Spring Spring Spring

Notes from Kent :-)

I think I speak for Kristen too, when I say that we're both just a little bit wackadoo this week. With our typical busy schedules, I don't think we'll really believe we're going to Germany (just 1.5 more days!) until we're on the plane and in the air. Then it'll be for real. We both have our mental to-dos that need to get done before we leave, and we're in varying states of getting those all knocked out.

Little synopsis of our family life....

Kristen, Emmo, and Fia have busy busy schedules, with play dates, out 'n abouts (Target, Sunflower Foods, etc etc), etc etc going on all of the time. Super Kristen balances it out getting in good exercise, yoga, going to 24 Hour Fitness, taking XLN classes at DU, knitting/crafting, keeping our schedule in check, and the occasional freelance xln job. whew. That is all on top of full time Mom'dom.

As you can see from Kristen's great posts + pics, Fia has been one busy kiddo the past months. Fia *always* has her opinion of how everything should be. She's growing up from a toddler into a beautiful, sweet little girl before our eyes - it's going fast. One of my favorite things about her is how, when she's happy, she flits about, walking on her toes, singing her made up songs, just lost in her world, in whatever she's doing at the time, and in her happiness in the moment.

Side story to the "happy Fia tip-toe walk". Kristen and I took a parenting seminar from a local Waldorf teacher; I was a little skeptical of the instructor, until she said "children in 3-4 year old range, if they're happy and have had their sense of imagination and fantasy nourished, will walk around like this".... And before my eyes, this 40-50ish woman transformed herself into the *exact* way that Sofia walks around. My ears opened a little bit more after that demonstration and amazingly keen insight.

So that's our Fia. She's a challenge, and she's a love, and she's the smartest, sweetest, most determined, dramatic, most naturally compassionate and caring little girl around. She's a Tinkerbell/Cinderella/Sleeping Beauty vision of happy childhood, telling us her stories and dreams and thoughts. Oh by the way: Man, can she ride her balance bike that was her big family BDay gift from last year. Amazing to see her coast for 20-30 feet, down a slight incline, on that bike, and wonderful to see her enjoy it sooo much.

Now Emerson... This kid is something else. He'll see a person across a room, make eye contact, and just flash that natural smile and all of a sudden he's got a connection, and he's playing, smiling, and flirting with somebody. In the past 2-3 weeks, his level of physical activity has just skyrocketed. Kristen and I tonight were discussing how he's creating games to practice pulling himself up to standing, sitting himself down, repeat repeat repeat. If I could somehow construct a little obstacle course / jungle gym for him, he'd love it. Non-stop energy, strong, good sense of balance, doesn't cry too much when he falls over. He's like a little non-stop motion koala bear.

Me? Work is busy and is good. If I'm getting honest feedback, I'm doing really good work. I definitely feel very lucky to be supporting 2 (imho *very cool*) growth businesses within this large company, not to mention its core operations. There's a project that will hit a new phase the week after we return from Germany that I'm pretty excited about, and that's one of about 9 projects in which I'm heavily involved. During interviews, the job spec sheet said that this position is about "Changing the game for how we do operations", and the job feels like that, which is exciting. It's very nice to not be on-call, by the way...

I'm excited for this trip. Fia will be old enough to remember it a bit perhaps, she and Emmo will hear the German language, which if you read about early childhood brain development, helps create those neural network maps. Fia and Emmo will get to meet and play with Nik for the 1st time, we'll get to see lots of good friends, and always when you take a trip, you create those memories that enrich life, and you have some time to reflect on things. Hope this soo verbose note finds anyone reading this well, lots of love to our friends and family.

cheers cheers, xoxoxo, kent

Fia and the Magic Wand

Hi, it's Kent blogging this time...

I just wanted to preserve the memory of Fia and this Christmas. First of all, everything is Cinderella. Anyone can be Cinderella. Our Shelf Elf is Cinderella, Fia is Cinderella, Lhasas or Leone can be Cinderella, and even I can be Cinderella on my best days. If someone is bad, they're Anastasia. Rounding out this magical princess/fairy trio is Tinkerbell.

So, we are in the land of princesses and fairies for sure. This despite all of our Jayhawk basketball watching (sidenote: She *does* love the Jayhawks. You'll be glad to know, that Fia's favorite player on the Rockies baseball team this past summer was... the Jayhawks).

Now with all of this as background, Fia is getting a Magic Wand for Christmas. Every day, 10 times a day, Fia is getting a Magic Wand for Christmas. This much, she is 1000% absolutely for sure. We're trying our best to communicate with Santa Claus in hopes that he's able to bring Fia *just* the right one.

The outcomes of this to me personally are a bit frightening. For instance, what if Santa doesn't bring the right one? I think he has 5-6 to choose from. And then...what if, once Fia has the Magic Wand, she's unable to "Wand you" with the desired outcome?

This is something Fia says all of the time: "If you are a good boy, and you say please and thank you, then I will wand you into a princess".

It'll be an interesting Christmas time for sure, this Christmas of Fia's Magic Wand.

My Peoples

Hi there. It's the lesser-blogging part of this dynamic duo, Kent. We're sitting on the couch on a Wednesday night, the kids are asleep, we're 1/2 watching a movie, 1/2 laptopping. I'm trying to get my new laptop setup (ugh) and Kristen's sorting photos.

Mom and Jerry visited 2 weekends ago, we had a lot of fun! We went to the zoo for "Boo at the Zoo", and on Sunday, Mom found + gifted to Sofia a series of stories that her Grandma read to her. Mom and Fia had lots of good play time together!

Last weekend, my friend Dave came to visit. We cleaned up the garden on Saturday, saw game 1 for the Nuggets (Lakers), and saw the Broncos-Dolphins game on Sunday. And then, Sofia and I got the flu that Kristen had. Blech. The familia's still digging out from our collective colds.

Update on the kiddos... Fia can read the Madeline book through by memory, can count to 10 in Spanish, is recognizing the letter S all over the place ("Look - it's a ssss" [phonics]), and is really enjoying school and gymnastics. Emerson is more alert all the time, grabbing things, and was turning himself over today. Kristen will bring him down to visit while I'm working, and he's so full of smiles and alert - he's adorable.

If you're reading this, I hope that you're doing really well. We're so blessed and thankful to have such great friends and family. We love you!

Lots of love from Sloans Lake, Kent

PS - Kristen posted a bunch of new pics below - check em out!! :-))