February Fun!

Anna and I made a Valentine's Day gingerbread house this year. She had a great time decorating and eating. I thought it would be a big pain but it was actually very fun and will probably be a new tradition in our house. Here are the girls eating lunch on Valentine's Day. Heart shaped PB&J's and any other red or pink food I could find. We had a busy day with all the class parties. Claire held up well under the pressure and no nap. Probably b/c of all the candy.

This is taken at Ethan's class party. They had just decorated cookies and were opening goodie bags. Now the cool thing is the two-finger hands. :)

Claire got to decorate a cookie too....she concentrated very hard and ate one 1/2 of a bite. :)

Bubble Bath time!!! Need I say more? They had a great time!

More Florida pictures....

Sweet Anna...she took naps on the beach on a few different days. There's not much cuter than a sacked out kid comfortably sleeping under a beach umbrella. I guess my Grandma and my sister were talking to her minutes before and looked down and she was totally sleeping. :)

Here are our sweet, angelic children....not sure what happened to Ethan's smile.
This was taken outside of our favorite restaurant DaRuMa - a Japanese steakhouse. It's always a highlight of our trip!

Sadly, these three crazy people are related and, worse, related to me.
We do not allow Ethan to spend too much time with his two uncles.

Here is Miss Claire sipping her Japanese soup.

For some reason (thank you Ethan) every time we told Claire to smile on this trip, she decided to pull this "suprised" look. Oh well. :)

Aunt Jesi and Claire were posing for our photographer, Anna.

We had a great sunset photoshoot one night. The girls did not care, they just wanted to build castles. :)

OK, Anna will be happily interrupted to smile for her mom.

Clearly, Ethan will pose too. Look at those muscles!!!

Here is a great picture of the Jesi and Violet, my mom and Claire and I. Apparently, Claire is upset that Violet upstages her at times and gives her a dirty look when she thinks no one will notice.

Would you believe I have even more pictures??? I'm too tired to post them now but more will be coming. :)

Happy New Year.....Better Late than Never!

Well, we survived our drive to Florida and here are the kids the first night down there celebrating their freedom from the van! :) They did great and we had so much fun in Florida. Sunny and warm each day - you can't ask for more.

Ethan and Anna got huge lollipops from our neighbor down there. Of course, Ethan's was gone in a matter of hours while Anna gave up and gave hers to me.

Christmas Eve with Uncle Brett.

This was our typical view every day. Until they "got bored"....who gets bored on the beach??

This picture was taken at Quail Creek right before our fantastic Christmas Brunch. Wow...we all ate way too much!

Mom is too busy in December to take normal pictures....

I got to take Ethan and Anna out to the Civic Theater in the beginning of December and we walked downtown to watch the ice-skaters. They were hooked and we went back the next week to skate. It was the first time for all the kids - super fun! Ethan did really well, Anna looked like a cartoon character whose legs would not stay underneath her and Claire skated pretty well while either Joel or I was bent over helping her. Our backs did not fare well. Sadly, I took no pictures - this one is taken downtown when we went to the Civic, though.

On a sunny Saturday in early December we went to the Santa Claus Parade in Caledonia. Small but fun - I think the kids were more interested in the hot chocolate than the parade.

No Christmas season would be complete without Pillsbury cookie decorating. Please try to note the HUGE pile of sprinkles/sugar completely covering every inch of Anna's cookies.

Ethan was more meticulous than his sister. I didn't know it took so much concentration! :)

Bears being herself by our tree.

We're off to Florida for the holidays. We're driving this year so say a prayer for safe travels and we wish you all a very Merry Christmas!

Meijer Gardens Holiday Visit

Why is it that the one year I do not need a Christmas card picture (remember the 4th of July cards??), I get several great choices without even trying. So, here is the your virtual holiday picture. Minus the card and envelope. :)


Here is Mr. Beans by his favorite Christmas tree at the Gardens.

Another good one of all three....not sure about the look on Ethan's face. Claire seems to be the only one hamming it up - as usual.

Awwww...sweet siblings. :)

Assorted November Activities

Earlier this month Anna went to her first Libby Lu Birthday Party. The girls get their hair and nails done and basically acted way too old for their age. Actually, it was quite cute and Anna looked like a princess.

The other day, the girls took all the toys out of our toy shelves and decided it was their bed.

Here is a picture of my lovely sister and I while we were in Las Vegas. Wow...what an awesome time it was!! No kids or responsibilities for 4 days!!

However, we still managed to irritate our husbands. :) And we even got it on camera! If I recall, we were simply suggesting they scooch closer together for their picture.

This fantastic picture was taken in my mom's suite - my sister and I, Elvis, and my two lovely new sisters, Sarah and Erin. There was a great Elvis impersonator at her 60th birthday party - he stayed past the party and hung out with us and sang just for us... it was so fun!

Happy Halloween!

And here we have our lovely witch....we've decided we need to use face paint every year from now on. It was so fun!

It's no suprise who Ethan was going to be this year. He was loving life being his favorite Nascar driver, Dale Jr.

Here are the three Halloween Trixters.....Dale, ballerina and witch.

We trick-or-treated at Jon and Jesi's this year. It is so great b/c the houses are close together and decorated so cute. They were very excited to get started!

Here is the post-trick-or-treating pose....lots of excitement and silliness. They had to stop going from house to house because their arms were sore from all the loot.

The whole gang!

One final witch picture to leave you with....
she's got the glamour smile going on.