Some celebrations!

Sorry I haven't updated in awhile. We've been busy as usual. Anyway here are some of the things we have been up to.

Walter's school has a behavior reward program that allows them to earn super stars and with their super stars they buy things, anyway, he has been quite thoughtful when he spends his super stars because he has been buying things for us as well. So a couple of weeks ago he came home with a bunny Easter cookie cutter for me. So of course we had to make and decorate bunny cookies. Rose E really got into the spirit of it as you can see. She decorated for about an hour! Oh and speaking of bunnies, a couple of weeks ago we where talking about real bunnies and I said one year when I was a little girl I got a real bunny in my Easter basket, Walter replied back with "are you sure there where no screws or batteries underneath it!" Guess who just had a Birthday? Happy Birthday Ariel.

Last weekend we went to Green Bay to celebrate. The kids had a blast.

And the weekend before we went to Wisconsin also to celebrate baby Thea's baptism. I have better pictures of her in her beautiful gown but for some reason our computer has been playing hide-n-seek with our loaded pictures lately and I can't find them on our computer.

A photo of Walter, Rose E and Colton

These pictures where taken a little while back dressed in Sunday best. Anyway, I had to the post them because Walter made me laugh on that day because he said "why are we dressed like old people?'

I think we are finally moving away from all of that winter gear! The kids enjoyed some sunshine this weekend and it is nice to see that most of our snow is almost gone! Phew it was beginning to feel like it would never come!

Our entertainment

Walter's kindergarten class performed nursery rhymes for our preschoolers last week. Walter sang "It's Raining, It's Pouring" and was a little pig in the three little pigs skit. It was so cute! A couple of weeks ago too Walter read a book to the preschooler class, it was neat, the class was so into it. It is amazing to me every day how many more words he is reading.
This girl has been hamming it up. Every week she has a new name. Last week she was Lucy, then it was Rose Bud and then today she was Emily. Here she is holding her name tag for Rose Bud.
And here is the "finger skater." She found the helmet with our dress-up stuff and then had to go rummaging in the basement for a second skate, this is what she came-up with. Oh and our vacuum is now the Zamboni. Gotta love it.
Last but not least, Mama's little angel. She got her hair cut this week. We said good bye to the last of her baby hair. She was so excited to be in the beauty parlor and sat like a little princess the entire time.

An ice princess!

We've been taking the kids to open skating every weekend. It is interesting to see the differences between Walter and Rose E. Walter is all about speed and Rose E is a figure skater want to be. Her second time skating she saw a group of six year old girls that where in figure skating and studied them, then she pushed her pusher away and just started skating by herself. Now she is wearing dresses to skating with the dress hanging out of her snow pants to look like "one of those skaters." The kids are both upset because next weekend is the last weekend for open skating in the rink.

Oh and speaking of Rose E and clothing, she has now jumped up into a size 4t. Anyway, the other day I was putting a new pair of pants on her and they had adjusters inside the pants. Her pants kept falling down on her so I adjusted them a little tighter and she said excitedly "you mean my pants have a seat belt inside of them."

A new guest.

We are reading this book for a reading program at school and
Walter is so addicted to it. The story's main character is about a toy rabbit and his journeys. The entire school is reading this story and each class gets a stuffed rabbit to take turns taking home to take on new adventures. Anyway, Walter was ecstatic after school on Friday because it was his turn to have Edward Tulane (the rabbit). Our new guest has gone to the Mining Shaft restaurant and arcade (under Walter's request of course), to Walter's friends house, ice skating, and played a board game so far. Oh and Walter even set-up a special bed for him, using Rose E's doll bed, too cute. Walter's favorite part about the whole thing though is that he was given a camera to take a couple of pictures of Edward on his adventures.
Yes, we still have a lot of that white stuff, this time of year it is hard to imagine it all melting.

A snow train visits our yard.

Snow and trains, welcome to my world!

Weekend happenings.

This weekend we went to the school forest, the kid's favorite part was riding behind this sled pulled by a snowmobile. In this picture Walter and Rose E are with their close friends Emily and Daniel. They also had a tractor wagon ride and a bonfire with marshmallows. Walter is certainly our map guy! Every time we stopped he had to check the maps to see what trails we where on. He is also turning into to be quiet the little scientist. He has been into coming up with his own science experiments lately and making his own "hypothesis." For example, the other day he came home and asked if he could put toothpaste, pop and water into a cup. He wanted to see if there was a chemical reaction. Yesterday, he melted a bunch of ice cubes to see if the water would be clean when it melted. It is so cute.And back to the School forest here, they also had an igloo there that the kids liked going into and climbing up.

Here are a couple of pictures of Rose E's pals. She certainly takes good care of them.

Oh, and here she is when she was pretending to be the Easter Bunny that "laid a baby."
The baby is in her sling carrier. Her imagination is just so much fun to listen to right now. All of her barbies and stuffed animals talk to each other. Speaking of barbies and princesses, on Friday we took the kids to a high school basketball game and the high school had a homecoming court come out in between the j.v and varsity game, Rose E watched in awe. Then during the varsity game she looked over and one of the girls had set their dress shoes in the corner of the gym, Rose E was so upset saying "one of the princesses forgot their shoes" she kept an eye on the situation and reported to us that "one of the princesses friends came back to get her shoes." What a sweetie!

I'm back!!!!

Sorry to all who have checked my blog week after week with nothing there! I am going to try to be better about it now.

This weekend we had a great time in Minneapolis! We went to the Mall of America, shopping, on a train ride, to a train museum, and for a walk on the stone arch bridge. Walter was of course in his glory riding on and seeing lots of trains. He was sweet to in the Rain Forest Cafe he was so happy that he turned to Jeff and I and said "I love you always". Above is a picture of Jeff and the kids in front of the metro train that we rode. Rose E's big debate now is weather she is going to grow up to be a train conductor, dog doctor or baby doctor. She was of course thrilled to go into a big pet store and watch all of the puppies at play too.
Here are the kids at the train museum, they had several neat model train layouts.

Last but not least a picture from our walk on the stone arch bridge it was worth braving the cold. I guess though we had no right to complain about the weather there as for at home there where 60 mile per hour winds with the snow.

Hope everybody had a great Thanksgiving!

Here are a few Thanksgiving pictures. Walter was so proud of this turkey he made at school.

Here the kids are posing with their cousins on Thanksgiving.

Sorry that I have been neglecting my blog lately. I am taking an online course and it is taking up much of my time once the kids go to bed.

Winter has definitely arrived in the copper country! Around Thanksgiving we had one storm that gave us over a foot of snow. Rose E has been cracking me up with her comments lately about the outdoors. About a month ago she realized that she could see her breath when she went outside and panicked that she was on fire and smoke was coming out of her mouth. Then one day she was walking in the snow and said "I'm getting soggy." Too cute.