Another Cline birthday

Today is Justin's 29th birthday. He celebrated a bit this past weekend by going fishing with a good friend in beautiful weather and will celebrate some more in a few weeks when he goes on a float trip down the Smith River with some other friends. Although turning 30 was somewhat of a shocker to me, I think it will be even more of a shock when Justin turns 30 next year! It's fun being married to a younger man even if he does have more gray than me :) Happy Birthday J!

Being ridiculous is what we're good at

There are many ways to stay sane...this probably isn't one of them but it makes for good times.

Spaghetti and more

Sorry for not posting more about Madeleine's birthday. On some level I think I feel that 3 won't be that much different than 2 so there's no big rush to "celebrate" until we're close to birthday #4 when she'll seem so much older. Nevertheless, she is an outrageously funny and clever 3 year old so in those moments when I want to pull my hair out, she'll spout off something like, "Momma, it's okay to be happy you know" which tends to pull me out of my funk to let a little smile out. We are a far cry from when she was 2 (unfortunately 2 is looming in Parker's future...)

Madeleine did have fun opening lots of presents from us and our families and she DELIGHTED in eating the chocolate whipped cream frosting off her angel food cake (pic above). The cake portion of her piece was reluctantly devoured only after declaring that the whipped cream was her favorite part :) We had a few friends over on the Saturday after her birthday for burgers and hot dogs as an unofficial birthday party. The balloon they gave her continues to be one of her favorite gifts. Next year I'll pass on all of the puzzles, games, and art supplies and instead get her 3 balloons.

(Madeleine's birthday hair. After a lifetime of short hair I'm finally learning how to french braid for the sake of containing my daughter's crazy kinky/curly hair. Not bad for my first try.)

In other happenings, we've decided to let Parker in on the family dinner. For a while Justin and I would eat while the kids ran around wreaking havoc but at least we could eat in peace. Now Parker has hit the stage where he really wants to participate and feed himself everything so he graduated to his booster seat and sits at the table during meals. Not that he eats, mind you. He's the worst eater I've ever met and I continue to struggle with finding things he'll even taste. Fortunately though he managed to save face by adopting the tradition of loving the Arey family homemade spaghetti sauce. I can't get enough of his orange face.

Oh right, I forgot all about my pinot noir!

I managed to delay doing our taxes until after I finished sewing these insulated blackout curtains for Parker's room. They're not perfect at all but I had a lot of fun making them. Plus they do the job and that's what's important.

Recycled jeans make up the front. The back is lime green flannel. And sandwiched between is part of a fleece blanket. They're pretty bulky and don't stay open very well but they should keep out the cold in winter and heat in summer. I'm hoping to make Madeleine some out of recycled khakis in the next few weeks after I finish our taxes...

She's 3!

Today is Madeleine's third birthday! It's hard to believe three years have already passed since we welcomed her into the world. We'll be celebrating some today and some on Saturday so there should hopefully be lots to post about the fun to be had.

New nuggets: part 2

My mom pointed out that the previous title also applied to the info I shared with her earlier today so I felt it was necessary to use it again.

I think it's safe to announce that we are officially in potty training mode, except that there's no real "training" involved. Madeleine simply announces she needs to pee, walks to the bathroom, pulls down her underpants (which she has insisted on wearing at home instead of diapers the last 4 days), sits down and does her business. Up until today she required we put on a diaper for #2, but today she took the challenge and went for it. Hooray!!! We couldn't have been more happy :) Madeleine took pictures with camera but I decided to spare you the pictures. It's thrilling to see her maturing naturally. This is definitely one area where I'm sure we did things the right way: although it seemed to take forever, waiting until she was ready has made this incredibly smooth (thus far). It feels good to be negotiating this transition successfully.

And because I can't post pictures, here's a fun video for you (internet explorer seems to cut off half of the picture so use firefox or safari instead for greater entertainment).

New nuggets

We've had other things going on besides Justin's surgery. For instance, this is what I've been working on for our last few sewing classes. Forgive the apparent lack of color coordination...I think it's just the lighting. I'll have to take better shots when the sun's out.

Despite the size it's supposed to be a quilted wall hanging for Madeleine's room. I'm amazed at how quickly it got larger and larger and larger... Now I'm stuck trying to figure out exactly how I'm going to quilt this thing. I'm hoping to have it done before March is finished. Our sewing class sadly ended tonight. Our awesome teacher has offered to let all of us take her intro to sewing class again next fall and winter and bring in our own projects to work on. I'm looking forward to it :)

I finally got the baby carrier I've always desired but never wanted to spend the money on. I found this one on Craigslist, of course. Parker obviously enjoys it :) This will work much better for toting him around while vacuuming as compared to the hiking backpack. Parker loves it so much he's learned to say "ergo," the brand of the carrier. What a cutie!

With our new carrier it's a lot easier to trek up the hill behind our house. The kids and I headed out today to let Justin have some peace and quiet at home. Both kids mainly keep their heads down investigating the rocks and dirt. I can't help but daze into the sky in disbelief that I get to live here.

Take that!

Yeah, our house is down there somewhere.

My kids' version of the whale tail.

Breathing easier

Justin had the packing taken out today and he feels much better. Although the doc said there wouldn't be any change in appearance both of us think his nose looks a little different...a septoplasty and nose job all in one? The swelling still needs to go down so once it does we'll take a picture and let you decide. I'm hoping he feels well enough tomorrow night to hold the fort after the kids to go sleep so I can attend my last sewing class. I have a pretty neat project I've been working on but I'll wait until tomorrow to reveal it. I've gotta keep giving you reasons to come back, right?

Surgery update

We picked Justin up at 2:30 this afternoon. He's in a lot of pain and trying to manage it as best as possible. He has his follow up appointment tomorrow afternoon to remove all of the packing which may be the most painful part of this process but after that things should start looking better. Madeleine has been very sweet wanting to give Daddy lots of hugs while Parker has been frightened by how strange Daddy looks with his nose bandage. It will be nice for everyone to get past this stage.

A new nose

Justin went in for surgery this morning on his nose. He's lived his whole life with a very, very narrow nasal passage which has resulted in sleep apnea and overall poor rest. It's pretty amazing he's been able to spend so much time sleeping in the wilderness considering how much difficulty he has sleeping. But today is the day all of that changes. After a 15 minute consultation with an ENT doctor two weeks ago, it was confirmed that surgery would change his life forever. Thanks to his generous sick leave he's taking the whole week off to recover, although we hope he feels much better by Wednesday. One of our friends will bring him home after he's released and Jen will come over tonight to help with the kids while Justin works on recovering. After 5 years of buying him breathe right strips, it will be nice to have a permanent solution. Now if we could only find a more permanent solution to our kids and their nightly sleep problems...