Dancin' Shoes!

Just to "keep you on your toes", here's a recent video of Anika with her favorite shoes.  She doesn't wear them all of the time (typically from after nap time until bath time), but she loves them! 

And in this one, she's showing off her howling skills while squeaking away (she's headed to the refridgerator where there are pictures of Peli and Bismarck)

Let me see that smile again!!!

Yes, its blurry, but the dimples still show!!!

The result of expecting a flash everytime you're asked to smile...scrunched faces.
And yes, this is blurry too - I didn't have the flash on in an attempt to get a nice non-scrrunchy smile.

I'm working on getting a post of some of our winter adventures...now that its springtime :-)  Lots of fun in the snow was had this past winter! 

Christmas Day with Miss A!

Christmas morning started early...for me, that is!  I woke up early and started bugging Ben and telling him I was going to get my stocking and did he want his?  Like most couples, we grew up with different holiday traditions - in my family, you could go get your stocking and go back to your room and dig through the loot Santa left for you.  Many times a "gift" from Rudolf, a moo-ing cow thing that moo-ed every time you wiggled your stocking (that year it took me about 20 minutes to get up the nerve to remoooove the stocking from the hanger), or something of that nature.  Ben's family had to wait for everyone to get up and *then* they got to do the stocking thing together.  Alas, in an effort to not wake Anika and to get the coffee going, we waited.  And waited.  Finally, when Ben's mom was up, the 3 of us did our stockings together.  Apparently Anika does not yet have the anticipation bug that I do and she kept on sleeping.  And then....and then...and then....

She finally WOKE UP!!!!!!!!!!!!

Don't you wish you woke up every day like this?  The coffee industry would be rather upset due to their decrease in sales, I believe!

Then we brought Anika into the family room to see what Santa left behind.

The sled initiation!

What a face!

She's got WHEELS!

Digging through the stocking - that's our girl!

A proper lady in Colorado *always* has lip balm
at her finger tips! 
Princess lip balm is even better.

From the gifts from Santa and Mrs. Claus, Anika moved onto gifts from the family...which pretty much brought her up to her nap time!

Sensory overloaded gift hound.

Hugging Baby Stella!

I didn't make the cinnamon rolls like I did last year, but Ben's mom fixed the Spudnut recipe and we fried up some gluten free doughnuts!  (Spudnuts, really, as they have mashed potatoes in them)  My review after having a fresh warm delicacy, "Holy Fair Food, This is AWESOME!".

Mother and son bonding over food!

The BOOTY!

Since I don't think she'll read this post (in time at least), I'll let you in on a secret - we still have some spudnuts left in our freezer.  My college roomie is coming in this weekend and I'm thinking that we may have to defrost said g-free yumminess and make an overnight french toast/breakfast bread pudding creation....I'll let you know the results ;-)

So, that concludes Ben, Mal, Anika's Most Excellent Christmas Post...well, this really does:

All is right with the world - the squeaker has been retrieved!
Way to go, Peli!

Holiday Memories 2010

I had this post originally drafted in my head back in December - it initially was going to be a one photo post titled, "Seasonal Anxiety" or "Did you realize it was DECEMBER?".  This was the photo:

But, I procrastinated and we ended up going to the Montrose Parade of Lights where I imagined beautiful photos and a happy smiley baby with Santa waving to her from his sleigh to add to the blog post.  This is what we ended up with:

Passive aggressive crowd control.  Or, Santa is a felon, so stay out of his way.

There were lots of horses and dogs in the parade and Anika loved it!

Anika clapping after the horses went by.

 THEN I was going to do a post about decorating, but decided that I'd include that in a full post about pre-Christmas preparations.

Checking out the moody snoman nose (the snowman changes color).

Anika, the animal lover.

Yup, the Caddyshack Gopher got into the Christmas Spirit, too!

One of my favorite photos of Miss A. 
Nevermind the fact that our 14 month old is playing with live wires. 
She's tough.

Not to mention the trip to Murdoch's Ranch & Home Supply, where Santa let some of his reindeer do some PR work for him.  We didn't get to go up and see the reindeer face to snout, but we saw them walk through the store and Ben brought Anika up to their trailer.

Yup, Donder walked right through the store! (or is that Blitzen?)

Check out that fuzzy nose!

But this post didn't make it on because I was waiting to scan in our photo with Santa (Ben and I jumped in with Anika...I'm even holding her sippy cup), but for some reason I didn't get to that point yet.  Oh, yeah - our tax stuff is sitting on top of the scanner.  Wouldn't want to disturb that prematurely, now would we?

And then, it was Christmas Eve.  There wasn't a "Wigglers Service" like there was last year, so no 5 year olds doing improv and acting out the Nativity Scene...nor was there a hay fight in the manger, but we did go to a standard/traditional service and Anika got to hang with her peeps down in the nursery.

Anika had on her holiday finery and we had fun showing her off :-)



My 2 Blue Eyed Loves

In front of the tree at Montrose UMC -
yes mom, I know, I should've had my shoulders back -
"Be proud of your height"

And then, it was Christmas Day...and that, my friends, is another post - perhaps if cookies make it to our house (gluten-free, of course!), the photos will make it up a little more quickly.

Awww...what the heck - here's little tease: The offering to Santa (shot of bourbon compliments cookies well, I've heard), and what Santa left behind!

Santa needs a warm-up every once in a while!

Ummm...Santa distributed the loot before devouring his treats -
he didn't want to get sidetracked!

Okay, Merry February 25th to all and to all a Good Night!

Art comes in all forms.

Yes, this is a slightly random posting, but the video is worth it!!!

When one thinks of "art" (or at least when I think of "art"), still images come to mind.  But, as we all know, "art" can come in many forms.   Here are a couple pictures of Anika's forays into crayon, sticker, marker, and paint art:

This one goes....

"Daaaaaare!"

Gotta keep the blood sugar up with a cracker!

Anika was initially slightly apprehensive with the texture of the paint.

She got over it.

Ta-da!  (I couldn't help but notice a Bismarck body
in the lower left of the photo - never far behind!)

Art also includes performing.  Here is Anika's performance art:, a quick video we took last night at dinner of Anika going through her animal noises :-)

Did you see that great elephant interpretations?  She's got the trunk action DOWN!