Still alive...

After more than a 1 year hiatus, and really thinking this place of mine was firmly and completely finished... here I am.  After rereading old posts over Christmas break, I was so thankful to have such a complete and candid account of the early beginnings of our journey to become parents and as parents- it seemed a horrible loss to have nothing from the past year, except photos and the memories in our heads.  My posts won't be the same- they definitely will not be as candid, nor am I even sure that there's anyone left that may possibly read anything I type... but I am going to try to dust this little corner off and see if I can regain some momentum.  Encouragement appreciated. :) 

Since I have no posts from 2013, this post will try to remedy that with some memorable quotes and events from last year that I think bear remembering.  We made a memory jar last January and added little slips of paper of things that happened when the mood struck us.  We forgot to open it on New Years Eve (lame since we spent the past 12 months adding to it!) but reread every slip today.  Here are some tidbits worth forever being recorded in print:

• Watching Snow White the movie for the first time and discussing what "beautiful" really means- inside and out.  January 1st
• Mama: "Your body is fighting the germs.  Say Hoo-rah!"  Sam: "You-rah!"  Mama:"HOO-rah!"  Sam: "YOU-rah!" January 2nd
• Exploding hot water outside when it was really cold.  January 5th
• At the beginning of nap- Sam, yelling from his bed: "Mama, do elephants swim?!?"  Mama: "Yes they do."  Sam:  I love you more than elephants, mama." (his favorite animal)  Mama: I love you more than elephants, too." January 6th
• Anna sticking up for her brother (1st day at their new daycare): "Be nice to my brother.  I love him." January 8th 
• Anna: "I eat noodles- I'm a Noodle-vore!"  January 14th
• Sam pulling Anna in the sled down the path on the hill: luge style January 18th 
• First water park experience.  January 26th
• Surprise lunch visit from Jake on the 5th Cold Day/No School.  January 28th
• Reading Mercy Watson Chapter books at bedtime (they love them!) January
• Beautiful winter sunsets over the pond in our backyard.  January
• First Winter Carnival for Sam and Anna: ice chair, sculptures, drinking hot chocolate and chasing pigeons. February 1st
• Sam: "Let's eat at Wildebeest (Buffalo Wild Wings)." February 2nd
• Friday night when asked what he wanted to do this weekend, Sam said: "Eat pie!"  So Daddy made peach and strawberry pie the next day- yum!  February 8th
• Valentine's Day pigtail heart hair- Anna was so proud at school! February 14th
• Sam and Anna's first snowshoeing expedition. February 16th
• Singing Frozen songs together; Sam: "Mama, you have the most beautiful voice in the world."  February 17th
• Snow Day/Winter Weather No School Day # 6 for the year!  February 21st
• Sam and Anna wearing Daddy's belts to "go to work"- Sam: "we are going to have a meeting about eating pie."  February 26th
• Royal 4th birthday party for princes and princesses. March 1st
• Sam writing numbers to 100 with only a little help (3 years old).  March 2nd
• When going for a scooter walk, Anna fell- Sam got off his scooter and walked all the way back to give her a big hug, unprompted.  Then she stopped crying.  March 12th
• Setting leprechaun traps and "pretending to be asleep" (being very quiet at bedtime) so the leprechaun would come. March 16th
• Sounding out words with Sam (just turned 4 years old).  March 18th
• Spontaneous hand holding on the way to daycare, the whole way.  March 21st
• First swimming lessons by themselves (without Mom or Dad) March 23rd
• Sam's first time ice fishing. March 24th
• Anna's purple dress up cape (she wore as Elsa) she wore all the time. April
• Sam's animal drawing collection. April
• Saturday at the Farm- baby animals and collecting sap for maple syrup.  April 18th
• Sam's first bug catching jar. April 20th
• Watching herons, ducks and geese in our pond. April 27th
• Mama: "You will have to be good listeners and good direction followers."  Sam: "I can't handle both."  May 3rd
• Sam with a silly Mohawk after bath:  "Look!  There's a rooster behind me!  Nope.  It's just my hair!"  May 7th
• Mother's Day- Caribou coffee, breakfast and roses in bed.  Sam: "I picked all the dandelions in the yard because I love you so much!" May 11th
• Sam and Anna dancing and singing with an umbrella inside in the entry.  May 12th
•  "I love you more than..." "...all the planets!" (Sam)  "...all the people in the word!" (Sam)  "...Anna loves Elsa!" (Anna)  May 13th
• Rooftop dinner date by the river- perfect weather, perfect date night.  May 24th
• Garter snakes and painted turtle in our yard. May 25th
• Baby robins in our willow tree.  June
• Big kid bike excitement: "This is the best day ever!"  June 13th
• In the car, discussing how many twinkles in our eyes- Sam: "I think I have 3." Anna:"I think I have 4." June 24th
• Anna- praying to God loudly, looking up into the sky: "God, please don't let it rain today so we can go in our pool.  Only during nap, okay?"  June 25th
• Sam: "Mommy, you are the best mommy on the earth ever." after having a festive red, white and blue drink on July 4th
• Anna and Daddy weekend fishing up north, Sam and Mama weekend going to the zoo and other fun things. July 13th
• Meeting Ollie, our neighbor's golden retriever puppy. August 
• Accidentally getting into the special exhibit Ultimate Dinosaurs at the Science Museum- Oops!  August 5th
• Photo booth family fun at a wedding. August 9th
• Sam climbed a tree for the first time (willow tree in our yard) August 13th 
• First time at the Renaissance Festival. Anna: "This was the best day EVER!" September 21st
• Anna:  "It's all in the past."  October
• Sam and Daddy grouse hunting weekend up north, Anna and Mama weekend shopping.  October
• Anna: "It's hilarious!"  October 
• Sam and Anna's first time ice skating. November 2nd
• Family Harlem Shake in the bathroom.  November 12th
• Anna: "We are learning sike words (at school)."  Mama: "I'm glad you are learning sight words, Anna."  Anna:  "I'm glad you are... NOT EATING PEOPLE!"  Silly girl.  November
• Anna's super neat coloring inside the lines and leaving no white spaces. November
• Flocks of swans flying over our house. December
• Anna's preschool boyfriend, Matthew:  "I'm going to marry him."  Giving me a plastic blue star ring- "This is the ring I want him to give me when we get married, okay?"  December
• Anna thought her Wild Kratts Creature Power Suit would really give her creature powers.  December 26th

And two scary BAD parts of our year, that really, are blessings because they could have turned out so very, very differently. So yes, I want to remember these too:

• The large 5 drawer dresser falling on top of Sam and he only had minor scratches and bruises.  No urgent care trip even needed. (one of only two large pieces of furniture in our home that wasn't attached to the wall at the time.  Both now are firmly strapped to the wall) June
• A shooting in the parking lot of our very good daycare in a very nice area.  Short version:  a man randomly chose the parking lot for a drug deal transaction. The police were called to investigate and when questioned, he ran, then pulled a gun on the police.  The police officers shot him.  The children at the daycare were on lockdown at the time, and evacuated when it was under control.  The kids aren't aware that anything happened.  Scariest afternoon of my life because I did not know that anything had happened until I was heading to pick them up, saw news helicopters in the air and the road was blocked off.  But so very very thankful that, in the end my children were safe and that it was a random thing and will never, ever happen again.

But I don't want to end on that note!  In 2013 we really made our house our home.   We painted every wall.  Made friends with our neighbors.  Settled into our jobs.  Watched Sam and Anna grow into full blown kids, instead of little 3 year olds. Saw them develop more and more into the individuals they will be for the rest of their lives.

I can't wait to see what gems worth remembering make it into our jar this year.