Back to work

OK, another seemingly unforgivable delay in posting to the blog.

I'll start by posting a few pictures from a trip we made to the Discovery Museum last week. It was fun hanging out with Maya and Owen. Owen worked hard on milking the cows and playing in the climbing gym. Maya worked hard being afraid of the cows (she is actually quite fascinated with them, until you get close and they lose their appeal), and enjoying some of the levers she could flip herself.

Anyway, I'm sorry I've been so slow at getting things added to the Blog. The past couple of weeks have been pretty crazy, though. Here's what happened ...

Amy returned to work this week. Her first day was Tuesday and she worked part time through Friday. On Monday she goes back to a 40 hour week.

The timing was just about perfect. Amy was really feeling like she needed this kind of change, and the option of returning to a place where she'd been, with a good salary and a solid sense of the lay of the land have helped us feel like this is a good decision.

Thanks to Nana Aalberts for coming down to watch the kids as we started transitioning our schedules this week.

The other happiness is we all feel good about the day care/pre-school program we found for the kids. The center is very nice, with quiet yet engaging rooms for Maya and a five-day-per-week pre-school program for Owen, which he will love. It's going to be a change, as we've never both worked full-time since Owen was born, but I think it's going to be good in the long run.

We have been enjoying this final weekend. We did some work today prepping snacks and lunches for the kids (and us), but also enjoying some fun around town.

This morning I took Owen and Maya to the Pantagraph's Kids' Expo this morning, and Owen went to part of the Preservation Hall Jazz Band concert tonight at my theater. Both good options on a cold, windy day.

Some videos of our time at the Expo follow. It was fun, with lots of booths, some face painting (you'll be amazed at how fast she works), and, best of all, some bouncy slides.

Very fun! (And we all took great naps!)

Happy birthday, Nana!

Nana and Grandpa drove down Sunday after church for an overnight stay and celebration of Nana's birthday Monday. We opened presents, made Nana wear the silly hat, and everyone enjoyed cake and ice cream.

It was a relaxing visit, and Owen and Maya enjoyed some play and reading time with their grandparents.

We even had a little early Valentine's Day celebration, with new rescue vehicles for Owen ...

And some fun (and surprising?!) books for Maya.

I think Nana also used up her birthday wishes on the beautiful weather! We got out a lot over the weekend with temps in the lower 60s on Saturday, and in the 40s and 50s yesterday and today.

The big outings were a couple of trips to the fire station.

Owen got out his bicycle and pedaled up the hill. Maya rode along today ...

And the family met the newest firefighter, who not knowing, or not caring, Owen is a stationhouse regular, showed off all the trucks to Owen.

It was a great visit ... so good Maya only lasted half the trip home.

Assembly Hall

Go Hawks!

Owen went to his first Iowa game this weekend. Grampie Ives joined Amy and I in a trip to Champaign on Sunday for the Iowa vs. Illinois basketball game.

It was kind of amazing. Amy and I had been to several away Iowa football games, but this was the first time we'd been a college basketball game outside of Iowa City.

Walking into Assembly Hall dressed in black and gold was pretty daunting. Unlike going to a football game where it's pretty easy to see the visitor's section, Assembly hall was literally a sea of Orange. Strangely enough, the only other person we could see dressed in black was Michael Jordan, who was sitting courtside on the other side of the arena.

Jordan's son Jeff plays for the Illini and is arguably the least popular member of the team. I mean, seriously, what could be worse than parents' weekend and making the entire team feel self conscious playing in front of THE BEST BASKETBALL PLAYER WHO EVER LIVED!?

No pressure.

Anyway, Iowa played a pretty good game, but ultimately lost. Still, we had fun and made it home in plenty of time to watch the Super Bowl (at least one team wearing gold and black won on Sunday).

And, continuing with the black and gold theme, Owen tried on the new Bumblebee pajamas his grammie brought him.

While we were at the game, Grammie enjoyed some time with Maya. Maya's biggest hit this weekend was a new book filled with flaps to open ... and a mirror on the last page. When Maya would get to the page, her eyes would widen at the sight of the baby in the book.

Then we'd ask her if she could kiss that baby, and she always did, leaning in to kiss her own reflection.

The other highlight last week was bringing Owen and Maya to a performance of Ailey II at my work. Maya napped in her stroller throughout, but Owen thought the dancing was fun. The music was loud, so he was ready to go just before it finished. Maya, on the other hand, slept soundly while all the music crashed and banged ... but woke up the moment it was over and the hall was quiet.

10 Months with the Wiggly Worm

Maya turned 10 months old today.

As you watch the video, pay attention to that tongue ... rubbing on the bottom gums, a sure sign that first tooth is coming in.

Very exciting!

We had a great, but busy week. Owen's great aunt and uncle, Tom and Alma (from Joel's side of the family) came for a visit on Thursday from Sioux City, IA. It was a short, but very nice get-together. They enjoyed meeting and playing with the kids, and Amy and I had a nice time catching up ...

Owen is busy as always. I haven't written yet about his favorite game, "Wiggly Worm." We have questioned many of our toy purchases when the sofa and its cushions has provided such unlimited entertainment at no additional cost.

Owen builds up the cushions and builds himself a worm hole where he can be safe. Then he knocks the hole down and builds another.

Amy says this can go on all afternoon sometimes during the week ... and I don't think that's a misunderstatement.

Fashion plate

Some photos and video of Maya ...

Despite the cold, we've been getting out with little Maya this winter. It was unseasonably warm on Friday, so Maya joined Owen, us, and the Merrills from across the street on a walk to the fire station. Her snugly snowsuit from Christmas really did the trick.

And here is a photo of Maya and her dad. And look, Maya is in another new Christmas outfit!

Was this taken on a Sunday morning? Another Sunday we dressed for church, but didn't make it on time?

More than likely the answer is yes. Anymore, we like to think we're just dressing for Sunday breakfast.

And speaking of sporting a new look ... our little lady seems to be cutting her first tooth. Very cool!

Lastly, here's a video of Maya looking at the ducks in the creek out back. Cute. Cute.

RIP Porcupine

PORCUPINE

December 30-January 5

We hardly knew ye

Holiday recap

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

It's happened. I was ... what's a nice word? ... lightly "chastised" today for not being very diligent about updating my blog.

Rightly so. I admit, the holidays got the best of me. Between holiday programs at work, holiday shopping (God bless you, Internet), pre-school programs, and the holiday travel itself, it's been a doozy of a 17 days.

So here's a quick overview of the Christmas season in the Aalberts house:

On Friday, December 12 Owen and I went to see "Franklin's Family Christmas" at my theater with Owen's good buddy Philip, and Philip's mom Kelli and sister Jenna.

The show was cute and involved a "12 Days of Christmas" sing-along that made me wish I could wind back the clock and add it to a "Cocoa and Carols" show with my college show choir.

And there was face painting. Here are the boys done up like reindeer.

The following Tuesday was Owen's holiday party at his pre-school.

On Saturday the 20th, Amy and I got out for our Christmas treat, "A Rockapella Holiday," a fantastic Christmas show also at the BCPA. I'd first taken Amy to a Rockapella show when we lived in Ann Arbor, but this was even better. Just take a look at what they did to "The Driedel Song" and try to argue this isn't fun.



In the face of an advancing winter storm, we left for Iowa City on Monday night. It turned out to be a great idea as the winter weather ended up stranding Auntie Pam in Bloomington for the Christmas celebration.

Getting there a night early also gave us some extra time to do fun things like meet up with our good friend Jeff for lunch ...

... and have a little down time before going to Owen's Grampie's retirement party on Tuesday afternoon.

Grampie was richly honored for all of the terrific work he's done for The University of Iowa, from working in the General Counsel's Office, to being Business Manager, Interim Director of Facilities, and his current work managing the university's tax work. We all had lots of fun ... and Owen and Maya did a great job entertaining the crowd.

We then settled in for a nice Christmas celebration with the Ives. There were lots of

Pictures ...
Fancy Christmas outfits ...

And very tired babies ...

We drove home on Christmas day, finding out there was good reason for Maya's fatigue. When we got home Maya threw up ... truly a harbinger of things to come.

That night Pam came over. We'd managed to pack her Christmas presents into our car, so we enjoyed a larger family Christmas as we opened our own gifts that night.

On Friday we drove up to Grandpa and Nana's house outside of Chicago.

We had a nice dinner with the larger Aalberts clan on Friday night, but then I started feeling a little sick almost immediately after the meal was through. Feeling mostly dizzy, I went to bed at 7:30.

Over the course of the night the bug Maya carried with us back to Illinois caught up to everyone else.

My discomfort (how can I put this in a delicate way?) passed right after Owen got up ill with Amy at 3:00. At 4 we had Owen and Amy packed up into the car and were on our way to the ER, where Amy received a bag of fluid, and Owen some meds to help him restore his hydration.

We all recovered pretty nicely, though, enjoying more fun with my family. There were more naps as usual, especially as Nana came down sick the next night, but it proved to be a memorable weekend marking Grandpa's return to the pulpit for the first time since his Nov. 17 heart surgery. Daniel and I sang several times as a part of the service, making it a pretty special morning for all of us.

We went home on Monday morning, enjoying the warmer weather. And I returned to work on Tuesday, biking in ... a sharp contrast to what would have been possible when it was -5 degrees out just five days earlier.

Lastly, allow me to introduce you to the newest addition to our family, Owen's handsome new Betta fish he has named Porcupine. Owen Maya and I went down to the pet store and picked out Porcupine on Tuesday night, settling him into the little tank Owen got for Christmas.

Owen's been wanting a fish for a while, and we seem to have picked a winner, if by "winner" I mean, "A fish who survived his first night."

We'll keep you posted.