Happy Birthday Reagan!

On Saturday we celebrated Reagan's second birthday. We had a party at grandma and grandpa's house...Matt and Em close on their new house next week. It seemed hard to believe that Reagan was already 2! It was a beautiful day, much nicer than the day he was born. Matt's mom, and some of Matt and Emily's friends were there too.




Reagan opened several of his presents while sitting in his truck. He didn't want the girls driving, but he did let them ride in the back of the truck!

Ellery disappeared for a while to play in grandma's kitchen...she was making us some muffins. She gets this cheesy grin every time we ask her to smile. She's a ham.

Reagan blowing out his candles, with the help of mom. Last year he had train cars, this year he had regular cars for cake.

Reagan and his girls. Grace, who is 5 days younger than Reagan, Ellery and Reagan all eating their cake.

Ellery wouldn't eat her birthday cake, but I think she's decided that it's yummy stuff!

On Sunday Jason and I had everyone over to our house for a Super Bowl Party. We weren't really planning on having a party, but mom and dad's local channels stopped coming in on their satellite dish...so we had everyone over to our house. We bought a new TV on Saturday afternoon. Our TV was one that I bought 7 years ago when I moved to Denver. A few weeks ago it started making a high pitched whine, that Jason couldn't hear, and it drove me CRAZY!! So, we joined the modern age with our very first flat panel tv...but...we won't be hanging it over the mantel anytime soon...not quite my taste. For dinner Jason fixed some delicious chili! This is the only picture I took that night, I should have taken one of all the boys lounging on the sofa! None of us really cared who one the game, but we were rooting for Arizona, since Kurt Warner is an Iowa boy!

The next two photos are just silly shots I took at breakfast one morning last week. Ellery loves to eat oatmeal with her daddy in the mornings, and she was in a particularly good mood this morning. In the first pic they are both making a funny face at mama.

Three weeks ago tomorrow Ellery and I started swim lessons. We're in "bubble club" at the YWCA. We started class with Emily and Reagan, but I think they're going to drop out. Ellery loves it. She's already learning a bunch. She can kick, do her arms and jump into the water to me from sitting on the edge of the pool. What can I say, she's a fish like her daddy. Reagan, on the other hand, hates it. He cries from the minute we arrive until we leave. He wont participate and he clings to his mom for dear life...we can't figure out why he doesn't like it. At the end of class they get to play with toys. Ellery grabs a water baby every time. She loves baby dolls. The only bad thing is that then I have to take it away and she cries. But, she cheers up as soon as I tell her we're stopping at McDonald's for a happy meal on the way home. She loves french fries and bribery works!

Ellery doesn't like her swim teacher. As you can see, it's an older woman and she insists on taking the kids from you when they get in and out.

This is our group photo after our first swim class. Reagan was traumatized!

I think that about sums up the last few weeks. We're all fighting the flu again. Matt had it first, and he was nice enough to share his germs. I was next...I was up from 12:30-5:00 AM throwing up on Tuesday morning. It was horrible. I haven't been sick like that in about 5 years. Then dad started throwing up around lunch time on Tuesday. Tuesday afternoon Jason and Matt had a fever and were nauseous. Jason had a fever of 101 last night. He sat in here at the computer with his sweats and winter coat on writing his paper that was due tonight. Today I felt MUCH better, still weak and tired but not nauseated. Dad didn't do surgery this morning, that's only the second time he's every had to cancel his surgeries. We're all just hoping that Ellery and Reagan don't get sick. Needless to say we're all ready for this to be over and for spring to arrive! Think warm thoughts and send them this way!

Oh yeah, one last thing. We cancelled our trip to Steamboat Springs. None of us wanted to go on a winter vacation with more cold and snow....we've had enough. We should have stuck to the original plan of going to the Florida Keys...oh well...maybe next year. Jason and I are going to go spend a night or two in Chicago, for the first time without Ellery, when the weather gets nicer. We miss the city and it'll be nice to spend a few days so we appreciate home more!