Is spring here yet?

We are all getting a little stir crazy here.  Luckily we had our first break in the weather last week and actually got out for a walk—50 degrees felt absolutely balmy. The snow drifts we have been staring at since Christmas are finally melted!

Here are some recent photos.  The first is of Jane rolling.  She is our rolling master and can get across the room in nothing flat.  She is now starting to figure out how to crawl and can inchworm herself to toys.

These next photos document Claire’s recent bloody nose from an accident on her slide.  She started freaking out when she saw the blood and all the kicking and screaming got the blood everywhere.  Our bathroom looked like a scene from a horror movie:

After she finally calmed down, I asked her to smile for the camera (notice the blood smeared all over her face!):

Terrible Twos?

Claire is now 2 1/2 and some days I am not sure if I will make it through the “terrible twos”.  I have been wondering if all 2 year olds throw a fit (yelling, screaming, kicking, running away, etc) for everything or if it is just her.  Claire throws a fit 85-90% of the time for the following:

• Getting into her chair for breakfast, lunch, & dinner (she never wants to eat a meal, she only wants “nummy treats”)
• Brushing teeth
• Washing hair
• Getting out of the bathtub (even when she has turned completely blue)
• Brushing hair (don’t even think about making it look cute)
• Getting dressed and undressed
• Getting her coat, hat, & gloves on
• Putting lotion on her face
• Wiping her nose
• Turning off the TV
• Going to bed
• Getting her diaper changed (especially bad)
• And other inexplicable reasons

Things she is always willing to do include:

• Eating candy or gum
• Watching Curious George

Is there light at the end of the tunnel?  I have heard that the “threes” are worse than the “terrible twos”, if so, please let me know and we will consider a family of four sufficient!

“The Road Series” by Claire Allen

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We have discovered that Claire’s artistic style is of the linear nature.  She calls them “roads”, several of which are built each day.  I am currently consulting with my brother Jordan, who is studying to be a psychologist, to make sure her art form is not an indication of OCD!

And here is a cute picture of Jane:

Halloween 2009

Claire as a butterfly. She loved going trick-or-treating with Dad. The first door they went to Claire walked right inside the house when they opened the door (luckily it was a neighbor we knew). She quickly caught on that you just ring the door bell, say "Trick-or-Treat", get some candy, and then leave. After she went to bed we hid her candy from her hoping she would somehow forget about it. The first thing she said when she woke up was, "where is my blue pumpkin?".

Jane as a happy peanut.

New pics of kids

Here are some more recent pictures of Jane:

Blessing dress pictures:

Binky addict?:

Jane Allen: Special Delivery

Jane Allen arrived two weeks early on August 8th at around 2:10 am in our upstairs bathroom with Jake stepping in to deliver her. Needless to say, her birth did not go as planned! My water broke Friday evening and I decided to stay home, rest a little, and then get my contractions going before going to the hospital.

The general rule of thumb on going to the hospital is when your contractions are around 5 minutes apart consistently for about an hour. So, we were waiting for my contractions to get in a good pattern and then we would drive the short distance to the hospital. By 2 am my contractions were intense, but were only around 6 minutes apart. All of a sudden I felt like I needed to push and could tell the baby was coming. Jake called 911 and they talked him through the process to help little Jane into the world. The 911 operator came to visit me at the hospital and said that Jake deserves an award because he was so calm and did such a great job (especially considering that a few weeks before I asked him if he wanted to cut the umbilical cord and he wasn't sure he was that interested!).

We are so blessed that Jane was in perfect health with no complications. Paramedics arrived less than 5 minutes after she was born and then we were rushed to the hospital. She weighed in at 5 lbs 14 ounces and 19 inches long. We are now "back" home and trying to adjust to life with our special little delivery.

Proud big sister Claire with mom and baby.

By the way, Jake's shirt is not wet from the delivery but from a wet towel someone put around his neck.

We installed our concrete countertop in our kitchen a couple of months ago and I wanted to show everyone what it looks like. I started it in April and finally completed the project in June. Luckily it didn't take any longer because I don't know how much longer the tablecloth-covered plywood countertop would have lasted. Mandy was patching things up with duct tape on a daily basis.

I started by building a temporary table using cheap saw horses and 2x4's. Then I made a water-tight melamine mold on top of the table. Imagine a remesh and rebar grid suspended in the mold (I forgot to take a picture of it).

The next picture shows a couple of smaller molds. One for a small section in the kitchen and the other for the bathroom countertop.

After the mold was complete it was time to pour the cement. We borrowed a cement mixer from a farmer in our branch and got to work mixing about 16 80-lb bags of cement and additives. It took Mandy and I about 9 hours, with no breaks, to get the cement poured, vibrate all the bubbles out and screed the wet cement. I almost wet my underpants.

After about 10 days I took the mold apart, flipped the pieces over and started polishing the top surface using a wet grinder. I put on a few coats of sealant and then had some friends help me carry the three large pieces into the kitchen. The pieces weighed between 200 and 400 lbs so it took three guys to lift them.

I just hope the floor is strong enough to hold everything up.

I still need to finish the backsplash and trim and then we should be done with the kitchen.