Merry Christmas Eve, eve, eve!

Since the Paquette's will be flying to MN tonight, we had Santa come to our house a little early! Mckinley did a good job opening her gifts and had even more fun playing with them! After she opened one present she wanted to play with it right away so that is a good sign! It was fun to watch her face light up! She really loved the airplane and daddy showed her how to fly it in the sky! Here is a short video:

Finally a video

Hello family and friends -
We are excited to be coming home to MN soon for the holidays! We spent the day playing and relaxing while Daddy did some homework. Alyssa has been waiting so patiently for a video of Mckinley! I am sorry I have not been doing a good job of video documenting her! Here are a couple of videos from today!

Babymoon

Denis and I were lucky enough to go on a little "babymoon" to Las Vegas last week! He had to go there for an airshow convention and we decided to make a little trip out of it! Grandma Rosie came up to Alaska to stay with Mckinley and off we were! It was a very relaxing trip for me! Denis did have to work most of the days but we took advantage of his time out of the convention! We went to a magic show, a Dave Matthews concert, out to eat at some fun places and most importantly snuck in some naps! It was wonderful! I think Mckinley and Grandma Rosie were more busy in Alaska! It was a much needed vacation before we welcome baby #2! We are so grateful for our "babymoon"!

Happy Thanksgiving 2009

We had a great Thanksgiving today! We collaborated with our friends the Drewrys and had a wonderful Thanksgiving meal and day! Mckinley had fun playing with Austin and Chloe and Denis and I enjoyed chatting with Ruth and Nate. We even snuck in a game of Taboo while all the kiddos were sleeping! On the way home, Denis and I talked about what we are thankful for and we both are just in awe of our countless blessings! We are so blessed to have such wonderful family and friends, a healthy family, and just an absolute amazing life! We are especially thankful for all of you who enjoy reading our blog and seeing pictures of our family. We love you all!

Mckinley's skates

Daddy got Mckinley some new skates this weekend that will work a little better then the ones we had before. They are soft tecs and they feel a more like her winter boots so she is more willing to try them out! Here is the latest video of our girl - she has her new "chooes" on and also says some of her favorite words, "ball" and "dog" and shows the "baby" sign. That is all for now! Love you all!

Weekly Video

Some of Mckinley's biggest fans would like to see more videos of her in action so I will try to post a new video every few days. The problem is when she is doing something funny or cute I usually don't have the camera on her. So besides having a camera on 24/7 we will just try to capture a few of the things she is doing lately.

This was about 7:45 pm at night. She just got done coloring, she wants to play with Reganne, and does not want to go to bed! We also showcased one of her latest signs - your welcome! Enjoy!

A Snowy Veteran's Day

It was Veteran's day today and so Denis had the day off! It was an awesome day to celebrate our veteran! We had a fun day playing and walking in the snow and then having hot chocolate to warm up afterwards! We have so much to be grateful for!

A night in the life of Mckinley

There have been some requests for some updated videos of Mckinley! So here is our Mckinley just playing around the living room tonight! You can enjoy her "chooes" on the wrong feet, her lovely cough, her mommy's wonderful singing, and a few of the signs she knows! I decided not to cut it down to a few seconds since her Auntie wants to see what she is up to! Enjoy!

20 Weeks

We had our 20 week ultrasound today. It is always amazing for me to see our little one! I am feeling he/she move a lot more but it is unreal to see this little person on the screen! We thought we might even want to sneak a peek and find out who little Paquette is, but this baby had a different story in mind! He/She kept his/her legs closed for the entire ultrasound! The technician was sweet but ultimately he said he would have been guessing! So we will find out in 20 weeks with the rest of the world! More importantly, I could see the little heart beating, the brain and spine. We have a doctor's appointment in 2 weeks to go over the results! Ultimately we are praying for a healthy baby! Thanks for all your thoughts and prayers too!

Grandma Rosie's Dress

Mckinley got to wear Grandma Rosie's dress from when she was a little girl! It was pretty cute and fit her perfectly! Daddy got Mckinley dressed for church in it this morning!

Halloween

This Halloween was pretty uneventful for the Paquette's! Mckinley and Mommy have been on the mend after being sick this week so we decided to stay inside and feed the trick or treaters! We still dressed up and had fun though! The Paquette's became the Flinestone's!

Happy Halloween Week

We have been having such a blast with Grandma Karen! It was fun to have her here a couple days before Denis left and of course wonderful to have her here while he is gone. She is cooking all our favorite meals and treats and it is so nice to have so much help. It is fun to watch her and Mckinley interact. They just make each other giggle!

Mckinley has been saying some new words - chooes (shoes), mo (more), nana (not sure), gamma or gammy (grandma)!

We also carved some pumpkins to get in the holiday spirit! Mckinley wasn't sure what to think of the pumpkin guts - it was funny to watch her face when she touched it for the first time!

Mckinley sees an airplane!

Mckinley loves airplanes! Big surprise! It must be in her genes! Whenever we drive on the Air Force base she always loves looking for them in the sky. Even at our house there is usually a float plane or two in the sky at any one time. She can even pick out the sound of an airplane from inside our house. While we were at Flat Top today there was an airplane in the sky and we were trying to show her where it was. She could hear it and she was looking for it and then she finally spotted it! Denis did a great job of capturing her excitement!

Awesome Autumn

We had an extraordinary day in Anchorage today. It was sunny and bright and even got up to 60 degrees. We wanted to take advantage of the day so we went to Flat Top Mountain to see an amazing view of Anchorage. We were excited to see that there was also an awesome view of Mt. McKinley. We had fun getting lots of shots of Mt. McKinley, our Mckinley and Reganne!

Pumpkin Patch

The fall weather has been pretty good to us in Alaska considering that our family and friends in Minnesota have had snow already! We decided to go pick out some pumpkins while it still seems to be fall here. The closest thing we have to a pumpkin "patch" here is "Bell's Nursery" which had a lot of pumpkins to choose from. We brought our camera and tried to capture Mckinley's first time picking out a pumpkin! We all had fun and even ended our day with some apple cider!

Fall Fun

We have been having fun in Alaska watching the leaves turn colors and start to fall! It is getting cooler every day here and we are starting to have to get bundled up to go outside! That is no fun! We have been enjoying our new camera and find ourselves playing around and taking lots of pictures of Mckinley (big shock)!

I am 15 weeks along and I am feeling great! We have another doctor's appointment in a week and that will be fun to hear the baby's heartbeat again!

Mckinley is doing awesome! She is learning more sign language and words everyday! It is amazing to watch her learn and grow! Her latest word is "no"! We have a video of her in the tub I will add later! It is pretty hard not to laugh at her when she says it because it is so cute but we don't want her to say that word. We are working on it!

Love you all! Take care!

Higher

These shots where taken during a local Air Drop sortie out of Elmendorf AFB by a professional photographer. I thought I would put some music to it and let you see them. Enjoy!

Our All American Girl

Mckinley is growing up fast! Life is so short, we must move very slowly.

Mckinley has been saying a lot of new words lately! She is saying Mama, Dada, dog, eye, down, hot, book, and the word she probably says most often right now is ball! Grandma Rosie sent her a basketball hoop and ball from SDSU. She loves playing with it and when Daddy gets the ball in the hoop she raises both her hands and yells "SCORE"!! It is all very cute! Another thing she does is finds the ball when it rolls under the bed. She gets on her tummy and reaches underneath to get her ball. It is cute and this video is Mckinley in action!!

Lots of time and lots of news!!!

Well it seems that is has been a pretty busy summer! We haven't posted anything for awhile and is seems there is a lot to share! We had a great summer! In June, we went home for Phil's graduation and got to watch him play in the State Baseball tournament. That was awesome! In July, we had some visitors from Texas come up and we got to go on a Glacier Cruise. It was fun to have them here and get to see some more of beautiful Alaska. In the middle of July, Denis left Alaska for Malaysia. He was the only Air Force officer to attend. What an honor! He learned a lot and met a lot of nice people. Mckinley and I went home to Minnesota while he was in Malaysia and got to do a lot. We went camping, went to a family reunion, watched Grandma Karen sing and got to attend John and Erin's wedding! It was all so fun and exciting. While we were home we also found out that Mckinley is going to be a big sister around March 23, 2010! That was pretty SURPRISING and exciting news. So now we are back to Alaska with a lot of pictures and memories! I am feeling good and just trying to soak up this time with Mckinley. She is growing and changing everyday. She is so fun and silly! We will post some pictures and videos of our time in Minnesota soon! Love you all!