Piper

Hello 2010

I guess I shoudl post something on here to let people know we are still alive and almost well in Iona, ID. The holidays were good to us! We spent Thanksgiving with my family in Twin Falls, at Lacey's new home. Christmas we were able to have a visit from, yes St Nick came but so did Aspen and Troy, Tarry, and Mom and Dad with the younger Waters clan. Wes' mother, Mike and Blake came Christmas eve for pizza, Blake came back the next day for a while too. We rushed a tape and texture job the few days before Chirstmas and had a semblance of a family room where we decorated the tree and opened presents. IN THE BASEMENT! Then after Christmas with the family still with us we put them to work priming and painting the new family room. Any and all who wish to come see it is welcome to stop in and stay for a bit. I spent my birthday painting and accent wall and then New Years eve we started laying a lovely Brazilian Cherry laminate floor. Three days later and 2 swollen hand the majority of the floor is down and we have carried down the TV, entertainment center, DVD cases, and installed the surround sound system. The bean bag has found a new home in the center of the new floor. Piper loves it!

I have since carried down the double recliner so there is newly found space in our "office" up stairs and comfortable seats down stairs. I am working on making new cushion covers for some lovely wood furniture that will reside in the living room once the covers are done. Then the comfortable couch and love seat will also go down stairs.

I started back at work the first Monday after the New Year, and school started (ISU) the 11th. My classes are terrifying! I am praying to pass all 3 and working on Grad School application! This is my last semester of Pre-Professional classes!!! I will be taking fall semseter off this year to hopefully help my brain recover.

Question, how do you refer to this year? 2010 do you say two thousand ten, or twenty ten? A topic of discussion at work.

Wes is still at the credit union and we are hoping to some day soon have a floor plan to present to the owners of a specific building here in town for a future SHAKE OUT in Idaho Falls.

Piper is a delight and a challenge, We love her to pieces and enjoy listening to her chatter about things daily. She also is very stubborn and determined, where did she get that?? Just today, she wanted to go to a friends house to play and pulled me all over the house to get my boots on, her coat on, looking for her boots... Then screaming when I sat down for a minute to rest. We ended up next door for a few minutes and in that time was being bullied by the 3 year old so she bit her on her cheek! We promtly left as I lectured her on not biting. What to do with a toddler? Anyway, we are still here and that is a bit of what we are up to.

Feel free to comment, I love getting feed back!

Trick or Treat (woof woof)

Our cute little puppy, she was not feeling so secure on the trunk of the car. We took her trick or treating at the down town North Platte 11th annual Halloween trick or treat around local businesses. We really liked the money tree idea and wished we had one with some real cash on it :)

Crossing the street to find the fun.

Piper couldn't say trick or treat so we had her say woof woof instead, so cuted she said it out the side of her mouth. If you look close you can see which side was her bark.

Meeting the big black cat

Hello Big Bird

This is Sparky the fire house dog.

They even let her sit in the drivers seat of the fire truck.

We went sledding that night rather than trick or treating because we didn't feel much like knocking doors to people we don't know. This is basically the ONLY hill in North Platte. She loved the sledding and always was the first person to sit on the sled when it was on the ground. It was dark so the pictures didn't turn out the best.

Grandpa going down with Piper.

The Jones Family ready to go!

Halloween and Nebraska

Piper's first experience with snow. Piper's first step into some "deep" snow, she stopped there and cried because it was cold.

Then she tried to pick it up and learn more about it.

Building a bucket snowman with Grandma

It is getting taller

A finished snowman who promptly fell over :(

Piper driving her John Deer tractor in the snow, she loves vehicles that move!

After one night of snow this is what we ended up with. Piper is 31 inches tall and you can see the snow was pretty high up on her. We shoveled for a while to get cars out.

The start of the pumpkin clean out. Piper tried to use a spoon...

She quickly figured out her hand worked so much better.

Each time she picked up a handful she would say eww or yucky.

We did not get the end result of the carved pumpkin but this was the last of the goop pulled out. Piper had a blast and I think her Dad enjoyed it aswell. Wes found a power tool for pumpkin carving. Proof that he knows how to use it. Grandpa Joe made this rocking horse for Wes when he was a little boy. Piper loved it! She also found the glasses to be very entertaining.

What has Piper been up to?

See how tall she is now? At her 18 month check up she was 31 inches tall and her weight had not changed. She was still 20.5 lbs. This put her in the 3rd % for her weight. I don't remember what % her height was I think it was around 17. Anyway, they suggested putting her on pediasure to help her gain weight. I have not done that but I think she is gaining a little here and there so hopefully she will get upto 22 lbs some day. Her carseat says to put her forward facing at 22 lbs.

Growing Pics, we try to get pictures of the "kids" with Piper at least every couple of months to compare how much she has grown. I remember when they were bigger or the same size as her.

At Walmart waiting for a antibiotic perscription, she had another ear infection. This is what she did with her sticker from the pediatrician's office. That is the ear that had the infection, her own little band-aid.

We had to stop at Cabela's and she loves trying on hats.

Piper found Adam's chex cereal down stairs. He usually lets her eat some so did not think much about her carrying the box. Then we found her at the bottom of the stairs and she had dumped out the entire box. She started eating it then changed to crushing it into the floor.

Happy girl going to "school" daycare. It is on the high school campus and students come over each period to learn about taking care of kids and helping with the daycare. It is such a great set up and she is learning so much. We are truly blessed to have the opportunity to have her in this program since she has to be in one anyway.

Piper going to "school" She loves walking into daycare with her backpack carrying her lunch.

Piper after finished with her cereal she put the bowl on her head to let us know she was done.

I might have already uploaded this one but it has been so long I thought I would add it again. She is the little mother, driving and taking care of baby. We were in the store the other day and she loved the entire row of babies.

We were at a fabric store and Piper decided it was time to pray! So cute!

little mother

Piper has suddenly taken to babying her baby dolls. Last night, sorry no picture, she was shushig her baby while putting her to bed. She would pat her back and say sh sh sh sh pat her a few more times and then drop her over the side of the crib. Then reach in through the side and pull her out to repeat the process. It really was adorable, then she needed her blanket to wrap the baby in. This was happening just minutes before we put her to bed so we just sat in her room watching her do this.
Earier this week she was out side playing with the little neighbor girl and she took her baby patted the baby's back and sat down in the car. She held onto the baby and was "driving" the car. I did get a picture of that!

Unfortunately my computer is now being stubborn and not allowing me to upload pictures, sorry!

Big News

I got a job. It is at the same school district but obviously different from what I have been doing. A week ago Friday I got called for an interview with the Bonneville School District for an interpreting position. Things looked good, I was excited/anxious for the change, and ready to give notice to the part time job I started at the beginning of the month. The one hang up was they had to keep the position open for 10 days before offering a job and it had only been 3 full days. Ten days was Thursday and schools starts tomorrow. that did not give them alot of time to find someone or me if they offered me the job to give notice at the other district. We would have to find Piper a new daycare facility and I was not ready to give up the place she has been going to. Then later that same Friday afternoon my old boss called. She had an interpreting position just open up and my name was on the top of her list. I guess my constant emails all summer and asking about interpreting positions was a good thing. The job is working in a self contained classroom with students I have worked with in the past. I have been at this school for 3 years and know most of the staff. I of course accepted the position and called Wes to tell him I got a job. Now Piper can stay in her daycare and I will be going to a school that I at least am not completely the new person. Know i find out that though my title is interpreter the real position is class room aide. This student they say does not need an interpreter all the time so I will be doubling as aide. This ought to be interesting. I am still excited about the position but I have a feeling I am going to be explaining something to the teacher about legal service time on an IEP. If the service time says all school day then legally I need to be with that student all school day.