Hoffmann Family Newsletter

--- Christmas 2009 ---

This has been another eventful and fun filled year. Unlike the past 3 years, this year was NOT spent redoing the house. We did get a closet put in the Master bedroom, but other than that, we have spent our time with family and enjoying each others company.

Our family vacation this summer was a trip to Milwaukee for the week. Nick and Eric planned this trip, so it just happened to coincide with the traveling schedule of the LA Dodgers. In Milwaukee we got to visit some museums including the children’s museum and the Harley Davidson Museum and then, of course get to go to a Dodgers/Brewers game. Before leaving, we toured Lakefront Brewery, which was very entertaining. On our way “home” we went up to Baraboo for a 2 night stay. On the way up we got to watch the “Great Circus Parade” This parade was about 4 hours long and included most if not all of the animals clowns and people that are part of the circus out of Baraboo, WI. After the Parade we moved north to Baraboo, where we stayed while taking part in activities in Wisconsin Dells. While at the Dells, we got to ride on the Army Ducks, which are retired military boats from WWII. The kids enjoyed our trip to Storybook Gardens, where they got to get up close and personal with animals like monkeys, a sloth and even a giraffe.

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Ian has had a big year. In addition to being a good big brother to Maren, he has also mastered to art of potty training! This was a major event in our lives. I must say that Steph, our Daycare Provider, deserves MOST of the credit. She had him potty trained a long time before he would do it at home. We ended up using good ole fashioned bribery! A quarter jar next to the toilet and a trip for Transformers at Target and the boy was done with Diapers. Ian started preschool this year. He has had his rough days and his good days, as to be expected. He loves school from what I can tell. I just hope he can continue with the listening skills, and improves with them, of course. His interests include, Transformers, PS3 (thanks Eric), Bakugan figures, several of the superhero shows. . .pretty much anything BOY! He has a leapster 2 now, we are hoping some of his love of the electronic games will be spent on learning games. . . we can always hope J

Maren is our little outgoing person. She is quite the joy to be around! She wakes up happy in the morning and if you get her schedule right, she goes to bed happy. . . her vocabulary is quite extensive and she talks constantly, I wonder where she gets that?! Maren is starting to show interest in potty training, so I am hoping to get things moving here soon and get her out of Diapers. Some of Maren’s current interests include dolls, crayons and cleaning! She collects dolls from around the house until her arms are full and all she can say is “Heby”(heavy). She has really shown an interest in drawing/coloring, which is completely unprovoked by me, I swear! We have moved a desk into the living room and she spends quite a bit of time working at it(most of the coloring on the paper some on the couches). Another thing Maren enjoys is cleaning. You can give her a baby wipe and she will go to town wiping things down. Every once in a while we will see her with a mop or broom, “cleaning the floor”. Eric and I still don’t know where she gets this from. For those of you that know us, it is one of our weaknesses! Lets just hope she keeps it up, she could prove to be very helpful in the future J

Eric continues to work at ITAGroup and still LOVES it! He has kept busy ousdie of work with a volleyball league that plays once a week. (Summer and Fall) As his Honey-Do list gets less extensive around here, he has taken to spending time on the PS3 and helping out with the cooking.

I am still at Orient Macksburg, in my 6^th year. This year has been my most enjoyable year yet. My class sizes aren’t extreme and for the most part, it seems that the kids want to be in my classes. (this is always good) The year is flying by so far!

I undertook a new activity this fall. Tupperware consultant. I am hoping to get more parties in to start off the New Year. It gives me some much needed time out of the house and if I don’t go and spend all of the money I make on Tupperware, it could be a good secondary source of income. If you need anything let me know J

The big news for our family this year came in September, when I found out that there’s going to be a new member to our family in June! So far, things are going great, I will try to keep everyone updated on our family activities on the blog. Make sure to visit! www.ericandalexahoffmann.blogspot.com

Happy Holidays!

Love, Eric, Alexa, Ian and Maren.

Seeing Santa tonight!

Life in the Hoffmann house has been as busy as usual. Last night the kids and I went and watched the EHK vs. OM game. I must admit that I felt like I could really cheer for either team. EHK didn't have the usual scrappy playing that they usually have, at least the girls, EHK lost. . . Boys ended up beating OM by quite a bit. I am now old enough that I know some of the players only by name. Any that I may have babysat or known in Elk Horn while I was there, have since graduated. Ian and Maren did an OK job at the game. We lasted until 1/2 time of the boys game before Maren had a complete meltdown. It WAS 8:30, an hour and a half past her bedtime, so taking that into consideration, she did great.
Maren is currently working on potty training. This being said, in a 1/2 hour span( at the basketball game ) she had to go potty like 5 times. She actually went once. . . at least IN the potty. I am hoping after the New Year, I am hoping to work on it, a little more focused! Hopefully by the time munchkin #3 comes, we will be out of diapers for the first 2 :) Boy, wouldn't that be GREAT!!!!!!!!!!
Maren is really talking up a storm and working on clearly pronouncing words. her yeah is now yes!. and she really likes to walk around the house saying "monkeys jumping on the bed"
Ian is glad to be back at school. With the snow storm last week, he didn't think he was EVER going to get to go back to school. Poor Ian. He still needs to work on taking a nap, but other than that, school seems to be going great for him. I think he is looking forward to Christmas and all the Transformers he is asking Santa for. We'll see just how well Santa does :)
This weekend is my 31st birthday, I can't believe I am already 31! I said I was going to be done having kids by 30. . .I guess it will have to be 31 :) As far as that goes. I have been feeling great. Eric has been slightly concerned by my lack of appetite, but I think I am still doing fine and taking my prenatal Vitamins. We go to our next appointment on the 30th. I can't wait to hear the heartbeat. Last time we didn't get to hear it but got to see the baby on the ultrasound. . .Next month is the big ultrasound (@ 21 weeks). . . CAN'T WAIT!!!
Tonight, after school we are heading to Des Moines for some last minute shopping and a visit to Santa. . . you know the real Santa is at Valley West Mall. He's a great Santa. I will post Pix later. :)

A long awaited update.

It has been a while since posting on this site. I have been saying I need to keep up the blog. . . I really am going to try. This last 2 months has been a whirlwind of events. In late September we found out that baby # 3 is on the way. . .Since then we have had family pictures. Maren's 2nd, Race for the Cure, Halloween, Ian's 4th Bday, Thanksgiving and all the activities in between. I will post some new pictures and hopefully get everyone caught up :)
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We went with a Transformers theme for Ian's B-day this year. This is the cake I made. Not even kidding, the thing weighs about 30 lbs! Most of it is frosting. Eric was giving me a hard time because I filled gaps in with frosting instead of shaving the cake down with a knife. Oh Well! I also attempted the checkerboard cake, which didn't turn out the greatest. OH WELL. We had a cake and a small get together. Ian got a lot of great things including Transformers, transformer blanket and pillow, clothes, a transformer computer thingy, a Leapster 2, Legos, and even a water gun!(Transformer of course) He had fun and is loving his loot.
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Thanksgiving this year was once again, spent down at Kansas City @ Mark and Denise Schieber's House. There were about 44 in attendance (from what I counted) It was great to see everyone! This year Mark and Denise hired this guy in a truck to come over. The truck was filled with PS3 and Xboxes. He also had a laser tag game to play. It was a hit.
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After leaving KC we decided to make a stop back in Walnut and help Nick and Barb with Christmas Decor. . . Ian helped plug in and check to see if lights worked while Eric climbed the roof and hung lights. Maren just made sure everyone was doing what they were supposed to be doing. We got a lot done. Barb and I got a jump on Christmas candy and got the Cherries done, since they need to sit and get the liquid on the inside.

Big News for the Troops!

This Thanksgiving, Ian and Maren had some pretty big news to share! Their little troop is getting one member stronger. Mommy is due with a little brother or sister in June!
We will be in touch with more info as it comes along :)

Family pix Video.

It's been a while

Life has been on fast forward in our house lately. I have taken up the new activity of selling Tupperware, which has just made time fly. I have been doing a good job so far of getting a party a week, this week I have 2! Sooner or later I will be actually making money instead of using what I earn to buy more Tupperware. Our kitchen is getting more colorful with the additions :)

Maren turned 2 this last week so we had a gathering this weekend. It was a small but mighty group, consisting of my Parents. My sister and Hermes, and Dana and Greg. Nick and Barb were in Tennessee and Kevin and Megan had an ISU game to attend.
This year was a much happier time. There was no candle grabbing and more importantly no temper tantrums!!! Ian did decide to get his own attention by attaching himself to the legs of our guests. Luckily they didn't seem too irritated by it. He is getting old enough to understand that it was Maren's day and that he would get his turn next month!
I decided to go with a flip flop cake for Miss Maren this year. I tried to think of things that interested her, and this is her current OBSESSION. She loves her Flip Flops!!!!! Maren got lots of clothes for her birthday. . . I think she liked them all. We will be sporting them for the next week or so :) Thanks everyone for the gifts. . . Maren will be a cutie in them all.
We got Family pictures taken on Saturday morning. We were hoping for some more mild weather but instead got 35 degrees and breezy. Maren did NOT appreciate the activities that we had chosen for her. I am just hoping that some of them are good enough to post. I am afraid of the red noses and snot that is sure to be seen in some of them. Ian did a great job with pictures. (Much better than last year!) I can't wait to see them. I think that next year we may have to opt for some indoor ones! or maybe a few around Leanne's house so we can do both! We'll see.

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Here is the log in a finished state. it took a while to get to this point but after it was all said and done, it didn't look

too bad :)

Mom decided to try and burn up the log. . . .this is in the beginning.

Eventually I will find the origional cd that came with the Camcorder! until then we get a watermark

Life has been flying by here at the Hoffmann house. . . School has started for me and Ian. He is doing a good job adjusting to going to preschool, going to bed at an earlier time and having every other day's schedule change. Maren appears to like daycare without Ian. . . I think they are happy to see each other when I go to pick her up everyday!
Ian has done a great job with potty training and has had only 1 nighttime accident since the beginning of the summer (and that was our fault). It is nice to have him out of Diapers.
Maren is next for potty training. I think Steph is going to start working with her. She seems ready but we'll see :)
Last night was crazy. I decided to better organize my kitchen, so I took things off of shelves and out of cupboards and started wiping things down with Lysol. As I was cleaning out the shelf that houses the Corelle, I felt a stinging in my fingers. I puled my hand back only to find it impaled with a 2" shard of Corelle! Ouch! It went into my pointer finger, all the way thought, and into the next one! After getting Eric's attention he pulled it out and bandaged me up. . .it is still bleeding some today, because I keep hitting it, but I am hoping for a speedy recovery. It is my right hand, and not being able to draw wouldn't be good!
My brother is now a daddy! He called around 9 and Miss Berlin Grace was here!!!!! 7 lbs 13oz. She was just a few ounces more than Ian (7lb 7oz). I can't wait to see more pictures and would LOVE to go out to see her. . .by the time Spring break hits, Maren will need her own ticket though! 3 tickets to AZ?! Hmm. Maybe Mom and I can drive out!
Not much else is going on, Eric is playing recreational volleyball with some of his coworkers. Loving work still. . . . is on old from riding the motorcycle untill uncle Keith gets his piece in to fix the exhaust on his bike. . .

I'm a plastic chic

I went to a tupperware party last night and left it being a Tupperware Consultant. . . . my mom thinks I'm crazy for doing it. . . I can see where she is coming from. I have a less than organized house and two very energetic kids. I am hoping that I can hit the minimum sells for the 3 time a year requirement. . . it doesn't seem like it would be too hard. . .
If anyone needs any tupperware let me know. I am having a party at my house on Sept 19th. @ 1pm. Let me know if you;d like to attend or order anything from the catalog :) A new sale flyer is coming out the 12th!

Ian is a Preschooler!

Maren wanted her picture taken with her brother this morning. I wish I would have done her hair! Normally it is like pulling teeth to get them to take a picture together. . .I missed the perfect opportunity!

Here are some pictures from Ian's first day of school. This last one is of him in front of his cubbie at school.

School is back in session

School is officially back in session and life seems to be getting back to "normal". Ian will be attending preschool in Orient this year, and is VERY excited about it. He has a calendar that has designated stickers for the days that he is at school, at Steph's and at home. . . Tomorrow night will be a meeting for preschool, where we can go in and meet his teacher and see where he will be attending class.
Last night we went to an I-Cubs game. . . the kids did pretty well considering th overall temp and humidity levels. . . Ian sweats a lot! The kids were tired this morning, not surprising though. We got home at 10. . .Maren is in bed by 7:30 on most nights. . . Lets just hope they got a decent nap at Steph's today. The Iowa weather is hot and muggy. . .it has been raining all day.

Last weekend was the Dexter Days Celebration. We were in charge of the movies in the park. it went a lot better than last year. We were more prepared for lights, and heat for that matter. It turned out to be an awesome weekend for outdoor activities. There was a parade on Saturday morning. The corner in front of our house is the best place to sit. The kids have enough candy to last them through the holiday season! We had visits from both sets of grandparents! Ian and Maren always get excited when they visit. On Sunday we went to the Firemens Parade in Walnut. The parade was short, but the kids made out like bandits, they got Lots of Candy! We made the trip short to Walnit, getting back around 5:30, just enough time to get the kids fed and Maren off to bed. The girl loves to sleep!

Sara visited

Today we had a visit from Sara, Nick, Barb, and Sara's friend Daniel. . .We went to Rock Bottom for dinner. .it was yummy! Here's our group picture.

Summer is winding down.

Summer is winding down. I am Looking forward to school, and am hoping to get some new ideas in the curriculum this year. Over the past couple of weeks I have started looking into new things to teach. During one of the classes I took last week, I learned ( or got reminded I guess) about Artist trading cards. These are fairly popular in the art world. All they are are Baseball card sized pieces of artwork that are traded for other peoples cards. I have made a few so far and am hoping to maybe get a few traded before school starts in 2 weeks. I will be posting some on my art blog here as soon as I figure out if my scanner is still working. . .

It has been a crazy couple of weeks. Last week I was taking classes on Monday, Tues, Thurs and Friday. So the kids didn't really see much of me last week. They are more than making up for it now. Ian has really taken to talking back and trying to get himself into trouble, just doing naughty things. I don't know why he is acting out and it is frustrating. I hope it is the age and he grows out of it. I would hate for him to go to school in a month and not be able to get along with other kids. I tried taking the kids into Des Moines today, to go swimming. In doing this I made several mistakes, resulting in our early return home. The plan for the day was to go to Des Moines, hit target, get supper and go to a pool out by Merle Hay. My first mistake was letting Maren take a nap at 11:30 instead of keeping her up till noon. . . by doing this, she was getting up as I was trying to get Ian to take a nap. . .with her up he didn't take one. . . BAD IDEA. He really needs a nap to keep him civilized! #2 I was trying to save a few bucks by hitting the pool after 5. Maren has a bedtime of 7, and Ian didn't get a nap, so his "civilized self" didn't make it to 5, or 3, or even 1 for that matter. . .Mistake #3: I took the kids shopping before hand. It wasn't a lot of shopping, just target to pick up some more hangers and a backpack for Ian. . .this was too long I guess. The kids fussed throughout the store and Ian turned into the shopping monster, refusing to stay in, or even near the cart. Why is it, every time I go out with the kids I say I will never do that again, yet I do?!?!?! Grrrrr. Things got worse when I found out that my keys were left hanging on the cart at the end of our shopping trip. By the time I figured it out, the shopping cart was on it's next round around Target! I did find them fairly fast, but not before being totally flustered and my patience running out with the kids not wanting to listen. Next Was the trip to Perkins. The kids were crabby and hauling them into a restaurant instead of picking something up through the drive-through was probably a bad idea. Ian did eat, which was a good thing, however I spent the whole dinner trying to get him to sit down and eat. After dinner was finally over we headed to the pool, only to find out that I was missing one of Ian's floaters for his arms, and had somehow lost the swim diaper for Maren. Target didn't have the floaty thing, but Big Lots Did ! Last one too!. . . Dahls had swim diapers. . . I got back in the car only to find out that Ian was horrible while I was in the store ( I can only threaten him so much. . . ) and the people we went into Des Moines with, no longer wanted to go swimming, because of his behavior. SO, after all that we ended up filling the car with Gas and Going home.

Ian had a good talking to and was send straight to bed. I really don't think that Not going swimming affected him. . . Luckily Maren was too young to realize what she was missing out on. . .

I guess the good end to the day was that both kids were in bed by 8 and I got to paint my bedroom. We are almost finished. . . Some trim and white paint will do the trick. . . Maybe tomorrow.

4 weeks until school is back in session.

I have just realized that there are only 4 weeks until heading back down to work. It has been quite a summer, with a lot of activities. After returning to Iowa from vacation in Wisconsin, we picked up Eric's cousin Alicen. She willingly came back home with us, to help out with watching the kids while we tore out our wall in our bedroom, for a new and improved closet. We ended up taking out the bathroom closet in addition to just our bedroom closet. We now have a 10'9" closet with 4 bifold doors in it. We aren't done with the walls n

ext to the doors, but inside of the closet has been mudded once, so we just need to hit it with sandpaper and do another coat or 2 of plaster. . . then paint. . . then hanging bars. . . and Ta DA we have a useable closet for the first time since we moved in. YAY!!!!! Our bedroom is a mess as you can imagine. I am hoping to maybe get some sanding done today and get another coat on so that we can at least get the inside done.

Getting the clothes hanging is going to do wonders for the state of our room at the moment. Here are some photos of our progress.

Alicen went home yesterday. . . I'm going to miss having her around, it was nice to have her watch the kids so we could get a big part of our latest project done. . .

This week is going to be pretty uneventful. I think I am planning on heading south to Orient and Greenfield for a day. I need to get come certificates lettered for the suftball baseball banquet next week. . . visit Zeke and Cindy. . . who knows what else. . .I have signed up for classes during the 26th and 27th and 30-31st for recertification. . . I have been putting them off, time to get going on them.

Milwaukee Days 2 and 3

Due to the late arrival time last at the hotel, I did not get the blog updated. So, this is what has been happening the last two days. We have done quite a bit of swimming. . .Yesterday we went to the Discovery World on the lake Michigan Pier. The activities were a little old for the kids but overall it was a neat place to visit. After the Discovery world, we returned to the hotel where Ian, Maren, and Barb took naps, while Eric, Nick and I went to the Lakefront Brewery for a tour. It was quite the show. Out tour guide was hilarius, I would recommend for those of you interested in that type of tour to go visit. . . Good Time,Good Beer. Last night we went to a Milwaukee Brewers/ LA Dodgers game. It was a good, but long, game. TheDodgers ended up winning the game in the 10th inning. 12-8. We arrived back at the hotel at about 11:15. . .TIRED!

Today was a more relaxed day, we started off with breakfast downstairs, then a quick swim in the pool. We didn't leave the hotel until almost noon, but we were in no hurry. We had decided to go downtown and find a local reasturant to try. We ended up at Water Street Brewery. As we were turning the corner to enter the resturant, we see Bristol Prebe, one of Eric's friends from BV, getting out of a nearby car. What a coincidence?! He was in town with his family to see the Dodgers play also. We ended up having lunch with his family. It was a very enjoyable time and a highlight of our day!

Next came the Harley Davidson museum. I had origionally thought that we were going to a Factory with a miseum attached, so we did end up north of Milwaukee at the Harley Davidson plant. . . however, you couldn't tour the plant with munchkins and the Museum was back in the area where we had just eaten lunch. Oh well. . . . well it was a really cool museum. Ian liked the bikes. . . So did Maren. . . Neat place to go. We are now back in the Hotel, I am doing a load of laundry, Maren is in her pack and play but refusing to go to sleep. Ian is behind me "playing quietly". Barb is trying to sleep over Maren's chattering. . .

Milwaukee:Day 1

This year we are taking a family vacation to Milwaukee WI. Vacation started at about 6:30 last night when Eric got home. The first leg of our journey was to Bellevue for an overnight stay. We hot there at about 10 last night. . .It was nice to see Rita, Ron, and Pat before continuing on the way.

Shortly after entering Wisconsin, we began to see signs of it's dairy highlights. There were dairy farms as well as cheese factories, periodically along the way. We decided to stop at the Roth Case Cheese Factory in Monroe. We had t

he opportunity to show the kids some of the cheese making process, they had a viewing hallway in the factory. There wasn't much going on other than some of the workers flipping cheese containers over. . . We tried on some cheese head hats and picked

out some cheese for the road before continuing on.

We made one last stop before getting to Milwaukee. . . this was a short stop for lunch in Beloit. Ian made friends with another 3(ish) yr old that was on the play equipment. . . It was a fairly short stop, but the kids appreciated it. We arrived at the hotel in Milwaukee at about 2pm. . .not knowing that check in was at 3. Luckily they let us have access to the pool!. . . All we have heard since Ian found out about vacation was " I want to to McWaukee to go SWIMMING!!!!" So, while waiting for access to the room, we went swimming. The pool area is very cool, there is a

6" pool for the kids, complete with a slide and those mushroom looking sprinklers. The kids poo

l is EXTREMELY COLD, due to the heater failing. . .This afternoon we went to the Old German Beer hole. It was very good! Rounding off the day was a stroll along the river walk and yet another trip to the pool. Wat a full day, but fun start to the vacation. Tomorrow is not yet totally decided what is going to have on the agenda, but we are planning on going to the Dodger/Brewers game tomorrow night. (Coincidentally the Dodgers will also be in Milwaukee for a series against the Brewers, kind of like the Dodgers were

playing the Rockies during our last vacation to Colorado)

Yard in Bloom!

I took some pictures while we were enjoying the outdoors today. We were busy getting ready for the trip today. Washing clothes, packing, and making mental notes(yes I know I need paper) of the things I can't forget, were just a few of the things on the agenda. We made a trip to DM to get the oil changed and while we were in there, had lunch with Eric. . . The kids were a handful. . .

We had our first harvest of beans tonight. We blanched them and then bagged and froze them. 3 qts so far. While we were in the harvest mode we went and picked about two gallons of rhubarb and stuck it in the freezer.

I am a little apprehensive about our upcoming trip. The kids can barely handle a day in Des Moines without a need for the next day to be a make-up day. (On sleep and restful activities) Maybe having 4 adults to pay attention to them, will make the trip easier (HOPEFULLY)

I am assuming that Nick will have his laptop in tow, so I will make an attempt to update at least once while I am out. . . that and could I make it a week without Farmtown?! We'll see. . . Enjoy the pictures