LAURA!!

I can't believe it's been 2 weeks, and I haven't posted about this! My old roommate and buddy, Laura, came to stay with us for a weekend. I LOVE having visitors, and she was the absolute best. Not only is she one of my funnest friends (funnest is a word, right?), but she even brings hostess gifts. She's so proper and cool like that - I'm sure her mother taught her well. Thanks for the Sees candy, Lolly! And she brought W some gold coins, which he found and tried to eat through the foil :). Now every time he sees a "money", he asks me to open it. Guess we'll have to get him some more.

We did a few fun things while she was here, which meant ditching Warren a couple times. I can't say that I minded too much. We went shopping, out to lunch, to an art sale, and to a dinner theater where we saw "The Producers". It was great having so much girl time. We miss you, Laura. Come back anytime!!

W called her "Miss Dora". A slam? No way, calling her that is the highest form of W flattery!

After church. She came and hung out with me and my sunbeams.

Waiting for our train downtown after we met Tay for lunch on Friday.

Outside our favorite cookie place. Warren loved "Sexy Santa"

Bilingual Child?

So W and I are counting his crayons (which we do about 100 times a day - the kid loves counting) and he turns to me and says "let's count in Spanish. Ready? Uno, dos, tres..." all the way to diez. He skipped a couple and 8 was "bocho", but I thought it was hilarious. Perhaps I should stop hating on Dora. Apparently, that show is educational.

Iowa Tax Breaks

I thought I'd throw this out there for all of our Iowa friends. If you:

1. Lived through the 2008 Iowa floods
2. Went to school in 2008
3. Have to pay taxes on your 2008 income
   

You may have won the tax lottery:

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p970.pdf

Turns out the government doubled the lifetime learning credit for those of us who spent June sandbagging, to no avail. Now you can get a credit (not one of those pesky deductions) for up to 40% of the first $10,000 of educational expenses. Click on the .pdf file above and search for "midwestern" for more information.

Don't know what tax credits and flooding have to do with one another, but it's nice to know our bailout-crazy government is thinking of us poor students.

Purple Dora Goes Outside

Dora went to time out for being in the mailbox. Her feet are against the wall just like W's have to be when he's in time out. Even though he's playing with a girly doll, it's nice to see him play the role of a grown-up and teach Dora little lessons.

Best of Both Worlds

So today the high in Denver was 71 degrees. Ahh...so nice. But there's still a little snow in our backyard from where the fence keeps the ground in shadows. So we had a snowball fight. It was great.

This is his new "smile". We'll work on it.

Ode to my Slipcover

I really think that our 2 slipcovers have been the greatest things we've ever bought. Not only do they hide our beautiful seafoam-green-striped-couch, but when W barfs on it, we can just throw it in the wash (which we had to do last week, poor kid). Now if only I could tuck it in as nicely as Taylor - my feeble attempt to put it on pales in comparison to his tucking genius.

Just thought I'd give a shoutout to my man and my favorite furniture accessory.

Warren taking a nap on Daddy taking a nap. Even though we have a newer, "nicer" couch in the other room, we all love to snuggle on this one the best.

Can you tell which sorry attempt was mine? I didn't know about this secret talent of Tay's until after we were married and the seafoam couch came to live with us.

Dear Iowa Friends...

Ditch this....and come here!

It's 60 degrees today in Denver and Warren and I played at the park. Word on the street is that it's in the neighborhood of -20 degrees in good 'ole Iowa City. For those mathematically challenged, that makes a difference of 80 degrees.

I think we made the right choice in which city to live. Anyone is welcome to join us if you need a break from the frostbite. :)

Latest Obsession

All kids go through phases. We've gone through Cars, Bob the Builder, Thomas the Train, and Finding Nemo. And while W still enjoys all of these other characters and movies, his latest love is none other than Dora the Explorer. Which is pretty girly. I tried to tempt him to switch over to Diego, but he won't have any of it. But he does a good job of yelling out the answers and stuff. Hasn't picked up any Spanish yet, but we'll see how it goes. He was sick a couple days ago, and I swear we watched 4 hours of that dang show. It apparently never gets old. Today I bought him a little Dora doll with the $5 our neighbors in Iowa sent him for Christmas. Taylor will be so happy that I bought him a doll. haha.

Here he is watching his favorite show, with his favorite new toy - "Purple Dora"

Baby Name - In Case You Were Wondering

We're down to three names - Claire, Caroline, and Jane. Claire is my #1, Jane is Taylor's #1, and we both like Caroline for #2. So unless one of us changes our mind, or can convince the other that their name is lame, we'll probably just look at her when she comes and hopefully feel a vibe. We'll keep you posted. But thanks for voting, everyone. That was fun to get your opinion - whether we'll use it or not is another story.

Is she a Claire?

A Caroline?

Or a Jane?

(OK, seriously - there are no famous people with these names! These 3 ladies are the only ones in existence. At least they're all pretty)