Arriving in May...

Erin will have a baby sister this spring! Fran is now over halfway there and doing great. We had a formal ultrasound this week confirming that it's a girl. Here are some fun video clips from a couple weeks ago (we had a couple extra minutes and a spare ultrasound machine at work). The first one shows her foot, the second is her hand, and finally her profile.

Happy New Year!

We had a great time over the holidays, and now it's time to get caught up on the blog. Fran and Erin took a trip to Portland in mid-December to spend time with family. You know we're getting old when Fran and her friends are outnumbered by kids in the picture above! Erin had fun playing with her nieces and nephews and still talks about it. Their return flight was the same day as our pre-holiday blizzard, so after an extra night at Grandma Beth's house they were lucky to make it home the next day.



Here's Erin hamming it up with her friend Anna. It will be nice for her to be closer to Portland for the next several years, and be able to make weekend trips down to visit.



After returning home, Erin got a second chance to enjoy all the Christmas preparations. She was really into decorating the tree. Much like Beth's house in Portland, our ornaments ended up in clumps around the bottom 2 feet of the tree requiring parental redistribution after she had gone to bed.



Here's the finished product, and Erin all dressed up to go out for Christmas eve at Jim & Lucia's house.



Grandma Jan and mom found a fun activity for Erin's event calendar, an afternoon at a local park with holiday activities. Her interaction with this Santa appeared "tolerant" at best! There were puppets, crafts, marshmallow-toasting, and best of all horse-drawn sleigh rides.

This was the first year Fran set up the event calendar (called 'December calendar') for Erin, where she gets to take off a tag each day that leads her to a small present/treat/activity. Grandma Jan did the same thing for me for years, and it's fun to see the needlepoint calendar now hanging on our wall. In fact, I remember Fran's anticipation all December 1999(?) when she would open a little package every afternoon down at Grinnell. Thanks, Grandma!




Grandma and Grandpa got Erin this pink hat earlier this winter and she loves it. I'm also a fan, but Fran remains lukewarm. Here's Erin and Grandma on a very cold sleigh ride thru the park.



This is our living room after Erin went to bed on Christmas Eve. The stockings were hung with care... and Erin got an easel and indoor trampoline from Santa. Dad got to eat the cookies she left for Santa, but the carrots for his reindeer went back in the fridge.



The next morning was a blast! Duncan was envious.



We spent a very relaxing Christmas Day at Grandma and Grandpa's house. We made a snow house in one of the big drifts in the backyard that included a snow chair and snow bed. Erin also did a nice job on snowshoes when we went on a walk on the lake that evening. Our next project is to get her on some ice skates this winter, before we move to the pacific NW. Erin will definitely miss time at G&G's house. Each morning we hear "is Grandpa going to pick me up from school today?" and on the days she hears 'yes' we immediately get "and can I have a sleepover?"




Last weekend we took a trip to a local pool. Erin took some swimming lessons with me earlier this winter and enjoyed it. She accidentally dunked her head underwater for the first time right after we took this picture. She was surprised but handled it well.

On the homefront, we're making progress again on the bathroom remodel (yes, still showering down in our 55 degree basement) and I've begun to help get the basement cleaned out in preparation to put our house on the market in a couple months. With it now being 2011, our move west is certainly seeming more real. It's going to be a busy spring.