Happy Birthday, Stu!

Another birthday post!  This past weekend my truly fantastic husband celebrated his 40th birthday.  What a joy!  To honor the occassion, I decided to host a little surprise party for him... nothing fancy, just some tasty cook-out food!  The true surprise came on Thursday when he got home from a trip to California and his parents (from North Dakota) were sitting on our couch!  His sister and her husband (also from North Dakota) came down to celebrate the weekend, but unfortunately his brother/ brother's family weren't able to make it down.  Pesky school schedules!  His family and I have been planning their trip down for the weekend for at least 2 months, and it was so hard keeping it a secret! 

We had a nice day on Saturday for our gathering.  Abbey loved having another birthday so close... she was a willing helper with opening presents!

First course over... I think they are all wondering when the cake will be served.

Yummy cupcakes for the kiddos...

German chocoloate cake... (one of) Stu's favorites.

Happy birthday, Stu!

Happy Birthday, Little A!

She's not so little anymore!  We celebrated Abbey's 2nd birthday this week.   We celebrated by having some presents and cake... nothing too big and exciting.  A fun day of playing with toys, and to make it even better Uncle Ty came over (which she has consistently been talking about since... "See Uncle Ty.  Uncle Ty sits here..."). 

The first of the gifts arrive...

An easel to work on our coloring..

And the kitchen... Thanks to my friend J who helped us get it to our house. 

Birthday "Cappuccino" (frothed milk with cinnamon)

This was my first ever attempt at a decorated cake.  I was pretty happy with how it turned out.  Abbey loves fish (or "Bubbles" as she calls them), so she really enjoyed the cake.

This has "Uncle Ty" written all over it...

Frogs and Hogs

Okay, so there are really no hogs, but I liked the ring to it.  "Frogs and Farm Animals" didn't sound as good.  A small museum near us had an exhibition with exotic frogs.  Abs saw the picture in the paper and got very excited about it, so we went to (in her words) "See frogs!  See frogs!  See frogs!"

The town we live in isn't very big (less than 50,000) and it is surrounded by ranches and farms.  There are a lot of horses and cows in this region.  Another thing we saw in the paper was an ad for "May Days."  It was sponsored by an agriculture group in our area and was held out at a farm about 10 minutes from our house.  Abbey has a healthy respect of animals.  She loves them, but tends to prefer them with a piece of glass between her and them (see above) or about 10 feet.  It took about 30 minutes and some very cute ducklings to get her to warm up to the farm animals at May Days.  She didn't want to leave.

Notice the duck to the left in the pond.  Abs is doing her best to mimick them.

If I lived on a farm, I would like to imagine it would be something like this one.  Less than 10 minutes to our downtown, close-by neighbors...

with a nice view of Pikes Peak in the distance.  Living on a farm seems like a lot of work.  Maybe I could have an acre or 2, though.

Abbey made sure the sheep were a healthy distance away before she started running after them.



Visiting Grammy and Grandad

Last week Abbey and I went to visit my parents while Stu was at a conference.  We of course had a wonderful time.  It's always nice to take a trip back to an area where you grew up.  For those who are unaware, I do not like mayonnaise, but there is one place in the entire world that I will willingly (and quickly) scarf down a chicken salad sandwich, and it is at a place in Edmond called McLaren's Pantry.  Scrumptious.  And of course there are always Braum's limeades and Cappuccino Chunky Chocolate ice cream.  Enough about food... here are some pictures!  

The poor statue did not have socks.

There have been a few times in the last few days when I have realized that Abbey really is not a "baby" anymore.  We were outside and my mom and I were sitting on the curb.  Abbey walked up, sat down between us and casually remarked, "It's nice out here."  It was very amusing.

Mornings can be tough for everyone.

Kids and their low pants these days...  

Thanks, Dad and Mom!  We of course had a great time!

It's a......

Baby!  You'll find out the gender when we do sometime around September 15.  :)  Here are some shots from our 20 week ultrasound.  Baby is looking healthy and happy!  I didn't feel like disturbing Stu at work to scan the images, so these were taken from the camera.  Same effect.

That's some flexibility!

Foot.

A very excited big sister...