Yipes! A stye in Sofia's eye. Pobrecito!

After 3 days of Sofia complaining that her eye hurt, we took her in to the doctor. Her eye was a bit red and he diagnosed her with a common bacterial stye. 2 days later, this is what her eye looks like. He said it would get worse before it got better and he was right! Poor thing. We are struggling to get her antiobiotic ointment in her eye - mainly because its not an eye drop, it's an ointment! What 4 year old is going to let you put that on her eyeball?!?

Friends

Audriana and Carson at Monster Jam!

A moose is loose!

On my way to work this morning, just a few hundred feet away from our house, I saw this moose munching away and enjoying breakfast. He was pretty big! I quickly took out my cell phone and took this picture (sorry the quality isn't so good). After I snapped the picture, I saw his friend standing another few feet away! Wow!

Ice Palace -- look at them go!

Click the little arrow to make it "go"! :-)

Happy Valentines Day!

I've got the best family. I love them so much.......

We had a very easy, restful, and happy Valentines Day. The girls woke up and found the balloons, and candy that I had set out for them. We also got them some cute socks, and a decorative Valentine pillow for each of them. We had a quick breakfast and then I had to get them up the hill to Sunday School, then Church, then off to Fiesta Mexicana for a family Valentine lunch. Yum! After lunch we headed home, and I decided to pick the mail up since it had been a good week or so since I had last gotten it. It's a good thing I did because there was a big box for the girls -- wrapped pretty in red paper with hearts all over it - a Valentines gift from aunt Pam and uncle Todd! They were so excited and it was all I could do to get them to wait the 45 seconds that it takes to drive from the mailboxes to our house! Of course they opened it right up and it was all smiles from there! In it was 2 adorable stuffed Valentine puppy dogs, as well as some candy goodies. I would have felt so bad if I hadn't stopped to get the mail! Anyway, the rest of the afternoon was spent just playing, reading, computer-ing, and being together. It felt so good to just be still - and not be rushing off to be somewhere or do something. We all needed that. Martin even got a well deserved nap in this afternoon!

Ice Skating with our Sunday School friends!

We stayed for "free skate" after the girls' last ice skating lesson today and met up with our Sunday School friends. It was a lot of fun and the kids had a ball. The weather was, dare I say, warm?! It was so beautiful! The sun was shining, and after just a few minutes, the kids had their coats and gloves off!
The Chaves family -- Erin, Derrik and Kevin

Audriana worked really hard perfecting her "speed skating" (and trying to keep up with Derrik!).

Here is Suzanne (Sofia's Sunday school teacher) with her 20 month old daughter, Sarah! She did really well on her tiny skates!

Sofia and Amy (Suzanne's other daughter)

Sofia and Matthew

Derrik

Sofia's injury -- she fell and the ice scraped up her wrist. She was alright as soon as we got a bandaid on it. :-)

The kids together for a picture

Suzanne and all the kids (only missing her older son, Mark)

I LOVE my husband!

Ok....so I just have to say how much I am loving my husband right now! He's awesome. He's fabulous. He's supportive. My work load has been insanely busy and crazy for the past 8 weeks or so -- I have seriously logged more days and hours than I have ever logged! I worked all through the holidays (had Xmas and New Years Day off) and then worked 15 days in a row until the grand re-opening of our lobby on Jan 10th. The hotel lobby has just completed a 850K renovation -- complete with a new restaurant (The Bistro) and a Starbucks in our lobby (We Proudly Brew, not a retail store). It's beautiful. And it's been a lot of work. But...back to Martin. He has been so great through all of this -- keeping the girls on schedule with school, playdates, ice skating, cleaning the house, taking down all of Christmas (which is a BIG deal at our house), laundry, making breakfast+lunch+dinners, etc etc etc. I could not have gotten through this time without his support. I really have missed him and the girls so much! Thank you, babe for keeping the home fires buring while I kept the work fires burning!!!! I love you!

You know what else I love about him? I love that he helps Sofia adorn her beautiful headbands with flowers. I love that he plays music with the girls....drums, piano, flute, guitar, whatever he can get his hands on. I love that he gets out all the art supplies and lets the girls create whatever they want. I love that he plays soccer with Audriana. I love that he jumps on the trampoline with the girls. I love that he lets Sofia wear the same beautiful dress 3 days in a row if she wants. I love that he lets Audriana wear her Halloween robot pants to school. I love that he takes the girls on long hikes after school. I love how patient he is with the girls. I love that he uses the juicer to make fresh juice when the girls want juice. I love that he will not serve them soup from a can, or a box, or a pouch -- he will spend time to make homemade soup. I love that he has created with the girls a huge ball of plastic -- made from each piece of plastic our family has consumed, teaching the girls the importance of recycling. I love that our girls know what "Organic" means because of him. I love that he loves my family -- and I love that my family loves him. So many things........but what I love most about him is his undying love for our girls and for me. The girls love him so much! No one could ever replace him....

It's Ice Skating Season again!

Our girls are ready to hit the ice!

This is Sofia's first time and she had no hesitation to get her size 10 skates laced up and proceed to the waiting area with Audriana and Maria. I was a bit nervous for her, so I stayed pretty close to the ice, ready to get her if she decided that she really didn't want to try this. It really shouldn't have been a surprise to me, as Sofia has proven time after time that she is quite a determined little girl! I know she was nervous, I know she had some fear of falling -- but she gets this very serious look of concentration on her face, and off she goes! I was so proud of her!

Here they are waiting patiently for the Zamboni to finish so they could get on the ice. Maria and Audriana were very sweet and really took Sofia "under their wings" since this was their second year of lessons and they knew just how she was feeling.

Here she goes....I had alerted one of the instructors that this was her first time on skates, so she lovingly helped Sofia on the ice. My eyes were teary and my heart just swelled with such pride. A few times Sofia looked up at me and just smiled, as if she were saying "look at me, mom!". (she was proud of herself, too!).

Sweet Audriana with Sofia..........

Audriana really loves getting on the ice and she is perfecting her "speed skating" skills this year.

She's careful and cautious.....

After their lesson, the 3 girls decided that they wanted to stay for "free skate" so they could skate some more. Joye donned a pair of skates and went out on the ice with the girls. What a fun day!

2009 -- the year in review

Oh my goodness...........Audriana stayed up until midnight to ring in the New Year! She was so determined and had made up her mind a few weeks ago that she was going to stay up. At 7, this is the first year that she has understood this holiday. She gets it - and she wanted to stay up. We played along.....bought the party hats, the party blowers, and the confetti.....knowing that she wouldn't really be able to stay up. Well.....she proved us wrong. what a determined young lady! I fell asleep at 9pm (along with Sofia), but Daddy stayed up and he and Audriana used the computer to check out some New Year festivities from around the world (YouTube). I woke up by 11:45pm, and joined them in the family room. The smile on Audriana's face when I came out melted my heart and I was so glad that I had done that. She quickly got me a party hat, and a blower (that she had already put my name on with a sharpie marker). We turned on the tv at about 2 minutes till midnight so she could watch the ball drop in Times Square. The 3 of us rang in the new year with hugs, kisses, smiles, high 5's, and confetti throwing. It was a tender moment that I will not soon forget. She was so proud of herself that she had made it! We sure do love her!
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Things we are most thankful for:

Our amazing and beautiful daughters. Our health. Our wonderful family. Our amazing friends. Our love for one another. Our faith. Our home. Our traditions and family rituals. Our dual-cultural experiences.

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Some of their favorite things:

Favorite movies (both girls): Mama Mia, Alvin and the Chipmunks, Space Buddies, Mary Popins, Barbie Island Princess,

Favorite Music: Alvin and the Chipmunks, Mama Mia soundtrack

Favorite things to do:

Audriana -- playing soccer, going to school and being with her friends, reading chapter books, getting a DS for Christmas, swimming lessons, ice skating lessons, play dates with Maria, riding her bike, being with Aunt Kristi and Uncle Mike, tubing on Lake CdAlene with the Meadows, reading/looking at childrens science books or children's encyclopedias, Webkinz World and Jig Zone.

Sofia -- dressing up and wearing dresses everyday, have her hair curled so she looks beautiful, having her nails painted, going to Montessori Central school, leaning her sounds, learning Spanish, having her first friends (Addy, Sophia and Bella, Hannah), coloring and art/craft work, tubing with the Meadows, Balley classes, writing her name all by herself, Webkinz, and doing puzzles all by herself on Jig Zone (amazing!).

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We had the Meadows family over for dinner on New Years Day. Martin made his Nicaraguan chicken dinner for all of us. Matt and Angie were so kind to bring our favorite appetizer from Twigs, Morrocan Steak, plus a cheese pizza for the 4 kids. Kristi brought the ingredients for "Joye's Green Salad", and we rounded out the meal with some french bread and some white rice. It was awesome, as usual, and the Meadows really liked it (which made Martin so happy). The night got competitive and more fun when Matt hooked up their Wii on our TV. Us 5 adults must have played for 3 hours straight while the kids played in the other room. I had never played the Wii, so it was a new experience for me. We bowled, golfed, and rowed. It was such a great afternoon!