First Snow

I don't know what the weather was like where you were, but in Central Iowa it was snowy on Saturday and Sunday. As I write this, I think we're up to about 5 inches. Mr. Teacher is hoping for a two hour late start, but we'll have to see what the wind does. Anyway, Jenna was very excited because she got to try out her snow pants and boots. She and Aaron played outside and built a snowman and fort. Jenna had a blast and is hoping for more snow days!

Thanksgiving

We had a nice quiet Thanksgiving in State Center. Our day consisted of: watching the Macy's parade on t.v., me making enough food for about six instead of three, Aaron re-arranging the basement and moving toys down there, watching Christmas movies (including one of my favorites, Home Alone), and eating leftovers. It was hard for me not to be with my family, but I survived.
My mom came down Friday afternoon and we all put up the Christmas stuff. We have a lot of stuff! I told Aaron I feel like Clark Griswold, but the more the merrier, right? :)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Just wanted to wish everybody a Happy Thanksgiving! Enjoy the time with your family and safe travels to everybody who is hitting the road. We are stuck in State Center all by ourselves. Aaron has basketball, so it just didn't work out for us to go anywhere. Grandma Jo is coming down on the weekend, so we're excited to see her. Happy Turkey Day! :)

Happy Birthday/Happy Hawk Fans Weekend!

Brody sitting by the recently installed snowmen lights.

Jenna sitting with the birthday boy!

Grandpa Frank and the Brode Man.

Brody climbed in the laundry basket, head-first, so Jenna had to get in too.

Jenna, a.k.a. Little Betty Crocker, making the birthday cake!

We had a really nice weekend. Friday kicked-off the girls basketball season and West Marshall won both the JV and Varsity games. Aaron's parents, Frank and Linda, made the trip from Sioux City and caught the second half of the game.

Saturday Aaron had basketball practice, so we hung out at home. Grandma and Grandpa got some quality time in with their grandbabies. Saturday night we watched the Hawks whoop-up on the Gophers! That was unexpected, but very cool! I thought the game would be close, but I guess not. Needless to say, there were many happy Hawkeye fans at our house.

Sunday was Aaron's birthday. He is now 29 and holding! Jenna and I made a "party cake" (Jenna's words) for "Papa" in the morning. She did so good! I measured everything out and she dumped and stirred. For lunch we had a little KFC and then because it was so nice, Aaron decided to put up some Christmas lights. What a great day Sunday was - the weather was amazing for November 23! After Frank and Linda left Aaron said he wanted to take a nap, "because it was his birthday," so Jenna and papa had a nap. Brody and I went for a walk and when we got back the other two were up and Jenna was very upset she didn't get to go, so Brody and Mom went for another walk, this time up to the park so Jenna could play.

We ended the night by watching the movie "Evan Almighty," which Aaron and I laughed through and Jenna just liked the animals. Above are some pictures from the weekend.

Happy Birthday Aaron!

Today is Aaron's 29th Birthday! Jenna and I are getting ready to make him a "party cake" as Jenna calls it. I'm sure it will be delicious! Happy Birthday Hon!

Flashback to the 80s

I don't know how many people watch The Biggest Loser, but we LOVE it. It's 'must see t.v.' for the Burdorf's. Anyway, tonite they had a flashback to the 80s. Wow! That really brought back some memories of some really nasty fashion. Let's take a trip down memory lane together. Do you remember: tight rolling your pants? side ponytails? (I had a school picture taken with one!) big hair and LOTS of hairspray? crimping your hair? (Confession: I owned a crimper!) those slouch socks that you wore OVER your tightrolled pants? Zubaz pants? Neon colors? Okay, that's all I can handle because that was just some brutal fashion.

On a side note for those of you who watch the show: Can you believe that Amy didn't vote off Vicky? What the heck?!

And then there were four!

Brody has two more teeth! He is up to four total - three on the bottom and one on the top. His other top tooth is just about ready to poke through the gums, so pretty soon he'll be up to five. He's doing well and hasn't been too fussy, just drooly and chewy! :)

Weekend Update

Our cuddly little Hawkeyes!

Jenna singing ABC's. She ends the song, "Now I know my ABC's, next time won't you write your name." We have no idea where that came from.

Brode Man playing and sporting his new haircut!

It was another uneventful weekend at our house, which is fine by us! We are enjoying these few quite weekends before basketball games and the holidays roll around.

Aaron had basketball practice on Saturday and it happened to be during the Iowa football game - he was NOT happy about that! Because it was so blustery we decided to stay home in our sweats, watched some games, and played with the kids. We spent large portion of the afternoon watching state volleyball on t.v. Two of the teams from our conference made it and also a college friend's (Gabe) brother coached Tripoli to the Class 1A title. Aaron played some fastpitch softball with him when we lived in Sioux City, so it was cool to watch him win the championship.

Sunday was more of the same, although we did venture out for groceries. I know we sound really boring, but we love weekends like this. Plus, basketball games start this week, which means our lives are about to get pretty hectic and crazy!

Season Finale (Just for Scott)

Well, the football season is officially over, so in honor of that I'd thought I'd put some more ridiculous writing from the local paper. I italicized the parts that I think are ridiculous, but feel free to form your own opinion. Who knows what kind of crazy writing basketball and wrestling will bring. Scott, enjoy!

1. We kick. They receive. And so this de facto championship begins. (de facto? Who says that?)

2. You know this is going to turn out all right. You just know because these are our Trojans and they believe in themselves as much as we believe in them, and if ever a group deserved the Dome this group does because, truthfully, fate if for 16th-century poets and 54-year old divorced men, but not this football team. No. Not. No. No. No. (16th century poets? Never thought I'd see that in a fb story!)

3. WM has it now first down on its 32 when Sam Buck breaks one. He just breaks one. Breaks through the line and breaks through the 'backers; breaks through the secondary in to the open field beyond; breaks through the hearts and souls and collective minds that is the Big Red coaching staff and their vociferous fan base; breaks through the boundaries a 17-14 deficit influct; then, finally, breaks through the real-life line of imperial authority, the end zone itself. (In case you missed it, he was breaking thru a lot of stuff! Vociferous? Seriously?)

4. And finally.....Coach Winkler's razzle-dazzle was never more razzley dazzley than the next play. (Speaks for itself, doesn't it?)

New title

Well, I officially have a new title that became effective on Monday. I am now a SINGLE, married wife and mom of two kids! It happens about this time every year and also happens in May. If you haven't figured it out, basketball season started! Although I know my husband loves to coach, I really do feel like a single sometimes throughout the winter. Aaron usually has games on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays, so I feel like I barely see the guy. I'll get through it though, although it should be interesting juggling another kid at basketball games!

Our unexciting weekend

Well, I don't really have too much to report from our weekend. We were kind of lazy bums, but that's how we like it. We didn't travel anywhere and nobody visited us.

The big news I guess was that Brode Man got his first haircut! We went uptown Saturday morning to the local place and they were so great with Brody. He sat pretty still and we were done in about 5-7 minutes. Afterwards, I sort of teared up because he looks so much older! It kind of tugged at my mommy hearstrings. By the way, Jenna liked the place because she got two free suckers. :)

After that, we headed to Marshalltown for winter coats. Not the most exciting thing to do, but since it did snow all day Friday we figured we better get them.

The rest of the weekend we caught up on housework and watched football. The Hawks game was awesome! They finally pulled off a close win. I know my heart was sure palpitating, but what a great game!

Week one volleyball...

Well, we survived our first week of volleyball! Eleven people showed up and I am happy to say that Aaron and I held our own. We weren't the worst players on the court (yeah for us!). We got a good workout and had a lot of laughs, which was great!

Why not change?

As a history teacher, what a great night last night was for our country.  Whether you are for or against the winner, presidential elections always stir up what is best about the USA-- your right to vote!  Freedom, after all, is what our country was founded on and can be seen in no better fashion then hundreds of people lining up to have their voice be heard.

No matter who won last night I was sure to have a historical angle to talk about this morning but with Obama winning that angle is even more prevalent.  As you may know, I am a person who doesn't always go with the flow, I don't always agree with the norm.  

Why not change?  What is wrong with a 'black' president?  Don't give me this 'he doesn't have experience' line...  totally not true!  Don't give me this 'he can't make good decision' line... he can and will, he has to!  What is wrong with passing on another 4 years of failed policies?  You can't argue that McCain doesn't have direct ties to what has happened the last 8 years.  I am not saying that McCain couldn't have been a great president but that is what is great about our country... the ability to choose!

What this country needs is for people to lose the idea of 'Republican' vs. 'Democrat' and start thinking about 'Americans'.  I don't know if this will happen in the next 4 years but I hope it does.  I was glad to see that the 'Democrats' didn't get to 60 seats in the Senate because that makes both sides work for what they want.  

Maybe in 20 years we won't have two-party politics maybe we will have 'American' politics. Maybe in 20 years we will figure out that Congress makes the decisions for our country and that the President only oversees what is happening during the process.  How many of YOU studied up on the issues that faced both your state and federal officials, not just followed the presidential race?  

I ask of you this...  stand up and be proud to be an 'American', be grateful to be free, and respect the office of President for this is a very turbulent time in our history and IF we chose not to work together it won't matter who is President

Election Day

Election Day is finally here! Not like you need to be reminded, but make sure you go and vote today. No matter what side you're voting for, it's important to go and cast your ballot.

I know we'll be glued to the t.v. tonite at our house. Aaron will be in full control of the remote switching from station to station I am sure. I wonder what commercials will air tomorrow? Hooray for no more political ads!

Family Picture

Here's a family photo that we took when we visited Justin and Mandy in Mankato. I will say, it is definitely a challenge to get everybody smiling at the same time!

Jenna is 2 1/2 and Brody 7 months.

We're getting old...

Aaron and I had this idea that we should start up an adult volleyball league in State Center. We would have it every Wednesday night from November-January for about an hour and a half or so. We have no idea how many people are going to show up, but there have been many people who have talked to us about coming and it starts this Wednesday.

Well, this past weekend my sister, Jess, and her boyfriend, Mitch, came down on Saturday to hang out with us. Because Aaron and I haven't played volleyball for a long time, we decided to go up to the gym and just work some of the rust off.

We are old! I used to play twice a week when we lived in Sioux City, but haven't played in my post-baby era. Yikes! It was scary. When I was bumping I felt like I couldn't get down and actually had to stretch. Remember back in the day when you stretched because the coach made you, not because you felt like you needed it? My, how times have changed!

It's funny how you take for granted what great shape you were in as a teenager. You could practice 2-3 hours and not think a thing of it. Now, my workouts consist of chasing around two children under the age of three and walks that include pushing a double stroller (which I think could double as weight training!). We found out we are in really sucky shape, especially judging by how much we were sweating (for the record, Jess and Mitch were too). Yesterday was another story, my shoulders and back are SORE!

I'm a little nervous about Wednesday night. I fear that I'm going to be the worst one on the court, but Aaron keeps assuring me I'll be fine and it will be fun. We'll see how it goes. I'll let you know...