Nelsons

Perception Of Time

Posted on February 14, 2015 by Jordan

This post will probably be more interesting if you know my brother…

Hannah has, as expected, been building her language skills by leaps and bounds as we move into the new year. One of the things she is starting to understand is that events have happened in the past, and that things are going to happen in the future, as in beyond today.

Her catch-all phrase for things that happened in the past is “last week” and her catch-all for things in the future is “next week.” It seems a fairly reasonable shorthand given how much is an unknown to her at this point. It is also the *exact same* system my brother uses to describe things in the future and past.

I suppose it’s possible they compared notes last time they were together, so I should be careful assuming she arrived at it independently, but I still find it rather amazing!

Speaking of things that were “next week” she was really excited for her Valentines party at school:

As you can see, each of her classmates was slated to receive a card with a sticker applied by hand! There was considerable excitement 🙂

-Jordan

Big Girl Bed

Posted on January 13, 2015 by Jordan

We converted Hannah’s crib into a “big girl bed” a little over a month ago. As you can probably see from the picture, she was rather excited by the change! So excited, in fact, that she invited most of her “friends” to play in the bed too.

The first few nights went pretty well. I don’t think she even realized she could get out of bed once the lights were off, and she was sleeping all night. As the days went on (or I guess I should say as the nights went on) she figured out she could get out of bed when she woke up. This let to us having a cute little visitor Saturday morning… a first for everyone.

Indulge a bit of a tangent for a moment here. Someone commented to me a while back that one of the many joys in raising kids was that you got to see them have first experience over and over. Every day is full of opportunities for your child to have “the best day of her life” only to look forward to another day full of new discoveries. When Hannah walked into our bedroom I realized that raising kids also provides an entire category (if I can call it that) of new experiences for myself that I wouldn’t have were it not for being a parent.

So, back to the story. Sleeping is going ok, but it appears she might be starting to get her canine teeth, and Christmas travel is upon us. Christmas was fun for everyone, but it was a LOT of stimulation for Hannah. By the time we got home I don’t think she knew which way was up, let alone what a normal day or night might be like.

Somewhere in there, she also figured out she could carry her little step-stool around and turn on lights. Previously it had just been something to stand on while she brushed her teeth. Now it has become a gateway to the power of light and darkness!

Having set the stage, I will now recount one of the first work-nights at home post-Christmas. Heather and I were kind of dragging as our bodies reluctantly adjusted back to a more normal early to bed, early to rise kind of schedule, and were probably sleeping more soundly than we normally would.

<approximately 2AM> I am woken up by a loud *CLUNK*. The first thing I notice is that there is light streaming into our room. The second thing I notice is that Hannah is climbing the step-stool she has just slammed down below our light switch. Some quick investigation showed that Hannah had turned on every single light on the floor, except the ones in our room prior to heading in. She had also started up her toy coffee maker. I suspect she felt sure she had a great start on a new day.

We are now a few weeks past that memorable night, and things are starting to be normal again. Along with providing a number of firsts, we may have learned a little about the implications of turning a toddler loose in the house 🙂

-Jordan

Nurse Hannah

Posted on December 18, 2014 by Jordan

Heather caught some sort of nasty 24 hour stomach bug that really knocked her down Sunday. While that’s no fun, it’s not really a newsworthy event when you are interacting with toddlers on a daily basis.

What was newsworthy, or at least qualifies as “something I hope to remember” was how Hannah responded.

Once she realized mommy wasn’t feeling good, Hannah would not leave her side. Heather curled up on the couch to watch a Christmas movie, and Hannah crawled up into the blankets with her, and quietly watched an entire move next to mom! I don’t know if I can properly express how unusual that is. Normally if the TV is showing *anything* that isn’t Elmo (including non Elmo-centric content on the Elmo show) Hannah will reliably throw a fit. She also appeared to be unable to sit still on the couch with us for more than two minutes; judging from prior experience.

It was a very Sweet scene in our house, that I would have loved to take pictures of, but given that this all started when Heather started feeling awful, I don’t imagine it would be popular had I taken a picture of the two of them and posted it online. Just imagine those two cuddled up on the couch under a blanket 🙂

When not nursing her mommy back to health, Hannah commandeered an old purse as hers. You might wonder what an almost two-year-old would keep in a purse? Every Christmas tree ornament she can reach of course! She hasn’t protested much when we re-decorate the tree, but she also hasn’t been afraid to restock her purse when we aren’t looking. Every day brings new stuff I guess.

-Jordan

A Day In The Life

Posted on December 10, 2014 by Jordan

So just a few updates…

It’s funny how often I think “I should work up a post about this” and then decide it would be too much work.

I also really wanted to avoid this becoming the Hannah blog.

I have come to realize a few things. One, there are things happening day to day that I would really like to remember, and this seems like a great place to save them. Two, Hannah is the person in our family undergoing the most change day to day, so she ends up being the most interesting thing to talk about.

That said, what do I want to write down today?

Hannah moved up to a bigger size of pajamas recently. They feature a button-up top. Her only other garment that opens in the front like that is a coat, so now every night she happily dons her “night-night coat”

She was up early enough to ‘help’ me pack lunches a few days ago, and started to feel left out that mommy and daddy each had a box with goodies in them but there wasn’t one for Hannah. I got her a bag, and she proceeded to load six Clementine oranges into it. Probably would have made for an odd lunch, but I had one proud little girl.

-Jordan

Meal Plan

Posted on August 3, 2014 by Jordan

One of the many benefits of having a wife who is not only on board with the Dave Ramsey plan, but also a spread sheet enthusiast is that we have historical records of our budget (both planned and actual) going back almost to when we got married.

This means that we aren’t saying “boy it seems that we are spending more on food these days” we are saying “our food spending is %50 higher than it was two years ago!”

I have seen some numbers on the actual rate of increase in food prices, and while they are non trivial, they do not explain the change in our budget. So then the question is, how much of that came from adding Hannah, how much came from changing what kinds of food we buy, and how much is the actual price changing on us?

Surprisingly, it’s hard to know. We don’t have any real records of what individual items we were buying, or what meals we were eating over that time. While it would be wonderful to keep those kinds of records, it starts to seem more than a little silly to devote much time to it right now, given the other things vying for our time.

What I can do is post the meal plan I worked up for the week. I have gotten much more disciplined about doing a full week’s plan now that swinging by the store to grab that one thing we forgot about is a major pain. We don’t always end up making everything on the plan, but it at least gives a good framework to build a shopping list from.

Monday: Grill Burgers
Tuesday: Cabbage Skillet with ham
Wednesday: Carnitas
Thursday: Pesto chicken and pasta
Friday: Chicken and quina
Saturday: Stir-Fry

I would like to actually include links and or post recipes for the things that aren’t obvious like burgers, and in some fantasy world where I can spend 10 hours a week on this, I would do cost per serving breakdowns as well. Here in the world of actual time constraints I think I will be happy with just getting the plan posted, and hope that it comes in handy down the road when I am trying to figure out if our eating habits are what is impacting the monthly budget 🙂

-Jordan

July 2014

Posted on July 28, 2014 by Jordan

Wow, so that goal of a post a week seems pretty darn lofty at this point.

So, anyway we have been doing a lot of things just not necessarily blog worthy things.

If I had to write down a few things I wanted to remember though:

Hannah going into total meltdown when she was informed she couldn’t simultaneously wear two pairs of shoes
Hannah going into a total melt down when Mom opted not to wear the shoes that Hannah picked out for her
Hannah going into total meltdown when Dad opted not to put on the socks Hannah picked out for him, before donning sandals for a trip to the pool

Beyond getting to see what the terrible twos are all about, Heather and I have both kind of settled into our jobs here in KC. Heather is much more of a senior team member, and has gotten to do some training (perhaps more than she wanted to all in one go). I have stayed busy, but it’s been good. I managed about a week to do a deep dive into housekeeping on an existing project that was BADLY in need of some attention. I am amazed how satisfying the results of that effort have been.

And to close, another trip to the park:

-Jordan

18 Months

Posted on July 1, 2014 by Jordan

Hannah is just over 18 months old now.

As I was loading some things into the car tonight before an outing to the park, she was playing in the front yard. When she saw the people walking a few hundred yards down the hill and immediately started loudly saying “hi! hi! hi!” and waving, I realize we are on the brink of a new era with her.

I have a feeling it’s going to be a lot of fun, and probably fast paced 🙂

-Jordan

Craigslist Adventures, 2014 Edition

Posted on June 3, 2014 by Jordan

I have a feeling this isn’t the first, nor will it be the last time I mention Craigslist, but once again we have purchased furniture using said site.

Perhaps I should back up. So in giving a tour of our house to some friends, it was mentioned that we were hoping to recruit a babysitter. It was quickly pointed out by a veteran babysitter that our house lacked a TV, and that perhaps we would never see the same babysitter twice given that setup.

With that in mind… well did you ever hear that story about the mouse and the cookie?

No mice this time but…

We need a baby sitter.

To keep the baby sitter happy, we (I am told) need a TV.

To have a TV, we (I am told) need an armoire.

To get the armoire home, we need a truck.

Only the “truck” we borrowed it’s actually one of the largest SUVs in production, so try this again…

To get the armoire home we need a U-Haul

To get the armoire onto the truck, we need three extra guys. (no kidding, I was starting to doubt the four of us were going to get it loaded at one point)

To get the armoire out of the tuck we needed a ramp

And now, to get it out of our garage we may need to have a BBQ or something just to get enough bodies on site to make the transition to the garage.

On the less complicated side of things, even with the truck rental, it was a great deal on a *very* solid piece. Hopefully that means it’s quality because I do not look forward to moving that beast again once it’s in place.

Oh, and did I tell you about this party we are having? Yeah we thought we would grill and then

<cough>carryThatGiantThingInTheGarageDownstairs</cough>,

ahem excuse me. Yeah grill and then I don’t know have some ice cream? I think I know where that ice cream maker got unpacked. It’s just down in the basement… you don’t mind carrying something while we go look do you? 🙂

-Jordan

Fun Facts

Posted on May 28, 2014 by Jordan

Well, I don’t know how fun… but I have had all these random things bouncing around in my head waiting until I had time to pull together a blog post, and none of them quite justify a stand alone post.

A few firsts (and I suspect this year will be full of firsts, but anyway…)

I snaked my first drain. My preparatory youtube session (the oracle of home improvement how-tos!) had me prepared for a giant nasty hairball from the drain in our bathroom sink that wasn’t working quite right. What I eventually recovered was instead a few bobby-pins tangled up with a pair of tweezers. The drain works much better now.

I bought a bow saw, and did some tree-trimming. As mundane as that sounds, it was noteworthy for how odd it felt to be responsible for some trees. They are kind of scraggly trees, so I don’t think I can mess things up too much.

Heather and I both got to experience the joys of getting a drivers license in a new state, especially the fun of getting our vehicles a safety inspection. Oddly I don’t feel any safer now than I did before, but then we were on good terms with our Des Moines mechanic, so maybe that isn’t so surprising.

I logged just short of 400 miles driving to and from work last week. I haven’t found the drive to be that taxing so far, but I suspect I will become a connoisseur of podcasts and audio-books.

Well, that is probably enough rambling… hopefully I can be more focused next time around 🙂

-Jordan