So excited!

Rachel was so excited to put her Halloween outfit on this morning. She was dressed and ready for the day by 7:45 and that's unheard of. Some days she would just prefer to stay in her pajamas all day and leave her hair messy. We (yay, Daddy's home!) were explaining to Rachel this morning about how we were going to go trick-or-treating tonight and what exactly it is. This will be her first experience. She is definitely excited to get candy, but she quickly informed us that her friend Madison could be the one to knock on the doors! :) Too funny! I remember my mom having to assign us turns to ring the doorbells. I guess those days will come... Happy Halloween from Rachel!

5 years later...

After 5 years of hard work and dedication, Andy has become a manager for E&Y. He has definitely worked hard to get where he is and continues to amaze me. He officially became a manager on October 1st. This past weekend, I was the first person to receive one of his new business cards saying, "manager". I wish I had a letter that is back in storage in Texas. Approximately 3 years ago I received a letter from one of Andy's co-workers just letting me know how much he appreciated Andy and how proud I should be of Andy. He had just been promoted to senior. In the letter his co-worker said a lot of things that I obviously already knew about my husband, but I was so touched and grateful that someone else had realized what a hard worker he is. I don't know the exact percentage, but for the big accounting firms there's a lot of employees that leave before ever making it to manager. So, this is a huge milestone for Andy.

I have always been amazed at his ability to balance work and home. Even though there are weeks that drag on with crazy, late hours, I know where Andy would rather be. He wants to be home and he's constantly apologizing for not being home. Rachel put it quite simply the other day when she was walking around the house singing "Daddy's at the office, all day long, all day long". We have been quite fortunate over in Holland with better hours. He still has his busy times, but for the majority of the year he's home by dinnertime, which is nice. When Andy does come home after a crazy, long day he still let's me talk his ear off before we head to bed. And even though Rachel is most likely asleep, he always peeks in on her.

Andy was supposed to be in Orlando this week. It's a big manager training/celebration that is held once a year for all the Americans. But of course, duty called. So, when he was asked last week to stay behind and continue to work on a project that has a deadline, he of course stayed. I am continually amazed at his commitment. So, 5 years of his career has come and gone. Who knows what the next 5 will bring. But whatever it may be I know that Andy will always excel at what he does. I am so grateful for him and for all he does for our family as a husband and father!

Can't be left out...

Rachel wasn't all that into her second birthday, but in the past couple of months she's talked a lot about birthdays. One night when I had a candle burning she insisted on me singing "Happy Birthday" to her and letting her blow out the candle. She also loves to pretend to have cake and pretend to blow out her candles with her play kitchenware. This past week she attended a friend's birthday party and didn't quite understand why she couldn't blow out the candle or open the presents. So, Andy was a good sport about humoring her on his day! :) After Rachel helped Andy blow his candles, she needed to sing to herself and have a couple turns as well. She definitely keeps us smiling and laughing! :)

Celebrating 31 Years

We celebrated Andy's birthday this weekend. We started off by splurging at a local international market and purchasing Andy's favorite blueberry muffin mix. So, Saturday morning (before Andy headed in for a full day's work at the office) we enjoyed some muffins. We have discovered that Rachel likes blueberry muffins almost as much as her daddy does! :) The benefit of making them Saturday was so we could enjoy the rest of them this morning. Saturday night we went into Amsterdam and had dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe. We couldn't break tradition! :) So, we enjoyed some good, old American food. Andy was even willing to let them sing to him so we could all share a free dessert. He claims he did it for Rachel. :) We all enjoyed the ice cream topped with hot fudge, whip cream, and a cherry. After they sang to Andy he commented how it's been a long time since he's done that in a restaurant. I guess your little ones bring out the kid in you. This afternoon we opened up presents and enjoyed some cheesecake. Rachel was so excited to help her daddy open presents and blow out candles. She's been talking about his birthday for days! I'm surprised Rachel didn't spoil any of Andy's presents before he opened them. She went shopping with me and I was just waiting for her to say something, but she did good and didn't ruin any surprises.
There's one handsome 31-year old sporting his new sweater. I actually did pretty good this year - I think Andy approves of everything he got! :) Although we are going to have to do some exchanging for sizes - I still don't do very well with the way things are sized over here. Here's Andy's cheesecake. Despite the way it looks, it still tasted good. This was another splurge at the international market. Rachel helped me decorate it on Saturday afternoon and by Sunday afternoon it hadn't fared well. Oh well, luckily Andy's not high maintenance and it still tasted good!

We didn't do 31 candles, we just shaped the candles into a "31".

We had to take video of Rachel singing to her daddy. I don't know who was more excited about his birthday - Andy or Rachel??? :) It was fun to celebrate Andy' day. He certainly appreciated all the phone calls, birthday cards, and well wishes.

Rachel's Routines

Any child development book you read will tell you how important routines are for little ones. Routines are not only beneficial for little ones, but for everyone. Rachel has some really cute, funny, and ridiculous routines. Here are some of her current routines:

• Even though she's been sleeping in a big girl bed for almost 2 months now, she still calls and waits for Mommy or Daddy to come get her when she wakes up. Once we go in to her room she then climbs out of bed by herself. It's really quite odd, but we like it. We don't have to worry about a middle of the night unwanted visitor! :) I don't know if it's because her room is really quite dark or if it's just part of her routine.
• Every morning when she wakes up she quickly states, "I need to take my vitamin". She has to select what color she wants, she chews it up, and then has to show everybody (including herself) what color her tongue has turned. Rachel also has to help me put my vitamin in my mouth. If I forget to let her help me - let's just say it isn't a pretty picture.
• Whenever we go grocery shopping Rachel has to sit in the toy car and pretend to drive. She doesn't want money deposited into it to make it move. Luckily she is pretty easy to get out of the car as long as I give her a few seconds to find a "parking spot". Sometimes (when she's not quite ready to get out) she finds one parking spot, but then has to find a "better one".
• If Andy happens to be climbing up the stairs with Rachel, he has to make a tunnel for her to climb through. If I happen to be coming up the stairs as well, I'm required to climb through the tunnel as well. I'm amazed that I can still fit through the tunnel. :)
• There's a bush on our walk back from the park that has really soft leaves. Every time we pass it Rachel has to pick one of the leaves and carry it all the way home.
• If both of us are around to put Rachel to bed, one of us has to be tucked into bed by Rachel. Whoever is going to read her stories stays in her room, while she follows one of us to our bedroom. She then has to tuck one of us into bed, make sure the covers are covering our arms, help us close our eyes, and then she tells us not to wake up until the sun comes up. I guess she's heard that line one too many times! :)

Rachel's routines have changed over the past two years and I'm sure they will continue to change. I'm sure it will continue to be quite the adventure as her routines change...

Keeping Busy

As everyone knows, toddlers like to stay busy. So, whenever the sun is shining we try to get outside and play. Rachel loves to go for walks, feed the ducks, and play on the neighborhood playgrounds. A few months ago Rachel discovered dandelions. I showed her how you make a wish and blow the dandelions. I don't think Rachel quite gets the concept of a wish yet, but she calls dandelions "wishes" now. Last week while we were taking a walk we came across a lot of wishes. Rachel ended up with four wishes that she carried all the way home. She was pretty proud of her wishes! :) This morning Rachel was insistent upon going on a walk. Rachel's been a bit under the weather recently, so I knew she wouldn't last long. Plus, it was a pretty chilly morning. I told Rachel this, so she insisted that she could wear her hat to keep herself warm. I talked her into just walking across the street to feed the ducks. So, off we went with bread and her pink hat. While we were throwing bread into the canal for the ducks a gust a wind blew Rachel's hat off. Before I had a chance to catch it, it ended up in the canal. Rachel was quite concerned! Luckily the hat stayed right at the edge and I was able to retrieve it with my foot. Thank heavens it didn't float into the middle of the canal - it would have been a goner! Here's Rachel before we set off to feed the ducks: We certainly try to enjoy the sunshine, especially before we begin our hibernation mode this winter. With a newborn I doubt we'll be heading outdoors all that often. We do get plenty of rainy, cloudy days here as well. So, when those days come along it's quite the challenge to keep Rachel happily entertained. Some days she does great, but when we've had a long stretch of yucky weather she struggles. We've actually been pretty lucky so far this fall. However, one day last week we had some pretty crummy weather. So, Rachel kept herself busy with some princess foam stickers. At first she thought it was fun to put stickers all over the couch:

Pretty soon though she decided that Mommy was a better subject:

Even though this isn't the best picture in the world, it's a fun memory. Taking a picture of yourself with a toddler can be somewhat tricky, but it turned out! :) Rachel was pretty proud of herself. You can't see them in the picture, but I also have princess sticker earrings on and she found two that matched. Rachel is obsessed with matches. :)

Pedaling Princess

In the past couple of weeks Rachel has figured out how to pedal. Her legs have finally grown long enough and she loves pedaling. We went to the park today and she spent a good 1 1/2 hours pedaling around and around and around. She even let other kids join her every now and then. The other kids grew tired of pedaling, but Rachel didn't. She's probably worn herself out and will sleep great tonight! :)

Our Baby Girl!

Amy inspired us. :) Here's a look at 7 weeks into the future! I think it's funny that the baby has so much hair. Rachel pretty much just had fuzz for the first year and she still doesn't have much. For some reason I don't think it's that accurate. I guess we'll just have to see... :)

Priceless

There are two happy girls tonight in Holland because the man of the house is home once again. After another week of traveling, we are glad to have him home. We are definitely glad this out-of-town business isn't a regular occurrence. Rachel summed it up pretty good just a few hours ago. As we were all heading for the kitchen with the dirty dinner dishes Rachel said, "I'm so glad you're home", to her daddy. Absolutely priceless! I guess she likes having him home, so she can laugh and play and do silly things like this with him:

Such a big girl!

Rachel is certainly proud of herself! She eyed a princess suitcase a few months back and we told her we would buy it for her if she used the toilet. Well, about a month ago she changed her mind and wanted a Dora suitcase. :) I told the store clerk to not even bother with a bag. Rachel was ready to wheel her suitcase around. She was quite disappointed when we reached the car, but I was able to appease her by letting her hold it in her lap. So, one bag of M&Ms down and a Dora suitcase, and we can call it a success! Rachel was a pretty quick learner. It's only been a week and she hasn't had an accident since Saturday. Since Monday, when she wakes up in the morning she promptly tells me, "I want panties. No more diapers. I'm a big girl!". So, we quickly put panties on and she's ready to go for the day. We haven't attempted night training yet, but we'll get there eventually... I have to say that Rachel is going to look pretty darn cute in March when we come home and she's wheeling her Dora suitcase through the airport! :)