bad from a distance, but they are not good up close, that's for sure!

Full update on Monday after the "princess" gets home from "camp." :)

Our anniversary

Nine years! Can't believe it -- who knew I had married a "man of steel" that would carry me off into the sunset of Omaha?? Well, here we are - only two weeks in town, so there are no babysitters on our radar yet. The whole family is planning to go swimming at "the club" tonight. Ellie is so excited - we have not been over there to swim yet (the weather has always been iffy whenever we think about going...). The kids are going to eat early (cheese pizza - everyone's favorite!) and then we will swim right after Frank gets home. After the kids go to bed, Frank and I will probably do something "take-out" style -- doesn't sound too exciting, but the proposition of eating by ourselves without being interrupted or having to get up a thousand times during dinner and not having to scarf it down to "keep up" with the midgets -- almost worth it to not eat until 8:30 or so!

"When I get to Omaha" Goal #1 - I have done it... I made a pie. I joked before we came here that I would become some sort of domestic pie-making person (because I would have so much time on my hands...). Well, after coming home from the grocery store with three different types of pre-made pie crusts (already - the undomestic side from chicago is coming out), Ellie and I made a fresh strawberry pie (her choice). It looks yummy, but we'll see how it tastes. Baby steps -- when the ready made pie crusts are gone, maybe I will venture into making them from scratch - just trying to pace myself... :)

The fourth of July - Omaha Style

We spent our first major holiday in Omaha - the fourth of July. The Hilts made the journey west to spend a few days with us over the fourth. It was so fun I wish they could have stayed forever! We were debating whether or not to go see an organized fireworks display, but we decided against it as it doesn't get dark here until around 10 pm and we knew the kids would have a hard time lasting that long. As it turns out, we were able to get our fireworks fix right here at our own house. At the first sign of "dusk" the entire subdivision (and I can only imagine the whole city of omaha) erupted in amateur fireworks. I wasn't sure if it was the fourth or if our neighborhood was under attack -- from every direction and as far as the eye could see -- fireworks. We truly are in the "heartland of America" here. It was kind of cool, as long as you didn't think about the fact that it was probably fairly dangerous - a bunch of drunk people with explosives. Hmph.

the whole weekend was very fun - it was fun to be tourists in our own town (partly because we don't know or claim this town yet...). We hit the zoo, the botanical garden, the parks, and still had time to hang out here, too. the perfect balance of sightseeing and hanging out. I can't believe that they drove all the way from chicago to see us (and omaha, of course...) -- we really appreciated the visitors and I think a good time was had by all.

This is our first "normal" week in Omaha - Frank goes to work M - F (no out of town nights) and me and the kids are just kickin' around here. Ahhh. . . summer.

Ed Zorinsky Lake and other adventures

Since the "grannies" left yesterday (was it just yesterday?), Frank and I painted the office (classic taupe!) and the linen closet and unpzcked the rest of the boxes in the office and the garage. There is still quite a bit of organizing to do, but we are on our way to being "done" with the boxes, at least. We also had a thunderstorm that went through Omaha yesterday at 5:00 pm that produced 80 mph winds -- the weather here is ridiculous! The kids and I were outside playing when the sirens went off -- didn't look too bad, but we decided to go in -- within minutes, it was near hurricaine conditions -- it's good to have a basement that's big enough to hang out in during sotrms - I have a feeling that Omaha has more than its share of severe weather!

We try to work in some things that are fun for the kids so that they continue to "love Omaha." So, in an effort to have fun and get something done, we went to get the kids' haircuts -- this is major entertainment for them -- we take them to those "haircuts for kids" places - fun chairs to sit in and balloons and lots of hoop-la. And let me tell you - Nathan was LONG overdue for a haircut - it's amazing the little things that get lost in a move. But, all's well - he looks like a little boy again instead of the son of Einstein or Cosmo Kramer. We also adventured out to a "new place" for us for dinner - Culver's (I know, first Red Robin and now culver's -- Omaha is bringing out the crazy in us!). It was fine, but I don't think we'll be rushing back anytime soon - of course, Ellie orders the ham and swiss sandwich on rye -- the least "kid thing" on the menu -- she didnt' eat much of it - oh well. I guess I'd be willing to try it again for dessert, but not for the butter-burger. :)

We spent a long time after dinner at Lake Zorinsky (I know - catchy name!). It's a pretty big lake with something like 7 miles of paved walking (biking, jogging, rollerblading, etc.) trails around it. We threw Ellie's bike and Nathan's push-car in the back of the car - and walked the trail until we got to a park. Ellie was especially excited to find a playground with woodchips instead of sand! We stayed at the park for well over an hour (that's long for us - Nathan doesn't usually have that kind of attention span for anything!) Even after we left the area we were at, we spent some time driving around the other parts of the lake - there is a lot to see, for sure. It was very windy here tonight, so I would be interested in spending more time there on a more "perfect" weather day...

More soon -

The Grannies in Omaha

Our first week in Omaha - Frank tells me that he has to go out of town (just to Des Moines) for the night on Wednesday night -- do you get the irony? We have finally moved our whole family to Omaha to all be in one place and he "leaves us" during the first week!

But, we were not all alone! My mom and Frank's mom flew out on Wednesday morning. The kids and I picked them up at the airport (something else I probably would never have done in chicago...) But, just like everything's bigger in texas -- everything's smaller in omaha! We went back to our house, did the "grand tour" - had some lunch and then the kids went down for naps. Later in the afternoon, we went downtown (yeah, I know -- I drove to the airport and downtown on the same day!) to see the Old Market -- just a quaint section of downtown with brick streets and lots of restaurants and shoppes (not shops... shoppes). It rained a lot while the "grannies" were here, so we did a lot of indoor stuff. We went to see the furniture mart. That is good for as many hours as you're willing to spend there -- what a huge place! Everytime I go, I see parts of it that we haven't seen before... it's amazing. We also drove past the club, the preschool -- all of Omaha's higlights for us. We did manage to squeeze in a trip to the neighborhood park, which is fine despite the sand instead of woodchips and the fact there is "7th grade" graffiti all over the place. The kids like it well enough, so it's fun. On the way to the airport on Friday morning, we stopped by the Ryerson plant to see Frank in action -- the kids love it there, because they "get to" wear little hardhats to go into the warehouse part and I think the moms were impressed, too.

It was a VERY fun couple of days for us -- I hope the "grannies" had fun, too - even though the house is still not quite the way we would like it to be (OK, not even close!). They did unpack all of the boxes in the dining room - that was a job well done! Now we just have the office and the garage -- maybe we'll get to those this weekend. They were also good sports about sleeping arrangements -- the first night, Ellie and my mom slept in the same bed (Ellie didnt' want to sleep on the floor, and my mom said she "didnt' have to give up her own bed...") and Frank's mom slept in Nathan's "big boy bed" while nathan slept in his crib...in the same room! It was crazy, but everyone was very adaptable. I hope that they had enough fun to bring back positive reports to Illinois -- and encourage everyone else to come out and visit. My mom said that Omaha was "bigger than she thought it would be..." -- just like me on my first trip out here - "Oh, they DO have target here..." I know we've only been here for a week, but it was fun to show people around - it was sad to say goodbye all over again when they left.

We are anxious for our next visitors... the Hilts are coming for the fourth of July -- we are so excited -- I am already making a list of Omaha attractions to see and groceries to buy for when they are here!

And then New World Van Lines was gone...

We were anxious for our furniture to arrive -- 5 days without all of your "stuff" is longer than it sounds... The "big truck" pulled up on Sunday and the same two mover guys popped out and started unloading. Two guys! Back and forth all day long -- they didn't strike me as the strongest guys ever, but impressive nonetheless - something about watching two guys carry in a piano is something else! About half way through the day, they told us that they didnt' think that they would finish on SUnday and that they would have to come back on Monday - bummer! We officially have too much stuff (mostly toys, we think) :) We unpacked what we could while they were there on Sunday, between entertaining the kids and staying out of the way. We pretty much kept up with them box for box until around noon (the morning was like half boxes and half furniture...) and then the afternoon kicked our butts -- the boxes were coming in faster and faster - too much too keep up. We did our best and did more that night after the kids were in bed -- when they came back on Monday (even though I knew it was the end) - I was dreading the onslaught of even more boxes!

We have done a decent job of putting stuff away, I think. There are certain rooms that haven't been touched yet -- the office (who really cares about flie cabinet stuff, right?) and the dining room (if we haven't used the china in 9 years, we probably don't need it unpacked today...) Otherwise, the house is starting to come together - now the work really starts -- everything is out of the boxes and in the right general area, but know we have to really organize and CLEAN everything (frank wants to hold a hand-washing seminar for the people that used to live here -- it's kind of gross - sticky cabinets - ick!)

Today, the kids and I ventured to the other"big" grocery store near our house -- this one actually counts as a "real" grocery store. The only downside is that they have those dumb carts shaped like cars (or a firetruck, as we chose today) -- I can't stand those things - they're harder to push and there is not as much space in the cart itself -- ahh, the things we do to have a little quiet time to shop in peace! And today, I needed to be able to concentrate -- I think we were actually in the store for an hour -- you take for granted that you know where everything is in your grocery store. Ugh, we made it, though. :)

Frank called at 5:42 pm to tell me that he was on his way home from work...for dinner...with us...! Throwback to the good ol' days. the only difference is that he was home by 5:53! That's Omaha "traffic" for you -- score one for Omaha.

Today we conquered the grocery store -- everyday will bring new "adventures" - stay tuned!

The Journey West

Well, we did it. We really did it. We packed up our whole family and moved to Omaha. Sometimes I still can't believe it. After this past year of talking endlessly about moving to Omaha, it's finally here. Sort of like a wedding, I guess -- you spend so much time talking about it and planning it, that you can't believe it when the "big day" actually arrives. Well, here's how our "big day" went down.

On Thursday, the buyers of our Elk Grove house had their walkthrough (and of course, they had complaints...anyone surprised?) They thought that the storage area in the basement - yeah, the one back by the crawlspace and by the furnace and all that stuff -- was dusty and they were not pleased that there were nail holes in the walls. Are you serious? This guy is from another planet! They have never owned a house before and he just kept saying, "well, a leasing company would fill the holes and repaint..." And then captain obvious would say -- "there is no leasing company, you idiot -- YOU bought this house!" And, at the last minute they decide that they don't want the extra refrigerator in the garage (who wouldn't want another refrigerator??) and they asked us to have it removed - um, let me think about that. NO. And as a final request, at the closing, they asked our realtor if we would send a copy of all of the remodel / addition information that we had. uh, sure, we'll see if we get around to that one, too...

Friday morning, we took our time getting going. We didn't leave Schaumburg until 8:30 or 9:00. We kew it would be a long day of driving and we though it would be smart to start with everyone in a decent mood, at least. The trip was 8 hours (with two stops). It really wasn't as bad as I thought it would be - the kids did surprisingly well - we had bought a "surprise" new video for the trip and lots of other little things to keep them busy on the ride. My mom had sent a bag of goodies for each of the kids, too - it was great! If anyone started to whine, we would just throw back a new book or a coloring book or something. It worked well.

Since our stuff won't arrive until Sunday, we planned to stay in a hotel on Friday night. On the drive here, Ellie must have asked a million times (or maybe more) about the pool at the hotel. When would we go swimming - before or after dinner - for a long time or a little time. Would she be able to stand in the pool or would it be too deep -- one track mind ellie! When we finally pulled up to our hotel, we learned that the pool was closed for some kind of maintenance. Ellie was absolutely crushed - one of those times when you really feel what your kids are feeling. She was totally deflated. So, we quickly diverted her attention by telling her that we had a surprise waiting for her at our new house. She perked up and exclaimed, "I hope it's a puppy!" Uh, disappointment number two in 5 minutes. not a puppy. We had bought the kids little scooters (as a "moving" present and also, we knew they would have anything else to do here for a couple of days...). So, we drove to our new house and they were very excited to see the scooters and also to run around the empty house. After all, we had all been in the car ALL day, so it was a welcome release for every one!

Today (Saturday), we spent most of the day running errands and (shocker) riding scooters. We ordered the sofa for the basement, went and picked up Frank's car, which was still at the airport. I even ventured out on my own to go to Costco and the grocery store. The Costco is new here -- I had to explain to a few people how it works, "...you go on one side and your cart goes on the other side." But, I will say one good thing about Omaha so far -- running errands at 2:00 on a saturday afternoon - not so crowded. Something, I would have tried to avoid at all costs in Schaumburg! We ordered a pizza in and did a "slumber party" thing with the kids -- popcorn and a movie. It was fun.

It's a weird town and a weird house that still "smells" like another family, and I need to ask for directions to go to Costco, but somehow it still feels like "home" since we're all together in one place. Hopefully, it will feel even more like home tomorrow when our furniture arrives!
More soon. yee-haw.