Star Cookie Christmas Tree

The chef poses next to his latest creation. (He had a little help.)

In the leaves

costumes - cheap & easy

Isaac was a road, Noah was a stop-light.

Total cost: $1.

Apple tasting

As part of a home school project, we got one of each kind of apple available at SuperTarget as a chance to notice the many differences. They turned out to have about a dozen different kinds of apples.

In case you haven't heard...

Looks who's joining our family in April! :)

9/11 at Lake Harriet

Even though we didn't play this year, the five of us went to the Lake Harriet band shell to attend the 9/11 tribute concert. At one point, Isaac joined a parade of kids which was lead by children rescued from the bus on the colapsed 35W bridge several weeks ago.

Camp Snoopy becoming Camp Sponge Bob

Not long after we heard Camp Snoopy wasn't going to be camp Snoopy anymore, we wondered what/if it would become. (http://erikdebmn.blogspot.com/2006/01/goodbye-snoopy.html Here's a post from a visit to the mall days before the Peanuts characters started to disappear.) Since that day, we've been joking about it turning into Camp Sponge Bob. Well guess what? We went there today (to celebrate 'first-day-of-school-for-everybody-else-since-we-home-school' day). And found this:

In the center of the world's largest(?) indoor amusement park used to be a large water fountain with Peanuts characters all over it. It danced to music and had water canon games you could play. This is what it looked like today.

Hmm, I wonder what they're going to put in here instead. Then I saw it:

A silhouette of Sponge Bob on the side of the wall blocking this area off. Now to anyone who's into Sponge Bob, I'm sorry. We've been discouraging TV watching lately, plus the little bit I've seen of Nickelodeon in recent years has been anti-parents, kids do whatever you want, don't worry about respecting others, as long as it's silly and makes you want to laugh and want to buy stuff. A far cry from the two-dimentional and slow moving, but respectful and thoughtful, world of Peanuts.

Due to my disappointment over this, it is likely this will greatly reduce our number of trips down to the 'mega-mall.'

MN State Fair

We went to the fair on opening day, despite the rain. We made our traditional stop at Little Farm Hands during a break in the showers. Isaac made a planter at the Home Depot booth and had his first trip on the Sky Ride.

Look who's 5!

Happy Birthday, Isaac!
(look close for Isaac's tongue-of-concentration)

Tragedy, close to home.

It was a crazy night that we’ll never forget. We’ve been using the 35W bridge a few times a week lately, including during the late afternoon rush hour. I thought it a little weird to be going over a bridge where in the next lane over they were repairing sections with jack hammers. This surface work was not supposed to affect the structure of the bridge, but I’m sure the real cause will be discovered in the coming weeks and months. We’ve heard first hand stories from friends and co-workers who used the bridge minutes before its collapse or were planning to about that time but for whatever reason chose a different route.

We praise God that he is in control, and thank Him for the miracles and goodness seen during such a disaster.

Slice of Shoreview

The last couple of years, we've gone to the Arden Hills festival (or whatever it was called) on Lake Johanna. We loved it, because it wasn't very crowded, but apparently that's not a good thing because we haven't heard a thing about it happening this year. So, we went to the suburb next door to see Slice of Shoreview for the first time. It was kinda cool. Quite a variety of vendors and plenty of food to choose from. The parade was a little long, but the kids seemed to enjoy it.

butterflies

We went to the MN zoo, again on a library pass - saved $$$! This was the first time we were there when the butterfly garden was open. Very cool!

Oh, look at the time.

As part of homeschool kindergarten, Isaac made a sundial today with a lamp post and some sticks. (That upsidedown, backwards 5 is actually a 2, as this picture was taken about 3:00, and the really big stick is noon.)

Gone Fishin'

Our 4th of July celebration in Hayward was actually in June this year. Isaac had a particularly good time fishing with his uncles and cousins, so he stayed there with grandma and grampa a few extra days.

Patriotic Pancake

It's starting to become a tradition in our house - to break out the food coloring for the pancakes at breakfast on holidays. It's not easy making a square pancake.

Camping Adventures

Just for fun, we got out the tent today. We haven't used it in a while, as we're not quite ready to try camping with 3 young kids - someday.

If you look close you can see Jimmy Gourd, one of the VeggieTales, in Noah's hand. Jimmy and Jerry have been his security, um, veggies lately and he hardly ever puts them down. When we wash hands, we have to be sure to wash the gourds too.

saving 90%

So, there we were at walmart looking at the indoor-outdoor thermometers. I wanted one for the back porch. There was quite a range, mostly around $20. Then I made the realization I could get two 97¢ suction cup window thermometers for way less then any of the indoor-outdoor models.

Just had to share our bargain of the week.

Out, in the yard.

Last weekend was not the first nice-weather-weekend of the year, but it was the first nice-weather-weekend that we weren't busy. :)

Look who's 2

Happy
Birthday
Noah!

Changing Seasons

It's hard to believe we were sledding down the hill last month after the biggest blizzard of the winter. We've been enjoying several days of beautiful spring weather.

Things have been busy with a recital, a trip to the MACHE home school conference, and meetings at the city about the future development in our area. It's nice to know God is in control.

Another milestone today... Isaac had his first day of homeschool kindergarten, and it went very well! We could have waited until fall, but why wait? He still has one month left of preschool, but that's one of the neat things about homeschooling - there's nothing wrong with being in two grades at once.

Greetings

If this looks familiar to you, it probably means you were someone privileged enough to recieve Lydia's birth annoucement. Sorry it took so long, especially to those who remember getting Isaac's birth annoucement the day after he was born.

We have done so poorly at getting around to sending Christmas cards, we decided to try to send some Christmas cheer at the same time. So, just save it and pull it back out at Christmas and pretend it was our greeting. Feel free to check back here for updated photos.

The big picture is Lydia at about 3 weeks old. In the upper right she is being held by her brothers for the first time at the hospital. The lower right is our traditional kids-by-the-Christmas-tree picture (Lydia wasn't born yet).

Lydia's Dedication

It was nice to have all 4 grandparents and some friends join us at church today for Lydia's dedication.
As was expected, she cried through the whole thing.

Eat your greens

Isaac wasn't so sure about his green pancakes at first.

Who was St. Patrick? Click here for an 8 1/2 minute video of VeggieTales explaining St. Patrick's Day, as seen on "Sumo of the Opera."

Sunday best

Here she is at 7 weeks, ready for Sunday morning in her first real dress.