Blauggie

Polar vortex survival guide

Among snow days, too-cold-for-school days, and regular days off, we have missed A LOT of school over the last three weeks. What have we been doing? Thrilling things! Such as:

Volunteering for Mama (to make up for all of the time I'm not spending at work!)

Eliza finishing her scrapbook

Baking (using what ingredients we happened to have on hand)

Finally having time to do the art kits they got for Christmas

Playing chess with Bruds

...and giving up on chess with Bruds

And lots and lots of Just Dance on the Nintendo Switch

Posted at 09:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

January!

Here is some of the fun we've been having in January:

Trying out new games (this one is called Klask - super fun!):

Volunteering (making sandwiches for homeless people - Sebastian and Lainey are writing the date on the bags):

Eliza and Derek and loading the sandwiches up:

Checking out the new Sky Zone near us:

Speaking at the school's PTA meeting (Sebastian and his Destination Imagination team petitioned the PTA to fund a test structure that they need to build for their competition). Do they look a little nervous? They were (although they really rocked the presentation):

Next week is Sebastian's first 5th grade orchestra concert! Stay tuned (not literally, because it will probably sound very, very awful)!

Posted at 04:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Holiday fun!

We took lots of pictures of all the fun we had over the holidays! Here is a summary -

We took a tour of the Vikings stadium on 12/23 (my birthday) followed by dinner at the Old Spaghetti Factory:

Christmas morning (this is Lainey receiving a watch, which she had been wanting).

I just love this picture because you can see how proud Lainey is of the gift she picked out for her sister.

Not sure what these two are opening...

Skiing for the first time (they liked it! They actually liked it!). The kids did a 1-hour lesson, after which we met up with them and spent some time on the bunny hill perfecting their snowplow. Eliza was a natural and got it figured out quickly. She left the pack and went up and down the bunny hill over and over. The other two caught on after a short amount of time and we all moved on to a "green" hill (with an actual chair lift) when Grampy and Auntie Parker met up with us.

Last run of the day.

Mama and Daddy got to ski/snowboard, too!

More skiing fun

Lainey heading up to the bunny hill. She only tipped over on this ramp thing twice...they only shut it down once.

Making slime at Grandma S's.

Annual bowling outing with the Schauts.

Strike!

Making princess cakes on New Years Day (she did it all by herself!). This was a kit she got from Grampy and Grandma Sue. She made the cake as soon as we got home on the 31st, and decorated it the next morning (which is why she's still in her jammies).

Posted at 08:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This kid...

...is ELEVEN YEARS OLD today!

He loves video games (understatement), coding, messing with his sisters, Imagine Dragons, Magic the Gathering, the shows Nailed It and AFV, Minecraft, writing stories, board games, and Jim Gaffigan (which is why it is very inappropriate that we "put candles in a pie" instead of cake tonight).

This is his last year of elementary school, but his first year of orchestra (he plays the viola) and being on a Destination Imagination team. And while all that is very exciting...I sometimes miss this cute, sweet (like, really sweet) little guy. Let's take a little walk down memory lane: