Fancy dresses

Bart's mom always gives the girls the most beautiful dresses for Christmas. Here they are looking beautiful on Sunday morning.

Christmas morning

We had a very nice Christmas morning. The kids were very happy with all their gifts. Bart got a Garmin watch he's been wanting for a long time and he surprized me with an iPod touch! I wasn't even wanting one but now I love it! Here are some pictures from Christmas morning. Their new favorite show is Disney's Wizards of Waverly Place. They each got a Wizards of Waverly Place wand. And Kenzie got a Wizards of Waverly Spell Book from Santa.

Bart got a Utah Utes mug.
Ainsley and Kenzie were VERY excited to each get an Our Generation doll.


Above: Grandpa is trying out his new alma mater Snuggie

Below: My mom painted me this picture from a photograph I had taken of an Afican sunset while I was in Namibia.


Bart got the girls a jumpy house. Luckly, it's down in the basement now.

Snow much fun!

We got dumped on Christmas Eve and Christmas day. What a perfect time to get lots of snow! We've been staying cozy and warm in our house but the kids loved going outside and playing in all that freshly fallen snow. Bart had the day off of work on Christmas Eve and they made a pretty big igloo on our front boulevard. Bart and the girls can fit in there all at once! Here are some fun pictures of that day.




Bart, Ainsley & Kenzie are inside the igloo and our neighbor's dog tried to join them.

Was it the real Santa?

Mackenzie really wanted to know if this was the real Santa or just one of his helpers. We told her she had to decide for herself. As for me, I tend to think it was the real Santa.

I am so done with standing in those awful long lines at the mall to get 15 seconds with a sweaty old man in red fur and a fake beard. And then finding out that I can't even take a picture of my kids with "Santa" with my own camera. But of course, I could pay $15 for a lovely 5x7 of my kids crying on Santa's lap. I hate to say it, but last year we didn't even go see Santa because of my just stated frustration.

Well, what a relief it was to walk right in to our local credit union and spend a good 15-20 minutes visiting with Santa with no other kids in front of us or behind us. Santa had a real beard and must've been eating healthier this year. He was so good with the kids. Summer giggled the whole time she sat on his lap and she even sang "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" to him. It was soo cute! The girls loved it! And I'm so glad we've found a new tradidtion!

Funny glasses=funny pictures

Rett Angel Kemry

This is my sweet niece Kemry who has Rett Syndrome.

Her older sister Cicely and younger sister Brynn are also in the video.

I love this picture

I took this picture the day we went to the apple orchard but I didn't put it in my apple orchard post. I love this picture and I just wanted to share it. I don't know what I love about it so much but now it is my background picture on my computer. Below is a cropped close-up of the same picture.

Halloween goodies!

We have had a fun weekend of Halloween fun. It started out with the Chili-cook-off and Trick-or-treating in the hallways at church on Thursday evening. Here are the girls all dressed up before we went. Above, Ainsley was a cute cow-girl.

(Don't call her a cowboy or you'll hear it from her!)

Below, Mackenzie was a really cute witch.

And below her Summer was an adorable Monarch Butterfly.

Then on Halloween day we went to pick out some pumpkins at Pahl's market. The girls had fun running through and playing hide-and-seek in the hay-bale maze. After that we carved our pumpkins with our friends the Amotts. Bart and I were both really impressed with our pumpkin carving skills this year. I actually have always hated carving pumpkins. I've always done just the typical jack-o-lantern face and it always turns out real dopey looking. Well, this year the Amotts had these cool cut-outs that we tried. I carved the cat pumpkin and Bart carved a witches face into his pumpkin.

And I have to say, I think Bart and I did an awesome job!

Oh- and the kids did an awesome job scooping out all the goopey gross stuff!

The Amotts have a Halloween tradition of dressing up in tinfoil like a Chipotle burrito and getting free food at Chipotle so we all decked ourselved out in tinfoil and got a lovely free meal. We got there just in time before the line started wrapping itself around the building! Kenzie, Ainsley and Lizzie in their lovely tinfoil hats.

It was really quite a hoot to see all those adults getting creative with their tinfoil.

After dinner we set out for some fun Trick-or-treating in our neighborhood.

We all had a blast. The kids got tons of candy and looked adorable.

It was definately a FUN Halloween weekend!

Another 1/2 marathon

Bart ran his 3rd half marathon last Saturday. It was called the Siouxland Lewis & Clark Marathon held in Sioux City, Iowa. We all went there to cheer him on. It was definately on a much smaller scale than Grandma's considering we were able to park 1/2 a block away from the finish line and we had no crowds at all to contend with. It was super fun to see Bart run across the finish line and he said it totally made his day to see his 4 girls cheering him on at the end.

Bart was pleased with his time of 2 hours and 22 minutes considering there were lots and lots of up hill parts. We are all so proud of him and of his dedication to his running goals.

Little House

I've been reading the Little House on the Prairie books to the girls this past summer so when I saw the musical was coming to the Ordway in St. Paul I knew we HAD to go. Bart and Summer had some fun daddy-daughter time at the MOA while Ains, Kenz and I had some fun mommy-daughter time at the theater. The musical was nice, most of the funny parts involved Nellie Oleson, and I loved the love story between Laura and Almonzo. Even though she doesn't have the best singing voice Melissa Gilbert, who played Ma, really made the show worth it because it just wouldn't feel like Little House on the Prairie without her. Overall, it was a great success and everyone enjoyed themselves.

Sing along! Music: Popcorn Popping

I looked out the window and what did I see?

Not what I expected Oct. 12th to be!

Fall has brought me such a scary surprise,

Snow falling gently right before my eyes.

I could take a snow ball and throw it far

It still wouldn't make me feel on par.

It was really really so

That white stuff sure was snow

Isn't Minnesota such a wonderful place!?!?

Walker Art Center

On Oct. 1st I got chosen to help chaperone Ainsley's 3rd grade field trip to the Walker Art Center. I never quite understand modern art until I hear the story behind it or have someone explain something about it to me. Some of the works we saw were very interesting and enlightening. While others...well, exhibited the "I could do that!" or "my 3 year old could do that!" comments. The part I love most about the Walker is their famous sculpture garden. This was a favorite for the kids as well.

Below is a picture of my group of kids in front of the famous Spoonbridge and Cherry. Ainsley is in the middle.

This one is called X with Columns.
It was a bit rainy but still a fun, educational day and a day I got to spend with Ainsley!

school pictures

School picture day totally took me off guard this year. It happend during the 1st week of school. I don't ever remember it coming that quickly before. Anyway, we've had the pictures back now for a while and they've just been sitting around on my desk. I finally got around to scanning them in tonight. And being the completely harried mother that I am I of course, have not even gone to get Summer's 3 year old pictures taken yet. So here are just Ainsley and Kenz and hopefully by the end of the year I'll get Summer's pictures taken too.

Ainsley ~ 3rd Grade

Mackenzie ~ 1st Grade