Kitchen!

As usual, a lot has happened since I last posted. Most excitingly, my cousin Catherine visited and after months of procrastination and detail changing we finally made our final decisions and got the great kitchen renovation going.

Having Catherine here was really wonderful. Either she was really happy to play with the girls non stop, or she was really good at faking it, but either way she could not have come at a better time and I was able to get a lot of work done and kitchen stuff done while she entertained my darling children. She probably needed a holiday after this holiday, but I was happy to take advantage of her kindness ;-)

She's not a fan of being in photos, so here are a couple of the girls, who were super excited about the presents she brought...

Thanks for visiting, Catherine! We loved having you and we miss you!

In kitchen news! It's almost done. In theory I was going to post a picture every day of the progress. Obviously that worked out.

So here's the sequence of events.

1. Emptied out the cupboards, cleared off the counters. We are, of course, doing this at midnight the night before constructions starts.

BEFORE:

Day 1. Wall comes down.

Days 2 and 3: Drywall, taping, plaster, painting...

Days 4 and 5: New counters and stove (not really blue, but almost gave me a heart attack when I saw it like this). Cabinets are re-hung.

Day 6: Tile backspash, bar top, pendant lights.

Day 7: Grout, touch-ups.

In the days after this we were able to put stuff back and get it all re-organized. In the process I found that we had 9 different containers with some kind of salt in them. And now, looking at this picture I realize the one we actually use is missing, so that makes 10. We were well overdue for a cupboard clear-out.

I also put together some bar stools, which Fiona loves. And then, finally, it was mostly done.

There are some final details to do and some tiling by the back door, and Ben and I have to finish painting the kitchen, but it's almost complete. It's complete enough to post pictures anyway :-)

We really love it!

Strange things...

I have lots of things I could post about. Rides at the mall, adventures on tricycles and big girl bikes, tea parties with friends. But instead I'm going to post some of the bizarre things I've seen in the last couple of months. Starting with...

Spotted this on a trip to best buy.

I was really, really tempted. But it wasn't a blu-ray. And I'd want to see the mega shark and giant octopus battling it out in the highest possible picture quality.

Spotted these at the pharmacy...

Which led me to have a number of questions:

Collector's series? When do you collect them? After you use them? I hope not. Before you use them? Doesn't that just make them really expensive, oddly textured stickers? Where would you even keep such a collection? Do they make special band-aid collectors books, like with coins and pokemon cards? This product is clearly for a very special kind of person.

Spotted this looking for bubble bath...

I can only imagine the commercial to go with this... does your baby have a hard time picking up dates? Smell a little too fresh, milky and powdery? Never fear, just use Johnson's baby cologne and your bundle of joy will be smelling like a frat boy and fighting them off in no time.

Seriously? Baby cologne?

And finally... this was quite some time ago, but it deserves a mention. For all the Brits, when you order tea and specify that you'd like milk to put in it, here's what you might get...

You get a mug of (often lukewarm) water. A teabag on the side with more lukewarm water. Some lemon. And almost a whole pint of milk. Because that's totally what I meant.

Tuesday Fun!

Today it was really warm. It's been a very mild winter so the first real warm day isn't as noteworthy as it usually is, but it was in the 50s and lovely outside so after daycare the girls, dog and I headed to the lake for a walk. With 50s of course comes slush, mud and puddles and Fiona was very excited by this.

Towards the end of the walk the girls experienced the first swing on the swings of 2012.

Then we headed home, wet and sandy.

So what better activity for the afternoon than baths? And how do you get some stuff done while your kids take a bath?

Bath them in the kitchen sink...

Fiona spent her time carefully transferring water using containers, cups and a syringe...

and Adele went absolutely nuts drenching the kitchen in water...

After that the girls insisted on bathing the dog, who was covered in sand and mud, and it was way too chaotic to take any pictures but he's all clean and sweet smelling now, though the entire bathroom was left looking like I'd shaved a yeti.

After all that work I felt it was time to take a break and see what was going on on facebook, and noticed that they are now hitting my interests pretty much 100% with their targeted ads... here's what they were promoting to me today (click to enlarge)...

Creepily accurate.

Adele's big day.

I know. I'm sorry. It's been too long. Turns out those two additional PT sessions took up way more time than I anticipated and combined with getting very little sleep lately, I haven't had much energy to get anything done in the evenings. If you think this poor blog has been neglected, you should see the state of my house...

ANYWAY, my Mum is visiting this week and that's exciting for us, so I was planning to try to catch up on this, and a number of other things while she's here.

Fiona is very excited!

A couple of weeks ago Adele got a new AFO (ankle-foot orthotic) for her left leg - it comes all the way up to under her knee and allows her foot to lift up, but prevents it from tilting down. This is to stop her dragging her toes along behind her when using her walker. Well, today the extra PT, new AFO, and wanting to show off for Granny all came together and she took.... HER FIRST STEPS!! I don't know about you but I wasn't sure she'd ever get round to it, and I can't quite believe it happened!

She was so proud of herself, it was really fun to see. She is old enough that she understands a lot now, and she really knew what she was doing and wanted to do it over and over again. She kept saying "walk more" then she wanted to see the movie I made of her walking. Needless to say, I have many, many movies of her walking, so here's one for your enjoyment :-)

In other news, this month I had a birthday. Not a big one... though next year you'll all be invited to a super party!

Fiona got very, very excited about Valentines day. Her class at daycare had a party and she made each of her friends a card...

And when not being exhausting, the girls played, watched movies, and were cute...

I don't really have any other news! I'll try to take pictures while my Mum is here at least. And as Adele takes more steps, I'm sure there will be many more videos of that!

December Events

I'm sure you'll all agree that December was a busy month! Well it flew past here and now it's January already. Happy New Year everyone!

We had a lovely month - my awesome cousin Catriona and equally awesome sister Ali both visited and Ali stayed for Christmas.

Gingerbread houses were constructed by Ali and Fiona...

Christmas photos in cute matching dresses were attempted, with partial success, but they never made it into christmas cards...

We performed a dramatic enactment of How the Grinch Stole Christmas in the annual Hamer talent show. There were many other spectacular talents on show this year too... here's 10 minutes of the most impressive talent showing you've seen.

Santa Claus stopped by and brought Fiona the backpack she wrote to him to ask for. She had what she described as "the best day ever" opening presents from all the kind and generous friends and family we have. Adele had fun too but was a little overwhelmed.

Adele had a big assessment at Shriners, which is an amazing hospital for children specializing in (among other things) orthopaedics. We are lucky enough to live very close by and they provide services for free to people who do not have insurance or whose insurance doesn't cover the treatment they need. She's been diagnosed as having mild cerebral palsy which almost exclusively affects her left leg, and we're going to be doing physical therapy there two times a week in addition to the PT we do once every 2 weeks through the Minneapolis schools early intervention program. There's no reason she won't learn to walk, it'll just take a while, but all the extra PT will be great.

We headed to the U.P. for New Year and stayed in a log cabin in the woods with some friends.

Minneapolis has been eerily warm and almost totally snow-less so far this winter, so Fiona was very excited to stomp around in the snow up there.

Adele doesn't like to wear her mittens so didn't last long but enjoyed rolling around in it and observing for a while.

We had a great time hanging out with friends, and Fiona and Adele loved making two new friends of their own.

Today (and I did initially plan to just write about this before feeling a need to summarize the whole month) Fiona requested that I paint her fingernails (for the first time). She noticed a girl in her class at daycare had hers painted and asked me to do hers for her. She asked for red, which, luckily, is one of the two nail polish colours I own (the other being clear) so I painted them for her. I'm guessing that this is only the beginning of many requests for things she'd like because her friends have them...

She was so happy she kept bouncing around and it was very hard to get a picture in focus!

So that's the excitement for today. And who knows what tomorrow might bring!

Adele is 2!

On Saturday Adele became a 2 year old. Here's what was happening two years ago, and here's the post I did on her first birthday, which really feels like it was just last month.

Ben's family came over on Saturday and crammed into our tiny kitchen for lunch to celebrate with us.

Adele had been singing "happy birthday" to herself all morning and was really happy.

After the obligatory savory course came the part everyone had been waiting for... (chocolate chip banana) cupcakes!

After cupcakes were licked, smeared, smooshed and eventually consumed, it was time for presents!

I was surprised at her first birthday that she got SO excited about opening presents, and nothing has changed. After she opens something she gives it her whole attention and only wants to play with that thing. Like bottles for her poor, perpetually naked baby...

A book about Elmo...

this cell phone from Grandma and Grandpa...

She also got an adorable tea set from the Tennants but I didn't get a picture of her excitement because the box was in front of her as she was squealing with joy.

It's amazing how much changes so fast. So now we have to have the "look how she's grown" progression...

Birth (well, 2 days old) 3lbs 2.8oz

1 year old. I can't remember how much she weighed... around 14lbs? Clearly my brain is running on fumes.

2 years old. Has a check up on Thursday so we'll find out how much she weighs then. Around 20lbs probably... more depending on how much snow she eats beforehand...

And talking of snow, it snowed. We all went out to play on sunday and Fiona climed up the snow mountain and made snow angels while Adele just plowed straight through with her walker.

Adele, over the last year you have worked so hard and learned so much. You are the same sweet girl as always but now you are holding your own with your sister and not letting her push you around. You love so many people (and a few animals) and let them know with the smiles and hugs and slimy kisses you share so easily. You're smart and funny and we are so proud of you. Looking forward to seeing what the next year brings, tiny love!