Continuing the Holiday traditions. . .

Continuing in the holiday tradition we prepared for next week's All-Hallow's Eve by carving a pumpkin. The original desire was to get a tiny one for Alisa, and two for Jason and I, we would each carve one (or bite one . . . whatever), and display them for all the world to see.
Unfortunately the grocery store only had 21 lb pumpkins when I went and we could only afford 1. Jason started the carving process today and is having a blast. Alisabeth is helping occassionally too. Then Jason took it outside to smoke out the inside and left Alisabeth alone in the kitchen with all of the guts. . .

It's so much fun exploring the holidays now that she is old enough to get messy with Jason.

This week was fast. I took three tests and am quite hopeful about the outcome. I also hit the 1/2 way mark in my New Testament class, it has been a great experience because not only does it talk about Christ and His teachings, but it also goes in depth in the history surrounding His ministry so that the letters and teachings can be better understood.

Jason has been having a blast with his work. He's got his plans almost set for next semester so that I can work tax season while he's in school. We also mapped his last three semesters so that he's on the right path to make sure he can graduate on time.

Alisabeth has begun really copying sounds. She can howl with us like a wolf, and she can say uh-oh and ma,da,nana. She's been doing all of these sounds for a while now, but it's only recently that we can get her to do them on command. It's so cool to watch her grow. She also transitioned from the bottle completely this last week. (After three nights of waking up at 3am screaming). We're much better at making sure she gets a full dinner before bed :) Another new first for her was the dentist. She got a completely clean bill of health and the destist praised us to the stars for bringing her in so young (I figured she already has 8 teeth, we had better figure out what to do about them). He did a mini cleaning and sealed them and gave us a new toothbrush and toothpaste for her. It's neat. She loves her teeth being brushed and I am trying to remember to do it right after breakfast. Hopefully she'll have a mouthful of teeth for a good long time.

She also received a package this week from her grandparents containing some more birthday presents. For them I'll include this video, it represents the essences of Alisa:

The first first!

Today we celebrated Alisa's first birthday. She was completely oblivious as to why people were coming over, but seeing as our house is often crazy with families and people she wasn't put out. Then we brought out the cupcake tower with her one candle and she could see that this was no ordinary
day. . . Needless to say she is a pyromaniac just like her parents. Even the smell of chocolate didn't distract her from the little flame.

She received several nice gifts from grandparents and a few from neighbors, but she was so fascinated by each gift that it was a struggle to get her to let that one go for a second so she could open another one! She got two books, a bath toy boat, letters for her floor, a dancing tower, and giant legos. . . all in all, this kid made out like a bandit!

She even got to play in her own personal cake, which was the most important part of the day. . . thank heavens for carpet cleaning solutions.





Then later in the evening she had another great first, her first Halloween Party. Jason dressed up as Clark Kent with a blue shirt under a red and yellow tie and his hair dyed black, I was Lois Lane, intreped reporter, and Alisa was Cryptonite. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, even though she was extremely tired toward the end.

And so it begins. . .

I'm making it my goal to update our blog weekly if possible. . . course, if we're not interesting that week we probably won't :)

We had our first snow of the season midweek this week, luckily it didn't stick, and so we all rejoiced, even though the temperature was low enough to feel your ears burn after 15 minutes of walking outdoors.

Unfortunately yesterday it began again. Jason thinks it will go away, but I think different. It's already later in the season than last year's first snow and we've had beautiful weather up to this point, so I figure we're in for it.

Other than that the week has been pretty quiet. Alisa is trying to decide what she wants to do now. She is refusing to take her morning naps and is exhausted until Jason finally "forces" the issue in the afternoon. It's been hard for me as I try to balance being a good mother with being a good student, but we'll survive!

Jason also had a great adventure this week. He was pulling a manual car forward just a few feet to work on it in his stall and froze mentally when it kept rolling and he saw a slow motion picture of his tool chest lifting up and over the hood of the car. Needless to say he's gained the nickname Crash at work and everyone had a good laugh at his expense. No damage happened to the car except a few small dents, and there were a few dents in his toolbox which were easily undone. Poor guy.

We also went on a great date this week. We decided to try a new restaurant and choose a place called the "Fantastic Bagel" which has an amazing assortment of styles and choices. It was pretty good! Afterward we went over to Florence Chocolates and got a free turtle with our starving student card (similar to Entertainment Book). Afterwards we went to Walmart, and spent way too much money outfitting Alisabeth for her first real winter (last one doesn't count because she couldn't interact with the snow).

Alisabeth loves the winter weather, she got so mad at us when we brought her in last night. It's going to be a fun season!

Love you all!

We've finally done it

We got a couple of people asking us about a blog so I finally decided to take the time to make one. I hope you enjoy what we supply. :)