ANDREAS is 110% boy. The kid is obsessed with dinosaurs, planes, trains, boats, and cars. He adores pushing/flying/driving his little toys around the house.

He frequently latches onto one or another of them in an obsessive manner, meaning that a particular item travels EVERYWHERE with him for a day (or two or three). Interest in that specific object will then wane as a new one replaces it, but you have to be on your toes. A previous “must-have” toy can unexpectedly return to “cannot-live-without-it” status without any notice, and if it is not easily accessible (read: you don’t know where he last put it), panic will ensue. And so, Caleb has received many a mid-day phone call from Nancy asking, “Do you happen to know where ‘Gruenes Flugzeug’ (green airplane) is right now?” or “My life will be markedly improved if you could tell me where the VW is. . . please?!?”

He has recently also begun showing a bit of an interest in arts and crafts. His attention span is growing increasingly longer, so if we put some children’s stories or music on the radio and give him a dinosaur coloring book, we can occasionally buy ourselves a few minutes of (relative) calm. (Warning: he may still knock over an empty chair, color on his sister or Lord-knows-what else, or come up with some other mischief, so this is not a free pass to leave him unsupervised!) He had a lot of fun with fingerpaint recently.

Andreas is going through some typical 3-year-old “mean” stuff: hitting, pinching, teasing, jumping on, and otherwise aggravating his big and little sisters. He comes up with some hilarious but not appropriate insults, so Simona often comes running up to us to report, “Andreas hat mich eben stinkig doof Kuh genannt!” (Andreas just called me stinky dumb cow!). Not sure where he gets these, but I sometimes have to bite my tongue to keep from laughing. We are trying to work on this behavior.

Physically, he continues to be relatively small. He had his 3-year well-child visit in January and weighed in around 31 pounds, which put him in the 50th percentile for weight. I don’t remember how tall he is, but I think it was around 95 centimeters (about 37 inches). Whatever it was, he is in the 20th percentile for height. He also had a bad haircut (I take full responsibility for the unfortunate mishap with the clippers!) in December, so he has spent January regrowing his hair. (These are before and after pictures from December. . . he looks much better now!)

He also had a sore nose (from a late-December cold) that he kept picking at, so it grew into a bigger and bigger scab. We had to enforce wearing a band aid on his upper lip and then had to resort to socks over his hands to allow it to finally heal up, but it’s pretty well healed now.

Despite his wild-man ways, Andreas does have a tender little heart and will sometimes crawl into your lap for a hug or a story- preferably about a train, plane, dinosaur, car, boat. . . He definitely idolizes his Papa right now, which is really cute to see. His laugh is contagious, and he is a sweet boy. He brings so much fun and energy into our lives.

(Umm, you’re about a month late, aren’t you?!)

Well, technically, yes. Technically, the new year began on 01.01.2012 . . . which was a month ago. . . but allow me to explain why I am deeming this the start of the “new year.”

New Year’s Eve is my least favorite holiday. It brings along expectations that one is going to do something wild and crazy- sort of a second Mardi Gras, since you have to live it up before new resolutions take effect the next morning- but I’ve never really been a wild party girl. Even prior to having kids, I rarely managed to stay out late without threatening to fall asleep on the bar/table/whatever. Couple that with the fact that I am too cheap to want to shell out extra money for something I could do at a fraction of the cost on most other nights of the year, and you may start to see why I dislike the holiday.

My distaste for New Years also may stem from many less-than-stellar New Years in my memory. By far the most vivid for me is ringing in 1996, when we celebrated the new year in Germany. My grandfather was dying of cancer, and around 5AM, before our New Year’s Day flight back to the States, we had to take turns going upstairs to say our final farewell to our Opa. This is one of my saddest childhood memories, and I think of it every New Years.

Other not-quite-so-sad-but-fairly-random New Year’s Eve memories range from standing on a cold, foggy street with some other elementary / middle school kids banging on pots and pans to my entire family lying sick in a hotel bed in Cancun, Mexico, watching news reports about the death of JonBenet Ramsey. One year found me standing with friends at Underground Atlanta to watch the Peach drop (the Atlanta version of Times Square!), only to learn first hand that it really is not as exciting as it is hyped to be.

This year proved no exception in the not-so-fun-New-Years-Eve department. We left Iowa on December 30, and by that evening Caleb and I had both come down with a severe case of strep throat. We lay in our hotel in Ohio alternating between shivering and sweating from fever, trying to catch some sleep before a second tedious, long day of being trapped with 3 kids and a cat in a rental minivan. By the time we got home on the 31st; unloaded the kids, cat, and luggage; fed them a quick dinner; and got them into bed; we were exhausted. We crawled into bed at 8:30 and tortured ourselves further by watching a replay of the Northwestern bowl game (which NU predictably lost) and were asleep well before midnight– still suffering from sore throats and fevers, and now also bemoaning yet another NU bowl game loss.

Now, generally, my dislike extends only to the holiday. I love the promise of the new year itself: a chance for a fresh slate and a clean start, a chance to make new goals, to re-prioritize, and to weed out bad patterns or habits. This year, though, the rough New Years extended into a rough new year. In the past four weeks, various members of our family have suffered strep throat, a lice re-infestation, an injured tendon, a nasty wound that wouldn’t heal, another round of strep throat, a stomach virus (complete with middle-of-the-night vomiting), and diarrhea. Oh, the laundry I have done in the month of January!

I think, though, that we are over the worst of it. We are hopeful that this month, we can start with a fresh slate (and a clean bill of health!). Ambitions for good exercise and sleep habits are back on the table, as we cast off the illnesses that have encumbered and hindered. Along with those come renewed desires for more time with God and better stewardship of our precious free minutes and free dollars. So what if the year is already one-twelfth over? Choosing to re-boot 2012 is kind of liberating. Failure to stick to our resolutions in January- whether for lack of effort or for insurmountable circumstances- doesn’t matter.

In that sense, it is a lot like the chance God gives us- and we desperately need- to start over every day (or even every hour). God is steadfast in His compassion and mercy, which are new every morning (Lamentations 3). He longs for us to reject the actions and patterns of behavior that have come before; he is quick to let us start over, deliberate but unburdened by past mistakes and failures.

So, wherever you are in your lists of good intentions, goals, or resolutions, please join us in turning the calendar page and starting fresh. Good tidings to you, and a happy new year!

We drove up to New York City on Saturday, November 5, and arrived in the early afternoon, as incident-free as can be expected with 3 young children. Mom & Dad and KK & Mike were all assembled at the hotel, so we quickly checked in and boarded the last round of charter buses heading for the Expo at Javits Convention Center in Manhattan.

If you’ve never been to a race expo, you’re not really missing out. Besides picking up your number and race packet (often including your finisher’s t-shirt), you have the opportunity to sample an endless quantity of power bars, gels, and drinks while wandering through countless racks of running shoes, apparel, and other gear. In between, officials from other races press brochures and promotional material into your hands. The cynic in me doesn’t relish being required to attend a marketing/promotional session; the runner in me has to admit that there is a unique air of excitement and enthusiasm for running not found in many (any?) other venues.

Anyway, we spent the rest of the afternoon doing some sight seeing, though Andreas and Maria (and thus Caleb and I) did not last quite as long as the others. After an early night at the hotel and an extra hour of sleep (thank you, end of Daylight Savings time!), KK, Dad, and I arose at 4:30 AM to catch the buses to Staten Island.

About 47,000 people run the NYC marathon each year, and the race takes place in all five boroughs of NYC. (Before this trip, I could not have named all five.) The logistics of shutting down major roads and bridges throughout the city are, I’m sure, insane; it also means that the morning is a long one for most participants.

The “staging area” is Fort Wadsworth, which is on the eastern side of the island. Runners take buses or ferries at designated times to arrive at the fort by about 7 AM, which is when the Verrazano Bridge between Staten Island and Brooklyn closed to traffic. We were split into three different colors (blue, orange, and green) and three different “waves,” starting at 9:40, 10:10, and 10:40 AM. Within each wave, we were further subdivided into “corrals.” Dad was in the first wave, I was in the second, and KK was in the third.

During our many hours at the fort, we were fed coffee & bagels (courtesy of Dunkin Donuts), Power Bars and Gels, water, hot tea and hot chocolate, and Gatorade. We came prepared for the chill of sitting outside for so many hours, but the weather was gorgeous this year and made staying warm relatively easy. Conversation, food, and race preparations passed the time quickly, and before we knew it, it was time to find our respective UPS trucks, which would take our bags to the finish line for us.

Around 10:15, after months and months of training and anticipation and one final rendition of the Star Spangled Banner, I began the race. We began at the base of the Verrazano Bridge, which meant that we were packed in and running elbow to elbow even more than one normally is at the start of a big race. My first mile was thus much slower than my intended pace, but I overcompensated and ran my second much too fast. After that, I settled into a decent pace through Brooklyn and Queens. I slowed a bit coming across the Queensboro Bridge and then decided to start walking through the water stations in Manhattan. Still, I felt energized by the AMAZING crowd support.

Honestly, it was astonishing to see that so many people would stand along the side of the road and scream, clap, high-five, and otherwise cheer on the never-ending stream of spandex and dri-fit clad runners. The only place no one was cheering was on the bridges, and only because they were closed to non-runners.

I continued to feel strong as we passed into the Bronx and then back into Manhattan, but the hardest two miles for me were around 23 and 24, where we gradually ran uphill along Central Park for what seemed an eternity. Finally, we came around the southern edge of the park, passed through Columbus Circle, and entered the Park for the final stretch. I felt strong during my last 1.2 miles, and crossing the finish line was an amazing feeling.

Then came the worst part of the race: shuffling to our UPS vans to pick up the bags. We were not supposed to sit or stop unless we needed medical attention, so we continued walking. . . and walking. . . and walking. Mine happened to be the second to last truck, which meant that I walked about .6 miles- an eternity when all you want to do is get off your feet! After grabbing my belongings and changing out of my sweaty clothes, I again started walking. . . and walking. . . and walking.

We had arranged to meet just north of Columbus Circle, but because of where I exited the Park and road closures, I ended up walking (shuffling) almost 2 miles to meet up with Mike, Caleb, and Simona. All of that took close to an hour, and unfortunately, my chip had a glitch, so my mile 26 and finish times were not recorded. This meant that those tracking me didn’t know if I had finished. . . or collapsed at the end. Thankfully, I found them (courtesy of the highly visible German flags) shortly before they called the emergency number for missing runners!

In the end, it took about 2.5 weeks for the NYC Road Runners club (which administers the race) to determine my accurate finish time (via video recording of the finish line). The delay was a bit agonizing, especially because I didn’t stop my watch at the finish and so didn’t really know my final time. I am grateful to the NYCRR , though, for being so professional and thorough in resolving such glitches. In the end, my time was 3:41:33- not a PR (personal record), but my second fastest marathon and well under my hoped-for goal of 3:45. I was thrilled with the entire experience: the weather, the crowds, the city, the course, my effort, and my time.

We finished off the weekend with Sunday morning brunch with a dear old friend, Leslie, whose dad completed residency with my dad in Chicago in the early 1980s. We lived in the same building then, and our families have kept in touch over the years. I hadn’t seen Leslie since high school, so it was wonderful to reconnect!

One final but very important note: I could not have achieved this without Caleb’s tremendous support. During the many months of training, he took on an extra childcare burden while I mapped out, planned for, and executed my many, many training runs. He sacrificed his own sleep, time, and work-out time to let me focus on this, and I’m extremely grateful. I’ve promised him a break from marathoning, so I’ll be focusing on some shorter runs for the next few years. But come 2014 or 2015, I hope to be taking on the London Marathon. Let’s see if I stick to it!

You would probably be even more confused if the excitement about Christmas has been building for weeks, while at the same time, your family has been telling you that it is almost your birthday, too! Supposedly you are going to be three years old (no mention of Jesus’s age has been made). To top it off, the kind, well-meaning lady at church contradicts what your parents have told you: When she asks you, “Whose birthday is coming up?” and you tell her, “My birthday!” she gently corrects, “No, we are celebrating Jesus’s birthday!”

What?! What is with the tree, the lights, the decorations, the manger, the stockings, the presents? And for crying out loud, WHOSE birthday is it, anyway?!?!?

Such has been the world of Andreas over the past few weeks. He finally understands a *little* about birthdays and a *little* about Christmas, but celebrating these two events back to back was, I think, quite overwhelming for our 3-year-old.

Nonetheless, both events were wonderful celebrations. We rented a mini van and drove (yes, drove) to Iowa- cat and all- to spend the holidays with Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle Seth, Uncle Wyatt, and Aunt Grace.

Fun there began with cutting down our own tree on Grandma & Grandpa’s Christmas tree farm and continued with gatherings with both sides of the family.

The kids are lucky to have three living great grandparents in Iowa: Great Grandma and Grandpa Neil and Great Grandpa Lowell. This was Maria’s first trip to Iowa, so it was great for her to meet all of them!

This was the first year that we saw Simona take pleasure not only in opening presents but also in giving them. Andreas opened his very first present- a set of four airplanes from Grandpa- and became so absorbed that he couldn’t be bothered to open other gifts! Maria had fun pulling at the wrapping paper and crawling around in the chaos.

Andreas was pretty tired by the time his birthday party rolled around, but he rallied nicely after a quick nap and dinner to enjoy the festivities. We had baked a chocolate cake from scratch, so the kids got to help decorate it. He received another (larger) airplane and again was immediately enamored. I think this year was the first time he realized his birthday was “his” special day.

The rest of the week was filled with indoor and outdoor play. The weather was great- highs in the forties or even fifties, and little to no precipitation. Highlights included a long romp at the playground, games of hide-n-seek in Grandma & Grandpa’s back woods, a bonfire, and a trip to the shooting range! Grandpa let Simona and Andreas each take a turn.

Overall, we had a wonderful time and can’t wait for our next trip to the Hawkeye State.

So though gift #2 made us merry, you may think, “In light of #1 and #3, #2 wasn’t very bright!”

But, I’m glad we went ahead and bought the new camera anyway. Our kids are only little once, so we want to capture as much of these years as we can. My parents bought a video camera when they really should not have, and they have never regretted it. We all enjoy watching those old videos now.

I have a feeling we will feel the same way about owning a camera that a) does not specialize in blurry photos; b) takes pictures of more than just people holding very still for a very long time while it “thinks”; and c) is not cracked and barely working.

So far, we’ve had fun playing with the new camera (it’s a Canon EOS Rebel T2i, in case you care) and are learning to use its many settings. I’ll be working on a few update blogs, so hopefully the upgraded technology will be evident here shortly. Here are two sneak-preview photos that would not have turned out with our old camera:

Until next time, Happy New Year!

We are so glad that Maria is a part of our family and can’t get enough of that seven-toothed grin and those slobbery kisses. Though we occasionally feel a twinge of nostalgia for the warmth and frailty of brand new life, we also relish the excitement of watching her discover her world and become her own person. I’m sure before we know it, she’ll be dancing in her big sister’s footsteps, but for now, we’re happy she’s just who she is: A bald, sweet little ONE year old.

Happy Birthday, Missy Miss. Alles Gute. Wir lieben Dich!

It has been a LONG road to get here, beginning with submitting an entry to the lottery back in 2009. On April 3, 2010, my suspicion that I was pregnant was confirmed; a mere 4 days later, on April 7, I found out that I was one of the lucky lottery winners and had a slot for the 2010 NYC marathon. Obviously that wasn’t going to happen. After deferring my entry, I spent over a year telling people, “I don’t know where I’ll be living after Caleb graduates, but I know for sure I’ll be in NYC on Sunday, November 6, 2011!”

Then, in late January of this year, about 6.5 weeks after Maria’s birth, I began running again. Miles were slow and felt long, but by mid-summer, I had shed all but the last few pounds of baby weight and was ready to start training in earnest.

I used an official training plan this time (Hal Higdon’s Intermediate II), with some slight modifications, so my training kicked off on July 10. Since then, I have completed runs in Germany, Georgia, Alabama, DC, Virginia, and Maryland, logging 556.5 miles in heat, rain, wind, dark, cold, humidity, and more. I have trained harder for this race than for any in a long time.

And now, two days before the race, I am READY. Ready to run my heart out. Ready to run a PR, but also ready for the fact that it just may not be my day. Ready to take a 5 AM bus to Staten Island. Ready to spend 3 hours pre-race with Dad and KK hanging out in the cold. Ready to have fun. Ready to hurt. Ready to run 26.2 miles through the streets of New York City.

See you at the finish.

- Strolling along the Inner Harbor

- Playing in a spray fountain at the Inner Harbor

- Taking in the Grand Prix from Caleb’s office

- Exploring local playgrounds

- Running a race (Nancy) in Montgomery County (suburbs of DC)

- Date (courtesy of Nancy’s visiting mom!) consisting of brunch at Miss Shirley’s, a stroll through Lexington Market, and a visit to North Point State Park.

- Apple & pumpkin picking

- Two-day getaway with friends to the Shenandoah Valley

- And fun around the house

What? Sweet Simona, kicked out of school within the first month?

Yes. Back in early September, we received a letter from the city school board that three of her immunizations were not up to date and that she would need to be fully vaccinated by September 12 in order to continue attending school. We thought she current on all shots, but the school office insisted she was not.
So we quickly found a doctor and scheduled appointments for her and Maria (9 month check up). Fortunately, the doctor and the nurse both confirmed that she was fully compliant with all CDC-recommended immunization schedules and didn’t charge us for the visit. (Glad Maria had an appointment, too, so it was not a total waste of time!) The nurse also offered to upload the records to a system that can be accessed by city agencies, including the City Schools.
After two more trips to the school front office, I was told that that should take care of it.

And then I got home after a long morning of wrangling three children at the dentist’s office, complete with the bad news of cavities, only to find a message telling me that Simona was out of compliance and that, for the sake of her and the other students’ health and safety, she would need to be expelled. After a few frantic phone calls to the school and to her doctor (and to Caleb, in tears!), we finally found out what the problem was.

The school had incorrectly entered her date of birth to show that she was born on 12/06/06 instead of 06/12/06. Meaning that she would not have been born yet when she received several of the vaccines. (Also meaning that she would not be old enough to be in Kindergarten yet, I might add. . .) The computer was generating an automatic “non-compliant” message. After reassuring the secretary that I was sure Simona was born in June and that yes, I do have the birth certificate to prove it, she believed me and corrected the date, oh-so-graciously not requiring me to bring in the birth certificate (which they already have on file anyway!). Problem instantly solved.

Phew. Education and future preserved; expulsion from Kindergarten avoided.

Well, I’ve decided to try my own version: the C-food diet.

My motivation stems from the fact that Maria is approaching 10 months old, and I still feel like I look like I am 4 months pregnant. According to the scale,* I am back to my “pre-pregnancy” weight. And my clothes mostly all fit, but somehow 3 pregnancies changes a body’s shape enough that some don’t sit quite right anymore. Anyway, I still feel like there’s work to do. Probably ab-toning would be a good place to start, but with marathon training in high gear, I have no extra time to devote to (additional) exercising.

So modifying the diet it is. This is a diet I made up myself, and it’s simple. There’s only one rule: I cannot eat any food that begins with a “C” unless it previously has been alive. So carrots are in, while cookies are out. Chicken is ok, but chocolate and cream (whipped, ice, etc.), unfortunately, are a no-no. Cheese is forbidden, but celery or cranberries are approved. And so on.

I’m allowing myself the exception of not being too particular when I am eating something someone else has prepared (go ahead and throw that cheese on your lasagna, and then invite me over!) just to keep it from becoming a burden on myself or others. The goal here is simplicity!

The NYC Marathon is on November 6, so I will try to adhere to this diet until the race is over. I’ll reassess the situation at that point; until then, don’t expect to find me chomping on chalupas or chowing on chips anytime soon!

__________________________________
(*Note: we do not own a scale, so this is according to one that I stepped on when I was touring a local gym.)