Archive for the ‘Weather’ Category

Snow on the way?

Saturday, October 19th, 2013

Might get flurries this weekend. Haven’t officially had our first frost yet but it’s dipping into the mid-thirties at night now. Had the scouts camp out in our backyard last weekend – they can attest to the 30’s at night and the grass sure was crunchy and white in the morning regardless of what the weather people are saying about official frosts. I made campfire stew and we also used pie irons to make sandwiches and pizzas and all sorts of different kinds of pies over the campfire!

Sorry for the lengthy time between posts. Maybe I’ll make up for it by posting quickly twice. Or maybe not. Life has been insane but finally football is almost done, and soccer is done, and cross country is done, and CISM weekend training is done, and Beth’s pre-defense-(or whatever it’s called)-paper is done, and Susana has been in NYC for a week. It’s all good – but busy.

One of my make-a-wish children died a few weeks ago – very sad, but I got to see him the weekend before which I’m very grateful & blessed for it all working out. That same weekend he spent several hours with Vikings players at their practice facility, met AP and other Vikings, and went to the Vikings game the next day. The Viking World Order (VWO) group has been fantastic about taking care of him and his family – Make-A-Wish really didn’t get involved very much with a wish unfortunately but it was still great to get to know this amazing 13-year-old. At the visitation it was packed with people in football jerseys – unlike any visitation you’ve ever been to – I guarantee it! I took the kids and Susana to a spaghetti fundraiser the weekend after the services and it was the same thing – completely filled with people in purple and Vikings attire. It’s great to see their family get so much support in this time of need.

In completely random order that likely won’t match up to photos…

First-day-of-school photos (yes, from a month ago).
Colleen has braces.
Christopher is playing on a girls football team – or is it that a girl is playing on his team – I can’t remember 😉 BTW – she’s great!
Harry Potter sometimes visits us. Wish those darn owls wouldn’t follow him around.
Susana made us a fantastic Spanish meal – super yummy!!!
Mmmmm – fish chowder and local beer at the Angry Trout in Grand Marais. Love that place!
Colleen also made us a dinner – I recommend the orthoptera over the diptera.
Muddy, muddy football. The boys spent more time picking mud out of their shoes than playing!
Scouts waking up around the fire after spending the night camping in our yard on a 34F morning 🙂
Daddy’s and Megan’s apple pies. Yep – we are master chefs!!
Colleen and Mary Tyler Moore (we took Colleen to a nice dinner downtown followed by seeing Wicked for her birthday).
Lots of pictures from the corn maze this year. Fun times!

See the picture of me (or is it grandpa?) in the flannel and all hunched over helping serve food outside with the scouts? Did you notice the orbs? What?!??! You missed the orbs? I watched a video by Dr. Wayne Dyer several months ago. I wouldn’t suggest that anyone watch any of his videos but he did have a few fun quotes or ideas mixed in with all of the other insane thoughts that he has. So…he says that orbs in photos are spirits and otherworldly visitors and that it is an amazing coincidence when they show up in pictures. So I have four spirits visiting me that morning by the campfire. Sweet! Cool! And here I thought it was all due to me not cleaning my lens ever. Fantastic that Katherine, Andres, and Grandma & Grandpa T all joined us that morning!

Hope all is well with everyone. Can’t wait to see mom and dad in a month!!

Ups and Downs

Sunday, May 5th, 2013

Interesting week.

(Good) Coached my first girls soccer practice of the season (Megan’s team).

(Fun) 4 out of 10 girls have never played soccer before.

(Good) It hit 70s for the first time this year for that practice last Saturday.

(Bad) Despite it being in the 70s, I started getting chills & feverish while coaching and ended up coming down with the flu by that night.

(Good) Which resulted in losing a few pounds.

(Bad) We were forecasted to get 1′ of snow Thursday.

(Good) Woke up Thursday morning and didn’t have ANY snow.

(Fun) 30 minutes south got the full 1′ of wet, heavy snow.

(Good) Went to my first CISM team meeting.

(Good) There is a recent article about CISM at this link so I don’t have to explain it 🙂

(Great) People on CISM were very friendly and welcoming and serve a great purpose.

(Bad) Likely murder/suicide in Eden Prairie this week of couple in their early 20’s. His suicide was witnessed by police in city hall’s parking lot when he was coming in for questioning. Haven’t found her yet.

(Mixed) CERT (Citizen Emergency Response Team) got activated so I helped make phone calls & with the search for the young woman. I even got to drive and be in charge of a a van filled with 12 CERT members 🙂 Can you find me in these pictures? If you can your eyes are AMAZING. In one I’m in the center walking on the median. In the other I’m between the yellow lines in the middle of the road right in front of the tall black post going up the photo.

CERT2

CERT

(Good) I made Kentucky Derby pies.

(Bad) The bourbon didn’t bake out of the pies the way I thought it would.

(Good) The bourbon didn’t bake out of the pies the way I thought it would!

(Bad) Because I was helping with the search we didn’t get to watch the Kentucky Derby as a family yesterday (Saturday) as we always do.

(Good) We watched it as a family today (Sunday). Had fun screaming at our horses!

(Good) I had great intentions as I do each year to teach the kids about losing their money through betting on horses.

(Bad) I lost all of my money to the kids again. I’m the only one who keeps learning that gambling is gambling and not everybody wins.

(Bad) All of the weight I lost from the flu came right back with the Derby Pies

(Good) Beautiful day and I took the kids for a bike ride to the park

(Great) We get to see everybody soon!

Old man winter

Sunday, February 17th, 2013

I think I shoveled 5 out of 7 days last week and we still didn’t come close to getting as much snow as New England got in a day (hope things are getting back to normal for all of you by now). The weather has been anything but predictable here…snow, rain, ice, way below zero, back up to thirty degrees…I’ve stopped looking at the weather forecasts so each morning is a fun surprise 🙂

On one of the really cold days (I think it was -12F at the time) we boiled water and sent the kids out on the back patio to throw the hot water into the air. Pics are cool, huh? Poof! No more water – it barely even hits the ground.

We survived another pinewood derby. Christopher had the 5th fastest car. Megan’s was fast too – but not quite as fast. Christopher and his friends had lots of fun watching the cars zoom past (I loved watching his expressions from photo to photo). In one of the pics Christopher’s car is in 1st (in the far lane with three fins on it) and Megan’s is in 2nd (in the closest lane – red, white & blue). We painted sinkers on hers to look like people’s faces so it looked like hers had 10 people riding in her car. Christopher also got to lead the American flag in and out of the event that day.

Colleen and Megan built a snowman and sprayed blue food coloring all over it. The next day our neighbors had a red snowman in their front yard. Down the street there is a family of snowmen each holding tennis rackets, umbrellas, pinwheels, etc – they are a fun group to pass as we drive to and fro. We still have our Christmas lights up – only a few people on the street are in the annual lights contest – we’ll go to July if we have to – nobody is beating us, no way, not a chance.

Colleen danced again at the Timberwolves halftime. A friend of mine who works for the T-wolves got us great tickets (4 rows up) so we had an awesome view of the game and players. I don’t know how I did it but once again I positioned myself perfectly to not be able to get any good photos. Colleen’s instructor lined herself up perfectly between me and Colleen. The same thing happened last game. It’s a challenge because you’re fighting to get a good, low seat as half-time starts while so many people are exiting and we never know exactly where Colleen will be. She did great and had a fun time.

Megan had a music performance at school. We did the same thing at this event – got lined up so her music teacher completely blocked her for most of the songs (you can just see her in the pic right in front of her teacher). I don’t think we could have picked a worse seat – she was pretty much the only child in the entire gym that we couldn’t see! And the place was absolutely packed so we couldn’t move at all. The songs were great – my favorite was listening to her shout “Mama!” and wag her finger back and forth and do all the other hand gestures:

Mama! when you bake,
Mama! I don’t want cake;
Mama! for my sake
Go to the oven and make some ever lovin’,
Shoo fly pie and apple pan dowdy
Makes your eyes light up,
Your tummy say howdy
Shoo fly pie and apple pan dowdy
I never get enough of that wonderful stuff!

She also had a speaking part, which…earns us all ice cream 🙂 Yummy!

I’m two weeks into my five weeks of training to be a CERT member. Last week we learned how to use a fire extinguisher to put out fires. The rule of thumb is that if we can’t put it out in 5 seconds then we should retreat. That’s just a bit different than my fire instruction over the past 10 years but I’m ok with it and glad to be involved 🙂 My annual ski trip to Vail is coming up. Ran up the IDS tower again (50 floors – 1280 steps). I shaved 2 seconds off my time from last year and now am only 13 seconds from getting below 10 minutes total. Racquetball league has been good. Work and UMN are good for us. Kids are good. Purdue stinks. Man are they awful. Had a really fun night out with some friends last night – we stuck with the “sipping” tequila (versus the “shooting” tequila) but it was still a bit rough playing three early games of league racquetball this morning. Hope all is well with everybody. Hope RSS works for you dad – let me know…

We Need a Little Christmas

Sunday, December 16th, 2012

I had no idea Angela Lansbury had done anything besides Bedknobs & Broomsticks, Beauty & the Beast, and Murder, She Wrote – did you? 😉 Ok, maybe I knew a bit more but I really didn’t know much about Mame. I was listening to the Christmas station on the radio and was drawn to the words from We Need a Little Christmas. Maybe it had a different meaning in Mame but it sure seems to apply to how I’m feeling this year at Christmas…I really want to have a good, fun, meaningful, peaceful, reflective Christmas, and enjoy the times with family and friends – and I want that right now. It’s tough this year. But nothing is different for my kids – it’s just like any other year for them and we’ll have a fun Christmas – and I’m glad they will help pull me through it. Our tree is up, the stockings will be filled, I’ll have to buy a fruitcake to slice – and I’ll be sure to listen to this song a few more times (take time and read the words – I think they are just what many of us need right now):

We Need a Little Christmas

Mame:
Haul out the holly;
Put up the tree before my spirit falls again.
Fill up the stocking,
I may be rushing things, but deck the halls again now.
For we need a little Christmas
Right this very minute,
Candles in the window,
Carols at the spinet.
Yes, we need a little Christmas
Right this very minute.
It hasn’t snowed a single flurry,
But Santa, dear, we’re in a hurry;
So climb down the chimney;
Put up the brightest string of lights I’ve ever seen.
Slice up the fruitcake;
It’s time we hung some tinsel on that evergreen bough.
For I’ve grown a little leaner,
Grown a little colder,
Grown a little sadder,
Grown a little older,
All:
And I need a little angel
Sitting on my shoulder,
Need a little Christmas now.
Mame:
Haul out the holly;
Well, once I taught you all to live each living day.
All:
Fill up the stocking,
Young Patrick:
But Auntie Man, it’s one week from Thanksgiving Day now.
All:
But we need a little Christmas
Right this very minute,
Candles in the window,
Carols at the spinet.
Yes, we need a little Christmas
Right this very minute.
Agnes:
It hasn’t snowed a single flurry,
But Santa, dear, we’re in a hurry;
Ito:
So climb down the chimney;
Put up the brightest string of lights I’ve ever seen.
All:
Slice up the fruitcake;
It’s time we hung some tinsel on that evergreen bough.
For we need a little music,
Need a little laughter,
Need a little singing
Ringing through the rafter,
And we need a little snappy
“Happy ever after,”
Need a little Christmas now.
Need a little Christmas now.

Alright, time to talk about the pics. Follow along the best you can. I took the kids to see Eden Prairie play in the state championship (to the semi-final and final games). Eden Prairie dominated and won their 8th state title!! Skol EP! Colleen and Christopher brought friends and we saw many people we knew – it was fun getting out and cheering and letting the kids run around a bit in a semi-empty stadium (the games were played at the Metrodome where the Vikings play). Skol Vikings!

I remember how excited I would get to “paint” my dad’s face with shaving cream so I’ve let my kids do that from time to time. I love watching their eyes and expressions as they come at me with the shaving cream brush and lather up my face so carefully (ha!). They are so intent and focused – I love it. And Megan will soon outgrow it so I’d better let her do it a few more times!!

We got our first snow on Thanksgiving so the kids couldn’t help but run out and try to catch as many flakes as they could on their tongues. We had a good Thanksgiving – lots of great food and time to relax a bit. The kids have loved getting to smash ice on the pond again – the fun never ends. I’ve heard that’s bad on the fish (something about giving them horrible headaches – hee hee) but I hadn’t seen a fish in a while…until a week later I spied the fish in the photo at night swimming below the ice in the shallow part of my pond. Not sure what he was doing but glad he paused long enough for a photo op.

This is the time of the year when Colleen has several dances – we did the Gopher Women’s b-ball half-time, Gopher’s Men’s b-ball halftime, and then her recital at the high school. I do enjoy these programs now – her group is really good, plus I get to see some college hoops and walk around campus which is always fun. Can you find Colleen in the group photo? Hint – she’s the only one looking at me (not much help, huh). While we were taking photos a huge syringe walked by (the team the Gophers played were the Dayton Druggies and that was their mascot) and I found it funny watching it try to duck to get down the stairway.

I have always enjoyed traveling back to Rochester. Such ingrained memories from childhood of walking to the dam, hanging out at Grandma T’s and Aunt B’s, going to auctions, pizza parties with so many relatives, flag pole, etc etc etc. It’s always fun to see the kids asking to go the dam and then wanting to do the things that I always wanted to do. Mater was new to Rochester from what I remember – everytime I see a beat up old brown truck I always call them Mater so it was cool to finally see a real Mater. Loved it.

Miss you Grandma T. Yellow flowers will always bring up happy memories going forward. Driving home in Wisconsin the day of the funeral it was a clear night sky and I saw a shooting star right in front of me while I was driving. Thanks for saying hi Grandma 🙂

Check out the pictures of the cars. That was the day after we got a foot of snow. The snow covered the lines in the parking lot which apparently gave people permission to park however they wanted which included completely boxing people into parking spots with cars on all sides – the good news is that these same idiots can’t be out on the roads driving if I can see their cars all grouped together. Morons. And it’s crazy how one moron does it which immediately gives everyone else permission to turn off their brains too.

The picture of the snow falling in our driveway was the night after I hung up Christmas lights and cleaned out our gutters. Nice timing, huh?

December also brought us to a band concert for Colleen and Salvation Army bell ringing for Christopher’s scout pack (and Megan came too – she’s a great helper). We raised a lot of money – people seemed to be especially generous this year. Or maybe the boys got cuter? Or scarier? Whatever it was, it worked!

And here are some videos. The first one is the md-phd (Jakub) who is leading the lab that Beth is currently working in. He does amazing stuff for children with very serious genetic disorders. This video is one of his recent transplant patients for epidermolysis bullosa.

Jakub transplant patient

And here’s the video Beth’s team made for their final presentation for their cell biology class. You won’t quite get the full effect if you don’t watch it with Beth laughing the whole way through it. I must admit it’s still a bit hard for me to find quite as much humor in this as she does but I’m doing the best I can 🙂 Oh, don’t judge me until you’ve watched it! I’m not even sure that I’m smart enough to say that I’ve even learned anything by watching it more than once – I just hope her teacher lets her bring stuffed animals to her final test!

Beth’s cell biology final video

And finally, since I’m posting other videos…can’t remember if I’ve posted this one before or not but here’s another cake video that a friend posted. And yes, I know my own Grandma’s name 😉

Grandma T cake on fire

Spring is sprung?

Sunday, March 25th, 2012

Remember with this new gallery format that you may have to click a few times on pictures to get them to a bigger size and then may have to hit backspace (or the back button in your browser) to see all of the photos again.

This weather is insane! It’s still March and everything is green and growing! People are out and mowing when typically we still have tons of snow on the ground. What a lame winter! Think I’ll get the snow tires off of my car this week – that’s sure to jinx everything. I got all of our lawn furniture out today (with Megan’s help) and pulled a bunch of weeds. It’s a sure sign of spring when Beth sprinkles stinky stuff all over the yard (darn bunnies!). In a week or so we’ll be playing in the water park for spring break. We have four families going this year which should make for a fun time – with I think over twelve kids. I also made the reservations for Grand Marais this week – that’s only 4 months away 🙂 I’m really looking forward to that. It’s been really busy lately – band concert for Colleen (french horn – can you find her in the very crowded picture?), dance recital for both Colleen & Megan (Christopher’s reward for going was getting to ride the craziest rides he could find at the Mall of America – the picture has him holding a joy stick that spun/stopped him with 360 degree range while hurling around in a circle on a track), swim lessons started, kung fu is prepping for belt testing for both Christohper & Megan, and increased fire calls for some unknown reason. Colleen is also doing an extra dance event this year for the first time – a duet with another girl in her dance team. They have been having fun coming up with fun tricks to do…here’s Colleen practicing one of them:

Colleen cartwheel trick video

I spent 5 hours in the evening last week at a big house fire. The garage was fully engulfed when we arrived and the biggest concern was making sure the neighbor’s house didn’t catch fire due to all of the heat. If you look closely in the picture with the fire fighters you might just see someone you know putting on an air pack (just don’t tell my station or I’ll have to buy pies). This morning (Sunday) we responded to a single car wreck on the highway. An elderly gentleman totaled his car (with his wife by his side) – lucky for them the wire barrier in between the highways did it’s job and completely caught his car and prevented it from barreling into the oncoming 60 mph traffic. The last we saw of him (remember, Sunday morning, about 10 a.m.) he was with the cops walking the yellow line for a sobriety test…I don’t think that was going to end well for him. Very lucky he didn’t hurt anyone.

This past Friday night Colleen had 3 friends come home with her on her bus. Then they got busy painting on t-shirts and writing bizzare stuff all over their arms and faces. And then…Beth took them and Christopher to go see The Hunger Games on opening night. Megan and I went and saw the Lorax at the same time. The theater was packed with weirdos waiting in line to see teenage kids kill each other (go figure). They all loved it and Beth & the kids all lied to me and said the violence and mature themes weren’t that bad at all. Beth said the girls held hands the entire movie (and sat in the front row) and screamed and jumped at all the right parts. What fun!

Life is good and very busy. Hope all is well with everyone.

EPFD goes prime time

Sunday, January 29th, 2012

Did you see this video during the football games last weekend? I’m not in the video but there’s a certain fire department in this nationally televised video. Sweet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wz18EC5NEwM&feature=BFp&list=FLItVbRNkeu3eJatkZaN4_IA

We spent New Year’s Eve with our friends who have a house on a big lake in Eden Prairie. The ice wasn’t that thick but we still ventured out a little ways and had a fun time. The kids spent a lot of time with sticks attacking any dead plants poking up through the ice. We shot fireworks from the ice and our whole family had a sleepover that night. Fun times for all. And then the next morning on New Year’s Day I got up way before anyone else was even stirring and ran a 10K race 🙂

Christopher’s scout pack had an “ool” party a few weeks ago. Megan and Christopher spent most of the time blowing water through long foam tubes at anyone who got in their way. Megan shot most of her water backwards behind her but Christopher targeted head shots. Fun times.

Have you ever scanned the people of Walmart picture compilations? Always good for a sad laugh or two. So after swimming I promised Christopher that we would spend his $10 Walmart gift card that he was awarded for selling so much popcorn for the pack. It was a really cold day in early January in Minnesota but there we were in Walmart with my kids wearing flip flops and crocks – so here’s my “people of Walmart” contribution. Maybe next year I’ll have them wear spandex and tube tops too.

This year has been crazy in terms of very little snow. We get an inch or two every now and then but the weather gets above 30F and it melts soon after falling. Finally this past week we’ve gotten several inches spread over several days but I see warm temps next week too. This makes for interesting sledding conditions and wardrobe. Here the girls are playing in their pajamas while sledding on a pathetic covering of snow. Wheeeee!

No snow makes the kids be more creative indoors this time of year. Between the dog and other kids, Megan was lucky to build a chain this long!

I laughed when I first saw this picture. Doesn’t it look like Christopher just left his job as a Chip’n Dale dancer wearing a checkered g-string? This was us earlier today at the pinewood derby race. Christopher took 7th place in his pack – not bad considering I had him do quite a bit of the work on his car this year. Here are the 3 amigos, followed by results of one of his heats, and then some of the kids in his den.

We also just hit a major milestone in our household. Colleen lost her very last baby tooth/molar. Does that mean we can’t put off braces much longer???

Crash on the final turn?!?!?!?

Monday, May 30th, 2011

Are you kidding me???? Hildebrand can’t make it through one more turn to win the 500???? He cost me $3.50 and handed my mega-jackpot to Megan. Darn rookies. Megan also had the driver leading at lap 100 for another 50 cents. Colleen had the highest finishing female driver and the first car out of the race for 50 cents each…the rest of us walked away empty handed 🙁

Happy Memorial Day. It’s thundering outside right now and supposed to be off-and-on severe storms all day. Seems like this is the weather every weekend lately. I like storms – but the rain is making everything grow like crazy and it’s hard to find time to work in the yard in between the bad weather.

Here’s Christopher playing baseball. Love the catchers gear. They use a pitching machine this year and get 10 swings if they need them. Some of these kids have already been playing for a few years and can really hit and throw. Christopher’s game is improving a lot already and he has a lot of fun out there being one of the guys on the team. We just signed up for football in the fall so this will be a 5 sport year (soccer last fall, basketball in the winter, baseball in the spring, kung fu off & on, and football next fall) – he’s still trying to find his sport. I think it will be a riot to see these little kids bouncing around off of each other in that big football gear.

The scouts had their egg drop last week. I got the fire truck to come out again this year. They load the bucket up, raise it up pretty high and then bombs away. Some of the scouts try to make something to protect their eggs – and others just like watching their eggs go splat. Christopher’s survived again this year. Afterwards we had a question and answer session with the kids. One kid was on a roll with mixed-up answers – which brought up great talking points but made it hard not to giggle. We asked the kids to tell us what they knew about fire. He said if your house is on fire you should drop to the ground and roll around 🙂 We asked if the kids had a meeting place if there was a fire. He said he and his sister had a meeting place…in the living room 🙂 We asked what they should do if they were inside their room, the smoke detectors were going off, and his door felt hot. He said he would run to his window and break it (we warned him that he might get in trouble if he’s breaking windows and it was just dinner being slightly burned) 🙂

The same night that Christopher had his egg drop I was supposed to be coaching Megan’s soccer team. I went there for a team picture before the egg drop, gave the other coach the line up that I created, and then rushed to the egg drop. Megan has great soccer skills – she’s got a strong foot (actually, both feet) and understands where to go, but she’s been tentative in the games so I keep telling her to get in there and play hard and that I know she can score a lot of goals. I got a phone call from Beth while we were at the egg drop saying we had to meet them for ice cream because Megan scored 3 goals that night. She may not want me to go to any more of her games this year if this is how she plays when I’m not there, huh???

Here’s Megan biking off to find that pot of gold after one of our recent storms…wish her luck…

Here’s a sure sign of spring crawling across our floor…yuck.

Mom & Dad – you were asking about birthday presents. After several years, just yesterday I emptied the final crumbs into a tupperware container of my 6 lb box of “peanut brittle crunch with decorettes”…hint hint. 🙂

Hey Dad – keep getting better and stay strong and positive. Kick some cancer ass!!! See you all in two weeks.

Rain rain go away

Sunday, May 22nd, 2011

It was a crazy weather day today. It rained about 10 times today and it would go from sunny (well, almost sunny) to torrential downpours. There were tornados in north Minneapolis too. We were out and about until about 3:30 p.m. and finally decided that the weather looked sunny enough to go for a walk around the marsh at about 7:45 p.m. Sure enough…exactly half way around the marsh the sky turned dark grey and it poured on us. And sure enough, for the second time today we all had jackets except Christopher. It was a warm rain so the kids didn’t mind, and it brought a gigantic rainbow which was cool. Today was the art center’s open house so we were there at 2:00 p.m. and one of the crafts for the kids was making “rain makers” – funny how that worked out…they’re doing their job today!

Last weekend Beth and I had a date night and got to see The Prairie Home Companion show. It was really cool (another sign that we’re getting old). I wanted to see Garrison Keillor before he retires next year (if he actually does this time). We had a fun time and ate at Tom Pham’s Wondrous Azian Kitchen afterwards (which was also surprisingly really good considering its name). It was a mix of asian and sushi and I got to have a sake flight sampler which was yummy.

Here we are at the art center’s open house today. They had snacks, and demos, and crafts for the kids, and some awesome displays of artwork (especially the lighthouses and cardinals) by some very talented local artists 😉

Guess I’m going in reverse chronological order today. Today was our make-up mother’s day (since Christopher was hurling on the real mother’s day). Beth loves going to Convention Grill for mother’s day so here we are at lunch dining on our real malts (chocolate with banana, and chocolate with peanut butter cups), burgers, and fries. Nothing but the best for our mommy. In the bottom center of the picture is my burger – there is so much smoked cheddar and grilled onions piled on it that you can’t even see the meat – tasty!!! All these years I’ve been a little hurt when people say that Megan gets her looks from her mommy – after seeing this picture I’m starting to agree with everybody 🙂

Colleen wrapped up another season of dancing. Here she is with her teacher getting her trophy. She had an awesome year – can now do the full splits, is in the front row for most routines, is the only dancer with a move named after her, and does some fancy thing all the time that she’s really proud of where she pulls her back leg up by her ear while hanging onto her toe. Next year is the year that I get to dance with her – the dad theme this year was Michael Jackson songs – I’m a bit bummed that I didn’t get to wear sparkle socks with the dads this year 🙂

Having trouble finding Colleen in this picture? Just look for the only girl doing the splits perfectly…ouch.

I can’t remember if we told you or not, but the spanish immersion school wasn’t working out so we moved the kids to a combo 1960’s & Amish school…here they are heading off to school in their new uniforms.

Mom – I’m kidding, they didn’t switch schools. It’s hard to believe that we managed to keep all three kids clean (especially Christopher in 100% white) through their school dance performances. The kids did great – lots of good dancing. Christopher’s class even got chosen to do their dance again for one of the other elementary schools that was celebrating a spanish night.

There’s been a lot of bad weather recently. Last weekend we got hail and even found one bigger than a quarter. The kids couldn’t resist running out into the yard to pick up the bigs chunks that were falling…here they are with baggies filled with hail (I’m sure they’ll still be in our freezer for the next year or so).

I have no idea what this picture is all about. The things that the kids are allowed to do in public when their mommy is supposed to be watching them. Here’s Megan’s new wide-eyed look again…

That groundhog was wrong

Sunday, February 20th, 2011

Did you check out that Purdue basketball game today? Ohio who? Not in our house. Boiler up!

Yesterday I think the forecast was something like 2″ – 12″. Today it was 12″ – 15″ and they think more is coming tonight and tomorrow but at this point I guess it doesn’t really matter. Here are a few pictures of our house, the road into our neighborhood, and me shoveling. Whew! Lots of work!!!

Ok, maybe those weren’t quite accurate (thanks Paul Douglas for letting me borrow those from your website – that’s the least you could do for being so wrong on this weekend’s forecast, huh?). Here is a photo from tonight. This morning we could see 100% of our patio…and tonight it is a different story. So here’s a question, if Beth is the one who wanted the little kick-me foo-foo dog then why am I the one shoveling the backyard?

I had to drive through the neighborhood this afternoon to pick up the kids from play dates. The road conditions were awful – I blew through several stop signs so I wouldn’t get stuck. I also feared for my life driving through my neighborhood – house after house had mean looking dudes wearing ski masks and goggles out front looking angry at the snow as they pushed their snow blowers around. Perfect day to rob a bank – you’d fit right in.

Christopher was star of the week last week in school. That just means that his parents get to stay up late making posters about how wonderful he is 🙂

I used to recommend that it is a good idea to create a chalkboard wall for your kids. I’m having second thoughts about that now. Grrrrrrrrr.

Has anyone read The Dream Manager yet? Created your dream lists? Or bucket lists? One of my dreams was to take some art lessons. I took a soldering class in the fall and made the ugliest jewelry you’ve ever seen in your life. Absolutely awful. Not my calling. So now I’m taking some water color classes – they fit with my open Wednesday nights and it is a TON better than that last class. Here are two of my paintings after a few lessons…the lighthouse painting isn’t done. I think I paint a few nudes next. Guess what everybody’s getting for Christmas this year?

I’d write more but it’s time to go shovel (again).

Fluffy & Spot

Sunday, January 16th, 2011

It feels like I shovel snow every morning and night lately. And I love it. And they’re saying plenty more is on the way – we have a TON of snow on the ground and stacking up along the driveway and road and patio and pretty much everywhere. I still want to get a copy of that photo from Duluth when I was a kid and the snow drift was over our heads and the dog was way up high (hint, hint, if you can find it). I feel sorry for the people who don’t get to spend as much time really enjoying snow and real winters.

The kids are still in the backyard all the time. Today we had 4 different sets of friends over to sled on our hill. Colleen had two friends over and Christopher had two friends over but despite calling several people we couldn’t find anyone home or available for Megan to bring over – she’s struggling with being the youngest today and missing out on what the other two have. Get used to it kid 🙂

Christopher is still really enjoying his big (well…not so big) Christmas gift…Fluffy. When he was naming Fluffy, Colleen said to him “Are you sure you want to name him Fluffy? What if your friends come over and find out you gave him that name?”. Made me laugh. He was undeterred and stuck with what he wanted to name him. Beth still wanted to name him Speedy after her first night with him when he chewed through the cardboard box from thet pet store while in our bathroom and Beth caught him just in time as he was headed towards the door to our bedroom. Yikes – Christopher almost never even got to see him!

Megan got to do a Build-a-Bear and chose to make a dog named Spot. Spot travels everywhere around the house with her and she’s proud to tell visitors how she built him and everything that she got to choose including the heart on the inside. Fun.

She still loves getting all of her stuffed animals together, here they are going for a ride in a multi-car train that she built. Seems like a fun ride until she decides to go up and down the stairs with them!

Colleen has very proudly mastered the splits. I know who she doesn’t get this flexibility from (although P90-X is helping in that department too). She’s getting to be quite the dancer.

And don’t worry, with all of the new additions to our house Orca still manages to get a bit of attention too.