Happy Birthday MAMMAW!!

We are in the midst of the Stickley Family Birthday Fest!
Brent, Uncle Ed, Cris, and Aunt Carmen recently celebrated birthdays.
Grandma, Alex, and Lyndsey are coming up.
And today is Great Grandma Nova's (aka Mammaw's) Birthday!

We love you, mammaw, and we are looking forward to many more years of your crazy antics, hiliarious sayings, basketball games, card games, delicious meals, hugs, kisses, and words of wisdom. Your life is an inspiration to so many, and we are so blessed to have you in our lives.

Disney Live! Rockin' Road Show - Denver!

We are kickin' off an amazing weekend tomorrow by hanging out with Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Cinderella, the Toy Story characters, and Tigger! We are headed to Denver for the Rockin' Road Show.

The show will be playing in the Wells Fargo Theater at the Colorado Convention Center on Feb 5th and 6th. Interested in going? you can save $3 on each ticket bgy using the code KIDS when you purchase your tickets through tickmaster! Your kids will have a chance to sing along, and get on their feet to dance! It sounds like it is right up jbug and nova's alley, and we can't wait!

After the show we are headed to the little ski town of Steamboat Springs. I have a jampacked weekend planned, so stay tuned for post-weekend pictures! (be warned, however, that my normal nikon lens is still broken, and i have to use my zoom lens for all pictures, so everything will be really, really close up!)

3 - 7 !!!

We had a fabulous day yesterday celebrating Cris' 37th birthday!
We recently discovered a fantastic suprise living right next door....17 year old Carson! she is our very sweet neighbor, and the girls really like her. Which means....drumroll please...we have a babysitter! Since we no longer have Sally (our much loved nanny in hawaii), and we no longer have Betsy (aunt-extraordinaire), we haven't really been out and about without the girls since moving to Colorado. Until yesterday! Carson came over right after school to watch the girls, and Cris picked me up at work (which has been ridiculously crazy, and i mean insanely crazy, busy this week).

We headed out to see a movie.
a real, live, grown up movie.
in the theater.
without any babies.
with popcorn, nachos, and dippin dots.

We saw The Book of Eli, and we both really liked it. Then we grabbed a quick bite to eat, and headed back home to lots of love and hugs from our girls, who missed us very much!

Juneau has become OBSESSED with birthday related things lately. She was thrilled that we had a birthday cake, candles, and presents. She led a rousing chorus of Happy Birthday to You :)

Nova helped blow out the candles
The girls LOVED helping Cris open the presents...and even had a few presents of their own

"Where the wild thing are!"...which will go just perfectly with the girls "Wild thing" t-shirts (thanks Becky and Bets for the cool shirts!)

OSU ear warmers...

everyone in the family had to try them out...even Denali

Who knew West Milton, Ohio had it's very own t-shirt!

A Farmall Thermometer....a major hit!

Below is a picture Cris took of the girls....believe it or not they are actually in "time out" in this picture. Just a few minutes before this picture was taking they were picking at each other and fighting. Cris put them in time out together, and all of a sudden they were laughing and giggling and the best of buds again...gotta love sisters :)

Happy Birthday to an amazing husband!

Thank you for choosing to make your family the most important thing in your life. Thank you for spending your days making our little girls the happiest little sweethearts in the whole world. Thank you for your neverending patience, your endless energy, for getting up a million times a night with crying babies, for changing a billion dirty diapers, and for always putting the needs of your 3 girls ahead of your own!

not too much going on...

we have had a lazy but fun weekend! it seems like we haven't had a weekend just hanging out around the house since before christmas, so we all enjoyed just hanging out!

Cris has had a somewhat frustrating week in the job department. There is a pretty cool job posted working on base working with the special forces with strength/conditioning/injury prevention that was posted a couple of weeks ago. The frustration comes with trying to apply for a job through the U.S. Government website. first of all, the applications go through a central processing center, and there is no local contact listed. Second of all, you don't really send in a resume, you just fill out this little online form. if you are missing a qualification they think is essential, your application doesn't make it past the initial reviewer. For example, there is a basic certification that Cris doesn't have, because with his PhD it never seemed important for his field. unfortunately, without this particular certification, his application never actually made it to the local office. So, long story short (or somewhat short), he applied online to go and sit for the exam. if he can get scheduled before Friday, he can resubmit his application. if there is no space available for him to sit for the exam, then he is out of luck for the job. needless to say, we are hopeful there is availability for him to take the test this week. we should find out about that by Wednesday, he will hopefully take the test on Friday, and then submit his application at the last second! Please keep this whole situation in your prayers this week! We would love for him to be able to find something in his field here in colorado, and both of us working on post would be ideal!

With the cold weather we hqave spent a lot of time in the basement playroom. We found this playgym used at the end of summer, and the girls have been putting some serious time in on it! they have been jumping off the edge onto the beanbag, and Nova can't get enough of it!

Nova looking cute... :)
"raise your hand high above your head and say....blastoff!" - little einsteins
both girls love to say "blastoff" before heading down the slide

juneau mid-jump

getting ready for a jump

nova has been talking a lot lately. she doesn't exactly pronounce everything perfectly, and often substitutes G for D (like Giaper instead of Diaper). Her funniest one is anytime she sees Dora the Explorer she starts squealing "Gora Gora Gora" or if she is really excited she adds a Y to it and says "Gory Gory Gory!". sooo cute.

RODEO!

Sunday morning we dressed the girls up in their little tractor shirts (that match Grandpa Stickley!), and headed out to the rodeo. When I bought the rodeo tickets i was unaware that apparently there were a couple of rather important football games on Sunday, but Cris was a good sport about it anyway! Fortunately, most of the exhibits were indoors...it has been quite chilly this week!

The rodeo was fabulous! It started off with a bang....literally! there were some pyrotechnics at the beginnning of the show, and that kind of got Nova a little sour on the Rodeo. Her opinion changed quickly once the horses and cowboys came out, and we all enjoyed the show!

The show was a little long - about 3 hours. Juneau took a little nap in the middle of it :)

I'm thinking of trying to convince Grandpa and Grandma Stickley to buy a sheep so Juneau can practice her sheep riding and participate in the Kid's Sheep Rodeo next year! I think she has some Cowgirl Rodeo potential!

yes, that is a monkey riding a dog....

We made it home in time for Cris and the girls to catch the end of the 2nd football game! the girls didn't care too much about the game, but were happy to stay up late and cuddle with dad.

Second Anniversary of Juneau's Referral

Two years ago we saw our little June-bug for the very first time. Cutest little face we ever did see. I must have looked at this picture of Juneau about a billion times between January and August, when I finally held our girl for the first time.

We had a great day today. We spent a little time grocery shopping at Costco (the girls LOVE Costco because of the samples, or "snacks" as they like to call them). Then we ate their very favorite Costco pizza and Berry Sundaes. We played in the kids play area at the mall (one of their favorite winter activities), and then took a nap (while i got a hair cut). The highlight was dinner tonight. We ate at a little Vietnamese restaurant i have been wanting to try and it was FABULOUS! probably the best Vietnamese food we've ever had. The owner totally loved Juneau, and was so impressed when she told him she was born in "Bietnam". The owner's wife came over to meet Juneau also, and it turns out she has the same name as Juneau's vietnamese name, Nga. It was such a sweet little family owned restaurant, and we can't wait to go back!

Juneau with her Referral Picture

Last year with her Referral picture.

Big Winner

"The Pack"

Juneau looking fabulous in some Uggs
This little girl has her daddy's sweettooth all the way!
Well, I came back from Vegas with $98.00 extra dollars in my pocket :) I'm not really a gambler, but my friend Tracy has this thing with the Wheel of Fortune slot, so i thought i would just put $2 bucks in and see what happened. The very first time i pulled the lever i won a hundred bucks, so i cashed that puppy out, and called it a day!

We had a BLAST in vegas! I didn't take any pictures, but my friend Benny did, and as soon as i get them I'll post some. We had sooooo much fun...eating too much at extravagant buffets, getting massages at the hotel spa, and just being ridiculuous together. Four of us were supposed to go, but one of our friends who was coming from Fort Hood stepped off the plane in Vegas to 5 voicemails and text messages that she had to go back to Ft. Hood ASAP b/c they were sending her to Haiti. So it was a quick dinner, then back on the plane to Texas for her.

speaking of haiti, I volunteered to go with any medical teams the Army is sending. I'm not sure yet if they will be sending me, and if they do it will probably be really short notice, but I am hopeful to get an opportunity to be a part of the relief effort. There are a lot of things about being in the Army that I'm not too crazy about, but being a part of humanitarian relief is something I would love to be able to do, so i am hopeful to have the opportunity to go.

so, it's back to the old grind around the Stickley house. Juneau has been ridiculously funny lately. She's into this thing of adding "sweetheart" to the end of her sentences. Cris took them to the park this week, and Juneau was as little slow making it from the car to the swings, but she yelled out "I'm comin' sweetheart!". Also the other day when Nova woke up from her nap, Juneau started heading up the stairs to get her and yelled up "Don't cry, sweetheart!"

Nova seems to be preparing for her terrible twos in full force. She has started fit-throwing at the silliest little things. Unfortunately, her fit is a little more attention getting than average. Today she had a full-on breath-holding/pass out/posturing episode right in the middle of wal-mart. It has the potential of attracting a small crowd when she arches her back, extends her arms, and gets a freaky grimace, turns blue and stops breathing. We've learned to take it in stride, and try not to give her too much attention aside from a quick breath in the face to try to snap her out of it. We are definately anxious for her to grow out of this stage!

We are looking forward to an exciting couple of weeks ahead. Sunday we are headed to Denver for the Rodeo, and the next weekend we are going to the Disney Live! show in Denver, followed by a fun weekend in Steamboat springs. I have a great birthday gift planned for Cris - Mushing a Dogsled team in Steamboat Springs! so hopefully we will have lots of fabulous pictures and stories from the next couple of weeks!