Ryan and I always have good conversations in those three miles to and from school. The other day as we were driving home he says “Mom, did you know that daddy shouldn’t drink pop while we are driving? That is really dangerous.” I had to think about it for a minute and then remembered that it was drug and alcohol week at school. He just has never been exposed to beer and didn’t know the difference. Here he thought his daddy had been endangering his life all this time… Good thing we got that cleared up! Drinking and driving is actually a very bad issue around here. When I go on my walks in the morning I see new empty beer cans and empty cases almost every day. I would guess I probably see 15-20 cans every 4 mile walk. Not good.

Well I guess all I had to do was complain about Dane’s sleep problems. He seems to be doing a bit better lately. YEA! He had his 2 year check-up on Thursday. He is doing great. He was 29 pounds and 35 3/4″. He was actually 70% height! He is catching up to his borthers finally! He still looks really short compared to how tall they were at this age. 50% weight. No shots this trip. YEA!

Here are a couple pictures. He has had a huge growth spirt lately. He is growing out of all his 18-24 month clothes and I don’t have much in the 2T department. Ryan and Christian wore that size in the summer…. (and not for long). If Dane continues with his normal trend he will wear that size until he turns 3 so I might have to do a bit of shopping. Oh bummer! Notice this sweater is plenty big…. his hands are missing. LOL

My camera is still not working real well. I had a couple pictures of Christian but they didn’t turn out. Looks like I need some new Ryan ones too!

We had a couple kitten issues this week. Garfield used up one of his nine lives. I drove to school to pick up the boys (I go 55-60 mph) and as I walked inside a dad says “Do you have kittens?”. I thought yeah… how did you know that? He then goes on to inform me that one of them just jumped out from under my car and ran into the grass field. Lovely. So I gathered up the boys as fast as a could and we headed out to the field. As soon as Garfield saw me he came running. He was scared to death. He must have ridden on the skid plates under the car or something…. Then this morning there were cats all over the garage as soon as I opened the door. Matt was trying to convince them to get out as I got ready to back out. I looked in my rear-view mirror to back up and there was a kitten perched on the very top of Ryan’s car seat. So I plunked her out – I’m still not sure how she got in. The boys must have accidentally let her in when they were climbing in. So I guess our kittens like to ride to school with us. They have been earning their keep – catching lots of mice and the occasional bird. Momma has been teaching them good hunting skills.

The last couple days we have been on a cleaning frenzy downstairs. After school for two days in a row the whole family went down there and worked for a couple hours. We organized all the kids toys, vacuumed really good (I still need to shampoo the carpets), and I FINALLY unpacked the last couple boxes in my scrapbooking area. It looks so organized down there now! HMMM, if we can only convince the boys to keep it that way we’ll be doing good. It’s especially hard when our house is packed with kids on Bible Study nights. So we’ll see! Now if some magical fairy would just come and do all my laundry for me…..

We got our internet fixed today too. Matt called every day for an entire week until they finally were convinced they needed to send someone out here. It was SLOW and kept turning off. We upgraded to a more expensive package in hopes that would help, but still nothing. So the technician came today and replaced our radio in our satellite. MUCH BETTER! Yea! I have been trying to watch these videos for the training I am doing and it just wasn’t working well.

Speaking of business…. We are finally becoming a bit more official. We applied for a business license today under the name Steendahl Enterprises. Then we’ll have Dine Without Whine a Division of Steendahl Enterprises Etc. We have to get the paperwork notarized and then run a notice in the newspaper for three weeks and then we’ll be official. We also got a Tax ID so we can buy products wholesale if we ever want to… The next step is to incorporate, but our accountant said we probably dont’ need to do that until we are grossing 90K per year. That will be awhile yet…..

Well, I think that is all the news for now!
C-

Well, Well, Well, my little sweetie pie has decided he does not like to sleep through the night anymore. I’m not sure what the problem is but he is up every night at least 2 times. Everything has to be just so – tons of blankets, water in his hand, a certain toy or book etc. If anything is out of place he wakes up upset about it. Hopefully this phase is over soon! He has been super cute during the day lately though so I guess I can handle it a bit longer. He has his two year check-up on Thursday so we’ll see if he is making any progress in his vertically challenged status. He has grown a lot in the last month or so! Maybe that has something to do with why he’s not sleeping as well…

Ryan lost his fourth tooth yesterday. Luckily during one of Dane’s moments last night the tooth fairy remembered she was supposed to visit! That would have been sad. I guess it was a good thing Dane woke me up last night! Ryan is really starting to enjoy reading as well. I am hoping that is something that will last for years to come.

Christian had orange day at school today. He wore an orange pumpkin fleece hat, but they made him take it off once he got into the classroom to go with the no hats policy. He had an orange motorcycle on his shirt as well, so he was good. When we got home he decided to pull an attention getter. He got the markers out and Matt told him that as soon as he was done he needed to put them away. So he colored about 2 minutes and walked off. Matt said “oops, you better remember to put your markers away!” And he said “I did!”. Matt said, “That’s funny, I didn’t see you put them away.” Christian once again said “I did, they’re in the cupboard”. So Matt goes to look and low and behold there they are on the table. So….. off for a nap he went. He slept about 40 minutes and was back to his normal self in time for dinner.

Well, I’m off to bed.

C-

Dane’s favorite new phrase is “No! Please…” Hey, at least he’s polite about it. LOL He says yes quite well now also, and big long sentences that I can’t quite make out yet. Right now he is screaming in his bed because we won’t let him sleep with his toothbrush. I might have to just give in, but it is the principal of it… It’s just kinda gross to sleep with your toothbrush don’t you think? Lately he seems to get attached to everything. Last night he cried and cried until we gave him two more blankets in his crib – whcih equaled about seven and then he cried and cried in the middle of the night until we gave him another one. There was hardly room for him in there but he LOVES blankets right now. He seems to get attached to almost anything these days. Not sure what that is all about… I don’t remember our other kids going through this phase.

I was teacher for a day on Wednesday. Word gets out quickly that I have that one thing….. What’s it called? Oh yeah… a degree! Anyway, at the beginning of the year I told the principal I could sub. if she was absolutely desperate. I didn’t want to be on the main list but could do it as a last resort. Well…. Tuesday night at 9:30 I get the call – I’m desperate! So I taught preschool for a day. It was pretty fun actually. I wouldn’t want to do it every day, but it was fun to see how Christian’s time at school is structured. His teacher actually has to have some surgery and will be out for 2 weeks so who knows, I might get another day in there before she is back.

I got reprimanded by Ryan’s teacher on Monday. I dropped him off and went to Bible Study. One of the moms came in and said “Ryan is really sad, he forgot his take home folder!” Well, I knew he had it and I was only a block away so I dashed over there. His folder is navy blue and the inside of his backpack is black and he just missed it in there. He sits in the back row and the bell had just rung so I snuck in the coat closet and handed it to him. I was on my way out and his teacher said “Did he call you?” I said “No, another mom told me he couldn’t find his folder.” She said “After the bell rings if he doens’t have his folder, he doesn’t have it. You are not allowed to come into the classroom like that.” I didn’t know what to say to that, so I said “Sorry!” and left.

We went out to dinner and Wal-Mart tonight. We were busy chatting with someone from church when Christian decided to go for a walk. We were in the toy aisle, so I expected him to stay close….. but he decided jewelry was more exciting. Needless to say, a few minutes later we got the “Matt and Christine please come to the customer service counter” page. Oops. Christian was as happy as can be. They gave him a fun coloring page and were chatting away.

Well, Dane is still crying so I need to head in there and see if I can convince him to calm down and go to sleep. I hope you’re doing well!
C-

Alrighty, I apologize it has been so long since the last update. Life got crazy. The boys had five days off of school this past Thursday – Monday. Then I was working on a huge project – www.familydinnervideo.com which is now complete. YEA! Then I had a couple days where our internet was not working at all. I also just joined a new big time one year course that will teach me even more about internet marketing / website stuff. I feel like I’m back in college. Actually it is big bucks to take part in it, so it is kind of like college… It is a lot of work, but I am pretty sure it is going to pay off. If not, then I guess I’ll be a drop out.

It is freezing here! I went out for my walk this morning and it was 33, but the wind killed me. I am guessing the wind chill was around 20. I need to invest in a face mask and earwarmers or something. I was cold to the bone after my 4 miles and I never did really warm up after that. When we went to the grocery store there were actually snow flakes coming down. (tiny ones, but STILL….)

Tomorrow is the harvest party at Ryan’s class, so I will try to head on over for that at 2:00. (providing Matt is home to monitor sleeping Dane.) He was so disappointed I didn’t go on his field trip on Tuesday, so hopefully this will help. I would have gone on the field trip, but they already had 5 moms going and basically asked everyone else not to go. He is still doing really well. He had a few missing assignments this week, but I think we got that all figured out.

Saturday I am heading off to a gigantic craft fair in Indiana with a friend or two. It is apparently a full day outing that is tons of fun and more booths then I can imagine. They run it for 9 days. www.coveredbridgefestival.com Apparently they had 2 million visitors last year. That’s pretty big for a craft fair huh? They seem to know how to do those out here.

Monday we headed to the Chicago Lincoln Park Zoo. We figured it is very rare that both Matt and the boys have the same day off, so we had to take advantage of it. That and it was a beautiful day! I took a lot of pictures and none of them turned out. I was so bummed. We so need a new camera, but Matt is holding out for the really nice one that he has picked out that we have to save for… Could be awhile. LOL Nana, Dane wore his zoo animal overalls we made. sooooo cute! It is a really nice zoo. It is free to visit, but they get you on the parking. It was nice to venture out into a big city again. The coast by Lake Michigan is beautiful. I think we’ll have to hit the Children’s Museum next. We got to go to Cracker Barrel for dinner on the way home. YUM! I love that place, it is so cute and fun!

Oh, we had a kitten fiasco on Monday too. Our neighbors called and said they found two orphaned kittens. So we headed over and looked at them. I am guessing they are about 4 weeks old. They wanted us to try to get our mommy to take them in. So we brought them home and she right away warmed up to them and was licking them etc. So we left and went to the zoo. When we got back in the evening all our kitties were hissing at the new kitties and our mommy was hissing at her kitties. So….. back to the neighbors the abandoned kittens went. The next day ours were a big happy family again. One of the babies caught a mouse in our window well the other night and Matt saw Snickers, the mommy, catch one in the corn field across the street today. So at least they’re turning into mousers for us. The family who was going to adopt one of ours backed out on us. So for now we have 7 cats! Can I mail one to you? They all love each other so much I think we would be sad if they seperated. I’m just worried about the spring when all the girls get pregnant. EEK!

So the only pictures I have that have turned out lately are Matt’s new back massager….(no wonder his back hurts!)

And Christian the pen man. I bought a new pack of pens on our Sam’s Club Trip (which is a whole other story) and Christian decided to wear them all.

So the Sam’s Club Story. We realized the other day that we hadn’t gone to Sam’s Club since right before my parents came out in June. I think that is a record for us as far as staying away from a warehouse store! We were out of EVERYTHING. So we finally bit the bullet last Thursday and went. $730 later we made it home. YIKES. We didn’t even add many extras. We were just honestly out of that many things. It adds up fast when you have printer ink for $80 etc. I did throw in a new set of flannel sheets (which were a really good deal) because our sheets from our wedding are finally dying. We have other sets, but I like to have a few to rotate just in case.

Well it is getting late. I think that is about all the news for now. Dane is learning to talk up a storm. I wish you could hear him. It’s so cute!

C-

I just finished a Halloween Fun Kids Recipe and Game Book. Enjoy!

Well, the kids are home for 5 days now. They have Thur. – Mon. off. The teachers have training Thursday and Friday and then Monday is Columbus Day. It’s Thursday morning and they are already fighting…. I just assigned them some work to keep them busy. I guess we’ll have to find something creative to keep them entertained in the coming days. I think we’ll go on a little day trip somewhere tomorrow.

Our beans were harvested. I tried to take pictures, but they didn’t turn out. Both Ryan and Christian got to ride in the combine for a few rows. I asked if it was fun and they said it was high so they could see a long ways, but it was too long of a ride… Now Matt and Ryan have dreams of a g0-cart track. Matt and I are thinking we could run that in the non-farming months and still let them farm in the summer. The extra $$ from the farming enceavors is a nice perk. We ended up with 215 Bushels from our 4 acres.

We have had strange weather lately. Yesterday it was 80 degrees and sunny when I took Christian to school and 63, windy, raining and cold when I picked him up 3 hours later. I had put him in shorts and he was freezing when I picked him up. We have been having lots of wind and thunderstorms. The leaves are starting to change and fall as well.

Ryan had a good week at school. He was the “Star of the Day” on Monday and then on Wednesday it was his turn to bring dessert for the entire school. They have hot lunch at school every Wednesday and families take turns bringing the dessert. Ryan wanted me to make cookies, but if you bring cookies you are requested to bring 2 per child. That is 180 cookies! I wasn’t feeling that ambitious… so I finally convinced him that I would make our familiy cookies and he brought those popcycles with ice-cream in the middle. MUCH EASIER!

I decided the other day that next time I buy Ryan shoes I am buying 2 pairs. I am tired scrambling every morning trying to find his shoes before we run out the door for school. I have tried having him place them by the back door at night, but it still sometimes fails. So considering his current shoes are totally falling apart… I ordered two pairs of shoes and a pair of snow boots from L.L Bean this morning. We’ll see how they fit and last.

Dane had a good birthday. We didn’t do anything too major. It was Sunday, so we had church and then Matt had an afternoon meeting and then we had our family Bible Study at night. We had the cake with the Bible Study Group. White with Lemon Frosting and Carrot with Cream Cheese Frosting. YUM! I had to go to the neighbors to borrow eggs for the cakes because I had forgotten that Dane had decided that cracking eggs is a fun thing to do… so I was out and I didn’t want to run all the way into town just for that.

Here are the Birthday Pictures. He was terrified of the horse at first, but he’s warming up to it. Ryan and Christian think it’s great fun.

Well, I think that is it for now – or at least all I can think of as I have whiny, fighting, crazy, wonderful little boys yelling, crying, laughing and climbing all over me.

C-