Merry Christmas from The Dugorepec Family

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Happy Holidays Everyone!

Boy, this year has sure been busy but exciting to say the least. So much news and so much fun, who could ask for more? Here’s a little recap of our year:

January 2006

• Lexie turned 2 years old. With it came that sweet little smile that just looks so innocent. NOT!!! This child is really the devil in disguise. We’ve even wondered if we should call a priest to have her exercised. After talking with a lot of moms, some teachers and some counselors, I’m happy to say that this is THE TERRIBLE TWO’S! Because Bella didn’t go through the two’s to this extreme, we didn’t expect this with Lexie.

February 2006

• Lauren Grace came into our family. I gave birth to our cutest little bundle on Valentine’s Day. Very easy delivery – one long push and out she popped! She’s by far one of the best babies we’ve had.

April 2006

• Bella officially became potty-trained. Going back to two in diapers was a blessing!

June 2006

• Bella & Lexie became avid swimmers. They learned how to jump off the side of the pool and swim with only floaties on their arms. Every single morning they started their day with “Mommy, can we go in the pool???” It sure made nap time easy on me. They would be completely pooped by the afternoon.

July 2006

• I opened my own business called Crop Street Café. It’s an online scrapbooking business.
• Milenko picked up golfing. He now plays golf EVERY weekend that is sunny.

August 2006

• Our first family vacation. We went up to Oregon for The Gardner Family Reunion. We drove. BIG MISTAKE!!!
• The girls got to go to the beach for the first time on this trip.
• Lauren cried almost the entire time – we found out on the way home that she was getting Roseola measles and that was why she was so irritable the entire trip.

September 2006

• Lexie officially became potty-trained as well. Now we’re only one in diapers (with the occasional accident from Lexie).
• Lauren had two milestones: Her 3rd tooth appeared and she started crawling all over the place.
• Bella and Lexie both started preschool. Bella’s 2nd year, Lexie’s 1st year.

October 2006

• The kids spent a lot of time with Grampa because he was moving up to Seattle at the end of the month.
• The kids got to go to the Pumpkin Patch and pick out pumpkins 2 pumpkins each.
• They all dressed up like pink & purple butterflies & went trick-or-treating with their cousins Nic & Christian.

November 2006

• Bella turned 4 years old.

December 2006

• The Polar Express is the kids' new favorite movie - every day.
• Our lights are hung, the tree is up, the presents are wrapped and the kids ask each morning, “Is it Christmas Time yet?”
• For the holiday festivities, my family is getting together here for Christmas Eve and we’re getting together with Milenko’s family the day before.

We hope that everyone is doing well and that you have some great plans for celebrating this holiday season. We wish you all the best and look forward to seeing you next year!

Happy Holidays,
The Dugorepec Family
Milenko, Debbie, Bella, Lexie & Lauren
(and Cede, Beamer and Biscuit too)

Here's a cute little picture of all the "Gardner" Grandkids - when MOST of them are smiling.

Clockwise: Nic, Christian, Bella, Lauren & Lexie.

Lauren's Little Boogie

I had a little boogie.

It was inside my nose.

I picked that little boogie

and in the mouth it goes

That yucky little boogie

Didn’t taste so good

I should have listened to my mom

It tasted like she said it would

YUCK!

No boogies were harmed in the making of this monolog. In fact, Lauren really didn’t do all of this in sequence – but it sure is hilarious!

Lexie’s First Haircut – An Unforgettable Experience

Lexie was in one of her great moods today. She is feeling a little under the weather so it makes everything 10 times worse than it already is. As many people know, Lexie’s hair is always doing its own thing – usually making a rat’s nest in the back of her head. It’s been this way for about a year and every morning it’s a major chore trying to comb through her tangled mess.

While Lexie was in the bathroom, she didn’t quite make it to the toilet and peed herself. After I cleaned up the floor with bleach and put her clothes in the wash, I put Lexie in the kitchen sink. Why? Because Lauren was upstairs sleeping and if I dared to put Lexie in the bath tub, that would be the end to Lauren’s peaceful nap. I soaped up Lexie and put a ton of conditioner in her hair and let it sit for about 10 minutes. I was running around with Bella at the same time so the extra time that the conditioner sat in her hair was just perfect for me. After 30 minutes of de-tangling Lexie’s hair, she had nice smooth, long hair again. It was so pretty – for the one moment I was going to admire it! I went upstairs, grabbed the scissors and came down and cut Lexie’s hair. I didn’t cut it with the clippers like I would have liked to but I did cut about 2-3 inches off in length. I cut just enough to make the tangled mess a little easier to tame.
Lexie didn’t have a problem with me cutting her hair. It was Bella that had the problem. She saw that I was cutting Lexie’s hair and yelled at me to stop. She then ran out of the room and hid in my computer chair sobbing….I don’t love you anymore, Mommy! When I came in and tried to explain what I was doing to Lexie’s hair she told me that I cut off all of Lexie’s hair and now I don’t love you any more. Now how do those crushing words sound so hilarious? I guess it was just because I couldn’t keep a straight face while she was so upset with me. I let her call Daddy and tell him what I did. Boy, those tear drops were HUGE! She told Daddy “Mommy doesn’t love Lexie anymore and she’s cutting her hair off.” On top of that, she told him “Lexie’s hair isn’t pretty. It’s not long like mine.”

Now that Bella has had a chance to go upstairs and rest, I can see that Lexie’s hair is super cute (and manageable) and Bella has forgotten all about the bad hair-do.

Milenko also reminded me that Bella’s sweet disposition also came through when she saw Lauren cry for the first time. When she saw that, Bella started crying too because the baby was upset. I sure hope this caring disposition of hers never changes

What a fun day we had!

Birthday, Pumpkins, Halloween & More Birthdays

As of September 25th, Nicholas officially is no longer a little kid. Most everyone who is reading this knows that Nicky is my nephew. The big boy kindergartener turned 5 years old! Watch out world - Here he comes!!! We went to a Jumphouse place in Tracy and Nicky had a pirate birthday party. The kids had a blast!

October means time for the Pumpkin Patch, dressing up and most of all - trick or treating. This year Lexie is in pre-school and so we got to go to Joan's Pumpkin Farm with both Lexie & Bella's class. They got to pick out their own tiny pumpkin and a big pumpkin. This was Lauren's first time at the pumpking patch. As expected, she was just along for the ride.

Michelle & Dave FINALLLLY let me watch their kids the weekend before Halloween. We had a great day. We went over to the Larsen's house and decorated Halloween cookies. Let's just say that the black frosting on the cookies made their teeth look really nice!

Lauren now has 4 teeth. She looks hilarious when she smiles too! We've also been teaching her to flip people off if they bug her. ;-) haha Click on the picture to see those dangling suckers close up!
On October 30th, my sister-in-law Michelle turned 21 (again). Dave, Michelle & the kids came out on Halloween to go trick-or-treating with the girls. I didn't have to pick and choose with the girls costumes this year. If they didn't get the same one then they'd be fighting over the other one's costume. Since I've learned my lesson and I don't want to deal with that kind of crap, they ALL wore the same thing. They loved being butterflies - even Lauren.

Nicholas & Christian were absolutely adorable. Nicky was Captain Jack, the pirate, from Pirates of the Carribbean. Chris was Dash from The Incredibles. So fitting for that little booger! Aren't they the cutest little boys?

We even lucked out and got them to all sit on the couch for a picture. I didn't say they were smiling, just that they all were on the couch....

The Dugorepec and The Gardner families on Halloween

We got together in October to celebrate Bella's birthday as a family. This was the only time we could get all the family together and take a group picture. Can you believe those two old people in the middle are responsible for all the people in this picture?

November 4th was Bella's birthday. Our little Princess is now 4 years old. We had planned to have Pony Parties & Petting Zoo out to the house to do Bella's birthday but due to some unplanned circumstances, they had to cancel. Good thing because I was sicker than a dog. Bella, Lexie, Nicky, Christian & Alyssa went to Chuck E. Cheese for Bella's birthday. After playing for a few hours they came back to the house, where I was coughing up a lung and blowing my nose, to open presents and eat cake (cupcakes). As you can see, blowing out candles in our family is definitely a GROUP thing.

Now we have Thanksgiving and Christmas to look forward to. As we do every year, we're headed over to Milenko's parents' house for the day. In fact, Bella and I are going over there early on Thanksgiving morning so that Bella can help Baka make a turkey.

My brother Dan turns ....err....well his birthday is December 5th. We'll probably get together that weekend and Milenko and he will go golfing like they do almost every weekend.

Christmas Eve is always at our house. It's fun to do it here because the kids get to open all their presents from family that night. It's like a wrapping paper chaotic disaster when this happens. It's a lot of fun though.

That's it for now. I'll try to get another blog in before the end of the year so everyone can see how our little weeds are growing.

LONG OVERDUE FAMILY UPDATE

Okay, last time I updated this blog I was somewhat sane, it was 4^th of July and things were a breeze. What have we been up to? You asked – here comes your novel…

First of all, we thought it was time to experience OUR FIRST FAMILY VACATION! We packed up our gear, packed up the kids and headed, yes in the car, to Oregon. We started off 3 days before we had to be in Oregon so that we could take the coast and see the views.

On our way up, we stopped by the beach. This was the first time that the kids had ever been to the beach. It was foggy and overcast and extremely chilly but the kids enjoyed the water and sand. Lexie fell in the waves – it was hilarious. She didn’t think so as it got colder but thank goodness we had extra clothes packed in the car.

We stayed in Mendicino the first night and the kids loved swimming in the indoor pool. The next day we headed up through the Redwoods. The kids were pretty good for the most part. It's hard to expect little kids to stay well behaved, but they were pretty great. We did cut across the state and take the quick way up Highway 5. Good thing. We made it to Salem just before midnight. If we took the coast, we'd probably still be on the road...

We went up to Oregon for a Gardner/Beaird Family Reunion. While we were there we went to the kids 1st baseball game. Boy, was that the wrong thing to do. The Red Robin mascot, The Chuck E. Cheese mascot, the Oregon Beaver Mascot and some Bumble Bee mascot scared the CRAP out of Lexie. She went into complete hysteria. At the same time, Lauren went into an uncontrollable hysteria too. It was so bad that we had to leave the ball park. I was attributing Lauren's horrible behavior to the possibility that she was teething. I was soon to find out that I was wrong in that assumption.

We spent a lot of time at Grandpa Bob's apartment. The kids couldn't get enough of his pool. These kids swim better than fish now-a-days. Lauren didn't sleep much during this trip and had me up every night. I was functioning on 3-5 hours of sleep each night. It was sure the worst trip I had ever been on.

The last day that we were there we spent in 3 places. We went to visit my cousin Mick & Julie's house in Salem. They moved up there about a year ago. Cute place - it's just too far from us! :-( After a good couple of hours over there, we went to Aunt Gloria & Uncle Lee's house (Mick's parents). Bella & Lexie know them foundly as Mimi and Papa Lee. They are in love with their dogs because they're just the right size for a 2 and 3 year old. Lauren was a pistol the entire weekend and we finally got her to smile ONCE for a picutre with Mimi. As for Lexie & Bella, they have a secret crush on Papa Lee.

Well on our way home, we found out the true reason why Lexie had been crying the entire weekend and why she was so fussy. When we got to Lake Shasta I took a peek at Lauren. She was covered from head to toe with the Roseola Measles. (Symptoms: fussy, unconsoleable, restless, won't eat, fever - for 3-4 days before spots show up.) Yup! That was Lauren. All the kids had it when they were small so we knew just what it was and how to treat it.

Now that we're home and things are back to normal, Lexie has been potty training since the beginning of the month. She was doing great the first week but she seems to be slacking off now. However, when she does use the bathroom, she's so excited and proud.

Here are the links to the other pictures in the albums. In fact, there are so many that I've put them into albums by month. Here is the link to the albums that I've created. The password is DEBBIED:

http://deardebbie.shutterfly.com/action/?a=8AaMWLRq3ZNGz9

Oh yeah, the other good news. Bella & Lexie are in preschool. I haven't uploaded the pictures from the camera yet but as soon as I do, I'll post the "big girls" on the blog. :-)

4th of July Holiday

CLICK ON ANY PICTURE TO ENLARGE IT - ESPECIALLY THE ROLLER COASTER PICTURE AT THE END.
What a fun 4th of July. The girls got together with the neighbors and the Larsens and we all did fireworks the night before in our court. This was great for the kids because there weren't a bunch of older kids stealing the lime light or adding fireworks that scared them.

Lauren enjoyed the fireworks too. She loved the colors and the sounds didn't scare her at all. She never smiled, but she didn't cry and was completely glued to the firework show.


(L) Lexie, Bella, Laura, Zachary, Lauren, Jordyn & Greg
(R) Lexie under the blanket, Bella hiding on Laura's lap & Zackary ohhhing.


On the 4th, Bella & Daddy had a swim race. Bella & Lexie are now swimming all over the pool with their floaties on. They're doing great. Thanks to Milenko and Uncle Dan, Lauren is learning to use the computer at an early age. :-)

Dave and the boys came by on the morning of the 4th. Bella & Lexie did some "sparklies" with Nicholas and Christian. They had a great time.

Bella and Lexie had more fun during the with the sparklers just because they could see them a little better. (So could mommy's camera - thanks for the advise Laura!)

On the 5th, Mommy & the girls went to the Alameda County Fair with Donna & Alyssa. The kids spent most of the day looking at the animals and eating gummy bears and very expensive ice cream. While I was changing Lexie on the grass, Bella fell down and split her tongue open pretty badly. Thank goodness Donna was watching her. It's always great having a nurse for your best friend! After spending about $30 on the worst food ever, we packed it up to get the munckins home for a nap. Boy did my kids need it! (Wait, so did I!)

Since Bella & Lexie didn't get a chance to ride the ponies on our first trip to the Fair with Donna, we went back again at 7pm that night with Daddy. The kids were able to get their pony rides and they played on the carnival rides too. We took a million pictures!

The Kanagroom ride was a favorite.

So was the car ride. Milenko said that the only thing he saw when he was taking pictures of Lexie was the back of her throat. She was constantly laughing.

Bella & Lexie also got to go on a real roller coaster. This was Bella's 2nd time on the ride and Lexie's first. 1/2 the time that we were looking at Bella she looked terrified. When the coaster came to a slow spot, she was cracking up. Go figure!

Lauren had a pretty good time too. She was in the carrier on Mommy's chest. She stayed nice and warm and got to people watch - her favorite thing.

I've created a bunch of albums on Shutterfly for you to see all the pictures we've taken over the past 3 months. You can go there by putting this link in your browser and entering the password debbied:
http://deardebbie.shutterfly.com