Our baby grew up!

March 15, 2010 (the correct date!)
Happy Birthday Ava!
I can't believe it has been 4 years since our little cutie was born. Ava is so excited for her birthday she can't hardly stand it. We brought homemade cupcakes to her preschool today. She helped me decorate them. She tried to put candles on every single cupcake for all of the kids in the class. It was cute. She kept reminding me all weekend that I needed to get "party hats and balloons" for her party. She is a crack up. We are having a Dora the explorer birthday party on Saturday complete with pinata. I am enjoying her being out of the terrible 2's and 3's. When I told her she was turning 4 and getting to be a big girl, she had a very surprising reaction. She was really upset. As she put it, "I don't want to grow up and be a big girl". I decided to run with this and see what she would say. I told her she would grow older and older and would one day move out of our house and get her own house. She responded with "No Mommy! I lube you! I want to be an Ava forever, not a big girl". Dan and I decided she can stay awhile longer :) As for the rest of the family- Dan is still deciding on an internship. He got a whopping four offers! He also pulled straight A's again. He is truly "the Man". We will decide Tuesday if we are going to Minneapolis MN, or Raleigh NC for his summer internship. If we head to NC we will be enjoying a family reunion with my Dads side of the family in June. I am currently trying to type this and rock Kat to sleep. Aah.... the life of a mother. Back to Dan-- He has been doing so much traveling lately for interviews and case competitions. In one month he was in New Jersey, Washington D.C., North Carolina, Minnesota, and Massachusetts. Crazy! I have really felt like the lone mom. I am actually getting good at it, though I don't prefer it. I love me some Dan Kruse! On to Kat- There is only one word to describe her...a chubby ball of spaz! Oh wait that is five. She is easily excited, to say the least. If you hold her in the air she begins kicking and squealing. She is so funny. The only exception to that is when she is mad. Look out, this little girl has a temper. She has started saying momma over and over really pathetically to get me to pick her up faster. It is working. She has two bottom front teeth, big blue eyes with long dark lashes (jealous anyone) and is still pretty bald. She is getting most of her chub in her thighs. We fondly call her thunder thighs. With her current appetite, I think she will be keeping that nickname for awhile. As for me, I am living the life of a wife of a grad student/mother living in the city. If you want an idea of what that is, see the movie "MOTHERHOOD" with Gweneth Paltrow. I wouldn't have related so closely to this movie before moving to Pittsburgh. Now, watching it feels like I am watching video of my week. The parking situation wasn't so bad until the blizzards hit. At least in New York no one would be so crazy as to think a lawn chair holds your parking spot on a public street! Good ol' Pittsburgh. Besides the mom stuff, I have been doing some traveling myself. I spent almost two weeks in Wisconsin. Some good friends flew me and the girls there to visit. We also went to Washington D.C. with Dan for an MBA school basketball tournament. It was Valentines weekend so we celebrated by going to PF Changs for dinner. It was oh so good. Combine those trips with going to Texas for New years and it felt like I spent the majority of 2010 traveling or recovering from traveling. Now that I am settled again,I have been keeping myself busy with various projects. Sewing, scrapbooking, and baking. I am running more to get ready for a 10K I want to do. Now that the weather is warmer, I have gone back to running outside. Pittsburgh is a great city to train in. All the sudden steep hills really get you in shape. I am also on the Tepper Partners Club committee as the fundraising and family activity coordinator. We had a pretty successful bake sale on campus during finals weeks. The students and faculty were all very happy to part with their money for some yummy treats. I will hopefully be working with the wives of incoming students to help make their move to Pittsburgh seamless. At first Pittsburgh can seem very anti-family friendly, but once you get to know the city, it is an amazing place for children. It is tempting at first to want to just settle in the suburbs, but you miss so much of the culture and uniqueness of Pitt when you do that. Not to mention your spouse since the commute is so long from the suburbs to CMU. As scary as our apartment was when we moved in, I don't regret living where we do (especially since our amazing landlord fixed the place up). I have to admit, I'm really getting excited at the idea of having an attached garage. A girl can dream can't she!