Grace Turns 2!

February, 11, 2011

Happy Birthday, Grace!!!
Your Dad and I can't believe how fast you are growing, how well you are talking, and how happy you are ALL THE TIME!
You go to sleep laughing in your crib, and wake up giggly and excited for the new day!

Your favorite thing about this birthday was the 'Happy Birthday' song.

How special you felt when we all sang it!

We sang it to you Friday night twice,

once at your birthday party on Saturday,

and once again Saturday after dinner!

I'll sing it to you every day if I get those awesome happy squeals and smiles!

At your party we played with magical wands, read some Fancy Nancy books, and opened up presents! It was a good day.

You are already so great at kicking balls, and holding pencils, running, jumping, singing and dancing! We can't wait to see what this new year brings for you!

We love you!

-Mom & Dad

Happy February 1st!

This February of the year 2011, welcomes us with beautiful white, crisp, clean, quiet snow. Snow that has fallen and continues to fall sometimes softly, sometimes with gusto. Snow that brought the Rasmussen family a very rare and beautiful gift...a day with DAD!!!

A day of projects, fun bubble baths in the jet tub, naps, coloring, lazying around and watching Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer one last time. One teeny tiny one's short adventure outside. It's been a day of hourly pics of our table and chairs on the back porch, decorating gingerbread angels and trees, and eating meatloaf and potatos. Most fun of all, a day of each other, a coveted day of just sitting and being, and watching the snow fall fall fall!

Oh, how I have loved this day!

The Magic House

As we pulled up to The Magic House (as us old people call it), it's now referred to as the Children's Museum, I was completely awe struck. It.was.huge. And then, I got a little dizzy once I realized that it had been TWENTY years since I had been there. Gulp.

I was happily surprised to find a lot of similar things here from the South Dakota Children's Museum...

Here is a HUGE sandbox...

a water room...


A special place just for children 0-2...

more of that special place...

A secret mouse house...

inside the mouse house...

An awesome three story Jack in the Beanstalk...

(surrounded by a spiral staircase all the way to the top)

There was a whole wing devoted to our government.

Here Grace is trying out the office to see how it fits.

Woo hoo!

This was fun.

Alex could be our next President in 2044!

I talked with Alex and Grace about whether or not they thought they'd be interested in the job of President of the United States.

Alex had some admirable ideas about healthcare and international relations.

Grace said she would feel comfortable running even though she's never been able to see another country from her backyard.

For our first talk on the subject, I think things went well.

The top of the beanstalk!

There was a whole room filled with trains and train tracks...

Awesome light/music room...

(this is Alex)

ELECTRICITY!!!

The power of AIR!

Air rockets...

A bubble room....

(Thank you, whoever you are, for helping Alex with his bubble!)

Alex didn't need any help doing this by himself!

Out of all of the kids, he was the only one who was little enough, and pulled it up at the right speed to actually work!

Way to go!

More bubbles...

And, of course, Musical Chairs!

We all had such a great time!

What a way, to spend a day, in the Lu!

The St. Louis Polar Express

Since watching The Polar Express, Alex has really started loving trains. He's been known to play with his train set for three hours constantly and quietly humming The Polar Express theme song. I felt it was time we got him on an actual train. What could be better?

Well, maybe not a train train, but I thought the MetroLink would work just fine...

...and it did!

First, we had to buy our tickets.

Grandma was free, and it turned out the kids were too (all children under 5 ride free).

So, we bought a ticket for lil' ol' me, gave it to Alex to hold (because that's part of the fun), and then waited...and waited...and waited for a train.

Here's a pic of the golden ticket!

It was super cold waiting for the train to come, but about halfway through our wait, we discovered there were heat lamps in some places.
Once the train started, any grumpiness from the cold vanished immediately!

Here are a few of the things we saw on our trip:

Other trains

The home of the BLUES!

The home of the CARDINALS!!!

The Arch!

We went over the Mississippi River!

And other Metros!

When we got to the end of the line, we had to get off, and wait for a train to come back and get us...here's our ride now!

We had a great time!

...but if we have to do it again, it will be when there is good weather and the trip will be half as long! :)

It's a Hard Knock Life

Tonight, after Alex spilled his milk for the second time, I turned around and found my sweet girl had gotten a towel and had started cleaning it up.

Immediately the following song (more specifically, the part I've highlighted in blue) started going off in my head.

Sing it with me now:

It's the hard-knock life for us!

It's the hard-knock life for us!

'Steada treated,

We get tricked!

'Steada kisses,

We get kicked!

It's the hard-knock life!

Got no folks to speak of, so,

It's the hard-knock row we how!

Cotton blankets,

'Steada wool!

Empty Bellies

'Steada full!

It's the hard-knock life!

Don't you feel like the wind is always howl'n?

Don't it seem like there's never any light!

Once a day, don't you wanna throw the towel in?


It's easier than puttin' up a fight!

It's a hard knock life!

Ha! Ha! Even as I'm writing this, Grace just came into the room and started playing the harmonica!!! How appropriate. The poor thing thinks she's been jailed.

Grace, do you need some 'one on one' time, honey???

Which brings me to the second cute Grace story of the day:

We are at the grocery store trying to load up and get into the car as fast as possible because of the snow and I say,

"Grace, come on," as I'm trying to help her out of the cart,

"You've got to help me with your legs! It's freezing out here and we're trying to move fast, remember?"
To which Grace excitedly replies, "Oh yeah. Sorry about that, honey."

Again, people in the parking lot think I'm crazy as I'm laughing hysterically!!!

Wouldn't you?

New Toothbrushes

Last night after the kids were asleep, I was doing my usual walkthrough of the house. I look for possible and potential disasters about to happen/already happened, and decide whether or not they are emergent enough to address at that moment, or can wait until the morning. (As you may have guessed, it is usually the latter.)

And THIS is what I walked into in the bathroom:

We just bought these new toothbrushes for the kids and they think they are awesome. They love that they can put them down on the counter and they stay standing up waiting for the next toothbrushing time.

I just could not get over that one of them actually thought to put them IN the sink. HA HA! Chris and I have NO IDEA which one did it. When I can't find Grace, I usually find her on/in the sink, and brushing her teeth is one of her favorite things to do. Alex, on the other hand, loves the sink too and spends a lot of time filling it up with water, soap, and other things...

Who do you think done it???

I Love Me Some Alex!

This is what just happened:

Scene: Mom is in the kitchen working on dinner. Alex runs in...

Alex: Mom, can I build my train tracks?

Mom: Sure, Alex. The tracks are in the closet, remember?

Alex: Oh yeah. Thanks, Mom, (giving me a high five) you are a GOOD listener!!!

Oh Happy Day! If only every day was going to be this easy! :)