Where did January go??

Daddy and Ashley pushing around Ashley's babies in the new strollers she received for Christmas.

Ashley eating her yogurt with a sucker!

My little messy face.


Daddy & Ashley. Aren't they cute?!

We celebrated Matt's new job and Sue's last cancer treatment with a Fondue party. We had cheese fondue with bread and veggies. Then we cooked yummy steak, mushrooms, pea pods, carrots, potatoes in a fancy broth and had lots of different dipping sauces. Then for dessert, chocolate fondue with brownies, pretzels, angel food cake, pound cake, bananas, strawberries and more. It was a wonderful evening!

Ashley with her buddies Violet and Gracie. Where did our babies go? They're little girls now!!

One night in efforts to get Ashley to stop fussing, I dug out a bin of stuffed animals that have been tucked away for at least a year. In the bin, she found a kitty! Now, they are inseparable. She loves kitties!

One of Ashley's new tricks is to hide. She'll hide behind the couch or curtains or run down the hall to hide.

Here's a video of Ashley showing off her jumping skills.

What else is new? Well, it's now been a little over a month since Ashley started on the asthma meds. I've been keeping a daily journal on her health and I am happy to report that she's doing pretty good. She's happy, active, and quite simply a riot! I'm amazed at the things she learns every day. I just love her daycare! We are at the stage now that she is saying new words every day and I know or can understand about 80% of them and when I say the word I think she is saying, if I get it right, she gets a big smile and says yeah and then finishes her conversation. Yes, we have conversations now! Weird. Oh, a few nights ago she woke up in the middle of the night and so we went to sit on the couch and have some juice. She started telling me about her friends Zane and Hayden and how they were wearing hats and then she started talking about Elmo and Elmo get wet. Elmo towel. She now has thoughts and a memory or can vocalize things she remembers from day to day. She wakes up thinking about things! I knew exactly what she was talking about too...when I picked her up from school, Zane and Hayden were playing with some crazy hats. Once we were home, we watched her Elmo movie and Elmo gets splashed and we always say "oh no, Elmo got wet!" She is able to correlate wet with needing a towel. Earlier this week she grabbed my hand and started swaying and singing something and I was tempted to call her daycare teacher to ask what Ashley was doing so that I could cooperate when it occurred to me that what she was saying was rosie, rosie...YEP, she wanted me to do ring around the rosie with her! Tonight, I went out to the garage looking for Matt and I opened the door and said "Maaaaaatt?" In the are you out here voice and Ashley is right next to me and repeats it just as I had said it. Maaaaatt! So then I explained to her that Daddy's name was Matt and mommy's name was Sheri. I asked her if she could say our names and they just rolled right off her tongue. Then about 1/2 hour later, Ashley's Grandpa stopped by and I said, hey Ashley what is mommy's name and she said Sheri. Then I said, what is daddy's name and she said Matt. Grandpa was very impressed! Then she looked at me and said something. I gave her my I have no idea what you said look and she repeated it. Ahhh, I got it. She said, "Grandpa's name?" She wanted to know Grandpa's name. So cool! I wish I could stop time because so far, this is by far the best stage!

Matt's new job is going great. Lucky guy already got to travel for work and spend a week in Florida. He's also scheduled to go to Las Vegas in April and Indiana in May.

My new job is insanely busy but it is going good. I'm overly tired from the long hours I am putting in but I am thankful every day that I still have a job.

Goodbye 2008...Hello 2009!

Goodbye 2008....Hello 2009!

Here's Ashley in her fancy Christmas dress. She has several Christmas outfits that were passed down to her and she was able to wear all of them because we celebrated Christmas on 12/14, 12/21, 12/24, 12/25, and 12/27. I was off from work from 12/18-12/29. It's been years since I have been off from work over Christmas. It was so nice to not have to think about going back to work right after all of the celebrations. Ashley loved to open her presents and she would help everyone else too. She didn't spend too much time with what she found inside, she just wanted to open the next present. She received plenty of new toys!

Here is Ashley and Daddy doing a little relaxing before we headed for our Christmas celebration. She is obsessed with her purple boots and insisted on wearing them instead of her dress shoes. She loves to look at her books and to be read to.

Here is Ashley in the Gavidea Commons downtown Minneapolis enjoying a PB & J before the Holidazzle. This was one of the fun things we did while I was on vacation from work. My girlfriend Jessie and her daughter Elsa joined Ashley and I on the adventure. We even rode down together which sounds easy, but included transferring car seats, finding room for two strollers, two bags with food and drinks and all of our winter boots, snow pants, hats etc. We started off by taking the girls to the Macy's Elf exhibit. It was a Friday before the holiday week so it was busy and we waited in line for at least 30 minutes but the girls did surprisingly well.

Elsa and Ashley before entering the Elves Exhibit. It was very hard to get these two to both look at the camera at the same time but this turned out pretty good. These days as soon as I take my camera out to take a picture of Ashley, she always wants to see the picture and won't cooperate to first let me take her picture. I look at this picture and just think it's crazy how big my baby is getting...soon she will be two!

Here is one of the scenes from the exhibit. It's hard to tell but right above the date on the picture is a kitty inside the basket. Ashley was doing all she could to climb up onto the exhibit to get to that kitty. I found myself feeling bad for her...here she is in the exhibit with all of these amazing things surrounding her, like the kitty or the fake snow or the cookies and candy or the presents and it's all at her eye level and she can't have it or touch it. I'm trying to explain to her (a 1 1/2 yr old) the she can look but she can't touch...which caused her to have a few small melt downs as I tried to get her to keep moving. I'm pretty sure she was telling me, humph- not fair!

Elsa and Ashley on the way to the parade. We found a great spot to stand and put the girls on our shoulders to watch the parade. It was so much fun- all of the lights and music kept the girls entertained the entire time and when the parade ended, both of them wanted to see more! It was so much fun.

Ashley loves to do art. She gets to do art several times a day at daycare and her latest obsession is to trace her hand or have someone else trace her hand. As you can see from her hand in this picture...she hasn't quite mastered tracing her own hand.

Here we are at my Grandma's on Christmas Eve. Santa showed up again this year and just like last year, Ashley didn't want anything to do with it! Maybe next year we will get a picture of a happy girl on Santa's lap.

Here is Ashley with her cousin Jessica at the Johnson family Christmas. Ashley really likes her cousin Jessi! In this picture, Jessi was showing Ashley her Nintendo DS game with puppies in it.

Here's Ashley rocking Elmo like a baby. That's one of her latest tricks, she likes to pick up any of her babies or stuffed toys and rock them, while she sings Rock a Bye Baby to them, which in her words is just rock over and over again with varying tones.

Here is Ashley with her girlfriend Maddy. Maddy and Sheli and John came over to go sliding down our awesome hill. The sliding hill remains awesome but evidently not risky enough for Matt because he has since taken the sliding hill to a new level by starting off on top of the garage roof where he then slides down the roof to get airborne onto the sliding hill.

After we were done sliding we ordered pizza and chicken wings. Ashley ate a ton of pizza and ranch dressing. The dressing was for the chicken wings but she had to have some "dip" even though she wasn't eating any chicken. She loves "dip". Ketchup, barbeque sauce, salad dressing...any kind of dip... in fact she will eat it by the spoonful if you let her.

And for you car junkies, her is a picture of the progress on the Cobra.

What else is new this last month? I've had Ashley to the doctor at least 3 times. She had pneumonia, then croup, then an ear infection...and what else? She has been sick with something or another since she was 6 months old. I guess the doctor finally heard my pleas because the last time I was there she said, you know, she just doesn't seem to get better. Does anyone in your family have Asthma? Ummm...yes. So long story short, Ashley is now on a daily medicine for Asthma. She hasn't been officially diagnosed with it because of her age but the doctor has placed her on these meds for the next month to see if this makes any difference on all of her respiratory issues. KEEP YOUR FINGERS CROSSED! We just hope this is it, because then we at least know and can treat it! So far after about 10 days on these meds her coughing has subsided and her nose hasn't ran in 3 days! Three whole days without any boogs! This is AMAZING to me. I carry around a burp rag for her nose because it runs so much and now for three days, I haven't even used one kleenex on her. In other news, we have great news, Matt starts a new job tomorrow! He will be working for Custom Fire in Osceola, WI as a Project Manager. A full time job with paid vacation, benefits, traveling opportunities etc! Awesome!

2008 was a challenging year...we look forward to 2009 which has already started with Ashley being healthy and Matt's new job...now if we can just get our house to sell we'll be livin' the dream!

Happy New Year!!

December 2008

Happy December everyone!!

Here is Ashley Jane at 20 months old... she'll be 21 months old in just a few days. She loves coats and shoes. She will go to the coat closet and get her coat and try to put it on by herself. That usually just consists of making a big ol' staticy mess out of her hair but it's fun to watch how independent she is becoming. She can put on her own shoes and pulls out matching pairs from her shoe drawer which consists of at least 15 pairs of shoes (all hand me downs).

Just a cute picture of Ashley in a head to toe pink outfit.

Here is a video of Ashley chasing and playing with our kitty, Sadie. I'm not sure why Sadie didn't run away...she just stayed and got pulled around by her tail and her leg and whatever Ashley could get a hold of.

Last weekend it snowed just a trace. Ashley and I were feeling cooped up in the house so we bundled up and went outside. It was maybe 20 degrees out. We started off playing on her slide but as bundled as she was she got annoyed with not being able to get back up once she landed at the bottom of the slide. This led me to think about pulling her around in a sled, which we did for a few minutes when I realized we have the most perfect sliding hill! We walked up the hill and I got her all set up in her slide and then I sent her a sailing. When she got to the bottom, she said, whoa. Then she and I climbed further up the hill and we went down the hill together. We were going so fast we actually made it across the street at the bottom of the hill and then half way into our yard. I haven't had that much fun on a sled since I was a kid. Ashley loved it and just said, more...more...more.

Here is a video of Ashley sliding down the hill. You will also notice that she has multiple layers of mittens on to keep her little hands warm. If you listen closely, you will hear her say, whoa, WHOA when she reaches the bottom of the hill.

Here's my little cookie monster saying cookies.

Here is a video of Ashley talking.

Ashley loves to wear our shoes these days. I'm not sure how she was able to move in daddys heavy boots but she did.


One last video of Ashley eating soup. It occurred to me as I watched her eat it that these table manners were not something she learned at home. I had to laugh as I recalled watching Ashley at daycare with 10 plus toddlers all sitting at the little table eating their cereal and drinking their milk from the bowl.


What else is new this month with Ashley? She had a spell with pneumonia for about 2 weeks but that has finally passed. She loves cookies. Ashley and I baked cookies at Grandma Terry's on 12/6 and Ashley couldn't get enough. Some of the cutest things I have heard her say to date is mu me daddy- which was excuse me daddy as she climbed over his leg. Daycare has taught her to say Yo. Now she lays in her crib and says, Yo daddy, Yo mama, Yo Molly (teacher at daycare). It's very cute. Ashley has also become obsessed with Elmo. One evening while we were eating dinner, we discovered that Sesame Street was on. We made the mistake of saying Ashley, who is that to which she replied ELMO! We were then stuck watching Sesame Street for the rest of dinner. This is the first time she has watched tv. Now, when we turn on the tv, she says Elmo? It's hard to explain to a 21 month old that Elmo isn't on the tv all of the time. Just as I had calmed her down...ELMO came on for a commercial and then 30 seconds later, he was gone. Boy was Ashley mad. We had to turn the tv off just to get her to stop saying ELMO, ELMO, ELMO!!

Happy Holidays!!