For the Fam!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

I saw one of these Elf videos and couldn't resist. It's hilarious!

New Basement!!!

So after MUCH time and $$$$$ the basement is done, well almost done. The carpet was installed this past Tuesday and it made such a difference. Now we've been able to start using the space! It's soo exciting! It's almost been like living in a new, or different, home!

Living Room

Stairs

(still need a stair rail)

Laundry

Bedroom



I don't have before and after photos of the bathroom because that's the area that's not quite done yet. The shower and sink aren't completely installed.


And now we finally have our Christmas Tree up. I was waiting for the carpet to be installed so that I could put it up down there. There is much more room down in this living room for those messy Christmas mornings!



And I've already got my Christmas present. Our new sofa that is now in the basement living room.

I LOVE IT!

Talking, Singing, and Just Being Silly!

It's been awhile since I posted any videos of Nicole and I know that the family really loves when I do, especially the Grandmas, so here are a couple.

Nicole is really talking A LOT now, pretty much non-stop!

But she seems to be a little camera shy because she won't say much when I put the camera in front of her. Here is a little bit of what I

have been able to get on video.

Nicole's always been a big fan of music, singing, and dancing. Here is a little clip of her singing the Elmo song and doing a little dance at the end.

Now a days when you ask Nicole to smile this is what you get....

She is a silly girl!

Thanksgiving

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!

The family always gathers at our house for the holidays and this year has been no exception. We love to do the cooking and we love feeding everyone. We always have a lot of fun and tons of laughs when we get together.

Dave, as usual, cooked the turkey, stuffing, and cranberry sauce. But he still got in as much football as he could with his dad and my dad and brother. Amber hung out in the kitchen a lot of the time with me while I cooked and helped to watch the kids.

Here's a peek at some of our oh so yummy dinner!

Halloween!

Halloween was soo much fun this year! We took Nicole out for her first Trick or Treat and she did awesome! She loved it. She was knocking on doors and quickly learned how to say "Trick or Treat". I hadn't been Trick or Treating for about 12 years and I loved seeing her enjoy it as much as I used to. But she may have enjoyed it a little too much. She's been asking us to go Trick or Treating all weekend and just doesn't understand why we can't go again.

Amber and Zaiden came Trick or Treating

with us in our neighborhood.

Nicole loved having her buddy Zaiden

as a Trick or Treat partner.

Fall!!!

Fall leaves are so fun!

Toe Nails

While I was gone last night Dave decided to paint Nicole's toe nails!

Now my little baby girl has Red toe nails!

Paint!

Painting has begun in the basement!

He totally looks ready for Halloween!

Colors!

Nicole has been learning her colors and she's getting so good at them. She still makes a mistake every once in awhile, but I think she does pretty darn good for an 18 month old. (Actually I don't know when kids usually learn their colors but 18 months seems pretty young to me.)

New Car!

So we finally got our settlement from the insurance last Friday and got our new car on Saturday! Everything worked out perfectly. We got what we thought we deserved for our stolen car from the insurance and found this car, on ksl, for a steal! Our car that was stolen was a 2002 Mazda Protege5 with 81,000 miles on it and our new car is a 2005 Mazda Tribute with 55,000 miles, and they both get about the same great gas mileage. From what the insurance gave us on the Protege we were able to pay for this Tribute in full(we had paid the Protege off earlier this year), pay for the taxes and registration, and still had some left over! Everything really ended up working in our favor.

So a big thanks to the car thief!

(No, really, I still think you suck)

Halloween Preview

I bought Nicole her

Halloween costume today.

She had so much fun wearing it.

I wasn't sure if she'd enjoy Halloween

and dressing up this year but

I think she's going to

have tons of fun

....and so will I!

30 Days to go!

Sleep Talking

I thought I'd share a funny story that happened last night. Dave has moments of sleep walking and sleep talking every once in awhile. It can be pretty amusing sometimes. Last night was one of those nights.
Dave had gone to bed a little early because he wasn't feeling well, at about 9:30. I went into our room just after 10:00 after cleaning up some cat puke(gross, I know, but it happens often having two 14 1/2 year old cats). I had a rag and tossed it into the laundry hamper.
Dave popped up into a sitting position and asked: "What's that?"
Me: "I just cleaned cat puke."
Dave: "What?"
Me: "It was a rag I used to clean cat puke."
Dave: "Oh"
Dave lays back down and I crawl into bed.
Dave: "You confused me."
Me: "OK....sorry."
....Short pause....
Dave: "I guess it's not that important in Wisconsin."
Me: "What?"
Dave: "The yellow pages."
Me: giggle "What?"
Dave: "Oh, I guess I'm not making sense to you right now."
Me: "Um" giggle "The yellow pages aren't that important in Wisconsin?"
Dave: No Response
Me: "Ok, good night."
Dave: "Good night."
As I turned over I was quietly cracking up. I realized he was more asleep than awake.
This morning when I saw him I asked him "So the yellow pages aren't very important in Wisconsin?" and he just started cracking up and said "I don't know, I was tired." I was pretty surprised that he remembered.
I don't know what he possibly could have been dreaming about, all I know is it was pretty darn funny!

The Silly to the Annoying

Kids can be so silly and cute sometimes...

And they can also turn simple things, like a plastic chair, into one of the most annoying things ever...

Great Birthday Gift?!

For Dave's Birthday I got tickets to one of his favorite bands, G-Love. We went to the concert last night at the U of U in the Red Butte Gardens. The gardens were really pretty and the show was great, but unfortunately things didn't end very well, for us anyway.
We wanted to leave a little early to avoid the traffic so we left the gardens and started walking towards the helipad where we parked. As we approached where we had parked, we both started to panic, our car was gone! We were really hoping that, for some reason, they towed our car, even though the cars next to us were still there. We both frantically looked around the area, turning circles, looking for our car, but it was no where to be found! We quickly went back to the gardens where there were two police officers and told them our car was gone! They sent another officer out to help us. The officer made us a little frustrated at first because he drove us around the parking lots asking us if we're "positive we didn't park somewhere else". After he was convinced that it had been stolen he filed the report.
And what really topped the cake was that I had left my purse in the car, on the floor in the back seat, because I didn't want to carry it around at the show. I had taken my driver's license and cash with me but all of my credit cards and my KEYS were in it! So they wouldn't have even had to hot wire the car to take it. I'll NEVER make that mistake again.
They were pretty quick to use my cards also. They put $145 on my debit/Visa, about $150 on my other Visa and $300 on our Mastercard, all at gas stations. But I got all my cards cancelled and re-newed now.
This is the second car we've had stolen now. The first time was with our Honda Civic about 4 1/2 years ago. It was stolen right out of our condo's parking lot. But they found it the next day because the ex-wife of the guy who stole it called the police on him.
I'm not sure how much luck we'll have with this car. We just have to start replacing things like a car seat, stroller, purse and, I guess, a car!

Wish us luck!

Happy Birthday Dave(Dada)!

September 6

We just celebrated Dave's 28th birthday. We had some friends and family over for a BBQ. Dave finally relaxed on a Saturday instead of sweating away in the basement!

Here is a photo of Dave as a newborn and one of Nicole as a newborn....

They could be twins!

We love you so much and appreciate everything you do for us!

We hope you had a wonderful birthday!

Little Bed!

Well, last Sunday we converted Nicole's crib into a little day bed. She was pretty excited when she figured out that she could get in and out all by herself! But that was one of the things I was worried about, getting in and out throughout the night, and I was also worried about her rolling out of bed all night....

But luckily we were able to find a bed guard that fit the full length of her bed. So when we put it up she doesn't try to get out, not yet anyway, and she can't fall out.

I didn't realize how much of a milestone this was going to be. When I tucked her in for the first time in this little bed I saw a little girl instead of a baby. It's kind of sad. It's amazing how much happens in just 17 months!

There's no more crib in the Krantz home....at least for now!

And Nicole's shoulder seems to be doing much better. She's not complaining about it as much and she's using it much more now.

She Really Did it This Time!

Some of you may already know that Nicole can be a bit of a hand full. She's an active little girl, to say the least. She was walking at 9 months and climbing everything shortly after. She has had several falls, skinned knees and arms, and bruises all over.....but now she's really done it....she fractured her left collar bone! On Monday she jumped out of her crib. She had done it once before but didn't hurt herself, it just scared her. I thought the first time taught her a lesson, I was wrong. I originally didn't think she broke anything. I thought if she broke a bone she'd be screaming in horror for hours or something. But after the fall she just cried for a few minutes and shortly after fell asleep for her nap. I began to notice that her arm/shoulder seemed to be bothering her so I took her to the doctors on Tuesday. The doctor checked her out and didn't think she broke anything either. He said she probably just bruised a muscle and she should feel better in a couple of days. Well, today rolled around and she was still pretty bothered by that arm. So I took her into the doctor again this morning to have an x-ray. Sure enough, her collar bone is slightly bent with a little fracture. But the doctor said that collar bones heal very quickly and he just put her in a little sling. But he also said that if she falls again on it before it heals it could snap! So I'm a little on nerve about her running around! She's in pretty good spirits and is still trying to be a dare devil!

Now I'm paranoid to go out with my 17 month old in a sling for fear people will think I'm a negligent mother! Just look at my poor baby girl!

My plan is to convert the crib into a little bed this weekend. No more jumping out of the crib!

Look who's Talking!

Nicole is really starting to add to her vocabulary now. She has a good sized list of words/phrases that she can say now. Here are a few:

NO, No Way, down, owie, uh-oh, cookie, ball, bubble, eyes, please, thank you, outside, patches(our cats name), cat, bicycle, papa, mommy, I don't want(mumbled together).......

She seems to be at a point where she really tries to say a word when you ask her if she can say it. I love being able to have little conversations with her!

Weekend at Bear Lake

We just got back from a short but fun trip to Bear Lake in Garden City Utah. It's been forever since I've had any sort of trip so this was a nice get away, even if it was just for the weekend. We went with my sister, Amber, her son, Zaiden, my brother, Allen, and my Dad. We rented a small cabin that turned out to be smaller than we expected but it worked out just fine.

Here's a bunch of fun photos.....

The Cabin

The Lake

Enjoying a camp fire.

Nicole was soo good for the long car ride!