Christmas Prep

This Christmas is so great! It is the first year that Maren is really in to Santa, and Addi is an old pro. She recently told me, "Mommy, I think Christmas is my favorite holiday because it is the only one that is magic." I think my heart melted. Her smart logical brain has lots of questions regarding Santa, but she loves the whole idea regardless.

The girls both had so much fun decorating the tree and posing with their favorite Tinker Bell ornaments.
Every time we drive up to our fully lit house at night the girls commend Brian on his exterior illumination skills.We made our traditional gingerbread houses at Cook Street Culinary School this year. Can you guess which one Brian and I made?Last week I caved and gave the girls one of their presents early -- slippers. I was just glad that they finally showed that they have different tastes and wanted something different than the other one. Maren picked out Disney princess slippers and Addi picked rainbow yeti boots (that is the only way I know how to describe them). They wear them every minute they are at home -- no joke, and Maren even sleeps in hers. Last night we had our Christmas celebration with Nana, Zia, the cousins and Auntie Erin and Uncle Manny. The pictures say it all.The girls have asked Santa for giant teddy bears this year (yes, both of them). Our friend Laura has one from when she was little and the girls love him. His name is big Ted, so they asked for their very own big Teds. Luckily Costco had some ridiculously large bears this summer and I jumped at the opportunity, and the girls haven't changed their minds (they even sat on Santa's lap and asked for their giant bears). They are a bit over the top -- we had to put them into huge black yard bags in the basement, and I can barely carry one by myself, but what the heck, its Christmas!!! Brian and I can't wait to see the girls' faces tomorrow!

The Jingle Bell Run

Tradition for the Icklers at Christmas includes partaking in the Jingle Bell Run for arthritis! Our good friend Laura has RA and is on the planning committee for the run, not to mention we love to get in the Christmas spirit and walk for a good cause! Every year Brian has a big work deadline at this time, so he couldn't make it, but Noni, Ash and a bunch of our neighbors came out to walk.

This year Laura had to be at the run site really early, so her husband, Matt, and I drove the kids to the run a bit later. He got some good pics of the girls enjoying their soy steamers and breakfast sandwiches in the car.Ready to walk!

6 years old

Wow, Addison Lane Ickler is now 6! She is this fantastic, complex, kind-hearted, intelligent girl. Here are some things that make Addi so special:

• She is convinced that she is going to be a chef someday. Her restaurant will be called "Addison's" and she will cook her parents dinner every single night. She recently made scrambled eggs all on her own -- with some careful supervision from Daddy.
• Her artistic skills are far exceeding her mother's -- she is so creative with her drawings and loves to draw and color. Here is Sid the sloth from Ice Age.

• She is still an extremely logical little person -- she does not appreciate sarcasm. She is fascinated with the human body and recently asked how people are born with all of their organs inside of their bodies. I had to break out one of my anatomy textbooks and figure out how to have a conversation about stem cells that was understandable to a 6 year old.
• She loves to play with everyone at school. There are some girls that "attack" her with squeals of excitement when she walks in the door to morning enrichment. I have been stopped outside of school on my way to get her by a group of girls asking me if I was Addi's mom, and then they all introduced themselves by name as her friends. We were a bit worried when she went through her 3 yr old phase of only talking like an animal and other kids didn't like to play with her, but all seems right now and she is quite social!
• Addi's teacher loves having her in class. She even thanked me recently for sharing Addi with her -- she said that Addi is a complete joy to have in class and she has such a sweet heart.
• Addi is the best big sister. It is as though she was meant to be one. She and Maren truly love each other and have so much fun playing every day (they still fight . . . a lot, but more often they play and love on each other).
  

This year instead of having a party, Addi decided to have a special day with her friend Maggie. We picked Maggie up and first went to pick out movie candy, then we went to Timbuk Toys and the girls (including Maren) got to pick out a toy, then we went to see Arthur Christmas, and we finished with dinner at Addi's favorite fine dining establishment: Red Robin. She got a family party, but it was really low key and fun. Addi wanted a cake with ocean animals on it, so I got her this -
Awesome, right?
Here she is with her sassy new sunglasses on.
We are so lucky that Addi is a part of our lives and that we get to experience life with her everyday. You are so special Ads, and we love you like crazy!

Fall Firsts

The first snow came and Addi couldn't wait to go outside and build a snowman. Well, there wasn't enough snow for a big snowman, so she built some little tiny ones. She used pine needles for their arms and tiny flowers and seeds for eyes. So cute, if you ask me.
Here we are holding her snowman's hands.
Then Addi's grossly loose tooth came out! It was actually uprooted from her mouth! What?!?! Since when did my baby become an actual kid who was old enough to lose a tooth? She was a total freak the whole time her tooth was loose. She refused to wiggle it or let us touch it -- the whole thing totally wigged her out. Then after spending the better part of a night battling coughing fits while she was sick she held her little hand out to me and asked me if her tooth was in her hand. She had just coughed it right out! Addi was really relieved that her tooth came out so easily and it didn't hurt.

Halloween

First we took our obligatory trip to the pumpkin patch. It was beyond lame. The pumpkins were all gross and rotten and the whole experience was basically just a big pain in the ass (see Maren below searching the horizon for carve-able pumpkins). We went to King Soopers and found some awesome pumpkins to carve and thankfully the rest of Halloween turned out much better.
It came as no surprise this year that Addi and Mae wanted to dress as the same thing . . . witches. . . good witches. Our Halloween traditions include socializing at our neighbor's fire pit then trick or treating with some other neighbors, all while drinking wine in coffee mugs so as to avoid judgment from others. Maren really loved keeping up with the big kids while trick or treating and was such a trooper (she went over 2 hours without having to pee, which is a long time for her little walnut bladder!).

I asked the girls if they wanted to wear any black witch lipstick I got for their costumes. Maren jumped at the opportunity and laughed heartily at herself in the mirror while puckering up her black lips. Addi, on the other hand, said, "Mama, I don't like the lipstick, it makes me look like I'm not me." I told her that was the whole point of Halloween, but she didn't care, the black lipstick made her look mean and she was supposed to be a nice witch.
We also went to our neighbors' costume party. Brian went as sheriff Rick Grimes (complete with his bloodied zombie beating stick) from the Walking Dead and I was his zombie -- we won for the best pair costume! I felt kind of bad though, because I really scared some of the kids -- they did like touching some of my bloody wounds however. The kids got to take turns hitting a pinata and play wildly with their buddies -- it was a blast!We were sitting around one night eating some candy treats for dessert as a family. Maren was in the process of eating one piece of chocolate when she spied some of my dark chocolate and wanted to try some. She then turned to me with a face full of dripping choco-drool and said, "Mommy, I really like chocolate." Yes honey, I believe you do.

Kindergarten

Addi started Kindergarten this year and she loves it! I was in school taking a test on her actual first day, but it was mostly a day for the parents to tour the school and have orientation, and Brian got to go. I got to take her to school the next day, which was the first day she actually got dropped off on her own, which actually made me feel like Brian and I both had our own first days of Kindergarten with her.

Her teacher is great and Addi seems to have adjusted quite well. She is always coming home with the name of a new best friend (we had to have a talk about the fact that she can have as many best friends as she wants b/c a little girl was trying to convince her that she had to tell her other best friend that she had been replaced -- yikes it starts early).

She is learning some sight words and working on simple math. We don't really know what is normal for this age, but she seems to be taking it all in stride and absorbing a lot. We will learn a lot more at parent teacher conferences when they tell us how she tested on her first standardized tests given verbally by the teacher.

We have already had to get in the mode of parents/sales people -- the PTO didn't waste any time in having the kiddos start selling goods to raise money for the school. Addi was thrilled that she sold enough cookie dough to earn a rainbow light-flashing, light saber with a plastic light-refracting crystal on the end of it. Plus it has the added feature of causing seizures and severe eye-spasms. But we did all have fun showing each other our favorite ninja-warrior moves with it in hand -- hey, nothing says tough like flashing rainbow colors.

Summer Highlights

Full-time school + full-time work + life in general with 2 kids = Madness!!! But we did it and we only have 17 months to go before I am done with school (which is like 2 full time jobs b/c of all the freaking studying) and I start working. Here are some summer highlights that occurred while life was a bit too crazy to blog.

Our neighbor's Canada Day Party. The fireworks at this party confirmed that our choice to go to Winter Park for the actual 4th of July was wise. Addi still has a really hard time with the noise of fireworks -- she goes into hysterics and she seems to really be in pain from the sound. But the rest of the party was a blast!
Maren's first Rockies game! The girls had so much fun eating naughty snacks and cheering.
We went to a petting zoo with Nana and saw the most adorable baby animals. There was a baby miniature pony, a baby cow and a bunch of baby pygmy goats (which are the cutest things ever -- I seriously wanted to get a baby pygmy goat and take it home, if of course it wouldn't make my head explode, which it would). The girls loved getting their little hands all over the furry, sneeze-inducing creatures.
The girls also enjoyed mining for gemstones, riding the zip line, riding on the alpine slide, and pony rides in Winter Park.
What would our summer be without a few trips to the Denver zoo. This was a trip that we took with Auntie Ash. The girls got to feed the Lorikeets, but the ear piercing screeching they are prone to really freaked Addi out, so she and I speed fed the little monsters and then got out of there. Maren on the other hand loved every minute of the whole experience.
We had our fair share of sisterly shenanigans, fights and play time. The girls still love to play with each other, but man can they fight. They have started name calling, mostly names that involve the word "poop," and they occasionally resort to trying to push or hit (which always gets them separated and then they get sad and want to play with each other again). Ahhh, the joys of sisterhood, huh? Luckily they are more often sweet to each other than not.
Overall we had a fun packed summer with lots of family adventures and fun. You know things are busy when both kids look as tired as their parents feel.