A little over a week ago, Ryan and I took a little trip to Denver and Colorado Springs, both of us for meetings, but we also had a lot of fun. While in Colorado Springs for a school board conference, we stayed at the Broadmoor Hotel.

Let me tell you about this hotel.

It is a 5 star, 5 diamond hotel. It is the sort of place where you'd better be rich to stay there b/c you'll go broke just for all the people you need to tip, since you're not allowed to lift a finger for yourself. We stayed in the main building; the West building is across the lake. But don't worry. There's a bridge if you're aching to see the ice sculptures over there. Our room had a huge bathtub, huge shower, huge bed, separate office area (great to put the crib in) and everything we could want. At night they came around for turn down service and gave us chocolates and the list of complimentary events hosted by the hotel the following day. These events included, by the way, movies in their own theater. Ryan also took Genevieve to cupcake decorating one morning. It was kind of awesome.

If you're thinking the school district should be outraged to pay for that expense, simmer. It was the off-season, the week after Thanksgiving, and they give a huge discount to our conference because it's been there for 20 years, so it's not much more than staying at other hotels. And, um, it was totally worth it. :) As pretty much the only perk that comes out of being a school board member, it definitely lived up to my expectations.



On a more normal note, Genevieve has already learned to help mommy with chores:



Development Updates:

• Vivi has now learned to sign and say "hot." Last night I made the mistake of telling her her eggs were hot at dinner, and she spent the rest of the meal blowing on them.
• She also has learned "no," and I'm already missing the days when she would say yes to everything.
• She signs "brush teeth." That baby toothpaste must taste good because she loves it.
  

We leave for Raleigh in 4 DAYS!!!

Well, it is now 2:52 AM, and I've been awake since 11 feeling so sick I would give up my Christmas presents to feel better. OK, maybe not. But since I'm up, I figured I could give you some more updates on our Genevieve.

We are amazed by how much she is now communicating with us! Here are all the signs she uses now:

• food
• more - We haven't seen this one in a while. She's still just signing "food," but we're working on it.
• dog - We went to Old Navy last week, and they had one of those creepy mannequin family displays at the entrance. Part of it was a dog, and she walked right up to it and signed "dog" without any help. Of course, she pats her stomach instead of her leg, but we know what she means.
• book - She also says "buh." This is probably her most common sign. She does it every time we go in her bedroom. She LOVES her books -- especially the peek-a-boo ones with flaps.
• please - I was at school board meetings tonight, but Ryan said she signed AND said this tonight without any prompting. I can't wait to hear it. Ryan gets all the credit for this one because I rarely remember to teach her these good manners.
  
• all done - I have to prompt her a lot to do this one -- she still prefers yelling at me when she's done -- but we're working on it.

Sometimes I think she might be doing a few others, but I'm not sure yet. She also keeps doing one hand motion, but I can't figure out what it means. It looks like "clean up," but there's no way that's what she's telling me.

Here are a few more videos. This first one shows what a good little helper she is. She was so cute, sitting by daddy and handing him screws as he needed them. I distracted her when I pulled out the camera. Oh well.

This next one's from a while ago. I turned the box from Vivi's new carseat into a little playhouse. It looks very ghetto, but she thought is was the best thing ever.





This is from even longer ago, but it's cute, and I'm up, so here it is:



Yes, there's still a lot more to post, but for now I'm going to try to sleep again. Fingers crossed.

"Yeah"

I have SO many new things to post, but I'll just start with a few fun ones from our trip this past week. Ryan had meetings in Denver the first part of the week, and I had a school board conference in Colorado Springs the second part of the week, so we made it a family trip.

Here's a video from the Denver hotel room, where she spent most of her time chillin' in the sink:

Vivi is not a very good talker yet, but she loves saying "yeah." If you ask her ANY yes/no question in the world, she will nod and say, "yeah." It's pretty entertaining.




SO much more to post. But I'm tired.