Norway

Most of those who read this know that my mom's side of the family is Norwegian. My grandma and two of my aunts have been to the actual country Norway. However, our family went to the town of Norway, Iowa to visit the baseball museum. Norway is a small town similar to Miles, Iowa known as the "Baseball Capital of Iowa." Recently, a movie called "The Final Season" was made there about a true story of a high school baseball team and the chance to win their 20th state championship before their school merged with another area school. Throughout the town, they had banners about the schools winning seasons and the scores. We weren't able to get on the actual field but Ben and the boys did manage to play some catch next to it for a while. "The Final Season" is a very good movie. I highly recommend watching it. We have baseball fever at our house so we watch the movie pretty regularly. They boys were really excited to see the museum and the field they filmed on. They pointed out a lot of things they remembered from the movie. There is really a lot of baseball history in that town and the museum was really nice. Quite a few players even made it to the pros. Jasper said the whole thing was "awesome." I'm sure there will be a return trip to Norway in the future.

Birthdays

We had a very special birthday yesterday. Allegra has turned one year old! It seems like just yesterday she was born! We celebrated with a small family party Friday night. After dinner, Allegra opened some gifts and then she got down and dirty eating some birthday cake. While she was opening her gifts, she was starting to fall alseep sitting in my lap. She didn't take an afternoon nap at daycare. We kept her moving though so she could have her cake.

While we sang "Happy Birthday" to Allegra, she sat there and smiled enjoying all of the attention. When we were done singing she clapped right along with everyone with her big smile. Next, it was time to dig in! She ate her own little cake.

At first she she just picked at the frosting and ate a little bit at a time. She didn't get as messy as I thought she would. She makes a bigger mess eating her supper sometimes. Allegra didn't even smear any of it in her hair! The boys kept making sounds so I think it was a little distracting to her, then she wasn't too interested in eating anymore. It was fun watching her anyway!

I love this picture. I wonder what she is thinking. It could be that she is savoring the frosting on her fingers or that she is giving the evil look to Ben. The look of "don't touch my cake."

Today is Ben's birthday. He is working tonight so we didn't get much of a chance to celebrate. Maybe this weekend we will go our for dinner as a little celebration. It seems like we don't celebrate birthdays much the older you get. My birthday is also coming up and I will forever be 21!

Back at It

Spring break is now over and it is time to get back into the swing of things. Ben and I worked so the boys were able to enjoy some time with Grandma Rosie and Grandma Luckritz. They played and worked outside A LOT! I think Mason would have slept outside if I let him. He wanted to be outside all day, everyday. I am so glad we had the perfect weather so they were able to use up some of their energy. Now that they are signed up for baseball, they like to go out and play catch. We also have a new swing away tool to help them practice their batting skills.

Allegra still had to go to daycare last week. That gave her a break from her brothers! While there, she has learned to walk more and more. Today she walked quite a bit all by herself! Pretty soon she will be running just to keep up with her brothers. She has finally started getting her top teeth at the same time. Four to be exact! She is such a big girl! It's hard to believe she will have her first birthday soon!

One Step Closer...

One step closer means a few things around here. When we got our tax return, we were able to pay the rest of my student loan. With that being paid off, we are closer to being debt free! We have our truck and house loans left! We are hoping to pay off the truck by the end of the year.

Allegra is also closer to walking all by herself! She can stand by herself really well and sometimes gets the courage to take a step but doesn't quite make it. One day she will be steady enough to walk on her own and then there will be no stopping her!

Hello?

Anyone there? You've probably quit checking to see if I've had any new posts. So I haven't been the best at posting lately, I'm sorry! My friends at work are even telling me I need to update my blog. I have found my self going in all different directions. We've been busy lately with activities and work. I am off work today because I have lost my voice and thought maybe I should give a little update.

Mason started out the wrestling season after Thanksgiving but gave it up a few weeks into it. Jasper decided he wasn't going to wrestle this year. After a few weeks he changed his mind and we started to going practice again. He has only done a few tournaments and has really improved! He seems to really enjoy it more this year than in years past. Ben wrestles around with him and says he is pretty strong! The season is winding down and they are both getting excited to start baseball!

Around Christmas, we were greeted with the stomach flu. Allegra and Mason had it come and go for about three weeks. Ben and I spent our time off at Christmas with it. Japser never did get it. Lucky him!

Allegra is getting to be such a big girl! She is on the verge of walking by herself. She is always into everything now that she can crawl and walk along things. She loves playing with the boys. They make her laugh a lot by making different noises and funny faces. I love to listen to her giggle! She has recenlty started going to a new daycare building. It is still part of the YWCA, it is just a north campus. It actually is just a block from our house, the old Horace Mann school for those of you who know Clinton. I absolutely love it there! I'm excited for the really nice weather when we can walk over there to get her in the afternoon. They did a big remodel to have the daycare there. Some of the teachers from the south campus are there so they are not comletely new to her. We do seem to have difficulty with Allegra going to other people lately. She is in the stranger faze. She doesn't like it when Ben or I have to go somewhere. I'm hoping this faze doesn't last long!

Ben is looking forward to going to Texas in March for work. They will be going to Texas A & M for some sort of training and will be gone for several days. We are both taking the Financial Peace University class that mom and dad took last year too. Mom and dad are actually our group facilitators. We have learned a lot and are excited to start saving and investing!

Special Trip Part 2

While we were in Indianapolis, we were able to visit my dad's foster brother Chad and his family. Chad lived with my dad for about nine months when he was a kid.

Chad lives with his parents Chuck and Janell just outside of Indianapolis. We took the short drive in the rain to their BEAUTIFUL house. Yes, I am very jealous! We ate pizza and were able to chat a while. Chad's sister Rhonda was there with her two kids as well. Tyler and Mason are the same age. Mason calls him his new best buddy. Lilly is four and just loved Allegra. She liked having her picture taken with her and holding her.

The kids played a lot in their game room with the dart board and shuffle board while the adults got the chance to catch up. We all had a great time!

Special Trip Part 1

Last year Ben and I decided to go to our first NFL game. Since we are Colts fans, we went to Indianapolis. We decided we wanted to go again this year and we wanted to take the boys. Since the boys had the Monday after Thanksgiving off, we decided to go that Sunday game. I didn't really want to be away from Allegra for the weekend so we asked Mom and Dad if they wanted to come with us. Dad said he would go to the game with us and Mom said she would stay at the hotel and watch Allegra.

We left Saturday and made the long trip to Indianapolis. We made more stops than we wanted too, but we made it. Of course we had to stop in Brownsburg and shop for Colts stuff since there isn't much of that around here. Brownsburg is only 20 minutes from Indianapolis.

We made it to our hotel that was in walking distance to pretty much everywhere! The best part was that is was a skywalk! We walked to the mall that night to work out a lot of kept up energy and get an idea of where we needed to go for the game.

Sunday was the game! We sat in the lower bowl and had a great time! Once again the Colts lost. They aren't having the best season as Peyton Manning isn't playing. Mason did get a little bored after a while but was pretty well behaved while we were there.

We came back Monday early enough for Dad's banjo lesson and Mason's wrestling practice. It's always good to be home but we had a great time! I think Mom and Dad did too. We have talked about making it a yearly trip, depending on when the games are.