First but probably not last

While it has been almost 2 months since the last post, we have been busy here in the Wismer household. Tiffany has be semi-training (as much as she could) for a 1/2 marathon in Las Vegas over the last weekend. I ran with a friend from Colorado Springs, Nicole and her friend, Selena. I also had college friends that ran as well, but did not get to see them as much as I would have liked, it was a CRAZY weekend.
We flew in Saturday morning and spent the day picking up packets and getting ready for the race. The race was Sunday morning, and we all happily finished the race. While not a record breaking time, I was happy with my 2 hour 45 minute time since I probably could have trained harder than I did. My original goal was 2 hours 30 minutes, so I was not that far off. I think next time my time should improve at least a little:) It was a chilly morning, but once the running started it was perfect! Here is a pic of the 3 of us after the race
Ben and Jeremy (Nicole's husband) met up with us after the race, it was fun to have them there to support us, knowing they were waiting for us helped a lot. Ben as always is the best husband ever supporting me through the process and being my biggest cheerleader, which I needed at the end.
We spent the rest of the day lounging around and taking it easy. We had WONDERFUL Indian food for dinner, saw Penn and Teller and the crashed. What a great day with great friends!
The rest of the time over the last 2 months has been busy with Thanksgiving, a fun day at Susan and Brian's with both our families. We had the kids Christmas programs and zoolights. We are getting ready to celebrate Christmas, the house is decorated and Ben and I are going shopping on Monday, so that will be done.
I will post video and pics from the last couple months soon, but I have to go get a massage!
Happy Holidays!

An honorable Mention

Nettie and her Poppa at her 5th birthday party....

Nettie Turns 5!

It is hard for me to believe that our "little" girl turned 5 yesterday. She has bee counting down the days since about June, so she was ultra excited for the day. Even better, she woke to SNOW! We only got about an inch on the grass, but she was so excited to see the first real snow of the year.
Overall, it was a great birthday with family and friends. We started the celebration on Friday night with a party at McDonald's for all her school friends. Here are some quick pictures of all the festivities

Time for an update

Time flies! August was a busy month for us. We celebrated Ben's birthday and our 8th anniversary. Both were fun celebrations, with family and friends. In mid-August, Nettie started the official kindergarten class at her day care. They have an accredited private kindergarten so we will have a choice next year whether she repeats kindergarten or goes into first grade. So far she is enjoying class, and loves her teacher Ms. Bekah. John is talking up a storm. He repeats everything and is now learning how to ask for things nicely. It is funny how Mommie and Daddy don't hear when you don't say please! We are starting to work with him on using the potty, hoping that by the time he is 3 he will be potty trained. He isn't a fan of it yet, but he will get there. We also got to go to the farmer's market at Belmar where the kids got to ride in the train, that is something that we will definitely do more of next summer.

Over Labor Day weekend we went to Boulder with Ben's entire family to celebrate Brian and Susan's birthday. It was a fun weeknd with aunts uncles and cousins. The kids had a great time with all their cousins, running all over the house, and over to the park. We have been celebrating birthday's including cousin Paige, Asher and Uncle Joe.

We are looking forward to celebrating Nettie's birthday next month, Cousin Lily turing 1 and cousin Luke turning 4.

What????

So after writing the LONG post about how my baby is no longer a baby, I go upstairs and find this......I have been cleaning out the house and getting rid of the baby stuff and John apparently doesn't want me to get rid of the Boppy.

Big Bikes, Beds and Kids

So the month of July has been a busy month that was full of a lot of eye opening changes. The month started with a fun 4th of July weekend. We spent time at the pool with Ben's family and Nettie was able to show us all that she has learned in swimming this year. She is still timid in the water, but she is learning. By next summer she will be able to go in the big pool hopefully. John loved the water, and enjoyed floating around the big pool in his floatie, and using it to support him in the baby pool. Then we had the 4th of July parade in Tiffany's parents neighborhood. As usual it was fun and this year we had a first. Nettie rode her bike with all the other kids. There was one spill that was partially Mommie's fault as I tried to slow her down on a hill (thanks to her helmet she did not hurt herself). She loved riding her bike and John loved driving the truck with Poppie. We have been trying to have Nettie ride her bike when she can, it is nice to be able to leave the double stroller at home.
In mid-July Tiffany was supposed to travel to Costa Rica for work. Due to travel restrictions the trip was cancelled at the last minute. The night the trip was cancelled, we decided since the weekend was so free it would be a good time to move John out of his crib. We took the crib down that night, and he LOVED his new bed. He was very ready to move, although he had never crawled out of the crib, he was asking to sleep in Nettie's bed every night. So it is official, the Wismer kids are big kids.
John is talking up a storm and repeats everything, so it is important to watch what we say. He is enjoying being moved into a classroom with older kids. We are hoping that the move will also bring increased desire to use the potty. While I cried the whole weekend we took the crib down, I may throw a party when the diapers are gone!
Nettie is getting excited. While she is too young to start Kindergarten in the county, she will be starting the private kindergarten at her day care this year. Her friend Athena, who has been gone from school for about a year returned this week, so that has made school even better. She loves to go to school to see all her friends. She will also start going 5 days a week this fall since she will be in a classroom setting. We can then decide going forward if she will go into first grade in the fall or do another year of kindergarten. She is also going to start gymnastics in the fall, so she will be busy.
Ben and Tiff have been keeping busy with the kids and trying to keep up at work. Tiffany still has to go to Costa Rica, just not sure when that will be. We planted tomatoes and pumpkins in the spring, but due to a major storm that came though last week, we have lost most of what we planted. We are hoping the flowers come back. We were lucky, Mom and Dad's neighborhood was hit very hard and there was a lot of damage.
We are looking forward to Ben's birthday and celebrating with his family this weekend. August will still be busy, but there are lots of fun events planned including Fantasy football, family parties and BBQ's with friends.
I will post some pictures soon!

Happy Birthday Poppie

I think it is so cool that I got to enjoy my Nonnie (my great grandma) until I was 27 years old and now my kids get to have Poppie around as they grow up. Today my grandpa turns 88 and we love him more each day and thank God that we have been blessed to have him in our lives.

Because in 17 years (or less)....

She will have her head in the toilet again, if she is anything like her mother. Do you think she will be a DDD too????

A look of pure joy

My Grandpa has a 1930 Model A. John loves to go to Poppies house and drive the truck - even if that is just sitting in the garage honking the horn and playing with the wheel. On Sunday we went over for a bit and hear is John "driving"
Last week we had a birthday party for a friend at a local rec center. Nettie has a blast as you see in the previous video, but here she is jumping on the trampoline...

Nettie learns to jump in

One comment that Nettie's swim teacher made was that Nettie was afraid to jump in the pool and climb out by herself. We are hoping she cured that today

The finished product

I still have a couple little things to do, but here is the finished bathroom:

Pictures of the bathroom renovation(phase 1)

Here is how Ben and my Dad spent their Memorial Day weekend.....
Before:



After:

There are still a few things that need to be done, but it already looks so much better. Plus, now when we shower we won't wonder how much water is actually going behind the tiles instead of down the drain!

sometimes growing up stinks....

As I am writing this, I am listening to Nettie (in bed) yell at John (in bed) "go to sleep" and then they both giggle. Neither of the kids are sleeping tonight because as the try to go to sleep Ben is pounding away in our bathroom trying to remove the tiles from what we have found to be our mold infested bathroom walls. Last weekend I decided to clean the shower in our bathroom, while cleaning the shower the seal around the base came off in my hands. Now, this was not a shock that it happened, it has happened before. But this time, the grout came off too, and then suddenly there was a hole between the tile and the wall behind was exposed and wet. That part has never occurred before. We then started talking about next steps, we knew we were going to redo the bathroom, this summer, but were hoping to put it off until late June, after our camping trip and after Jack's visit. This sudden shift to one bathroom and mold in the walls immediately changed our plans. After several days of trying to decide how to complete the job that needs to be done, and many hours of looking at how to complete the project without being out of a bathroom for at least a month, we had to make an extremely difficult decision and cancel our family camping trip with Ben's entire family. So here we are, with a mess in the bathroom, a small fortune left at Lowe's and bummed out that while all of our family will be having fun in the mountains this weekend, we will be stuck here in home renovation heck.
We know that this has not been easy on anyone that has been affected, the kids aren't sleeping, my Dad is giving up his free weekend to help us redo a bathroom in 3 days, and our annual family camping trip is now short one family, which is making us extremely sad. The choices that you have to make when you get older stink, and I don't think you ever realize how hard they are going to be until you have to make them.
So, in this last beautiful week of May, I have learned, I might like to garden, Mom was right, pulling weeds in the rain is awesome, they come right up, and sometimes growing up stinks.

Happy Girl

Lily's daddy knows how to make her smile!

Happy Easter

Poppie wasn't enjoying himself at all! It was amazing to get all 3 kids to look at the camera and not be crying. It was a fun brunch at Paul and Kathleen's complete with Easter egg hunt. Next year Lily will be joining in the chaos.


We finish Easter with dinner with the Eva's. The kids had so much fun together, hunting for Easter eggs and playing. Overall, it was a great day with family.

What happens when your 2 year old gets a hold of your liquid eyeliner

Luckily, I caught him quickly. I have since moved this out of his reach.

Uncle George

My grandpa has a younger brother named George. Both my kids know that Uncle George is Poppie's younger brother, and that he is a wonderful man. That doesn't however stop the fear that seems to come over them whenever he is around. I can remember as a child being completely petrified of this man. He would want a hug or to tell me he loved me, and I would hide behind my Mom cowering, you can ask anyone in our family to verify this fact. This fear has been passed to both of my children, although I have been working with both of them to realize that he is truly great. Last weekend we spent the day with my Auntie Cis learning how to make green chile and later Uncle Goerge joined us. As you can see in the picture above John is not too sure about this man who is holding him and WOULD NOT smile for the camera while in his arms. Hopefully, they out grow this fear before too long, of course all Uncle George has to do is bring a truck around and he will be John's best friend.

Quick Update

Just a quick update about the last few weeks....
1. John had his 2 year appointment. Thanks to him being Constipated he is finally back on the chart for weight!!!! OF course once his issue was fixed, we are sure that he will fall back below the 3% mark. Oh well, he is healthy and happy.
2. John is getting 2 teeth, which means we only have 6 more to go! He should have them all by the time he is 3. He is handling these 2 better than the others.
3. John is now talking up a storm. He repeats everything we say and loves to have Nettie help him learn new words.
4. Nettie is doing great. She is spending time in the Kindergarten class at her school and loves it! She is working on reading and writing at her own pace right now.
5. Nettie has asked to play soccer this spring. Her school has a coach that comes once a week and we are having a hard time finding a league she can play in so we may have her learn at school.
6. Nettie is reading Charlottes web with Mommie and Daddy right now and is enjoying it for the most part. Some chapters can be a little long:)
7. Ben and I are doing well. We are ready for the summer and have been enjoying the warmer weather that Colorado has been experiencing lately. Work has been busy for both of us, but we both prefer to be busy.
8. We are counting down the days until we go to Mexico for a friend's wedding in April.

I hope that everyone is doing well. I will try to add pictures next time.

A boy and his dress

In the spirit of John always wanting to be like his big sister, he decided to dress up the other night. Now, his Dad didn't want this picture taken, but I figured, he looks so proud and he promptly said 10 minutes later "OFF!"

John is 2

Today our baby is officially 2 years old. He has been working on the terrible 2's for a couple of weeks, but has finally reached the age to say that he is in it. We had a fun party with friends and family and it turned out to be a beautiful day. It is a wonderful living in Colorado when your birthday is in February and you get to play outside! We are excited for the next couple of years to see him developing into a full blown kid. He and Nettie are enjoying playing with each other and are starting to do so more often. We hope everyone is having a great February so far!

Is it February already???

Picture 1: Our happy boy
Picture 2: Nettie puts on her own lip gloss
Picture 3: Don't they love each other!

Here we are in the second month of 2009 already. So far, 2009 has been filled with fun travels, and events. January started with a date night for Ben and Tiffany. Our New Year tradition has become an at home date, and this year, Nettie started to understand that when January 1 came, it would be 2009. She like to tell everyone she saw this and each day would say "today is the 5th day of 2009". Thankfully, that only lasted about a week. We baptized our niece Lily on the 11th. It was a beautiful service and an enjoyable time with both families. I traveled to Oklahoma over Martin Luther King weekend to visit my friends Chris and Jen and meet their new baby Alyssa. It was a great trip and it was so much fun to spend that much time with a little baby. It also made me appreciate how far we have come since those days. Ben enjoyed his alone time with the kids, although he was happy to have me return home. Due to me getting strep, we had to skip our annual trip to the mountains with Ben's family. It was sad to miss the weekend, although the quiet weekend was a great way to get better.

Now, we are in February. The month has started busy with Ben traveling to Davenport to visit his Dad for a couple of days. We all miss him, but it sounds like he is getting a lot of stuff done while he is there. We will be celebrating John's 2nd birthday at the end of the month, hard to believe our baby is 2, but he is acting it! He is also starting to talk more and definitely lets you know when he doesn't like something. John loves to build things with legos and blocks, but his favorite this to do is paint or draw. If he has a pen and a piece of paper, her can busy himself for at least 30 minutes. It is fun to watch him just sit and draw.

Nettie is also getting used to having a brother that no longer leaves her stuff alone. He is in to all of her stuff and will do anything he can to get it away from her. We are all learning to deal with this and the best way to keep them from attacking each other. It doesn't happen often, but when it does, it is interesting. Nettie is loving school and is currently working on reading. It is fun to read books with her and watch her figure out words. She also loves to play games and dress up.