Dusha Christmas Pics

Here are a couple of Christmas pics from the Dusha Christmas. I am not sure why (why is it Dusha's?!) that we don't gather as individual families or as a group to take a picture? We need to start that. Regardless here are two pics. I wanted to add a video of Teague reading, but I have tried for 3 days unsuccessfully to add a video, it keeps saying it can't connect to blogger or something, so hopefully it will add through You Tube or something. Enjoy and Happy New Year!

Uncle/Godfather Ryan with Megan opening his socks!

Teague opening his outfit from Auntie Grums

Merry Christmas to All!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas! Ours was great, aside from Teague and I suffering with our colds and sinus infection. Gross. Anyway, it was a good time and Teague of course walked away with more stuff than he will ever know what to do with! He did seem to enjoy the present opening, but it was the ripping of the paper that was waaaay more exciting than what he received. We gave cousin Chase an Imaginex Jungle Castle - well once Chase grows out of that Teague will be very eager to have it. He loved that the most I think! Probably because it made animal sounds! So we spent Monday through Thursday morning with my family, Thursday afternoon at our house with the three of us opening presents, and then most of yesterday afternoon and evening with the Dusha's. Good food, good company and good times. Here are a few pics.

Bayer cousins and Teague

Teague very animately reading to Auntie and cousins
The Trio

Teague reading in his new bean bag chair from Tina

Just hanging out in his fav rain boots!"Enjoying" the bitter winter cold!

I am hoping to be on here a bit more now that some of the honeymoon phase of being on Facebook has diminished. It's interesting seeing where some long lost friends have wound up.

We have little planned for the rest of break. This weekend we are going to see our friends, the Krause's, and meet baby Parker. Next week Ryan has the Cathedral Holiday tournament, and then New Year's we will spend with the Van Beck's - it's nice and close to home so we can still bring Teague and get home shortly after midnight with little driving. Then back to the grind. I sure hope that the winter storms we have had are not an indicator of what is to come with this winter?!

May it warm up...someday.

Seriously? Will things get better now? Yesterday morning guess what? No heat again. So like a complete Clark Griswald I put on my flannel pj jammies, boots, ski mask, jacket and gloves and headed out to the furnace exhaust pipe. This time I didn't bring my hammer to LIGHTLY tap the pipe, instead I brought three extension cords along with my trusty hair dryer. So I plugged in the hair dryer and extension cords, climbed up on the ladder in my beautiful and fashionable get-up at 6:30 am and started thawing the furnace exhaust pipe. And if any of you are wondering where Ryan was while I was getting stuff running at home, I will give you one guess. C'mon, you must know - where would he be this time of year when things go wrong at home? Yep, morning basketball. Things are always choatic on basketball mornings - poor Ryan, I do feel bad for him because things do always go wrong when he isn't around! I then came inside to listen to my kid whine the whole while I got myself and him ready for daycare and work. Needless to say yesterday was not one of my more fashionable days at work. Yuck. Regardless, I felt so bad for my boy. Daycare called to report a sick toddler. Yep, had a 102 fever. He looked like he felt rough. So hopefully now that the heat works and the motrin has kicked in we are in for a good weekend and Christmas break! Here are some videos and pictures. Happy weekend!

Big boy with a bigger boy hat!

What up, homes?

Looking at the Christmas tree is always more fun with your rainboots on!

Playing with his animals - do you like his animal sounds??

Playing in the water.

When it snows, it blizzards????

Well I think the actual saying is "when it rains it pours", but this title seemed more fitting with the current weather conditions outside and inside at our house. Oye.

Thursday night and Friday morning we had lukewarm water, at best. So I trudged out to the propane tank to make sure there was propane, and there was plenty of propane (which I later found that by signing up for the "budget" plan like I did this past summer I locked in at $2.35 a gallon - and propane is now selling for $1.69, great "budget" plan). So off to work I went. When we returned home we went through all the trouble shooting in the user's manual for our 2 1/2 year old hot water heater and none were fixing the problem. So we retreated to using man's most reliable source of reference, the internet. So we googled our problem and find that another person has wrote a similar question on a chat forum. So the short answer to our problem was that we need to "sand" the flame sensor because it has build up on it. Yep, that took care of that. Great, let's get on with the weekend.

Saturday was fine and uneventful - well unless you ask Ryan whose newer cell phone died, Sunday we were trapped at home during the blizzard, and then Monday no school due to the blizzard. Tuesday morning we woke up and as we are getting ready for work we are freezing our tushies off! So neither of us paid attention to the lack of warmth and off to work we went. I came home at lunch to throw some dinner in the crock pot and noticed that it was especially cold in the house, didn't have time to investigate and just hoped it would be better when we got home. When we got home it was worse. It was only 60 degrees in the house and the furnace wasn't running. So with Ryan needing to get to his game and me needing to get to the swim meet to ref (and Teague with Grandma and Grandpa), we didn't have time to troubleshoot and use the handy internet. Time was of the essense, we were freezing! So I called the local plumbing and heating place since our fav plumber happens to live 65 miles away. Luckily we found out that the problem was not too hard to solve (the exhaust vent to the outside of the house had filled with snow and ice during the blizzard). So with that cleared out and all of us running in different directions we seem to have heat and warm water. Hallelujah!

So is everyone else keeping warm?!

It's beginning to look a lot like...

...a toddler Christmas. This is the kind of face you get when attempting Christmas card pictures:


It's been fun doing a little shopping for Teague this year. Last year he was still too young to care about anything. At least this year he should care about the bows and wrapping paper. I did tell Ryan that we should take advantage of this age. He doesn't even know what he wants for Christmas, can't tell us what he wants, and wouldn't know any different if he didn't get anything! But of course we still went all out. Ah, whatever.


Nothing else is new here. We are just finishing up with school and counting down to break. Ryan is usually quite busy with the holiday tournament, but does have a few days off from practice, so we are excited to be able to see more of him. Teague and I did go to our first game. Keep in mind that the games start at 7:30 and Teague goes to bed at the same time. So tip off was at 7:30 and we left at about 7:32. Fun times.


Have a great weekend.

Hip Hip HOORAY!

Here is Teague doing his Hip Hip Hooray routine.  Please ignore his overly excited mother's voice.  How annoying!

Teague's 2nd Thanksgiving

Happy belated Thanksgiving to everyone. As I told my family last night, I have a lot to be thankful for. Sometimes I just need to stop to remember how much I have in my life...a wonderful husband, a beautiful child, an outstanding family, a job (which is big in today's economy), and so on.

We have really enjoyed these few days off from work and spending it with family. On Thursday afternoon we had lunch with the Dusha's and then Thursday evening we spent dinner with the Mohr's. Like my uncle Bola has said, every Mohr get together is like a hearing aid convention. Everyone is trying to "out-talk" the next person and yelling, so it gets a bit chaotic. Teague loved running around with the bigger kids. On Friday Ryan returned home for bball practice and to get ready for the scrimmage on Saturday and my mom and I did some pre-Christmas shopping. Another chaotic event. Yikes. Friday afternoon I had coffee with my high school friend Amber - always so good to catch up with her - and then we had a wedding reception for a family friend. Today before we came home we did some swimming at the fitness center in Morris and Teague was in heaven. He wanted to swim OUT of my arms. He has no fear of swimming and could care less how much water he ingests. He loves to jump from the ledge into your arms. I haven't seen him that squealey and excited before! Anyway, Teague had so much fun playing with his cousins and it was a nice reprieve from reading books every free minute with monkey boy! We came home tonight and I think Teague was happy to see his own bed! All in all, a great weekend. Here are some pictures and a video clip of our weekend.

Handsome little Monkey before the wedding reception (please note that his hair is actually getting long enough/thick enough for a little spikey do - though it's so blonde you can barely see it). How do you like the forehead bruise from his monkey antics of jumping from one chair to another -and lack of success at making it to the next chair - at daycare?!

This is either "so big" or "who's crazy" at the wedding reception dinner. The true reason for the picture is to show his new found love for ranch dressing!

Mommy and Monkey at the reception. Getting a "good" picture these days is really trying!

Oh man, look at that excited face! He was just dancing around the changing room so excited so go swimming!

Finally he just sat in the locker so patiently waiting for everyone!

I think he thinks the wait was well worth it, he loved swimming!

Melrose Holiday Tour of Homes

This year we agreed to have our home one of the five homes that is showcased on the Melrose Holiday Tour of Homes. The proceeds of this fundraiser go to the Ronald McDonald House and Hope Lodge. You can read more about the tour at http://melroseholidaytour.blogspot.com/. It's a lot of work, but well worth it. The local floral shop came into decorate our house (marketing and advertising tool for them) so I had to take some pictures of their work. Of course pictures can't do it all justice, but hopefully you can get a sense of the Christmas Cheer! I think we estimated that between the two days there were around 350-400 people to tour our home. Wow-zer. Hope you all had a nice weekend.

FRONT OF HOUSE AT NIGHT

DINING ROOM


LOOKING INTO THE KITCHEN FROM DINING AREA

LIVING ROOM

THE BASEMENT

I've Been Tagged.

I guess I have been tagged, at least that is what Kelly told me on her blog. So here it goes.

I am: glad tomorrow is Friday.
I know: what an amazing life I have.
I want: Teague to always have such a happy go lucky personality.
I have: great friends and an awesome family.
I dislike: dishonesty.
I miss: the long sunny days!
I feel: content.
I hear: Ryan watching the T-Wolves game.
I smell: Cinnamon Spice (wallflower).
I crave: sweets. ALL. THE. TIME.
I cry: when frustrated.
I search: for all the things I have misplaced - it's this mom forgetfulness thing.
I wonder: what Teague will be like as a teenager/adult!
I regret: not just laying around more before Teague. Man I run a lot now.
I love: my family.
I worry: about everything.
I remember: what a great childhood I had.
I dance: when I eat sweets. Just ask my sister, it really annoyed her growing up.
I don't: like the cold weather. (If I didn't love my parents/sister, etc. so much I would move ASAP to warm weather).
I argue: as little as possible, but I am not afraid to speak up!
I write: college letters of recommendation for my students ALL DAY.
I win: some of my own personal goals.
I lose: some of my own personal goals.
I wish: to keep my family safe.
I listen: to Teague babble and say new words daily.
I can usually be found: reading books to Teague.
I am scared: of things I cannot control.
I need: a vacation, with my boys.
I forget: what it feels like to have free time.

Tag to Amy VB, Anita H, Sapphire, and Jaime

Teague Stories

I remember when Teague was just a couple of months old I told my friend Kelly that I loved that particular age. She was talking about all the different stages of her son, Devin's, life at that point and how she loved 18 months the most because that's when they really seem like they start to converse with you. She's so right. 18 months is not quite here yet, but I see that same thing coming about. Teague's newest favorite word is "Happy!". So all the way to daycare this morning as he is looking at a book he is saying "Happy!, Happy!, HHHHHHAAAAAPPPPPYYYYY!". I think he is actually just learning self-descriptive adjectives!

Another cute story... Last night I was on my way home from a short post-work shopping excursion. I had just talked to Ryan so I knew they were home. I forgot to tell him something so I called back right away and nobody answered, except the answering machine. So I am blabbing on the machine and all of the sudden I hear this sweet little "ah, ba ba.........Hiiiiiiiiiiii!........." and I was so confused and so I said "Monkey, is that you?", and he says "Hiiiiiiiiiiiii. Hi." And just kept blabbing. Of course Ryan had left him alone to use the, ahem - facilities and Teague actually answered the phone! It's all caught on the answering machine, so whenever I need a good laugh/smile I can listen to that!

I was trying to update some privacy stuff on this blog earlier this week. I feel fairly comfortable using blogger, but apparently in my attempts to block users from being able to find this blog online by googling us, I blocked people from viewing the blog, so I think it's fixed now! Whew.

Christmas Shopping for a 16 month old

What do you get a 16 month old for Christmas? In all reality (like a majority of kids), Teague needs nothing. But it wouldn't be Christmas if you didn't buy them some type of gift. It's sort of like last year. I knew he could have cared less if we bought him something. Same thing this year. But I really want to get him something he will love - but what? More books?? Honestly this kid can sit for hours and hours looking at books and sometimes the same book. He loves books (hence, his 16 month picture to the right). As an educator of course I think it's great, but sometimes I wonder if he just thinks that all the toys we have for him are just boring? So I asked Tina, "What does Teague play with while he is here?" and she replied - "Well, mostly books." Well that didn't help. So I have just resorted to buying him and suggesting to others the obvious - books and necessities like shoes. B-O-R-I-N-G, but not to him so that's all that matters, right?

I did some shopping yesterday, but I wasn't impressed with selection. Maybe what it really was, I don't know what to buy a majority of people on our list. And then there's always the worry that I will forget someone, so what should I buy "just in case" for that "emergency" situation. Yuck. I really love shopping, but not when I have to buy ambiguous items for people!

Have a good week!

All Better

Monkey is soooo much better. It took him 8 DAYS to get over that stomach bug. A few people have asked if he had rotovirus, but he did not and he was also vaccinated for that. It was just a bad case of the stomach bug. Up until Sunday he was still vomiting. Poor thing. But he seemed really good on Monday and was THRILLED to be back at Tina's. When Maddie (same age as Teague) woke up that morning and came down to the daycare, Teague sprinted across the room, tripped and hit his head, and got right up without crying and ran over to hug Maddie. He missed his buddy. He was, however, very exhausted from playing all day. Tina said he would play and then go over in the corner and lay on the floor like he was so tired and then get up and keep playing. That night he was in bed sleeping by 6:45 and didn't get up until after 7 Tuesday morning. Same thing last night. He is just trying to get caught up on sleep.

Other than that, life is normal again at our house. Ryan starts bball in 1.5 weeks. Teague's bedtime will likely make it pretty difficult to get to many if any games, which is a bit sad - but if I really want to see a game I will just have to hire a babysitter. The weird thing is that we do not have a single home Friday night game - there are only 3 Friday games and they're all away! I have to say I am disappointed because that was the one thing I looked forward to doing in the cold winter months - watching basketball - but we may just have to push the pause button on that until Teague is older.

Have a good week and enjoy the cold, MN weather! (Wasn't it just 70 degrees last week?!)

24 Hours

Well we have went 24 hours without puke. It's been like walking on eggshells in some ways though! I have worried anytime he eats anything besides toast, rice, bananas or applesauce. He seems to like cheerios for the time being and today we have branched out to chicken noodle soup. He loves that. I think he really misses his bottle of milk before bedtime (yes, he still gets one and yes it's my fault - it's my only cuddle time, sue me!). Anyway, he seems to SLOOOOOOOWLY be rounding the corner. And I have gotten over myself, my rants are over - though last night he was having a fun time playing with me but had apparently ate too many cheerios and drank too much water (which he proved to me when we were rolling on the floor playing and he puked half in my mouth and on my face - I deserved it). That's life as a mom - the 3 "P's" don't really bother you anymore (pee and puke in the face or poop - but not in the face). Yum.

Teague snuggling in, listening to Daddy read....A-Dorable.

We did venture to St. Cloud today. Auntie Grums and Ken are here from Seattle and we definitely wanted to be able to spend some time with them. When we asked Teague if he wanted to go "bye bye" he basically sprinted to the door. He was rather tired of looking at the walls within our house for the past 7 days! He was good there, but you could tell he was still not feeling the best. He did, however in his sickness (un)equilibrium, trip and hit his head on a chair and boy did it leave an egg/bruise on his forehead. And boy did he scream and hold his breath (but that's nothing new for him). I just feel so bad for him.

So we are hopeful for a full week's worth of work. And I am sure he will be excited to be back with his friends at Tina's.

Enjoy the COLD weekend!

My Personal Pity Party

Since I am a mom, in reality nothing can be about me anymore. And I am okay with that - there is nothing I wouldn't do or sacrifice for the sake of my monkey baby. But since this blog is mine and I can write whatever I want, I am going to have a pity party here.

I am really sick of cleaning up puke. Like EXTREMELY sick of it. Yes, you are right - like my kid is not sick of puking - I totally get that and I feel horrible for him. But I am tired. I am so tired of getting up and washing sheets and throwing away pillows and giving my poor babe a bath in the middle of the night when he is barely awake and his face and head are covered in puke and he is really mad at me because he doesn't want all his clothes ripped off of him and water being poured on top of his head and his eyes are still shut because he knows if he opens them all that disgusting slime that is dripping on his face will get in his eyes. Yep, I am sick of it. Officially sick of 5 days of this junk. If you have been blessed with the 24 hour thing with your kid, consider yourself lucky. It's not a big deal unless you are going on day #6 with your kid puking - ALL NIGHT. And then your husband is sick too. And you kind of just have forgotten about yourself and the fact that you still feel crappy because there is no time for that. Good Lord, will we ever get through this? I suppose we will - just in time for basketball season and me being a single mom again????

Yuck.

Yuck. That's the way everyone in my house feels right now. And that's how we all basically look too. We all have the stomach flu. Poor Teague. He's who I feel for the worst. Ryan and I have managed to work today, but I think we will both be home tomorrow. Yesterday I worked, Ryan stayed home with Teague and today my dad is with monkey. I officially have a fever - oh, on top of the flu, I also have a cold. So at times my belly will feel better, only to feel worse in my nose. We all are in tough shape and it has little to do with Halloween candy, unless those two pieces between the 3 of us were infected with something???

Happy Halloween!

The Trio on Halloween!

Happy Halloween to all the ghosts and goblins out there! Teague was a lion for Halloween. He was more like the cowardly lion from Wizard of Oz as his "roar" was really not too intimidating. It's actually kind of a sweet little baby boy roar. ahhhhh. Anyway, we put him in his costume before he went to Tina's today and after I dropped him off he went right down the stairs to the daycare and I stayed upstairs talking to Tina for a few minutes. I heard down the stairs "AAAAHHH, look! It's a LION!" and a bunch of little girl screams as if Teague were so scary. Poor monkey (or lion, whatever). Tina said he wore it for quite a while, but Maddie (same age as Teague) kept following him around and pulling his tail. Finally he walked over to Tina signing "please" and tugging at his costume. Apparently he had enough of the abuse.

Before we left for Tina's this morning.

After school and daycare we took him home and put him into the "official costume", face paint and all. The face paint didn't stay on so great. Oh well. Anyway, we took him back into town and went to the kiddie Halloween parade and to the city center for a party. He was really unimpressed and really didn't think the other kids were very cool. As a matter of fact he seemed unsure of them. If only he had looked in the mirror before we left, he would have realized that he looked like most of them. So then we took him to 4 places total: 2 houses and 2 businesses and we were all ready to just go home. This is obviously still an occasion for his crazy parents and not for a 15 month old. Once we got home it was like he was so relieved to be home and bathed! He was so much fun once we were home and playing. Maybe next year??

Nicole - one of my students - and Teague. Wow, look at how cooperative he is!

Maggie (or Marge) - one my students - and Teague

"LET'S GET OUT OF HERE. NOW!"

This video shows what he thought when we got home and he saw himself in the mirror!

"I am so happy - look at me all clean and in my jammies helping mama cook!"On Wednesday we carved pumpkins. Okay, I carved pumpkins. Ryan took pictures and Teague wondered around the garage getting into mischief. He could have cared LESS about me carving any pumpkin. And I believe Ryan felt the same way, but someone had to be the photographer!

In the beginning it was fun...

He's still SORT OF interested...Well, we are losing interest. Daddy's sandals are cooler now...And I am pretty sure he has officially lost interest (notice how I am still carving away - "what toddler is throwing a tantrum? I can't hear anything")FINALLY. The finished product. And then it was time for bed.

After we got home tonight I had to get stuff ready for the "tea party luncheon" that I am hosting tomorrow in celebration of my friend Lindsey's upcoming baby's birth! It should be a good time. Hopefully the food turns out okay - that's always a fear of mine when hosting any kind of get together!! Other than that we don't have much planned. I am trying to battle a cold, so rest is hopefully in the forecast for me!

Hope you had a great week and have a great weekend!

Misc. Dusha Business

Here are a couple of pics of Teague with his buddy "Lewboski" in Seattle. One of the pics he just got out of the bath. We wouldn't normally allow him to wrestle with the cat naked or anything!

Not much is new in our world. We are just going about our little work and daycare routine. It's nice that Halloween is on Friday since bedtime usually happens at our house on "school nights" during a time that could interfere with such festivities!

Last weekend Ryan went to Mpls for a basketball coaches clinic. Teague and I headed up to Morris to be with Nana and Papa and then on Saturday we drove home through Alexandria and visited my friend Kelly who just had her baby, Dayton, 3 weeks ago (congrats Kel)! He is so dang adorable and of course Kel looks fab-u-loso. Teague really liked their cat, Ramsey, more than he really cared about trying to play with her other son Devin or poking Dayton in the eye. He would run over once in a while when Dayton was in the bouncy seat and crouch down and say "hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii" and run away. Devin thought it was great fun to be able to pick up Teague (Devin is 4 and probably weighs about Teague's weight). Yesterday we hung out at home since it was FREEZING outside. Monday's are getting tougher in our house as we all have a hard time getting up and starting a new week. I am lucky because Teague seems to like sleeping in like his mom and dad, but waking him at 7:30 because we need to get going is not fun for anyone. I am usually sweating by the time all is said and done from chasing him, catching him, getting one more piece of clothing on him, chasing him again, etc., you get the picture.

Here are a couple of videos while we were in Seattle. He really loves animals right now. Everyday he tells me a new sound of a new animal. Here you can hear the "top 4" animals.

In this video you can hear him giggling in the car. All I was doing was putting his foot up by his face. Hilarious I tell you.

Sleepover in Seattle

We had a great time in Seattle visiting Auntie Grummie and Ken. They were awesome hosts and we were impressed with what a gorgeous city it was. We took in a few sights, but most importantly just got to spend time with the two of them (plus a few other friends of theirs) and visited. I was a little worried about the flight and time change (they are two hours behind us) with Teague, but all went so well. He didn't sleep on the plane ride there, but was really good. He slept like there was never a time change and slept on the plane ride home. What a super little traveler already! I was also wondering what we would do to "entertain" Teague while at their house, but they had just gotten a kitten a few weeks beforehand and Teague was in heaven playing with "Lewboski". Teague would run and the kitty would chase him and on occasion would "sneak up" behind Teague and cling onto Teague's pj's. It was super cute to see them playing together. He would get so excited to see Lewboski in the mornings. I have posted a TON of pictures with descriptions of each. Thanks Grums and Ken for a great time!

The Trio on the shoreline in Edmonds, WA (near Grums' house)

Ken and Teague on the shoreline Oh Monkey. He would throw a rock in the water and then clap for himself and run back for another rock to throw. OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER. Teague, Ken and Grums...he was getting another rock from them to throw into the water. Our visit to Pike Place Market - famous in many movies - you know, where they throw the fish (Sleepless in Seattle anyone??). Very cool, but a bit crowded with 4 adults and a stroller.Teague and a big "monk fish". He doesn't seem very impressed. Maybe nervous??Teague at the Seattle Aquarium. Now this is what he was impressed about. He absolutely loved this place and LOVED being able to touch the starfish, etc.
Doesn't he look impressed, my little squid??
He also loved the otters and seals.
Oh cute. It's Grums and Ken!
The 5 of us on the U of WA campus (where Grums works)

Grums and Teague
Who knew...Melrose Floral has a chain in Seattle??
And Earl's bar too??? Melrose is the place to be I guess!
Teague in his pj's, boarding the airplane - goodbye Seattle.

Monkey had his 15 month appt. today. He is still off the charts for height and 95th percentile for everything else. He hated his shots, but when he saw the sucker he was signing please like crazy! Silly monkey.