Checking In

Geez, here I am, back again with apologies. Our house has been turned upside down, that's my excuse. Do you buy it? Well, here's the real story...

Back in March, Mom and Dad ordered me a big girl bed. The people at HOM said it wouldn't be here until late April. Mom and Dad were really bummed that it would be that long, but figured they'd make it work. (They had originally wanted me to start sleeping in a big girl bed about the time of my birthday-April 17.) Well, lo and behold, Mom got a phone call on March 30th saying the bed was at the warehouse ready to be picked up. Mom and Dad flew into panic mode. They had to move everything from my nursery into the guest room/office and everything from the guest room/office into my nursery. Now anyone that's been to my house before knows that these rooms are different sizes. In fact, the nursery is only about half the size of the guest room/office. You can imagine what this meant for furniture arrangement. Not to mention all of mom's wardrobe (non-maternity and maternity) was in the guest room/office closet and a dressers. All of those clothes needed to fit into her and dad's bedroom. But all the space for clothes in that room was taken up by dad's wardrobe.

People, I could go on and on explaining the logistics, but I think you get it. Mom and Dad have been super busy and we had no internet for about a week until Comcast could come out to get it hooked up in the new guest room/office. We're finally online again, and I'm able to bring you news from the home front...

Um...but not a lot of news because it's getting a little late and it's the end of Easter/Daddy's Birthday weekend and everyone's a little wiped out and coming down from candy-induced sugar highs. So I'd like to redirect you to flickr where you'll find some pictures from my vacation. This week I'll work on bringing you pictures of my new big girl bed (in which I have been sleeping fantastically for a week and a half now-much to my parents surprise and elation), Spring, Daddy's birthday, and Easter.

TTFN,
Taylor

Buongiorno

Salutations from sunny Palm Springs, California. What a trip I'm having friends! The weather has been great (a bit windy the first couple days, but perfect since then) and we've been having lots of fun in the sun. Papa Steve has been busy with his fancy camera, so we'll have lots of pictures to share with you later. For now, I'll tide you over with some pictures from my camera...

Here I am in my modified capris. Mom and Dad had me dressed for Minnesota weather and we stepped off the plane onto the tarmac to find I was quite overdressed. Mom rolled my pants up to hold me over until she could get me somewhere to change me. I actually had to go change for two reasons. 1) The weather. 2) I got a little airsick during our landing and barfed all over myself and Mom. Oops. It was all over my t-shirt-that's why I have my sweatshirt on.

Notice the footwear-NEW CROCS! My feet have grown too large for the ones I got last summer, so when Mom and Dad saw that the Denver airport had a setup of THREE Croc kiosks and realized we had two hours to kill, well they did what any parents would do: they went shopping. Didn't I pick out some super cute Crocs?!?!




Yesterday morning we went out to breakfast. Grandma helped me stay busy and happy by building cream container towers. She's creative that Grandma!





Grandma and Papa also did some airport shopping. They got me this cute t-shirt when they got here to Palm Springs:



Today I helped Grandma pick grapefruit off the tree in her yard. We got a whole bunch!! Then I got to come inside and share one with her. My favorite part is when Grandma squeezes the rind into my spoon so I can drink the juice. Yummy!

Tonight we went out to dinner at Mom and Dad's favorite restaurant in Palm Springs. It's called Kalura Trattoria and they make absolutely positively fantabulous Italian food. I tried a little of everything and liked it all! And for about the 10th time this week, I ate salad. I just love the stuff! Everybody is very impressed with me when I eat salad.

Papa and I took a break to pose for this picture. (Papa had to take a hiatus from our vacation to go to Minnesota and Wisconsin for some business doings from Tuesday until today and I'm really glad to have him back.)

Well people, it's been another long, busy day here on my vaca, so I better go get some shuteye. Tomorrow is (sniffle sniffle) my last full day here so I'll be busy getting in as much fun as I can.

Arrivederci!
Taylor

Bon Voyage!

I'm so excited I can barely see straight! Tomorrow I get to get on an airplane (some might know that particular vehicle better as an "eem") and fly to Palm Springs, California! If it's anything like I remember from last year, it's going to be superdedupercalifragilisticfun! We've been busy packing this week and still have some work to do. Hopefully we'll be ready when Papa Taxi Driver (that'll be Papa Bob's handle tomorrow) comes at 6:00 AM.

In other news...

Last week I started a new ECFE class. It's called Toddlertime. That's right-I am officially a toddler by my school's standards now. I got to paint and I even got to wear a really silly paint shirt. Mom said it reminded her of when she was a little girl and would have to bring one of Dad's old dress shirts to school for a paint shirt. She says it was part of the functionality of the thing, but I just don't quite understand why Mom put it on my backwards...

Last weekend Mom and I were Hockey Widows while Daddy was away watching the boys high school state hockey tournament. Mom and I got to go out to eat at a bowling alley on Friday with Grandma and Papa and their good friends Rich and Carol Hetland. There was an arcade there that I found to be quite entertaining. I gave everyone quite a scare when I snuck out the restaurant door and ran down there all by myself. All the adults were running around looking for me-Carol even went through the kitchen! But Mommy found me down with all the flashing lights and ringing bells. I was happy as a clam and didn't know quite what all the fuss was. Mom says she hopes I understand someday how dangerous and scary it really was.

After dinner I talked Mom into swinging through the Dairy Queen drive thru for a little frozen treat. Ice cream is the bomb! I had a little trouble with the execution of the project, but I got 'er done...

The next picture is purely for your enjoyment. Daddy caught this super cute moment:

Last Sunday we got to go out to celebrate Aunt Jenni's birthday. We went to Dave and Buster's. Woopeedoopeedoo! More flashing lights and dinging machines!!! I had so much fun I about peed my pants. Wait...I think I did do that...but it's all good-I'm still in the diapers. After we ate, the nice server brought Aunt Jenni a birthday treat. She was nice enough to let me and the cousins eat it. YUM!

When you play games at Dave and Buster's, the machines spit tickets out. If you get enough tickets, you can buy prizes in a store. Since I'm just a little kid that really doesn't know the difference, my tickets got donated to Megan and Nate. The adults also donated all of their tickets to the cause so they got some nice loot out of the deal.

On St. Patrick's Dad we had pork chops that were cooked on the grill. (That's because we had a Spring Weather Sneak Preview this week.) I'm not sure it was a traditional Irish dinner, but it sure was good. In fact, the chops were so good I grabbed Mommy's bone to clean it off:

Well I do suppose I'd better go get some shuteye. That 6:00 AM wake up call is going to come early tomorrow.

I'll try to get some information out to you during my vacation. Take care people!

Monk

Seriously, March Already?!?!

Spring break is just around the corner and I decided to try on my newest new swimsuit the other day. I thought Dad's big ol' leather boots would be the perfect accessory. What d'ya think?!?!



This weekend I got to go see my cousin Nate play his first and only hockey game of the season. (At his level it's more about drills and practice than actual games.) It was lots of fun. He spent a lot of time on the ice-literally, ALL of his body-on the ice. He has a flare for the dramatics. Aunt Jenni says that if the hockey doesn't work out there's always theater or stunt work.

After the game, Grandma Jan and Papa Bob took us all out to breakfast at Jersey's. I had lots of fun being a stinky little terror monster running away from the table. I tried to go upstairs a couple times but Mom kept saying, "Sorry, you're not with the band, you can't go up there."

Here's me cheezin it up for the camera with my cousins.

Short and sweet this week people. Just like me!

Taylor

P.S. I've got a great video to share, but we all know how Blogger feels about my videos. Head over to my flickr site to check it out.

Dog Girl, Pony Tails and the Cookie Store

I would like to begin this post with a disclaimer. My parents have never ever let me eat in the bathroom (though I did try to bring a banana with me to the potty yesterday). Nor have they ever made me eat out of a dish on the floor like a dog.

With that said, here is how my mom found me in the bathroom the other day:

I did it all myself. Found a dish for me and a dish for the dog, and set it all up on the bathroom floor. What can I say? It's a nice bathroom. You'd want to eat in there too.

In big hair news this weekend, I now have enough hair for full pony tails. How cute!!!! Mom was pretty excited and even went all Pageant Mom on my and sprayed me with hairspray.

This weekend we went shopping. A lot. To a lot of furniture stores. (My favorite is HOM where you can eat a cookie if you're a good shopper.) The mission: a big girl bed for yours truly! Our mission was accomplished today on the second trip of the weekend to HOM. (Yep, I got cookies two days in a row. It's shameless!) My captains bed will be arriving some time in April. Mom and Dad would really like to make the transition before that, so they brought home the mattress and I might get to start sleeping on that after our Spring Break trip to California. Should be interesting to see how THAT switch plays out...

Another neat thing about ALL of the furniture stores is the cool trucks they have for kids to drive around in. Mom and Dad wish every store in the world had these since I actually have an attention span for sitting in it.

That's all I've got today folks. Take it easy and keep warm out there!

Tater Bugger

Papa Steve to the Rescue

Thanks to my Papa* Steve and his trusty Olympus, I finally have some material to share with you.



Last weekend when Grandma Trish and Papa Steve were in town, they took me to visit their dear friends Walter and Bobbi. They've been friends with Walter and Bobbi since way back when they all used to live in Rochester, Minnesota and run with the same golf crowd. Walter and Bobbi are really nice people and I really enjoyed visiting them.



(On a side note, Walter is a retired jeweler and he was the mastermind that helped Daddy have my Great Grandma Gert's old wedding ring turned into Mommy's engagement ring. Walter also had both Mommy and Daddy's wedding bands made.)


Here I am with Walter and Bobbi...

Here I am walking their dog, Riley, around their apartment.

They also have a cat. It's name is Peppy. That sounds a lot like puppy, so you can imagine the confusion that inflicted on my little brain. Papa Steve is severely allergic to cats, but got close enough to help me see him.






The best part was when I got to walk Riley out in the hallway on my way out of the building. I think I should have a dog at my house.

Later that same day, after a good nap, it was time for more fun. We went to the hotel in which Grandpa and Papa were staying so we could swim. We brought Kevin, Kris and Haley with us.

Here I am waiting for the elevator in my super cute swim cover up from Grandma. (A Valentine's gift bought with our Spring Break trip to Palm Springs in mind.)

Haley and I in the pool...

Jumping to Grandma...

Using walking feet by the pool...

Relaxing with my girl Haley...

Washing off the pool bugs...

I love love love to swim and I'm so so so excited to do lots more in Palm Springs in five weeks!

Mom got her camera located and up and running again late this week. Just in time to get some pictures of me blowing bubbles. Yep, blowing bubbles. Mom was pretty excited that I was able to do that-she says it shows good prognosis for ability to produce age-appropriate speech sounds. (Apparently some of those kids at her work can't blow bubbles and that inability is directly linked to their inability to correctly produce some age-appropriate speech sounds.)

I like to take pictures with my fancy kid camera. It makes lots of fun noises and plays photo shoot music.

Here's a funny video of me using my camera and then discovering that maybe my mom's camera is a whole lot cooler than mine and then deciding to do something about my feelings that I should have said cooler camera...

After taking a hiatus from training to potty train, as we like to call it around here, I'm back on the horse. Or the toilet I guess. When Mom was reading books to me at bedtime the other night, I tooted. I giggled and said, "Oh Mama my poopy". Mom asked if I pooped and I said that I did. After a little investigative work with her nose, Mom asked if I tooted. I replied, "Oh yeah my toot". Mom asked if I needed to poop. My reply came in the form of hopping off her lap and beckoning her to follow me to the toilet. She got me all situated (see picture below-oh and enjoy the little glimpse of the bea-U-tiful new bathroom!) and I PEED ON THE TOILET! Mom and Dad were very excited and I have to say, it was contagious. I even pulled the toilet paper off the roll and stuffed it down in the toilet, just like I've seen Mom do. (I'm not sure what that's supposed to accomplish...am I missing a step in the procedure perhaps?) I really wanted to stay on the toilet and poop and I tried for a couple minutes, but then Mom politely explained that I probably didn't really need to go at that point in time, and that it was really time to go to bed and if I decided I needed to go later, I could go in my diaper and she would gladly change the diaper for me. I'm not sure how far I'll take my training to potty train at this point, but it is pretty neat that I had this achievement.

Today we had a very fun family afternoon and evening. Mom and Dad took me to Lookout Ridge, the indoor park in Woodbury. (Remember my first time there with Quinn almost a year ago?) Daddy has never been there before and I was really excited to show the place to him. Mom and I got very adventurous and climbed way up through all the cargo nets to the BIG slide. It was a crazy trip up (perhaps not really appropriate for a child that is only 22 months old and a very tall woman that is 25 weeks pregnant) and then there was the slide. Much longer than I had anticipated and BLACK AS PITCH in the middle. I stopped at the part where it was dark and because it was dark, Mom didn't know I was stopped and ended up right on top of me. Oops. The good news is she shoved me out of the way pretty quickly and nobody was hurt. (Dad brought along the video camera and the parents did shoot some video, but as the downloading/editing/uploading process for videos from the video camera is still a slow process, you'll have to wait and see if anything surfaces. I advise you to NOT hold your breath.)

After the park, we went to dinner at Machine Shed. What a cool place!! There were tractors everywhere-even under my macaroni and cheese! Tell me you've seen something cooler than that and I'll tell you I'm a monkey's uncle.

Well folks, I hope that you enjoyed this post. I overheard Mom and Dad talking in the car on the way home from dinner and it sounds like they plan to have the bathroom completely finished by this Sunday, barring any unforeseen circumstances. (I didn't remind them that this whole project has been one unforeseen circumstance after another. Didn't want to burst their collective bubble.) So hopefully I'll have a blog for you next week with picture of our bea-U-tiful new bathroom!

Guten Nacht!

Tay

*After much waiting and speculation, I finally did what everyone thought I might do-I came up with my first epithet. During the stay at Granma Jan and Grandpa Bob's house, I began referring to Grandpa as "Papa" and I've carried it over to Grandpa Steve as well.

An Apology for Total Blog Duty Negligence

The excuses:

1. Living at Grandma and Grandpa's for 19 days while trying to renovate the bathroom.

2. Letting the camera battery die.

3. Misplacing the camera.

4. Finding out the camera battery is still charging in the kitchen at Grandma and Grandpa's so it really doesn't matter that you can't find the camera because there is no battery in it.

5. Moving home and (still) working in the bathroom while trying to clean all the dust and grime from the house and wash the nine loads of laundry that accumulated during it all.

6. Having family (Grandma Trish and Grandpa Steve) in town Thursday through Saturday.

7. Having a screwed up nap schedule on Sunday that prevented the family from doing anything productive.

8. Being home with Mommy for the President's Day holiday and finding time to run to Kohl's and Target in the morning but completely forgetting throughout the rest of the day that you could take pictures and work on a blog post.

Have I excused myself enough?

I'll try to get something out to y'all this week.

Later-Tater