Family Valentines Day Dinner

We had a nice Valentines Day weekend. Friday night I made a special dinner for our family. It was fun planning and making something special. We had Walnut Encrusted Chicken, Wild Rice Pilaf, Honey Glazed Carrots, dinner rolls, and Chocolate Covered Strawberries for dessert.

On Saturday, Grandma Maria and Annabeth had a tea party and Annabeth took a nap while Pat and I went into Albuquerque for a Valentines Day lunch at a little Italian restaurant called Nana's. It was nice to have some date time together.

Here are some pictures from our family dinner.

Here are the chocolate dipped "tuxedo strawberries" I made for dessert.

Grandma Maria and Annabeth were in charge of decorating the table for our dinner, and they did a great job.

Grandma Maria made us all valentines with Scripture passages on them, all verses talking about the heart. We enjoyed reading them before and after dinner.

Here is a picture of Annabeth. She was wearing a heart sweater for Valentine's Day.

Pictures from our trip to Sedona

Here are some pictures of the timeshare we stayed in this time around. Overall, it was really nice. This is the kitchen. There was a little breakfast bar where Pat set up his office, and a really nice see through kitchen so we could see out when we were cooking.
Here is one of the beds. There were two bedrooms with king sized beds. The outside porch was really nice, too. We were able to enjoy it in the afternoon, even though it was January. Highs were high 50's to low 60's when we were there.

Here's Grandma Maria and a bit more of a glimpse of the porch outside behind her.
Both bedrooms had jacuzzi tubs and walk in showers, which was really nice. I was able to relax with a nice bath one night, and a couple nights we used the tub as an "indoor swimming pool" for Annabeth, especially since the resort had no indoor pools. She got scared when we turned on the jacuzzi, though, and wanted to get out really quick after that. She was ok as long as we didn't turn the jets on.

The resort did have a number of heated outdoor swimming pools, and we went several times during the week. Inside the pools was nice, it was when we had to get out and go from pool to pool (which Annabeth wanted to do more often than we did) that it got a little chilly.

Here is my first official "belly" pic. Doesn't Annabeth look like a proud big sister in this picture? :)

Here is a view of the red rocks in Sedona. It's so beautiful there! A wonderful place to think about the majestic creation of our Awesome God!

Besides swimming, Annabeth really enjoyed the playgrounds while we were in Sedona. We went to 3 different playgrounds during our vacation, 2 in Sedona, and 1 in Phoenix.

Here is a picture of "The Coffepot," one of the named rock formations around Sedona. Right along the main street through Sedona, with a good view of the Coffepot, is The Coffepot Restaurant. We went there for breakfast one morning while we were there.

Annabeth loves to swing. Here she is in action at one of the playgrounds.

Here are a couple of pictures of the view we had from the balcony of our timeshare. What an inspiration! Several days we were there I enjoyed having some devotional time in view of the Red Rocks. Again, what an inspiring place to ponder on God's creation. When it was too chilly to sit outside, there was a window seat in our bedroom where the view was just as good. There are some good things about having some down time when you have a little one that still needs to nap in the afternoon.

Maria went with us on this trip, and Annabeth and I drove her down to Phoenix on Monday and picked her up on Friday so she could spend a few days with her sister Florence. It was about a 2 1/2 hr drive from Sedona to where her sister lives southwest of Phoenix. It was neat because her niece, Missy, who lives in Washington, happened to be in Phoenix with her mom when we visited, so Maria got to spend time with her, too. Most of Florence's other kids are in the Phoenix area, and Maria also has a brother, Rudy, who is in the Phoenix area along with most of his children, so Maria did a lot of visiting in her short time there. Please be in prayer for Maria's brother, who has Stage 4 cancer. The cancer is in his bones, so they are trying to decide on treatment options for him, and they're not sure how much longer he has, especially that he will be feeling well. We are thinking through trying to get Maria down to Phoenix in the near future again so she can spend more time with him.

First glimpse of Baby Moore - Ultrasound Pics

Here are some pictures from the Ultrasound we had last Wednesday. We took Annabeth with us, and I think she enjoyed seeing "my baby." The thing she enjoyed the most was hearing the heartbeat, and she asked to hear it over and over again. ("Can we hear the whoo..whoo..whoo?")

This was such a neat profile picture that they got at the end of the ultrasound - you can see the eyes, nose, mouth, and ears really well in this picture.




Here is a profile picture.

This was a neat one, with the arm and the hand in a fist with one finger pointing up. You can see the pointer finger and the thumb really well, with the other 3 fingers curled in.

It looks like Annabeth will be a big sister to a little sister, and here's the picture proof! We actually had a couple views after this that were even more convincing, but the ultrasound tech didn't get pictures of them.

Almost got it...

Almost got it...

Well, somehow when I went to post a blog entry from our vacation, it posted just the title, though it saved my draft for another time... don't know what happened. Anyway, here is what I wrote about our trip:

We are in Sedona on vacation right now, and I will post some pictures next time, but I wanted to share these moments before I forgot.

Yesterday when Pat was lathered up to shave in the morning, Annabeth said, "Daddy, you look like Santa Claus!"

In the car the other day, Pat and I were telling Annabeth that we were going out to dinner and Grandma was going to stay with Annabeth. We told her she could watch a movie while we were gone. At home, Grandma doesn't turn on Annabeth's movies, either Mommy or Daddy does. When we told her she could watch a movie while we were gone, she said, "But Grandma, you don't know how to turn the movie on!"

Annabeth is so excited to be on vacation. When we were leaving, "I'm so excited to go on vacation!" When we were getting ready to go to the pool, "I'm so excited to go swimming!" And when we were taking her to the playground, "I'm so excited to play on the playground!" It was neat to see the excitement of a vacation through her eyes.

Grandma Maria is teaching Annabeth how to gargle with her when she brushes her teeth. When I was putting her to bed the other night while Grandma Maria was in Phoenix with her sister, she wanted to gargle. She told me, "Mommy, I want to giggle and then spit in the toilet." I asked her, "Don't you mean gargle?" "No, giggle!"

Fun Moments with Annabeth from the last 3 weeks

Here are some pictures from the last few weeks. This one is Annabeth in her snowsuit, getting ready to go outside. She loves playing in the snow, making snow angels, building snowmen, and just running around and "marching" in the snow.

This picture is from the day after Christmas, when we celebrated with Earl and Cam. Annabeth is showing her "tiger blanket." It is a tiger that can be a stuffed animal or pillow when stuffed with the blanket, or a blanket when it is unzipped and unstuffed.

Annabeth's Grammy Helen and Grandpa Phil gave her this feather boa for Christmas. Here she is making it into a "mustache." Pat calls her boa a "frilly fru fru" and the name has stuck. :)

Now for some stories...

Annabeth has caught onto the concept of something being her "favorite." Lately, everything has been her "favorite", if she likes it, like one of her shows on T.V., or "not her favorite," if she doesn't, like certain vegetables at dinner. Although, I have to say that I'm proud of her. The last 3 weeks, she has been eating all of her salad for dinner.

Annabeth has an active imagination, and it's fun to see her use it. The other day she took a whole bunch of her food out of her kitchen, brought it to me, and said, "I have ingredients for making apple pie!" Her ingredients were interesting.. a chicken leg, cheese, a lemon, etc., but I was impressed by her attempt to make her own recipe. :)

Annabeth is not very shy, and I think she will continue to enjoy people as she grows. She will often call across the grocery store to someone - no matter that she doesn't know their name, she calls them "boy" or "girl" or "Hey, man!" and then continues to make conversation.

I love Annabeth's hugs, and she's giving a lot of them on her own lately. Annabeth came and gave me some hugs the other night, then said, "You're welcome for the hugs!"

When Annabeth is done with watching a show, she turns it off (whether the show is over or not). She came to me after turning the T.V. off one time, and said, "The hands brothers turned off the T.V.!" Yesterday, it was, "The finger brothers turned off the T.V."

Last week we were going out, and I was wearing the yellow Chico Hot Springs hat that I got in Chico Hot Springs, MT when my brother Jon and his wife Sara got married. I also had a gray and white jacket on. Annabeth said, "Where's your Michigan (as in Michigan Wolverines) jacket? (which is actually my San Francisco jacket in Michigan colors - maize and blue)" I asked her, "Why, what is wrong with this one?" She said, "It doesn't match your hat!" Funny that my 2 1/2 year old daughter has more fashion sense than I do. :)

Last weekend, we went to the Jungling's house - some friends from our church. Annabeth goes over there about once a week, and usually has a lot of fun and doesn't have a problem staying there when Grandma and I go to one of the local elementary schools to help with an After School Bible Club. This time, when I was staying and planning to help work on a partially built building of theirs that got destroyed in a windstorm we had in Edgewood, she was really clingy. She cried really hard when I tried to leave, and then after I left, it took my friend Kelly and her mom Sara a while to get her distracted. Kelly was holding her, and Sara asked if Annabeth wanted to go to her. Annabeth nodded her head, and said, very seriously, "I want you to take me to my Mommy!" After deciding that in my pregnant state I couldn't help a lot, and coming back inside, she was fine, and was able to play, as long as she knew I was there. When I left to talk to Pat for a minute, though, she came out of the room where she was playing and said to Kelly and Sara, "She got away from me!"

Tipping the scales

I was weighing myself on the scale the other day and Annabeth asked if she could get on, too. So I let her get on the scale, and I asked her what it said. She said, "Two years old."