Basement update....

The basement is moving right along...of course I would only hope that it would be done tomorrow...but they should be painting on Friday and Saturday and we actually have a date set for the carpet to put in so only a couple more weeks.....Here is what it looks like so far




This is a view from against the entertainment wall looking back towards the bottom of the stairs (hidden by the pole) and if you are wondering what that dumb pole is - Rapid City code - so we just make the best of it I guess....the 2 door ways is the big storage closet and the door way to one of the bedrooms.


View from the bottom of the stairs looking into the family room - we plan on building a full wall built-in entertainment center hopefully in the next year or so....against the wall that doesn't have any windows on it.


View from the sliding door looking back into the family room/bedroom - the non family room area will probably be for toys and a computer area - we are actually considering putting the toys/toy room in the big 52 sq ft storage closet we have at the bottom of the stairs....


Bedroom #1 one - that Ana has affectionately labeled her room - we'll see when the time comes if she really is on board for moving down there.


Another view of "ana's room" - the closet


Again "ana's room with the window view...


The bathroom which is actually on the other side of the basement...


View from the sliding door looking the opposite way of the family room - on the other side of the wall is the bathroom and you can see the door way to the 2nd bedroom - just to the left is the doorway to the mechanical room - We are putting laminate flooring down in this area which will include in front of the sliding door too....I hope to use this area as a craft/kids area.


1 view from the window into bedroom #2 - that door way goes into the closet - which is also very large.


View from the closet looking back towards the window - again in the bedroom 2 - yes the electrical panel is in this room - kind of ridiculous but that is what they do here....

View from the bedroom looking back towards the family room.....

Hopefully the next time I can post pictures it will be at least painted....

A perfect way to kill some time......

BEFORE BED - WII

Check out Ana's left hand bowling form.....



THE BACK SWING - We usually set Ana up to bowl and give Eli the other controller so he thinks he is bowling too....I suppose we won't be able to do that forever but it satisfies him for now.


AND THE RELEASE! Ana has gotten really good at bowling - she consistently bowls a 120....


Our ham ball....


Next up - boxing....it's pretty funny to watch these two go at it but they lose interest or tire out pretty quickly...


Finally - Eric takes the controls and goes a round against Eli - I started encouraging Eli to "go go go" and he just took off running around and around Eric - so much for winning that round!

A lesson in PATIENCE....

A round of candyland with a 3 year old and almost 2 year old.....such a good daddy!

The Ever Flexible.....(for now)

ELI

Our Ana Banana!

Keeping up with the rest....

Ema had her 4 month check-up last week.....She has no problem packing on the pounds....

Weight - 14lbs 13 oz. (75%)
Height - 25 1/2 inches (90%)

Jumpin' her way to 4 months old....

Ema is 4 months old :( - it's going all too fast!!

I brought out the "jumperoo" today....Ema loves to stand so I thought she might be ready for this....and she was!


She loved it...especially when the light lit up!


Ana and Eli were playing with balloons today and got Ema to giggle (unexpectedly for the first time!) - It was so great!

The party....

We really were not planning on doing much for Ana's birthday and then at the last minute decided to invite a couple of Ana's "birth" friends over - She has two friends that were all born within just a few weeks of each other...so it's been fun to watch all three of them these last 3 years.




Ana has been asking for a computer for ages....so she finally got a computer for her very own.....



And the "pitiful" cake - I am no cake designer that is for sure...thankfully Ana knows no different at this point in time and she is happy with just about whatever.....(well whatever being - it must have sprinkles, be pink, and have polk-a-dots)

The Birthday GIRL!!

CAN YOU BELIEVE IT??? - ANA IS THREE TODAY!!!

It's hard to believe how fast these three years have gone.....

Ana is such a fun-loving little girl. She loves to dance, sing (mostly made up songs) and play with Eli and Ema. She is one smart cookie....and continues to amaze us daily with her knowledge and skills. She is a very independent little girl (must be from her Daddy - ha ha ha) and really is teaching us all about being three - There are times that I pray we survive this year!! We love you Ana - Hope you had/have a great Birthday!!


Ready for Bed - she was hardly willing to let me take pictures today...so I guess I take what I can get at this point...


Grandma and Papa's gift to Ana was a trip to "Build a Bear" - so we went there today after naps...and Ana was thrilled - It took just a few minutes to understand but in the end she wanted everything for her (bear) - MONKEY.


She was a little unsure of this process - the "stuffing"


When her monkey was done...she got to give it a bath.


Introducing - "Ana Banana" - the pink polk-a-dot monkey.


All dressed up and ready to head home with us!
We are saving the rest of the celebrating for when we return to RC to celebrate with Eric too!!

Mirror Mirror on the Wall....

WHOSE THE CUTEST BABY OF THEM ALL??

All the kiddos....

Papa and Grandma - with all their grandkids....there is and I am sure there will be many many more to come!!

And we tried

We couldn't quite pull off a picture of Grandpa and 6 of his 8 great grand children....the kids were "feeling" done with getting their pictures taken!

Oma and ALL NINE!

We couldn't pass up up the opportunity to get a picture of Oma with all NINE of her great-grandchildren.

Going for a Spin....

This has become an activity of choice for these three rascals....spinning in Papa's chair!

Eli, Cousin Z and Ana

Meet my new cousins...

My brother and his wife actually had the same idea on New Years Day - head to Billings - so my parents suddenly went from having no plans for the weekend to a house full with their 6 grandchildren.....all (almost) 3 and younger.....

So - introducing the newest members of our family. Cousin D and Cousin H. They are 6 weeks younger than Ema and Ema is a GREEN GIANT next to them....

Feeling Frazzled.....

Our New Years Holiday was going to look something like this (in a perfect world) Eric was going to start working on wiring up the basement (only part of our basement we are doing ourselves) and the kids and I were going to be content and keeping ourselves busy upstairs so Eric could work uninterrupted. Well as you can well imagine...that was really only a perfect dream...by mid-morning the first day we realized this wasn't going work....It was 11am and Eric had not even made it downstairs yet.....

Eli (in his new sleeping bag) we tried to make content watching a movie in the living room.....that lasted all of about 15 seconds...If anyone knows Eli - he is a DADDY'S Boy - If Eric is anywhere even in sight - Eli wants to be held by him....

And we tried to meet Ana's needs by letting her lay in her bed watching a movie all by herself too - while she did last a bit longer than Eli - it still was short lived.

SO WE MOVED ONTO PLAN B - We quickly packed 3 kids and myself (well I hadn't even un-packed my bag yet from our Christmas trip so there really wasn't too much to pack) and we headed out the door to Montana....AGAIN! My parents graciously met us in Sheridan, WY and picked us up and Eric returned to RC to get back to work

Thomas and the tongue....

E is in LOVE with Thomas the train - or really any train for that matter.....


He got this track for Christmas and it has been a constant source of entertainment....the only problem is he thinks he needs to carry the track all over the house....so I sometimes feel like I am ready to pull my hair out for how many times I am asked to put the track back together...


And the tongue....since Christmas...it is constantly hanging out when he is concentrating on something.....



"I DID IT" - one a E's most famous quotes.....