Delivery Day is Upon Us!!

Tomorrow at this time we should be cradling a little one in our arms. YEAH!!! But today is a different story...

We are celebrating our Annual Pajama Day. We got up this morning and didn't take our PJs off,well except I ran into town so I at least changed my pants. :) The french toast was great and Lydia enjoyed some sledding with Charlie. Now we are catching a few movies and Lydia is enjoying a much needed nap. She is a little under the weather from all the late nights the past week. Hopefully she will feel better and be able to visit us in the hospital without sneezing on the baby. That's right the ban on kids 5 and under at the hospital is no longer in affect, so she can come visit us. YAY!! We are excited for what tomorrow brings and know that the Lord has definitely blessed us in 2009.

Here is our Christmas in review... SNOW SNOW SNOW SNOW, PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY, EAT EAT EAT EAT, FUN FUN FUN FUN. And here are some pictures to show the good times.

All of the Dahms' Great Grand kids enjoyed playing together on Christmas Eve.



After church us brave adults took the kids out to spread food for the reindeer. It must of worked because less than an hour later he arrived.

Lydia enjoyed opening most gifts, but not the one from Santa. Still not a big Santa fan, but she sat with me on his lap without crying.

Christmas day we enjoyed relaxing at my parent's house and then went to my Aunt and Uncles in town for more family time. Lydia enjoyed opening some great books, puzzles, and cute outfit.

Last night Lydia tore into the gift from her Godparents as sound as they said "gift". She's catching onto this opening stuff :)

Happy New Year!!

Exciting News!!

Lydia went on the potty chair for the first time yesterday! Yay!! We have a little one in the bathroom which she has sat on a couple times and talks about the "potty chair" all the time, but this was the first time for actually going in it. Auntie Carissa was the proud witness of the event!! She said it was pretty cute how Lydia let out a little sigh and then you could hear a little noise.

Other exciting news?

Lydia and I attended the John Ireland X-mas program which was GREAT!! I really enjoyed being an observer instead of my typical roll as a teacher.

Along with Carissa we had another visitor... Not Ike, but their new puppy Tasha. Lydia can say her name really well and liked petting her. It seems that Lydia is warming up to "puppies" as she calls them. Although we enjoyed Tasha's visit we didn't really like the barking that pursued after we went to sleep. At some point it did subside, but then Lydia lent her own music to the quiet night and woke us all. Maybe it was all in preparation for the sleepless nights to come with a newborn.

We have been making holiday goodies the last couple of evenings. Yummy!! I haven't done much baking in the last couple of years so it has been fun :)


For those of you that haven't seen Charlie recently, it's amazing how much sympathy weight that he has gained :) j/k

Post Blizzard Update

Last weekend as previously mentioned we went home to attend Breakfast with Santa hosted by the Little Saints preschool, but the fun didn't start there. When we arrived in town Charlie and I ventured to Nicollet for the high school's fall play. Charlie's sister Amanda who is a senior, hard to believe she's that old, did a great job playing Jessie a non-stop talking waitress in the play Leaving Iowa. Never heard of the play before and it took away to catch on to the back and forth of it, but either way it was great to see Amanda perform and see the Yost family.

Saturday morning Lydia decided to be an early riser at SIX a.m. which is not normal for her, but it caused us to be early/on time for breakfast with Santa which is not normal for us :) It was great seeing our friends the McHughs and Johnsons, but the guy in the big red suit was not a hit. I didn't even push Lydia to sit on his lap for pictures since I had a pregnant moment and forgot the scan disk, but remembered the camera. Ooops!

In the evening we enjoyed celebrating our friend Mike's 30th Birthday while Lydia entertained Gma Linda by reading an old FFA manual that she found in the basement. Maybe she will follow in our footsteps and join the FFA :)

Sunday we enjoyed watching the Colts continue to win while helping Gma and Gpa bring in and decorate their x-mas tree.

Monday we loaded the SUV for Iowa to watch our God Daughter's x-mas concert. Though the driving was long and exhausting it was great to surprise her and finally see the house they bought a couple years ago.

And now... We have spent the last 4 nights at our house. YAY!!! We have decorated for x-mas with our little tree from my college days since we don't want the house to burn down while in St.Peter for the birth of #2, brought out Lydia's FisherPrice nativity set which she loves and I would recommend to everyone with children, and all the random decorations that I love to make the house festive. We have also learned that our house is a little drafty so today we went to Winona for window plastic and other errands. Amazing what a little piece of plastic can do!! Wait I almost forgot, the biggest snow storm in five years as the called it on the news the other night caused Charlie to have Wed. off and Lydia to not have ECFE. It was fun being home together and knowing that everyone was safe!!

Hope all are excited for the Holiday season because it's only 13 days till Santa's sleigh will hit the sky and we will celebrate the most wonderful birth of all, Jesus' silly not baby #2.

What a big girl!!

At the beginning of the week we were able to cheer on the Saints in a win over the Patriots and swim at a hotel in Caledonia. Lydia loves swimming and never wanted to take her suit off!! Surprise, surprise!

Since then we have enjoyed being home in Saint Charles for a few days. Wednesday, Lydia and I went to "school". When we got to ECFE this week Lydia worked on 2 out of the 3 projects before being lured toward the babies and play kitchen. Who can blame a girl? It is fun to see and play with different toys than those at home!! When it was time to separate there was a little bit of sadness, but I was really proud to hear that she did great once I was gone. Yay!

Another big yay moment yesterday was getting maternity and Christmas pictures taken. We tried last week and had a horrible no good smile experience, but last night she slowly warmed up for us to get some good ones. The photographer was able to capture really cute candid shots of her kissing my belly and then in her Christmas dress reading a book. Then to round out the trip to Rochester we had some shopping to do at Walmart. Much to our surprise Lydia asked to go "potty" twice and actually sat on the chair twice. Not sure if this is a sure sign that she is ready, but we are willing to go at her pace. Anyone want to place bets that this is just a new game to see if we will take her to the bathroom?! :) To complete the evening Charlie and I stayed up late putting together Lydia's new crib which can convert to a toddler bed when she is ready. Now she is sleeping in her room instead of the baby's, where her old crib was set up.

Today started out as a great day with Lydia reading to herself for 30 mins. while I did the dishes and cleaned the kitchen after breakfast. She has really started enjoying playing, reading, and pretending on her own. It is amazing to see her imagination!! The day proceeded to be a strange one as I suddenly didn't feel well and started to think about what happens if I pass out because I was feeling faint or go into labor with no one around. Luckily eating something and napping made me feel better. Then when Charlie arrived home we all bundled up to enjoy the fresh air and new snow. Lydia wasn't thrilled to be outside especially having to walk around, but Charlie came up with a fun game of "roll the pumpkin" as we took the fall decor to the grove. Lydia ended up enjoying rolling and kicking the mini pumpkins. The last bit of strangeness for the day was Lydia's amazing skill of ignoring us as we asked her to do something so she ended up being in time out three times tonight which takes a lot out of a person. Hopefully with being calm and consistent she will learn to listen or what the consequence will be. I'm sure many of you are thinking, "it's just the beginning"!! :)

Well that's the news from our home to yours. Have a great weekend!! We are visiting Santa so check back next week to see if Lydia reacts in the same way as last year...