A Jill of All Trades: Custodian, Comedian, and Contractor

I've been saving up some photos of Anika that seem pretty well "themed" - you'll be able to see some, ahem, age differences in a couple of them.  However, since we have 8 gazillion digital photos of her, why not go back through some of them and track her progress?  So, here we go!

I remember "waaaay back when" helping my mom with the laundry.  Handing her clothes pins, eventually taking the high part of the hill that our clothes line was on so I could hang some by myself, matching the dried socks up, and learning my numbers when sorting things out by size when everything was dry.  So, I figured, why not start Anika out on this task?  Putting laundry away has never been a strong point with me, but maybe if I try to teach my daughter, maybe I'll finally pick up and finish the laundry job!

9 months old and sitting pretty in the laundry room with me.

Cloth diapers = plenty of laundry!

I figured having Anika push the laundry basket around the house would help out with her walking skills - it worked pretty well (except when she first started and took a couple of headers into the basket...I figured that would just toughen her up for Mountain Biking later in life, though).  Most of the time when I got out the camera, Anika abandoned pushing the basket for attacking Mommy...which isn't a bad thing either!

Anika has also become comfortable with being in the kitchen.  For example - she helped with the inventory of our fake-tupperware drawer.

What's this?

Almost done!!!

She also likes to help out when I cook.  This day I was making banana bread and Anika was making mixed cereal.  But a good cook always cleans up, right?  (Some days I'm not the best of cooks....)

Mmmm...tasty!

Cheeeeeeese!

Check out those motor skills!

Anika has also developed quite the sense of humor through the years [oops! she hasn't been around long enough for that!] months. 

Our 7 month old ham in the tub.

9 months -
"I've got my helmet on!  Nothing can do me wrong!"

Bunny impersonation.

Swimming goggles and silly Shrek face.

Sitting on her pregnant mother's belly (8 months along, by the way in this one)
...Kiddo #2 is in for it!

Spending some time in her Father's shoes.

Another Shrek face with boots on.

She actually made forward progress with the boots on
while driving the Dora car!

We've also been doing quite a bit of improvements on the house...okay, not a new concept for us as we've been consistently working on improving the Homestid.  However, Anika has ventured into being a General Contractor as you can see on this next video.  She's explaining to Ben how to finish out the flooring job.

We're looking forward to Anika's advice on picking out the area rugs (we know that it has to be crawl-worthy in the family room) as well as landscaping the front yard.  Some people put pressure on their kids to be prodigies related to the arts and smarts ... we're coaching ours to be a prodigy of home improvement projects.  Tim Taylor would be proud (Home Improvment t.v. show reference, just in case you didn't get that one!).

In other news, kiddo #2 is still cooking away!  We will let you know when the grand entrance occurs! 

"When you're up, you're up and when you're down, you're down" - Noble Duke of York

May was quite the interesting month for us. 

It started out with a wonderful week of celebrations - Ben's birthday on May 5!  We had a Mexican themed dinner - Ben's tradition :-)  We had fajitas for dinner and home-made g-free sopapillas for dessert.  I was nervous about the sopapilla process, but Ben was willing to share his expert insight and we ended up with some rather warm. tasty, poofy, honey-laden fried deliciousness that I wouldn't object to repeating in the future!

Laiiid back - Anika and Ben relaxing and watching some Shrek.

Innagural sopapilla creation...in the fondue pot!!!
(Betcha didn't think of this use, Dena!)

Birthday Boy showing the world how to properly put honey in the fried deliciousness!

A few days later, it was Mother's Day.  We planned on hitting the Ouray Hot Springs, but ended up going over Red Mountain Pass to Silverton for lunch and then back home...Anika was passed out by the time we got back to the Hot Springs and Baby #2 had been actively squishing my lungs all the way back down the pass.  But, it was a beautiful drive and I was wearing flip flops with multiple feet of snow around me at the top of the pass...I am on a mission to force spring to appear!!!

The view from the top.

Anika and I at the top of the pass.

The Subie is tough...but not THAT tough! 
Driving down County Road 16 is out for the day!

When we got home, Anika was ready to PLAY!  So, we let our little Rock Star have some kid time in the sun.

Silly face!

She has such manners...sharing her rocks with Biz!

Then, it was Peli's birthday - 10 years old!  Her gift: the "Winter that Never Eeeeennnnddddssss!" (insert echoing voice for that one).  No one seemed to tell Old Man Winter to just Let. It. Go.

Check out that incredible springtime view!

Ben made a snowman and a snowboulder :-)

We *did* have hummingbirds flying around!

Peli and Biz enjoying the last winter blast (hopefully)

Her Highness :-)

This is the part that goes with this post's title of "When you're down. you're down": Peli passed away early in the morning on Friday, May 20th from heart issues.  We are slowly healing our own hearts and Anika goes to the windows and doors every once in a while and says "A-woo, a-woo" and looks for Peli, but we're all getting better.  Peli had a great retirement out here and was certainly a "Good Girl", as Anika had just learned to tell her.

(I'm currently working on a post called "The Tails Behind Linstidtails" that will go into more detail on the Pelster among other things, but that's going to take a while...)

Lest you think we didn't get more than one spring day without snow on the ground (we got at least 3 days), here is evidence to the contrary:

Sitting pretty waiting for Daddy.

Whoa - that's pretty cool!

Daddy?  Daddy? Daddy? Daddy?

My Daddy...My Hero

Not to end the month on a boring note, Ben and I celebrated our 12th Wedding Anniversary on May 29th.  We had a family celebration all day long!  Brunch at the Camp Robber, then to the pool, back home to nap, and then a tasty dinner of beef kabobs and shrimp!  Yummo!!!  Anika loved going to the pool and asking Ben to "Splash!" - meaning, "Father, please remove those random children out of the way and show them how you are REALLY supposed to go off of the diving board...and then do it again and again.  Also, I'd like to do the same thing.  It's no problem that I am a teeny tiny toddler, I can do it.  I. Want. To. Splash. Now."

Fueled up with milk and ready to take on the swimming world!

On the family side of things, we also made a decision to shift our vehicles around to accomodate 2 car seats, a Bismarck, Ben & I, and all of the equipment that we will be using for our adventures for the next many years. 

Anika was illustrating how she thought the Subaru was going to feel.
Notice the snowsuit - she wanted that on the baby!

So, the Subaru and the Jeep got together and retired from their adventures with us.  They gave us this Beast for our expanding family as a farewell gift:

2011 Suburban...it should work for us for quite some time!
Beast on the outside...Beauty on the inside :-)

Thus, our May ended - and we are now in June.  We are 6 days away from the due date for kiddo #2...good thing the new baby seat made it into the Beast yesterday!

Sunset May 31, 2011. 
Pretty much sums up the month for us.