Finally its over!

Finally - the semester is over. Teaching is done. My last paper just got turned in. I am done. Not that this semester wasn't fun at school; I got to write a paper on energy security and that was really interesting. Do you know what the future of energy is? It looks pretty grim since it is projected that in about 10 years almost 95% of the world's energy supply will come from the Persian Gulf - a region of complete instability. And there are signs that the largest oil fields in Saudi Arabia - which produce 40% of the world's oil - are drying up and aging. How unnerving is that? Like I said, fun but hard work.

And now it is over. The stress is off for a while. My thesis proposal is in and awaiting approval by my advisor so that I can start on the research. Now all that I have to do is work and family - not that those are small things.

I get to enjoy the spirit of Christmas just in time for Christmas!!! I am really excited. I love Christmas time and have missed all the candy and cookie making that I normally do. So now I get to go full-throttle into that to make up for lost time.

As a Christmas present to ourselves, Jon and I are going househunting on Saturday. Hopefully we fall in love with something that is available.

Let it snow!

Let it snow! Incidently, those were the words to the last Christmas carol I heard last night before going to bed. Nicholas woke up at 11:15 and was crying for his father so he got his father.

And then the power went off. I called SMUD on my cell (strange how I have SMUD's power outage line on my cell phone) and they said it would be back on at 2:30am. This is on a night where the lows were predicted to be low enough to have snow in the morning. Nicholas went back to sleep, so did Jon. Jon promptly stole my covers and then I couldn't get to sleep becuse it was cold.

So I did the next best thing - read by flashlight. This was a little difficult because I have to use the light of my cell phone to find the flashlight - because Nicholas plays with flashlights and puts them in odd places. That makes it hard to turn the pages, but oh well. I woke up twice more with Nicholas. The last time - around2:15 am - I looked out my window...and there it was....snow in Sacramento!!! It didn't stick, so there was no use in taking Nicholas out, but it was fun to see.

I saw pictures of St. Mary's - my alma mater - and they had snow sticking on the ground, the hills, and the roof. It was pretty.

Maybe we can get one more night of snow, and let it be on the ground in the morning. But the power should also stay on that night.

Family pictures

What better time to get some family pictures than Thanksgiving Day? We wore nice clothes - then changed before we ate - and had a blast. So here are the newest Wunderlich family photos.

BYU and Nicholas

The BYU v. Utah game was Saturday. It's a big day for Jon. Normally we have a party at a friend's house and everyone comes, we all have fun, and laugh as Jon and Steve get really into the BYU game. It's hilarious.

This year, the big game was on a day when people were gone on vacation for Thanksgiving. And I had 3 papers to write, along with grading to do. So, instead, Jon and Nicholas went over to Steve's place (while Steve wasn't there) and watched the game with TJ and Orion.

Want to see how into the game Jon gets - he even tried to get Nicholas to wear BYU gear :)

The Day After Thanksgiving

Look - Nicholas can build towers like you wouldn't believe. And woebetide you who thinks to help him, or knock his tower over. He gets very protective.

Some people go shopping the day after Thanksgiving. Not us. We went to a museum.

Not any old museum - the Bay Area Discovery Museum. It is made for kids ages 0-8 (although Jon and I had a lot of fun too) and is a hands-on museum. They have a special toddler area for kids under 3 and 42 inches - and they have people there that enforce the rules. The toddler area has a great fake stream (real rocks, just elevated and no real plants or animals) with plastic frogs, crabs (what are they in a stream for) and fish to play with. The kids can splash around in it and the water flows down the stream, through rocks, under a bridge, and down two waterfalls. There is a special toddler playground, and two inside rooms (one has a frog theme and one has a hampster theme) where they can build things, run around, lay on lilly pads and make bubbles. Then there are the other rooms: the have one whole room devoted to trains!!!

We loved it. Nicholas didn't want to play with mom and dad, he wanted to play with everything and everyone else. In the playground, he didn't want us - he wanted the sand, then the rock/gravel building zone. He wanted to play with the trains and blocks, and beware the parent who tried to play with him. Jon and I got to see some cool stuff and watch Nicholas have fun. We are total fans of this place.

Nicholas loved playing in the stream. He got totally wet. The trains were a big hit too.

Jon tried to stack the cargo containers that Nicholas was using a blocks, and got yelled at. Nicholas likes to stack his own things.

He loves shovels. He prefered using the shovel to using his hands to put the rocks into the dump truck.

First encounter with BBQ sauce

Nicholas had his first encounter with BBQ sauce. I put some on a plate for him to try dipping his chicken nuggets into. It turns out, he really likes it. He proceeded to dip carrots, cheese and more chicken into it. I think he even got a few bananas into the BBQ sauce.

Apple Hill 2009

Jon took the day off work on the 23rd and we went to Tahoe to go hiking, and then to Apple Hill. It was great. We had a blast. Nicholas ate part of Jon's apple pie at the restaurant, and then proceeded to pick 2 apples out of the bins and eat them. He ate them all the way from Apple Hill to our house. It was hilarious. He would stop at random moments and say "Yummy." He also tried to feed them to his stuffed animals in the car. He really likes apples.



We originally went to the USFS Visitor's Center when we were in Tahoe in August. They told us to come back when the salmon were spawning, and it would really be a sight. Boy were they right. We went back on the 23rd of October to see the fish. There were tons of fish. Since these salmon die when they spawn, if the wind blew just right, there was also a horrible smell. But it wasn't bad when you were right down by the river. There were so many salmon, and some of them were even jumping out of the water.



Nicholas convinced his dad to carry him part of the way. See Nicholas' smile - that's why.



Nicholas hung out with me on a bench in the middle of the walk. He wanted to climb the bench.



My son collected pinecones. He really made a big pile of pinecones. He carried them around and then piled them up.



And then he played soccer with some of the pinecones. Little did you know that pinecones could be soccer balls.

So that was our day up there. It was great. We might go back up soon to get more pie and cider.

Bounce Palace in Folsom

We went to Bounce Palace today - it is in Folsom, across from the outlets. It is a great place to take kids before 3pm. They have 2 seperate areas - one is set up for younger kids, and the other is filled with these giant bounce things that older kids like. Nicholas loved both rooms. We got to play as long as we wanted for $5. I, as an adult, didn't have to pay. We also got to take our lunch in with us. This is a great place! They have blocks, bounce houses, inflateable slides, jungle gyms - and it is all inside! So rain or shine, kids can work off some energy. I really liked this place, and Nicholas had a blast too.

My favorite pictures from San Diego

So I promised pictures from San Diego - and I picked a few of my favorites. They are all posted at http://www.nicholaswunderlich.shutterfly.com/ if you want to see them all. But these are a few of my favorites.

Notice the huge smile? That's because he had a nap - the whole plane ride down! I included this picture so you can see all the luggage (everything behind him and to his side is ours). He's in a laughing mood in this picture, so he's enjoying himself. Which was great for me and my mom - because when he enjoyed himself, we enjoyed ourselves. This is at the car rental place when we went to pick up the car.



This is at the zoo. We went Friday afternoon and then again on Sunday morning. He really enjoyed the Sunday morning one (he slept through part of Friday afternoon). You can see he has the map - and he is trying to direct us around.

This is one of my favorite pictures. At SeaWorld they had this "Sesame Street Bay of Play." Nicholas came home with many Sesame Street characters (as of now, he likes to line them all up in his high chair and "feed" them crackers and milk. It is adorable). But in this play area, they had a section designated for kids under 36 inches (and they had people there to enforce it). There was this sunken area - the kids had to take off their shoes. They could run around in this tarp area, where there were different textures and densities under the tarp, which made them topple over somewhat. But there were also "blocks" - canvas covered foam. Nicholas ran around this area for hours at a time and stcked blocks. Sometimes he played with others, sometimes by himself. We went Thursday afternoon, Friday morning, Saturday afternoon and Sunday afternoon. Thank goodness for our unlimted access passes to SeaWorld, the Zoo and the Wild Animal Kingdom.

I just put this in because it shows my mom loving Nicholas and paying very close attention to whatever he wanted.

Ah - the stuffed animals. This is from Friday morning. We all went to the "Artic Zone" exhibit where they had polar bears and beluga whales. Nicholas loved the polar bear. The exhibit walks you through the various animal places, and has some interesting side effects and exhibits. Then it lets you out in a store (just like Disneyland). In the store, right at Nicholas' height, was a shelf of polar bears. He grabbed on and didn't want to let go. So he took it to my mom, kissed the bear, and my mom got it for him. The same thing happened with the penguins when we were done looking at them. And the whales.......see a theme? My mom spoiled Nicholas - and it was great to watch him love every minute of it.

Today he took his whole zoo - which now has a polar bear, panda bear, koala bear, giraffe, whale, penguin, Elmo, Cookie monster, Big Bird, cougar and tiger - into his bed for nap time. He put them all in bed, then told me he wanted to nap. And he curled up with all of them. It was really cute.

So these are some of my favorite pictures.

Here's some recent news.....

Here's our current update: We are doing well. New updates will come later this week with some pictures - especially pictures from our San Diego trip.Today was a very great day.

I went to pick up Nicholas from Ana's and he was totally in love with seeing me, and then he ran away to play with the toys. When it was time to leave, he gave everyone kisses and then tried to run and hide from me. He thinks that if he hides behind the curtain I cannot see him. So he hides there, then peeks out, then hides again. It took 10 minutes to get him to leave the house and come to the car. Stinker :)

Then we went to the park by his grandfather's (Jon's dad's) house. We played. He went down the slide on his own for the very first time today. So that was amazing to see.

We made a big trip recently- picking out a potty for him. Some people say he's too young, but he tells me when he poops/pees and he likes to sit on our toilet, so if nothing else, he can get used to a little potty for himself. They have these "demo" ones that are out of their boxes and up on the shelf, so I pulled them all down and let Nicholas sit on them and pick one. It was important to me that he feel like he picked it. So he sat in all of them, then re-sat in a few. Then he sat down on the FisherPrice "Laugh and Learn" potty and said "Mine, mine mine mine." We had a minor breakdown explaining that we had to get one in the box, and not the one he was sitting on. Then he chose some big boy underwear - Elmo ones (no one should be surprised about this considering his love affair with Elmo, the only thing more predictable would have been dogs).

It was a great trip, and we had a lot of fun.Gymnastics was great too. Today was the first day that he participated in the warm-up, did the circuit activities like they are meant to be done (normally he just runs around and does whatever ones he likes, in whatever order he wants - just like all the other boys). And he even ran on the tumbling track a ton, and waited patiently (sitting!) for his turn on the trampoline. The teacher was a little stunned, and wondered what happened to the Nicholas that normally comes and doesn't listen to directions real well.

Tonight I realized he was growing up so fast. When he rests his head on my shoulder and I am holding him, his legs reach my knees!!! My 19 month old son is such a big boy. He's not a baby any longer. Sadness.So that's our current life. More updates (with good pictures) will be coming.

Waiting at the airport

So today is day 1 of our San Diego trip.

Last night was rough. Nicholas woke up at 9:30 and decided he didn't want to sleep on his own. So he and I cuddled on the greatest rocker ever invented. We watched Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Cars. Then, about 2 am, he decided he was tired and just crashed. So I put him to bed. I then went to sleep. While we were cuddling I couldn't get to sleep. Every time I started to fall asleep, Nicholas would hit me and say "mama up." He didn't want me to fall asleep and leave him awake. Stinker. Then I work up at 4:30 and couldn't get back to sleep. Today is bidding to be a Looooooong day.

But we got bagels at Noah's Bagels on the way to the airport. Did you know that they have challa rolls? They are really good. I got one, and wanted to eat it, but Nicholas ate most of it. THe ride was great, except that Nicholas stayed awake - I wanted him to sleep.

At the airport, mom dropped me off with all the luggage. She and Nicholas went to go park the car. The very helpful skycap checked our bags, got me Nicholas' security document and gave me the boarding passes (A20 and A21 on Southwest if you are interested). I hung around with the stroller and all the carry-ons, waiting for mom.

They got back and we went through security. Thank goodness for the family line. No one minded that it took forever to get Nicholas to give up his shoes and Dog. But he walked through on his own. I, however, kept beeping. So I had to get wanded. The stroller had to get wanded and inspected. All the liquids had to be opened and inspected (we brough milk and a full sippy cup). Then the process of getting everything back together began.

Now we are waiting for our flight, just hanging out here at the airport. Nicholas is leading my mom on a walk around Terminal 2 at Oakland, looking out all the windows and yelling "fly." He also is trying to kiss the planes through the windows. It is pretty darn cute. So now we wait for the flight.

Did I mention - my absolutely awesomest sister ever got me an iPod Touch!!!

Gymnastics

I have been bragging about Nicholas and I going to gymnastics class. It is a great "mommy and me" class. Although, as he gets used to it, there is less "mommy" and more "me." I am really just there to make sure he doesn't run off with the older kids, or injure another kid.

This week was family week at the gym, and so Jon came. I also wasn't feeling well, so Jon was supposed to do class with Nicholas and make it a "daddy and me" class. Jon stuck it out until trampoline time. Then I switched spots with him because Nicholas was putting on a show for his dad.

But it was great fun, and I got to take some pictures of him.

Thanks Tricks Gymnastics! It is a great class for Nicholas. He and I love it a lot. It really helps his gross motor skills. He's running and jumping like an expert now. And he's doing better with sharing and following directions - although you wouldn't know it from this week's class.

State Fair 2009!!!

In keeping with the tradition (of three years now), my mom and grandmother came up for the State Fair. This year we went on Labor Day. The tradition is that they come up in the morning, we go to the fair, and then we go out to lunch. This year, lunch was at the Elephant Bar. It was really good.

As always, we go look at the animals first. My grandmother grew up with farm animals and loves to look at them. We saw llamas - first time at the fair to see llamas. We also saw sheep - who ran away from my grandmother. There were some steers there too, with baby steers. Those horns are really sharp.

The funniest moment of the animal watching was when Nicholas saw the sheep and yelled (while pointing at the sheep) "Ana" - which is the name of his sitter. Jon and I laughed. I told Ana and she laughed too.

Then we went to go find the petting zoo. While on the way there, my mom saw a pony ride and had the bright idea to put Nicholas on the pony.



The picture above shows that he's loving the pony ride. This was not the case at first. At first, he was not enthralled and wanted down. But my mom held him on there and walked with him, and then Jon and I cheered whenever he came around the circle to see us, so he began to love it. It is amazing what kids do for some cheers.

Then we went to the petting zoo. This year you had to pay to get into the petting zoo :( Jon didn't come in, but my grandmother, my mom, me and Nicholas all went. Needless to say, my mom carried Nicholas.

My grandmother only fed and petted the small animals. It was adorable. And they started to eat her purse, but since they were small and cute she didn't mind.

My mom helped Nicholas feed the animals. The rules said you had to be three to feed the animals. My mom ignored the sign, and let Nicholas feed them. He had a blast. See the smile?

Then there was this huge sandbox filled with corn kernels. Nicholas played in there with the cars, trucks, shovels and pails. We didn't have to pay anything for this. He did not want to come out. Not at all. But eventually he came out.



To finish the day, my mom and grandma went on the monorail with Nicholas. It turns out that Nicholas fell asleep on the monorail with my mom holding him (shocker).

Jon and I went to play games. We played this Whack-a-mole game that I loved. You get the hammer, and you have to hammer the noles as they come out of their holes. First one to 15 wins. Jon won the first game and I demanded a rematch. So I won the second. Jon also played other games. He won a cow, a monkey and a tiger for Nicholas. We also bought Nicholas an inflateable sword that makes noises. Guess what his favorite is?

The sword.

The games were great fun. Yes, games at the fair are expensive. But I think that is the first date we have had since Nicholas was born where we went and did something fun - something game-like. Normally we go to dinner and then do errands. Anyone who doesn't have a child does not understand the difficulty of errands with children. When you get to do them without children, it is almost like a date. So that's what we have been doing. But this was so much better. We laughed and had fun - just like we were dating.

But he slept all the way until we got to lunch, where he promptly ate a chicken quesedilla and some sweet potato fries. He also got to have some ice cream for dessert. Jon had lamb, I had sushi and a patty melt. It was great.

It was a fabulous day and I cannot wait until next year.

Everything is a climbing tool

Everything is meant to climb on. Nicholas believes that statement to be true. The funny thing is, it has really picked up since we have started gymnastics. All of a sudden, everything has to be climbed on, over and through. This includes parents. One of his favorite games to play is to run behind you and "push" you over so you are lying on your tummy. Then he climbs onto your back and walks around until he falls, and then he laughs. I continue to let him play this game because of the laughter aspect. I really love hearing him laugh.



Anyways, he has a fire truck. He loves to climb onto the fire truck now. Not sit on it, or ride around on it (like it was made for) but climb onto it. Same with his horse. He climbs onto it, and then bounces up and down to make it play the music. He sometimes falls, but he never really cries when he falls from these things. He just gets up and goes back to whatever he was doing. He is so adorable! And look at him smile.



If you think he doesn't know what a camera is for, you are joking. I took the picture of him on the fire truck by asking him to go get his truck. He got it, and stood on it, when he tried to get down, I said "stay there and smile for the camera." He paused, got back on, looked at me, and gave me a huge smile until I put the camera away. He's a camera hog!

Introducing Dan

For those of you who don't know, Dan is Nicholas' lamb. His name is "Dan the Lamb." Jon named him (He also named Nicholas' duck "Puck"). Nicholas loves Dan. There are days he carries Dan around and won't let him go. There are days that Dan is a kickball. Dan has also played the part of tackler and tug of war item. Sometimes Nicholas puts Dan into his bed, and then tries to get him out again. If you try and put Nicholas down for a nap, in his crib, without Dan - well there will be a price to pay. Dan has been with Nicholas since his birth. Dan is very cuddly, and loves the washing machine because hanging out with Nicholas is dirty.

But Nicholas will hold Dan and read to Dan. And you better not be the one trying to interrupt him. It is very cute. We had a first on Tuesday - Nicholas tried to feed Dan some banana. Dan got thrown into the washing machine after Nicholas went to bed that night.

And in case you are interested, yes, the shoe shelf pictured is what Nicholas busted his nose on. It was actually about 30 minutes after I took this picture that the whole nose episode happened.

Finger painting... or is it body painting?

Nicholas loves the finger paints. He gets to play with them and make things turn colors - like the dishwasher, the floor and himself. He really likes turning himself colors. Occasionally that gets streched into turning mom colors as well, but oh well. It all cleans up with soap and water.



Yesterday was another finger painting day. It was really hot outside, and we had been on a walk already. I was looking for things to do inside, and I thought, we hadn't finger painted in a while, so why not finger paint? So I got everything set up. I put the paints onto paper plates - and he knew what we were daing right then. It was very difficult to get him stripped down so that we could paint.



He decided that he had enough putting paint on paper, and wanted to put paint on himself. I don't mind - like I said, it washes off. So he just grabbed handfuls of paint and smeared it all over himself.



Nicholas was put into the bathtub afterwards. He was unhappy with me because I just let the water run, without filling up the tub, while I tried to get most of the color off him. As it was, the water was a very interesting color. He eventually got his bath, but decided he'd rather try and help mommy clean up the finger painting mess. Which resulted in another bath.

It was a ton of fun though!

Our First Trauma

We had our first major accident with Nicholas last night. We have a shoe rack by our front door. It is made of fake wood (IKEA) and Nicholas likes to pull all the shoes out of it and stuff them in different places in the rack, or stuff them all into one place. He also likes to climb on it, and sit on it.

So last night, he was running towards the shoe rack, and away from me (I was crawling after him, pretending to be a monster - the things we do for our kids). He slipped, and fell. His nose hit the shoe rack first, then his head. He broke out in the loudest wails I have heard in a long time. His nose started bleeding, and he was so sensative - you couldn't even take a warm washcloth and clean him up. He just wanted to be held.

He calmed down in about 20 minutes, so I didn't think there was anything that wrong. We cleaned him up (just a little). As a side note, if you want to see a kid squirm and know how strong they are, just try and wipe Nicholas' nose after he has hit it, or really anytime. He likes to try and blow snot bubbles, because he saw a kid at church do it, so now it is his new task in life.

The bleeding stopped, and he went to bed a little later than normal, but not too late. At 10:30 he woke up wailing. His nose was swollen, and all purple. I thought I had misjudged matters, so I called Kaiser. Who gave a variation on the classic "Take two tylenol and call me in the morning if nothing changes." They said, "Give him Tylenol and we will see you in the morning at 9:30 at the doctor's office." So eventually he got back to bed. When he woke up again at 1:30 - which is the time the Tylenol wears off - his nose was still all gross and weird looking.

But this morning, he seemed fine. He would touch his nose and then whine a little, but other than that, and a little swelling, he seemed fine. We went to the doctor anyways. Besides the doctor telling me that a size 8 was too big a shoe for him (and changing her mind after she had check him out - this wasn't our normal pediatrician), she tried to touch his nose. Wow!!! The fit that occured was horrid. They had to give him a little sedative so he would calm down and let her touch him.

The verdict is that he has "moved" some of the cartilidge in his nose. It turns out that toddlers - well this young at least - don't have a bone in their nose to break. It is just cartilidge. So he "moved" some, but when she looked inside, it didn't appear that there was any structural problems. Although she had a hard time finding where the bump was on his nose because he was still swollen. I have been told to keep an eye on it and that if it looks crooked, to go back. But otherwise, there doesn't appear to have been serious structural damage.

However, he has these black circles under his eyes, like he hasn't slept in 4 days. I was told those might get worse before they get better.

But Nicholas is healing, and I think he has forgotten all about the problem, because he slammed his nose into the couch. He cried a little, but it didn't seem to phase him that much. So - hopefully - this is the only trauma we have with him. At least until he starts playing sports.

So Monday started our hiking days in Tahoe. We discovered that Nicholas liked hiking better than rocky beaches, although not as much as the sandy beach we found on the last day (Sand Harbor, in the Northeast corner, is the best beach ever - for families).

We went to the US Forest Service Visitor's Center. They have stream profile chamber, which is a piece of glass that forms one side of a stream bank. We saw lots of fish in the stream. Nicholas kept pointing to the fish and getting really excited. He actually did some hiking on the trails there too - but he also got a lot of rides in his stroller.



The Smokey the Bear picture is from a short trail they have at the visitor's center. They give the kids a little badge when the complete the trail and answer the questions correctly at the end - but Nicholas is too small to take a quiz, so we didn't get the badge :( But we did get the picture with Smokey the Bear.

Only you can prevent forest fires :)



The Rainbow Trail is a mile long loop that has the stream profile chamber towards the end. It turns out there was a group of preschoolers at the center the same day. Nicholas wanted to follow them around - especially once he saw the girls. It was pretty funny. We had to keep pulling him out of their groups. They were all holding hands. So my son, who is not shy at all, walks right up to them and starts holding one of the girl's hands. It was fairly cute. Everyone thought it was cute. Too bad there was kind of a fit when we had to leave the girls.



This last picture is from our hike that afternoon. Nicholas was hungry because he didn't eat lunch. So he had a chocolate granola bar, an orange, and some water. Hence the mess on his face. But he really loved hiking. he did a good job going up the hill. He simply crawled over rocks, and roots, and wandered around the trail - and off the trail. He thought the whole forest was his kingdom. He really enjoyed himself.

Jon and I enjoyed hiking too (when we weren't carrying Nicholas). It was a fun family activity. We did it together, everyone enjoyed it, and we got to point out things to Nicholas. Nicholas has a love of trees, he loves to point at them and say "tree." Or sometimes feel them. And grab their leaves. So he had a lot of fun hiking around in the trees.

Our breakfast cruise

Jon and I had a great Sunday morning in Tahoe. We got to go on a breakfast cruise. We ate breakfast on the first floor (level?) of the ship. They had waffles, eggs and some other stuff. We got a private table, just the two of us. Then we went cruising on Lake Tahoe for a while, before coming back to the realities of being parents :)

Our first day in Tahoe

Ok. So we have been distracted with other things, rather than posting our adventures in Tahoe.

So this is the first post (of a few) that tells all about our Tahoe trip. First of all, if you are driving anywhere with a young child, you should probably plan to go when they will sleep. Luckily for us, Nicholas slept most of the way into Tahoe. Then we stopped at Regan Beach in Tahoe.

Nicholas was hungry, so he had an Oreo. If you have never seen a 1 year old stuff a whole Oreo in his face at once, take a look at these pictures. He did quite a good job.

Nicholas has never been on a beach, so this was something new. He liked playing in the sand. And he got into the water because we showed him that he could throw rocks in the water. This was pretty much as wet as he got. But he had such fun throwing rocks and watching them make splashes.

Then we went and had lunch with my mom and grandma. Nicholas did a good job eating his pizza - once we managed to get him to settle down and eat. He was so excited and thrilled by all the new things. Jon and I had a good lunch too. My mom and grandma came back on Saturday night to watch Nicholas so that we could go out to our anniversary dinner.



All the Tahoe pictures are available at www.nicholaswunderlich.shutterfly.com

We're back.....

So we are back from vacation...early.

It turns out that when you travel on vacation, away from home, with an infant it is best if you bring the following: a thermometer, tylenol and motrin. It turns out that Nicholas got sick on Monday night with a fever, and then started teething like mad (all 4 vampire teeth and 4 extra molars). So he wouldn't eat, and couldn't sleep. Not even with pain killers. I was seriouslly tempted to try my mother's suggestion - brandy on the gums. I am still not ruling it out. So he wasn't doing well the last few days, and neither were Jon and I (let's just say sleep came infrequently). So we came home. He's doing better now. Of course, that might be because of the 8 teeth, 3 are now through his gums since last night, and 3 more are almost visible.

On a brighter note: Jon got a promotion at work!! Yipee!!! Also, my cousin Rachel Cwalina Palmer is expecting her first baby in March. I am really excited for her. Good luck.

Still to come - pictures and explanations of our trip to Tahoe. It was FABULOUS!

Nicholas and the BYU fan gene

For those of you who are new to knowing our family, Jonathan is a HUGE BYU fan. He has these BYU flip flops that are years old and are being held together by duct tape. I am expressly forbidden from throwing them away and getting him a new pair because they are "BYU flip flops." Like the BYU bookstore doesn't have other BYU flip flops. These are so old, I think he wore them when he was a Freshman, before his mission.

I got him a pair of BYU slippers during our first Christmas as a married couple, and he still wears them around a ton, and loves them.

I think it is a sad day when I realize that "fan" traits are inheritable. On Sundays, once his dad is gone to meetings, Nicholas likes to tromp around in his dad's slippers (above). Not being one to over do things, Nicholas takes off the slippers before wrapping himself in the BYU blanket and making a "mommy give me cake" face. I call it his pitiful face. He tries to get what he wants by making the face. It doesn't always work with me, but it always works with Jon. Especially when Nicholas does it while wrapped in a BYU blanket, or with BYU slippers.

In another inheritable trait, Nicholas has started to wear Jon's stinky BYU flip flops around - well try to wear them around. He brings them to me, then sits down. I put them on his feet, help him stand up, and then he walks around. He gets very frustrated when they fall off.

Stinker. Cute stinker. But still a stinker.