surprise!!!

When my mom was here and we changed Lilja's room, we both felt there was something missing on her wall.. so today I surprised Lilja with a tree on her wall.. It still needs some touching up and some animals around, but I think he is looking pretty cute. Just what the room needed. Lilja was very excited when she saw the tree and i told her i would paint an owl (her favorite bird) on one of the branches, just like in her changing room. She said she wanted him to be red!! she really knows what she wants!!

p.s my mom also made those curtains..they are yellow and red with bugs as buttons.. and they are nice and dark for the nap time

This is the left side of her room when you walk in..

and the right side.. My parents bought her the art table ..now I want to decorate the cupboard with fun letters and pictures.. she loves sitting there and color and play with playdoh.. The best birthday present ever, besides her new big girl bed!!
p.s mom and I made everything you see in this photo.. the alfabet, the magnet boards and the curtains.. wow... that is fun to see..

Fall is here!!

Aran is hunting and Lilja and I went hiking. Hiking for Lilja is on this little hill that we take the dogs to when we do not have a lot of time to walk them.. for Lilja it is a 'Mountain!" and she gets nice and tired.. What an energy ... she loves running down this "Mountain."

up and down again.. she must have ran back and forth 10 times.. just a short distance, but she does have stamina!!

Can't believe these photos.. she is always so wigglely that take such photos are rare.. these I think are gorgeous!!

Our three loves,.. Lilja ofcourse our number one love, but our dogs are close second and thirds ;)

Opa and Oma photos

Our last evening with Opa and Oma.. Lilja is still roaring like a lion and Oma tooOne big snuggle to last for 6 months!!! We'll see you in the Spring .. !!

Opa loved to read to Lilja..

and take her for a ride...

But with Lamby #2 found and held between them.. they walk away wit great memories.. Lilja is still talking about Opaaaa and Omaaaa.. Yes, she has an accent.. ;)

See you soon Opa and Oma... we love you!!!

More Denver Zoo

I wanted my parents to take ilja into the Lorakeet pavillion where all these little birds eat out of your hands.. But look at Lilja's face, she did not want to have anything to do with going inside.. opa was very patient and so sweet, so they just watched for the outside.

Wrunning!!! running away from Momma was her new thing this day.. but I think we got it under control... here she liked running with OPa.. she was sooo tired at lunch she passed out and we had a nice quiet lunch..
The drum lessons.. Lilja loves music and really enjoyed making it on these drums.. It is so fun to see my parents so into what she does and act so silly with her..

the denver Zoo

My parents, after two weeks, are going back to Holland. This time I am driving them back to Denver to catch their plane to holland. We arrived a day early, just in case we got a flat tire ;) (right dad?) so we had an extra day and decided to go to the denver Zoo. What a treat to see Lilja's face.. to see all these animals for the first time in real life.. Honey, I promise we'll go again with you!!
So first we stopped at the Sea Lion program where they did a demonstration.. Lilja's face went from non interest to complete surprise!! see...

The giraffe made a huge impression, she was allowed to feel some dried skin, but the giraffes were pretty far away, however, she has talked about them the whole day today..I love it when we are there early as many animals were up and awake.. this polarbear was trying to fold this huge ball and succeeded in front of Lilja's eyes.. she loved him!!

Even the tigers were up and awake, playing with eachother and chasing balls. I think this was Lilja's favorite animal..
or maybe Oma's

Oma's birthday morning..

7 o'clock in the morning... check.. two cups of coffee.. check.. a huge chunk of fudge.. check and the number 70 lit up... check... here we go.. happy Birthday Oma!!!

The best thing in the world.. Oma's face!!!

Singing happy Birthday.. However, lilja was singing it to the colors... don't ask ;)

A nice morning walk with the birthday oma!!

Oma is 70!!!!

Today is Oma's 70th birthday.. ! How special that she is here to celebrate it.. Aran had not experienced a true de Ruiter birthday morning.. and the poor guy was just shaking his head.. It started out with decorating the house, then a tray with coffee and a fudge block with the 70 numbers on it was placed diagonally on the tray.. plus some cards and presents.. then we enter the bedroom, as early as possible and sing Happy Birthday.. Oma was sooo surprised ;)

The new Southern Ute tribe cultural museum

The museum just opened up a couple of months ago and it definitely is worth seeing when you are in Ignacio. We all felt we needed more time to really listen to all the videos and stories about the lives of the Southern Ute people and their impressive past.
Here Om and Lilja sit in a true Tee pee, .. very cool!!



Oma and Lilja are trying to bead, Lilja could do it all by herself!..Oma and Opa bought Lilja another lamby.. not quite the same as her"real" lamby, so she calls it.. wait for it..."Big lamby"

The entrance of the museum.. in the back you can see the structure is resembling a tee pee, the architecture of this museum was very well thought out and beautifully done!

the Southern Ute tribal fair parade

This weekend The Southern Ute trib held a parade and we thought it would be interesting for my parents to see it. Luckily the rain stopped during the parade and resumed after the parade was done!


This float was my work's float, that crazy woman in white is my boss, Robin.. the same woman Lilja think is Ellen degeneres. see the resemblance!!.

These beautiful women are some of my teachers from the Academy school that I teach Tumbling Tots for.

And then the highlight of the parade... Daddy!!
What was so funny was that every float threw candy at the people on the sidewalks, first we were not into it..(Lilja does not get candy).. well, she got a sucker and then we (Opa, Oma and I) got into catching the candy too, we have a huge bowl of candy now on the kitchen counter.. After seeing all the candy on the ground, and seeing us get it and then daddy came on the float ... Lilja yelled: "Daddy, throw candy!"

This is Aran's boss Steve with the fishing rod.. he had a sucker at the end of the rod and pulled the sucker away if you tried to get it... clever!!!

Opa and Oma are here again!

Sorry it took a while to update the blog, but we have been pretty busy with Opa and Oma.. First they bought a new "big girl' bed for Lilja then a beautiful art table with chairs and all. Lilja's room looks like a little toddler room now. The little bed is still as big as her crib and fit in the same spot. i will make new photos of the whole room as this photo was the start of the whole renovation. We were going to wait until oma and opa were gone to start the transition, but we put the bed in her room to see if it fit.. Lilja was so excited to see a 'big girl" bed that we could not take it back out. She had no problem. What a big girl she is getting!!

These next two photos are the example of what my parents will instill in Lilja:

Opa -Books

Oma -art!! This photo is taken on the new art table that now is in her room.. New photos will be taken soon of the new room, I promise.

Lilja is very interested in people crying..Oma was drawing stick figure of a "crying face" and a "laughing face". Now when Lilja is sad, Lilja herself will asks, "why is Lilja crying" and Oma will respond, where is Lilja's laughing face? then Lilja will (through her tears) make a huge smile..

Jasmin!

Last weekend Lilja and I went to pick up my parents in denver.. but before the pick-up, Lilja and I met jasmin (Lilja's tummy mommy)at Washington park. What a great placeto just talk, walk and be silly.. We will definitely want to meet there again..

There was a great playground that Lilja and Jasmin enjoyed ;)



I love this photo.. cool he??

It is fun to see Lilja get more and more comfortable with jasmin..

OK the best picture yet!!! At Washington park there was this beautiful garden.. what gorgeous colors that made a beautiful photo!

Hi Five, Jasmin!!! That was a great time.. we'll see you soon for Lilja's birthday!!!