I Got Crabs For Christmas!

So most of you know I was born and raised in Maryland. I grew up spoiled in a house smack dab on the Bodkin Creek. My bedroom window overlooked the pier, the sailboats, and the lone Great Blue Heron that fished from our dock every morning. This is a picture I took sitting on my bed last summer:
During the summer, if we weren't at the barn, we were on the water. Swimming, boating, and crabbing were just second nature to us. Maryland is famous for their blue crabs. Crab claws, crab cakes, crab dip, cream of crab soup... you name it and you can make it with crab! Sprinkle some Old Bay on it, grab yourself a beer and a mallet and you can make a day out of picking crabs. Finish it off with some Berger cookies and you've got yourself a perfect afternoon.
I've lived in Arizona for almost 7 years now, but no matter where I am, I can close my eyes and take myself back to that place. I can see the fireflies blinking as the sun starts to set. I can feel the humidity and the mosquito bites on my skin. I hear crickets in the thick grass and jet boats buzzing by on the creek. And my mouth waters just thinking about crabcakes and black bottoms.
This year for Christmas, my mom and dad sent us a package that "needed special attention." I told mom if they sent us a hamster I swear..... To my surprise.. it was crabcakes! MARYLAND Crab cakes!
So last night (and tonight) for dinner that's just what we had! Oh man oh man was it delicious! I guess if I can't be home for Christmas, I'll take the next best thing... crabcakes!!!!
So there you have it... best Christmas present ever. I got crabs for Christmas.

Family Pictures!

So this year we finally broke down and got our first family pictures taken! Now every year we have done a Christmas card, but always just had a friend or Tim's mom take it of us in front of the tree. This year I wanted to do something different, especially if it's going to be our last year in Arizona. A friend of mine is a photographer and offered to take our pictures out at the dunes! We were a little nervous at first at the thought of posing 2 small children and all the sand everywhere (we did bribe Leah with lollipops to give us big smiles..hey whatever works, right??)... but I'm so glad we did it! They came out amazing! Thanks to our awesome photographer, Andrea Hauck, who captured such great moments for us! Here is a sampler of some of our pictures... You can see the rest on my dropshots website: www.dropshots.com/vanderhoff









And those are just a FEW of all the awesome pics she took of us!

On another note, this morning I laid Chase down on his blanket and went to go take out the trash. When I came back inside, he was sitting up all by himself! And he's going to crawl ANY day now. He's also blowing rasperries and starting to babble. He CRACKS up every time Leah says or does something! And he LOVES cheerios!


Leah is SO excited for Christmas. She loves going to look at the lights. Whenever we pass a house with Christmas lights she yells out "Thanks for the lights!!" She's too cute. We also told her that Grandpat is coming for Christmas and so she asks everyday if we can go to the airport to see Grandpat... she's so excited!




Leah's Lingo

Me: What does the cow say, Leah?
Leah: He says 'Moooo'
Me: And what about a horse?
Leah: The horse says 'mmmhmmmhmmm'
Me: That's right! And what about a kitty cat?
Leah: Meoowww meoww
Me: What about Chase? What does Chase say?
Leah: (thinks about it for a second) He says 'WAHHH WAHHH'
haha i guess we're not the only ones who thinks he cries a lot!!

The other night after I gave Chase a bath I was putting his lotion and jammies on. Leah likes to help put his lotion on. She was staring intently at his..parts. I asked her out of curiousity to what she would say, "what's that Leah?"
Leah: "That's his booty...that's DISGUSTING!"
Bahahaha Tim liked that one.

Orange You Glad You Ate That?

So Sunday night I was on my way home from dog-sitting (yes, I'm a jack of all trades..) and I didn't feel like making dinner so I did what any normal mom would do... take out! I ran through the Panda Express drive thru for my favorite - orange chicken! I came home and Leah and I shared my rice bowl.... or shall I say DEATH BOWL! A little less than an hour later it hit me like a ton of bricks... I will spare you the nasty details but let's just say at one point I was on the toilet and throwing up in the bath tub at the same time. What else was I gonna do? Leah seemed fine at this point so I thought I was coming down with the stomach flu that was going around. I put in a call to Tim, who was at work that night, to warn him that he might have to come home early to take care of the kids because I thought I had the flu. After losing it a few more times, I called him back and told him you better hurry! He rushed home to save the day, just in the knick of time! He gave the kids a bath and put them to bed while I was praying to the porcelin gods...
Not 5 minutes after Leah went to bed, she started crying and then throwing up. I knew we were in for a rough night and I was SO glad Tim had come home. Leah and I laid on my bed, both of us shaking and taking turns throwing up. After about the 4th time Leah threw up and my 10th, we decided we should go to Prime Care.
Grandpa came over to sit at the house while Chase slept and Tim swept Leah and I away, buckets in hand, to Prime Care. There they determined we had gotten food poisoning and gave us both some Zofran to help with the nausea and told us that it would pretty much have to run it's course.
We got what sleep we could that night when we got home around 2am, after washing sheets and blankies and bleaching the bathtub and carpets. The next day we both were pretty much zombies. We didn't start to feel better until later Monday night and then on Tuesday we were both completely back to normal. Phew. I have never felt that sick before. Needless to say I will never be eating there again!!
I'm just so glad Tim was home to pick up the pieces and take care of Chase AND sick Leah because there's NO way I was going to be able to do that on my own!! Because there's no PAUSE button on motherhood!

Baby, It's Cold Outside...and it's about damn time.

Well, it's finally cooled off here in good ole Yuma, Arizona. This summer lasted FOREVVERRRRR and I'm not kidding. Once November hit it finally started to hit below 80 degrees and now it's been in the 60's every day... and we're cold! And we love it! We have been outside every second we get a chance.. because over the summer I vowed once it hit below 80 degrees that I would not waste one more minute inside this flippin' house. The past few days it's been too windy and we have all managed to catch the cold that has been running around all over town. Leah cries "Mommmyyyy booooogerrrrssss!" Nothing worse than a whiny 2.5 year old that's for sure! But we'll manage.
Now that Thanksgiving is over, it seemed like everyone jumped right into Christmas mode before even letting the turkey settle. I'm overwhelmed with christmas music and lights and pictures of everyone putting up their trees. The truth is I'm feeling a little "bah-humbug" this year. I'm sure I'll snap out of it eventually, but I have no desire to hang lights or put up our tree. This is the first year.. I think ever.. that I'm not going home for Christmas. There's just too much going on and it's not in the cards right now for us. Maybe what I should do is drag my tree out this week and hang some lights and the Christmas spirit will follow....
But for now all I want to do is put on my hoodie, turn the heat up to 74, get in bed with all my blankets and fall asleep... until the sleep terrorist wakes me up :) Hey, he slept for like 6 hours straight the other night! It was a miracle and I'm hoping something that will catch on!!
Goodnight, world. Bah humbug. xoxo

I'm Thankful For

This year, I'm thankful for:

Her -


My sweet, sassy, kind-hearted, 2-and-a-half year old animal lover.

Him -


My giggly, determined, stubborn, snuggly, blue-eyed mama's boy.

A husband who is the best, funniest, sweetest hands-on daddy to our kids.



I'm thankful for sleeping in every other Thursday.

For my family, near and far..they mean everything to me.

For junior mints and wine at the end of a long day.

For new opportunities.

For unexpected busyness...a welcomed change.

For lazy boy recliners...when he just won't sleep anywhere but my arms.

For turkey, ham, and stuffing!

Happy Thanksgiving!


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

My Monkey Man & The Power of Prayer

Today when we came home from church, I put the kids down for their nap. Chase was asleep in the car on the way home, so I just transferred him to his crib and he stayed asleep. Well he woke up a few minutes later so I let him stir for a little bit to see if he would fall back asleep. When I realized he wasn't going to go back to sleep, I went in and got him up only to find that he had spit up in his crib and then rolled himself all in it... it was in his hair, his eyelashes, and he stunk! So I gave him a quick bath and then let him lay on the floor in his room wrapped up in his monkey towel butt naked for awhile. I got some of the SWEETEST pictures of my little man:






Tonight when it was time for bed, I did the usual routine and laid him down. He fell asleep for about 20 minutes ...long enough for me to get Leah a bath and put her to bed... and then he woke up crying. I gave him a bottle and he drank a few ounces and I laid him back down (he usually falls back asleep) but this time he just got himself more worked up. He screamed and screamed... shrill, unconsolable screams. How can something that was SO cute just a few hours ago be so awful tonight? I thought. Nothing consoled him.. I tried rocking him and I even brought him out into the living room with me for awhile to watch TV and that only pacified him for a few moments. I put him back in his crib and he continued to scream for about 20 more minutes. As I was sitting there half watching TV and listening to him cry, I felt silly all of the sudden. I got up, went to his room and picked him up. I held him tight and pressed his little cheek against mine and I prayed over him for a few minutes. I laid him back down and he fell asleep almost immediately and I haven't heard a peep from him room since. All I can say is wow, why didn't I think of that sooner??

"Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours." Mark 11:24

Chase's First Love

So a few months ago, Leah saw a commercial on TV for the new Tinkerbell movie and she seemed interested, so Tim bought it for her and we have watched it almost every evening after dinner since that day. I have all the words and songs memorized and Leah has started talking with a slight British accent. But the funny thing is... when Chase was a newborn and collicky and screaming all the time, if we held him in front of the TV when Tinkerbell was on he stopped crying. He was mesmerized by Tink. We think he has a slight crush on Tinkerbell. He could be on the other side of the house in his walker and hear Tinkerbell come on and he makes a beeline (yea, he's fast in that thing!) for the TV. This is his face when he sees Tink:

We thought maybe it was just the bright colors and the animation that he likes, but no, it's Tink. We tried watching Finding Nemo one night and he was all excited as the TV started to glow and then he screamed..yes screamed..and then started whimper crying when he saw that it was not Tinkerbell. We changed it to Tinkerbell to see what he would do and he immediately stopped crying.
Leah has a Tinkerbell chair in the living room. We have a big blanket laid out on the living room floor for him to scoot around on and he loves to scoot over to the chair and stare at Tink and grab at her. It's pretty hilarious actually.
I'm blogging about this for his future girlfriends... and I have the pictures to prove it :) But, hey, we can't blame him.. Tinkerbell's a babe!
Sorry, Chase....




Grandpa thought it'd be funny to put a Tinkerbell poster over Chase's crib...






Leah's Lingo


Leah: Mommy, what's that on your chin?
Me: That's called a zit, baby.
Leah: Oh. Can I have a zip too?? Please??


Two nights ago we walked by the community pool on our evening walk and Leah asked if we could go swimming. I explained to her that it was too cold and that the pool was closed for the winter and that when it was hot again we could go swimming.
Last night we walked by it again...
Leah: Mommy, you wanna go swimming? (before I could answer her she responded...) Nope! Too bad...so sad!