Loving The Books

I know I have posted before about how much Evan loves to read books... but he really does. He will often sit and look at books by himself for quite a bit of time. I think we may have a serious reader in the making. Here are some cute pics Dan got of him just chillin laying on a pillow and looking at a book.

Christian's Funny Imagination

Christian is starting to pretend that he is another person or animal and it is so fun. I spend A LOT of my day sitting on my sleigh bed with Christian because it is a TRUCK. Christian does all the sound effects from the doors open and closing, seat belt clicking- and he will make sure you put your on too- to patting his pockets and saying "Oh where are my keys...oh here they are!" This truck is sometimes our Blazer which he always hooks the trailer up to. Sometimes it is a garbage truck or a fire engine in which case we do not make "normal" car driving noises but a siren instead :) He is fun to play with, that is for sure.





In this first clip Christian climbed onto the counter (which he knows he is not suppose to) while I was making lunch. I told him "Get down Christian boy" he replied "I not Christian boy, I a Giraffe" He then proceeded to be a giraffe for the next couple of minutes. I caught the tail end of this make-believe session. Hope you enjoy :)



Christian also pretends to be a rockstar a lot. Our coffee table is his stage. He jumps up there and says "Attention everyone! I'm going to sing the popcorn song!" You would think that this song starts out like "I looked out the window and what did I see..." but my friend, you are sadly mistaken.

Black Beans Anyone?

Scholarship Concert

My good friend Ben has gone completely insane, let me explain. A few years back we lost our good friend, teacher, and director, Syd Riggs. She was very influential and so talented. Starting last year Ben decided that it would be a good way to honor her by producing a concert that all the proceeds would go into a scholarship fund for a student each year. He ropes very talented people into rehearsing for just one week and putting on two shows on Saturday. Last year I had just had a baby so we couldn't participate, but this year we thought we would try the madness out. It was tricky with arranging babysitters for evenings and having the kids with us for part of the all day Saturday rehearsal. But we pulled off a pretty decent show and it was really fun. Of course I remembered to bring my camera on Saturday but somehow only managed to get one picture!

Like I said before we had the kids with us for part of the Saturday rehearsal, Christian was hilarious. He climbed up on the stage several times and would say "Attention Everyone, I sing popcorn!" Then he would sing "A pop pop pop, A pop pop pop!" Then take a bow, it was hilarious. The other cute thing he did was he discovered a drinking fountain that was low enough to the ground that he could get a drink on his own- he was in heaven. He would run all the way up the aisle, out to the hall- get a drink, run all the way back down to where we were sitting and start all over again. I think he probably ran that route at least 50 times. Evan, of course, was as good as gold and just happy to be where we were. We have such great kiddos :)


Here we are with some of our Bestest Friends

Devin Spann, Heidi Spann, Dan, Kevin Goertzen, and Me

Happy Birthday To Evan

Here's Evan with his loot, he was very distracted by how many people were crammed into our living room. But he really does love all those presents.



We finally got Evan feeling better enough to celebrate his First Birthday! It was a mad house here because our families are both so big, but we were grateful everyone was able to come and be a part of Evan's first birthday. We did a test run with a cup cake the day before, just to make sure we would have to rush Evan to the ER during the middle of his party. He really liked the cup cake so imagine my confusion when he wouldn't even try the cake. I realized I should have put icing on the cup cake because that's what totally through him off his game.


Evan examining the cake


Evan thinking, "What the crap is all over my hands?"


Evan finally trying the cake once I got him a spoon so he could eat it in a civilized manner


"Hey this is not that bad, I think I like it!"


Evan now finished with cake starts contemplating squishing it and getting ready to throw it on the floor, thankfully I was able to intervene before there was too much mess


Happy Birthday little boy we sure love you!

Can We Be Done With January???

Well I'm not going to lie to you, I'm ready for January to be over. Late last week Evan had a runny nose and was running a low fever, I figure it was teething since he just got a new tooth. We had his well check-up turns out that he had a double ear infection, a sore raw throat, and his right lung was not sounding too great. So they put him on some antibiotics and in a few days he started to feel better and started eating again- phew! He was funny though he's always kind of favored this little toy horse but when he got sick he really latched on to it, he would hold it around the neck everywhere, eating, playing, nursing, sleeping. These are the only 2 decent shots I got of him holding his little horsey, but I thought it was cute. This kid has got some serious horse blood in him, both my parents are big horse people, and his Grandma Duckwitz was a rodeo queen back in the day :)

On the allergy front I think we have pretty much nailed down another allergy of Evan's. I am afraid to say it but I'm pretty sure he is allergic to dairy as well. Not as extreme with garlic which is good. I am trying to ween the kid and I gave him a bottle of whole milk he drank 4 ounces and promptly broke out in hives and red rashes everywhere. A few days latter without any milk substances I tried butter (which we have given him before mind you) and he promptly broke in hives and red rashes! AHHHHHH!!!!!!! That's all I have to say right now, stay tuned for more drama, I'm sure :)

Holy Cow... January!

Oh for the love of blogging... it has been too long. I don't know about you but man my January has been flying by so quickly! We started our January off with a bang. Dan's brother Dave and his family were here for New Years. All of us Duckwitz's have a weakness for going out to eat so, every time Dave comes into town it's the perfect excuse! We decided to go to Olive Garden- Me and Dan got the all you can eat soup, salad, bread sticks if you haven't had their chicken gnocchi you really should try it. I had fed Evan prior to going, because that's just easier. But while we were waiting for our food to arrive I gave him a bread stick to chew on because he is a sucker for bread, just like his mama. Well immediately the kids face starts to swell up just like when he had lasagna. I panic because, of course, the one time I don't have benadryll in the baby bag is now. Me and Dan book it out of Olive Garden leaving Christian with our family and drive over to the grocery store in the same parking lot. Dan runs in buys benadryll and by the time he gets back, not only are his lips swollen but also his cheeks and his eye. We call the doctors and they say, of course, go immediately to the ER. Well amidst all the adrenaline and feelings that I am not in control- we realize what Evan is allergic too... Garlic!!! It's the only thing that matches up in the lasagna and the bread stick. It is a relief to know what he is allergic too, but man I am heart broken because I am a lover of garlic! And just so you know it is in EVERYTHING!!! For example, chicken stock, miracle whip, mustard, etc. I am going to have to become and even bigger label reader. I am hoping that he will grow out of this like my little nephew grew out of his allergies, but we will just have to wait and see.

This is a picture of poor Evan's face the day after our last ER trip the swelling had come down but his little face was so red and splotchy still.



This month we also became a family of 6! No I am not pregnant with twins, thank goodness! We watched our two adorable nieces Haley and Ashlyn for 5 days while their parents got some much needed R&R and celebrated their 10th anniversary in Hawaii! We love having the girls here and Christian was pretty much in heaven having a 24/7 playmate at his beckon call.

Greg and Erika put together little presents for them to open while they were gone, one for each day. This is them opening their presents, this time it was coloring books. Me and Dan learned that we would need to peek at the presents before they opened them because some were candy, and you try taking candy away from a 2, 3, 6 year old at 7 in the morning, not a pretty situation my friends :)



Haley has quite the imagination, she came home from school one day and she had this little ball of fur, it looked like something that had come off a girls coat. She was pretending it was a hamster named Joonr (her spelling). We immediately need to make him a home and get him fed because he had been in the cold for WAY too long. Needless to say, I panicked- I am not a crafty person by nature (I am learning how to be though) so I really had to stretch myself and channel my inner-Erika (Haley and Ashlyn's mom who is the queen of craft) and some how I was able to come up with a suitable cage, bed, food and water bowls, mirror, bathtub, and couch for dear little Joonr!

This is the inside of his cage



Joonr with Haley



The girls had never been away from the parents for this long, so we wanted to do everything we could to make them feel special and that this was a fun time for them too and not just their parents. We totally decked out their room. Both the girls kept calling the canopy a centipede. Silly girls!



Did you know... that Handy Manny lives at our house (Disney Channel character if you are not familiar). He has tools he carries around is very helpful by fixing everything. Christian is obsessed right now. He love to play Handy Manny, which is kind of fun since he has never pretended to be someone else until now. It's cute because he carries his little tool box around and sings "Handy Manny, Handy Manny" over and over, he also tucks a pencil behind his ear. What a cutie.

Of course where ever Christian is, that's where Evan wants to be :)




Handy Manny fixing our drawer



This drawer is a stubborn one, it needs fixing several times a day



Also other not so fun things that have happened this January: Stomach Flu, The Croup, Strep Throat, and lots of teething. But we are surviving! Also it was Evan's 1st Birthday- a little anti climatic because he is not feeling well, we postponed his birthday till this weekend in hopes that he will be feeling well enough to try a little cake. More pictures of all the fun stuff to come.