Happy 2nd Birthday Maycen!

Happy Birthday to my little Lovey!  We celebrated Maycen's birthdya while we were down in CA.  We had a bunch of family and friends meet at the bowling alley. Where we had Pizza and food and decorations of Pink Pig's since Maycen is into little Piggy's, likely from a show she likes to watch called Peppa Pig a British cartoon that is pretty funny. 

There have been so many fun 1st and milestones reached this year!  I really love this stage and her personality. I love to hear her singing and be silly. She is definately trying to express herself and her independance more. And although she seems advanced to me and her daycare teachers seem to think so as well, in her language skills I can still see her frustration when she wants something but isn't sure how to say it or when she misinterprets something.

Favorite songs, Itsy Bitsy Spider and Happy Birthday are still top songs.

We actually drove back on her actual Birthday to meet up with a friend of ours from Hawaii on the way back.

We spent New Years Eve shopping at the outlet mall and then went to Mcdonalds Playland and headed home just intime to get M in the bath Chopper a bath, throw in some laundry and settled in for Champagne toast and fireworks on TV.

Christmas in CA

We drove down to California just after Christmas and spent Maycen's Birthday with the Toppenberg's. Grandma Crystal did not get much of a break having us come in a few days after the festivities.  We had a Rib Roast BBQ at their house and had family and friends over so Jared could try out his rib smoking.  Unfortunaltely Ribs sometimes take their own time when smoking and it was pretty late by the time we got to dish up all the food! People were extra hungry with all the good smells so I think even if it had been horrible everyone would have dug in. Luckily, it wasn't and it was pretty yummy. 

It was nice to have so much help from Cousin Paris.  She is really good with Maycen and Maycen just loved all the attention and playtime!  I loved the breaktime:)

We opened Christmas with them and Papa T read some books to Maycen.  She really is a Daddy's girl and sometimes takes a while to warm up to other men. But she loves her books and all her gifts. 


Since we drove down we brought Chopper and stayed at Auntie Brenna's with all the kids. Brit is on her own now and out of the house so we missed her but Maycen loved all the activity and Paityn's toys and trucks.  The dog's were crazy and exhausted after a full week of nonstop play time and wrestling.

Grandma Crystal took us Shopping with the girls and we got to see Brit at work. I think Maycen rode every horse on the Carousel and threw quite a tantrum when we had our last ride. 

Christmas in WA

We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

We hope that this holiday greeting finds you all doing well.  We have had a fun year watching our daughter Maycen (23months) change from baby stage to a talking, laughing and exploring little lady.  The world through her eyes is so much more exciting and fun.

 


We are still living in Washington State. Jared is still in the National Guard working full time with Washington's Counter Drug Team and he continues to do guard once a month. His summer season came to an end pretty early this year after he crashed his bike and broke his ankle. We are lucky that that was all it was. He was in a boot most of the summer after he had surgery to put pins in place.

I am still working as a Pediatric Nurse for the Army hospital, this is my 10th year as a nurse.

Jared and I are feeling a little old this past year with all our surgeries and minor ailments. I also had surgery on my wrist for Carpel Tunnel which I have in both wrists after being pregnant with Maycen and it never went away. After surgery in March, I ended up having some minor complications which will require a re-do surgery. My surgery was scheduled for August however, Jared found himself in the operating room and now the surgeries for me are on hold until a later date...
As we are excited and feel very blessed to announce that we are expecting a little brother or sister for Maycen in June 2012.












Despite all the recuperating we have also gotten to do some fun things this past year including visits to families in MN and CA. Jared and I celebrated our 5th anniversary in Vegas and Maycen got to hang out with her Nana and Grandpa for the weekend. We took a helicopter sunset flight and touched down inside the Grand Canyon. We went to Mnt Bachelor in February and had a great time snowboarding.

In the first part of August, Maycen had her first camping trip and spent hours throwing rocks into the river. Thanks to all of Jared's downtime with his broken ankle we got a lot of use out of our boat that we bought at the start of this summer. With all our aliments we couldn't waterski but Maycen had a great time swimming with our dog Chopper.










With so many people out of work and struggling we both feel lucky to have jobs that are pretty reliable and stable, we feel blessed that even though we are far from our families' homes that our families are in good health and make an effort to stay connected.



We will be spending Christmas in Washington this year then driving down to celebrate Maycen's 2nd Birthday with family in CA for the New Year.  We wish you all a Merry Christmas and good health, happiness and prosperity for the New Year!

Please check in for updates on Baby T #2. I update this site every few months with new pictures and news to keep family and friends from afar in the loop.

Love and Peace,


Becky, Jared, Maycen and Chopper too!

Santa weekend

Jared had Guard this past weekend so I decided to move forward with creating some fun Holiday traditions despite his not being present.  So we spent a lot of time seeing the Man in the Red Suit! We had breakfast with Santa at the Firehouse in Dupont. She did pretty good sitting on his lap and then got to enjoy climbing up in the firetruck.  

We made it to the tree lighting later that night and also saw Santa there.

Jared's Hanger Christmas Party
we saw Santa again this weekend he surprised the kids arriving on a motorcycle.  Maycen was not that into sitting with him again but was over joyed with her princess wand and quickly took center stage to entertain with it.

Maycen loves airplanes and helicopters.  This year before Jared broke his ankle he was flying and hovered over the house and waved to her. So now everytime one flies over she says dadda and points or if she sees a picture of one will say "Dadda Airplane".  Maycen was fascinated with all the planes in the hangers but to our surprise she was a bit scared to get in Jared's helicopter and really didn't take to it much the first time even on Daddy's lap.  Maybe it looked too scary or like a big black bug, who knows she did better on the bigger ones and the planes.

She appears interested here on Dad's lap but only lasted a few seconds and was in tears again, wanting down.

After the party we were off to our last Holiday event for the weekend we went to pick and cut our own tree. With our little space in our home we have bought Christmas trees at Home Depot and lots before only to get them home and they are huge. So I figured what better way to find the right tree than to see it in its actual form before you pick it.

Maycen had fun running around playing hide and seek in the trees

Here is our tree that met our measurements to a tee, I liked it too because it was a left over from last year you can see it's all alone with no other trees its size near it.  I thought how sad it must feel all alone with these new trees.  So I stuck to my tree is the best pick. 

      Jared is showing off his strength by carrying our tree back to the packaging area.  Maycen loves all the lights on the tree and I am not sure how all the decorations will hold up this year as she is very curious about it all.  I came down the other day and she was standing in my reindeer that holds our Christmas cards.