Summer Fun!

Well, I suppose it's been long enough since my last post that I must acknowledge the elephant in the room...that's right, Katie's pregnant!  (Let me clarify that there is no correlation between the chosen animal and my pregnant wife, it's a common phrase and nothing more).  She's about 14 weeks along.  We're pretty sure it's a girl, just based on how brutal she was during the first trimester (whereas Daniel was not).  She has actually been doing quite well of late.  She experienced some pretty intense sickiness and tiredness in the first trimester, but we are moving past that at this point.

Baby #2 is about, again, about 14 weeks along.  According to our weekly updates, it is kicking around a bunch already, although it's hard to feel at this point, BUT, Katie said she already felt it move once.  What a good baby.  This'll be quite the journey.  Lots of people say that going from none to 1 is tough, but 1 to 2 is much harder.  I say..."challenge accepted".  Mainly because we don't have a choice now.  Daniel has really grown up quite a bit (literally...he can actually reach light switches now without a step stool) in that he is a super helpful little dude.  He helps do the dishes, clean up, put things away, and when he plays with other kids (some of the time) he's getting better at being a sweet lil' guy.  Kate's due date is about mid-December, so he'll be quite a bit older by then.  We're hoping he'll have his license so he can help with driving duty, but stupid Nebraska state laws will probably hold him back...

Strong opinions for a toddler.

Other happenings in the last month?  I finished my 10K.  If I died, then I'm living the exact same afterlife as my previous life, I'm going to assume I survived.  It was tough, but I wasn't passed in the last mile and had my personal best.  That was a big deal for me.  I also completed the Warrior Dash with my bro-in-law, Queño.  That was ridiculous as the rain left the course barely runable, but it's one of those things we'll look on as old men as a fond memory of mud-caking and falling.  School has finished and Katie is preparing for her new year in a new school district.  Again, she'll be working in Papillion now and teaching at Trumble Park.  She's very excited to have her own building and to teach more levels.  I'm in marching band mode and writing drill to make my band look like eagles, flowers, and such (actually, they look more like fallen necklaces and occasional parallelograms).

Last leg of the Papio 10k.  It was raining.

This was following the Warrior Dash.  I found mud in my ears two days later.  AFTER showering twice.

We've also welcomed two new folks into the Elsasser family.  Kate's brother, Brian and his wife, Danielle, had their awesome little boy, Brycen and her other brother, Rick and HIS wife Jackie had Eden about a month later.  The plan is to have enough kids to make yard-work unnecessary in our own generation.  I know Daniel has to work on operating the weed-whacker though, but we'll get there (Disclaimer:  I do NOT let Daniel use any yard tools except maybe an empty bucket).

Babysitting Baby Brycen.  Daniel was being quite helpful.  

This is at the hospital where Eden was delivered...so...I don't have any pics of Eden yet.

We've done some zoo fun, I traveled to Chicago with my band, saw some baseball games, played outside, went camping, had some family get togethers and many, many other happenings, but most of you have probably stopped reading by now, so here's some pictures!

Museum of Science and Industry with my WWII look alike.

Enjoying a Stormchasers game.

Eating some dinner with his buddy, Amelia.

Playing with his very, very favorite toy.

Best buds with our two curly-haired spawns.

Letters with attitude.

Even superheros gotta snack.

"Look!  A reticulated giraffe!"

Camping fun.  Check out the action shot on his cousin, Elaina, falling.

Drinking in the nude.  

Side-saddling?  I've heard of space-cowboys, but this is ridiculous!!

Tractor.

Big boy swing!

So much mess...so much sugar...so much summer.  

Growing Up So Fast

Man...it seems like Daniel is just making such great strides these last couple of weeks.  His attention to detail when it comes to routines is pretty great....most of the time.  He certainly gets very upset when things are out of order or against his wishes.  We've really been working hard on teaching him ways to communicate with us, because we find that's one of the times he gets really frustrated is when he wants something or is ready for something and we...don't know what that something IS!  Again, routines and certain words seem to help.  One of the best ideas (from Katie) was to teach Daniel to say "Help, please" when he would get frustrated with something.  Situations like getting stuck somewhere, not being able to get a lid back on can, not being able to find a certain page in a book.  He used to just get pretty darn upset, but he's much more calm and communicates so much better from just say "Helpee"...which is how it comes out.

Good speller.

A couple notes of some fun displays by our little guy, Daniel.  He's a very helpful guy.  He helps with the laundry and dishes.  I can give him his socks or PJs or shoes or pants or even shirts and he'll know where they go in his room...they don't stay folded, but it's a good start!  I'll take all the knives and sharp objects out when unloading our dishwasher and he'll proceed to hand me dishes or even put away items where he can access the cabinets/drawers (pots/pans).  He always helps clean up at night, he's usually very good with directions, and he's eating at the table very well for the most part.

I put him in the swing backwards...whoops.

This last week was pretty blazay (spelling?).  I had an honor band last weekend which is always bittersweet because I have a good time, but it often means an entire day without any time with Daniel.  Makes me look forward to getting more time in the summer.  We did get some big news for Katie.  As of this week, she will be working in the Papillion-LaVista School District this upcoming year at Trumble Park Elementary.  I know she would say that she truly loved Millard and will miss it terribly, but this will be a great opportunity for her and she's very excited to have her very own classroom and building.  I am truly ecstatic for her and know that Trumble Park is going to be extremely blessed to have her...also...it's about 5 minutes from our house =)  Katie's also been very, very busy with some graduate courses she's taking towards her Masters.  She just finished off some big benchmarks this week, so I know she has some relief, even if it's little.

Reuinted!

Lots of writing this week!  Looking forward to a nice rest of the week and hoping that you all have a nice time as well!

Camping...and other stuff

When we last left the Konrad family, they were on their way to a week full of work and camping!  Since even then, we've had family pictures, pumpkin gutting, and more sitting in stuff then we could imagine.  

Pic from our nature walk while camping.  Check out those noses.

Thug life.

The last couple of work weeks have been a bit of a blur.  It's parent-teacher conference time, so evening schedules are skewed and days grow long.  Just this last week, Katie and I traded almost every single evening because one of us had something or other.  We've also been preoccupied with the growing dilemma which is our treadmill breaking.  I've personally been using it a ton and with the colder weather (and my lack of experience running in colder weather), we were looking to replace it.  Kate was awesome in helping us find the one that currently occupies our workout space.  

Punkin walking.

So excited to Trick or Treat that he forgot his clothes (except his socks)

Cleaning pumpkins!

Last weekend, we went camping with Jen and Queño (Kate's sister and brother-in-law) and their baby girl, Elaina.  We'll have lots of pictures from that weekend.  Kate's friend, Kelly, also brought her son, Duncan out for some fun mud time.  It was hilly, we ate some Dutch oven food (sooooooo good), shot some arrows, and watched horses hang out.  

Elaina and my Myspace photo (message me if you forgot what Myspace is)

Elaina eating paper...don't worry...it's laminated.

Playing with Duncan.

Excited that my wife is learning the skills necessary to protect our habitat.

Daniel's first solo concerto.

Today we did some pictures for Kate's side of the family and we're really looking forward to seeing how they come out.  I got a couple over-the-shoulder shots, but the professional shots will look much better.  

Taylor's unphased.  That's focus, folks.

Getting buried by Grandpa.

More fun with Grandpa.

Daniel updates:  He's climbing like CRAZY!  Gets up and down so easily.  I'm still not comfortable with him descending the stairs, but he'll get there.  He's pretty good about not standing on furniture too.  Good thing for the future I hope...we won't let him watch Tom Cruise's appearance on Oprah because he's a bad influence regarding furniture jumping.  Daniel also is at this stage where he likes to sit in everything.  It could be as big as a laundry basket or as small as a can.  I have a collage below of all his random sittings.  Is this normal?  Do other kids do this?  Meh...anyways.  He's babbling like crazy still, walking quite steadily, and even running a bit.  What a great kid.

Climbing.

Happy (and a little curious...)

Enjoy some sitting pics!  

On the pot.

Daniel's bowling.

More sitting in stuff.  With his ducky of course.  That's water on his shirt.

Sitting in Grandpa's chair.

Sitting on the chair.

More sitting...

Summah Blog

Hey folks!  It's been awhile.  I'd say I've been busy, but goodness gracious I'm on summer break.  We're taking advantage of our first summer as a family and it has been quite nice.  Gee willakers (sp?), it's been a bit since I updated so a lot has happened.  School's out...as I stated earlier, but I just wanted to reiterate.

Since summer has started we've been keeping busy.  It'll be a picture heavy week (I had a former student say that she basically just looks at the pictures anyway.  Internet nerds call that TL;DR (stands for Too Long Didn't Read).  We spent a day at the zoo (Kate had a second visit today with a friend).  That was a nice bunch of walking.  I hadn't been there for a looong time, but I loved it as always.  Daniel liked to watch the monkeys.  I think it's because he recognizes them from the pants he wears with the monkey on the butt.  

We also spent a day camping at the LAKE OF THREE FIRES near Bedford, IA.  We did so with some friends of ours and it was great fun.  We're going to head back there some other time and try for the overnight thing.  I'm just not quite ready for that yet...we'll get there though.  This is out of order, but we celebrated Mothers' Day for Kate's family on Memorial Day.  We have a great field by our house so...what do the Elsasser men do when there's a big open field???...Golf baby.  It was a good time though.  Lots of good food.

We've been running lots of errands, doing lots of yard work, cleaning a bunch around the house, going out with friends, visiting the splash pads at Shadow Lake, moving dirt at our church, working at our schools, fishing with friends...just keeping busy.  BUT...in the essence of becoming long winded (I DID take a few weeks off though), I'll move on.

We had Daniel's appointment yesterday.  He weighs 22lbs 14.5oz (83rd Percentile) .  He's 29.5" long (86th).  His head is 18.5" around (90th).  The doctor said that he's lowering in the weight/height percentile, but he's making up for it with his large noggin.  Way to go son, so proud.

Here's some pictures!

Daniel protecting cousin Elaina.

I've decided that I'm going to tell Daniel when he's older that the style was wearing your pants way up high.

He's actually holding a ladle too. 

Camping with our friends.

Hanging at the splash pad.

Hanging with his homie...Joe HOMAN that is.

Kate spraying Daniel.  Don't worry, he loves it.

Daniel's friend the penguin. 

From our visit to Auburn.  Pre-shave and a haircut............2 bits.

Playing with Grandma Elsasser.

Probably one of my favorite pictures. 

Golfing in the field.