Done with December

Time to get the Tree!

Such a bummer this year with the weather and the fact that we had NO snow!  We still managed to have fun picking out a tree (in a different field this year!)  The girls were goofy and had a good laugh every time they found poop on the ground.  There was another family with college aged girls that were having the time of their lives.  It was so much fun to watch them interact with their parents and made me think how much fun we will continue to have even when the girls are older.  The family also drove a silver Toyota Sienna and also put their tree on the roof of their van.  It was quite funny to Brian and I.  We always have such good luck with Brewery Hill in LeSueur and its a great little family run business.  After the tree hunt we headed back to St. Peter to start a new traditon, eating at ElAgave...yummy!  Next year I'll get a margarita!  It wasn't as festive watching Brian drinking by himself!

Emily-Middle School Choir/Band Concert

It was fun to watch Emily at her Choir concert.  Still a little hard for me to believe she's in middle school.  She is having a good 7th grade year and meeting new friends and just seems to enjoy all aspects of 7th grade.  She got to play instruments with an old friend Abby, who used to go to JI and that was fun!  THe kids did a pretty good job overall...its definitely not JI quality of performance but it is always entertaining. :)

JI Christmas Program

I really look forward to watching the girls perform at the JI Christmas program.  Even though I tell them to stop singing their songs around the house weeks before the program.  I tell them I want to be surprised.  However, hearing them sing around the house tells me that they enjoy learning the songs and that they are excited about the upcoming program.  Barbara Frank, the choir director does such a good job highlighting each class and their talent.  Every year I'm amazed at the kids and I usually tear up at some point.  It's so hard to hold back but I know that I'm an ugly crier and I wouldn't want people sitting near me to experience that sort of thing.  Rachel was an angel this year and is in her 2nd year in the JI choir and 1st year in band.  She surprised both Brian and I with her drumming skills.  She's actually quite good!  Natalie just always has such a good time performing and is smiles the entire time.  She makes my cheeks hurt-I can't watch her without smiling from ear to ear!

Christmas Card Photo Session

We had hoped to have got a good family picture back around Thanksgiving, but no such luck.  So with a few instructions for the girls to make this photo session easy on all of us, we managed to get quite a few good ones to choose from in only a matter of 20 minutes or so!  I couldn't put all the pictures on the card this year but these are two of my other favorites.  In all of our craziness at times these are the moments I'm most excited for them-to have an abundance of sisters.  Imagine the fun they'll have when they're grown adults.  It makes my heart happy.

Cookie baking!!

This year the girls were exceptionally productive and worked together so well!  No fighting, teamwork, snitching the chocolate kisses-too many for me to even want to know!  They managed to bake/make 7 different cookies and roughly 4 dozen of each one so that was alot of cookies!!!! 

Progressive Dinner with Friends/Godparents

Our friends the Gracks, Gilbertsons and Crowleys and our family are not only great friends, we are also honored to be Godparents to some of the kids.  So to celebrate Christmas, Mary had a great idea to do a progressive dinner and throw in our family traditions too.  So we started at the Gracks with Appetizers and their family tradition, singing christmas carols and added our family tradition of wearing our PJs all day on Christmas by wearing our PJs to all the houses.  Next was the main meal at Gilbertsons, reading a book to the kids which is their tradition and also opening up presents.  The Crowley's also added to the main meal and then their family tradition at our house, reading "Twas the Night before Christmas". We ended at our house with desserts.  It was a great night despite Cody being quarantined to his room because of his flu sickness not able to join us.  I think this will be a fun addition to our Christmas celebrations.

Christmas with the Moore's

We celebrated Christmas with my side of the family a week before Christmas.  It was a fun day hanging out with cousins, playing bingo and eating yummy food.  

Kiwanis Lights and Dino's

A new favorite family activity before christmas is heading to Mankato for the Kiwanis lights show at Sibley Park.  It was a beautiful night to see all the amazing work these volunteers put in to put on such a great light show.  After a walk in the park we enjoyed delicious pizza at one of our favorites, Dinos.  

Christmas Eve

I didn't get a picture of the girls Christmas Eve, but they did all look beautiful.  I also didn't coordinate their outfits like I have in the past and low and behold I survived not doing it and they weren't disappointed either.  We went to Christmas Eve mass, which is always lovely at our church.  Rachel sang in the choir.  Lauren talked THE entire time.  It was hilarious and we kept people around us entertained.  After mass, we headed back home to get ready for round one of present opening.  Here's the before shots.....so pretty, so clean, so peaceful.....

PJ Time!

A tradition, one of many at this house, is PJs for presents on Christmas Eve.  In the past it's been pretty easy coming up with a theme, whether it be a certain color or character, etc.. This year I was a little stumped on what to do.  I wanted to get everyone stripped PJs from Hannah Andersen but I couldn't justify spending that much money for stripped pjs and I couldn't find a comparable cute knock off.  So finally decided on the girls' favorite character, cartoon, super hero, etc....  Here's what we came up with.  Next year...no theme...maybe I'll splurge and get those stripped pjs. :)

Lauren-Minnie Mouse

Caitlin-Captain America

Natalie-Elsa from Frozen

Rachel-Minecraft

Emily-The Flash

Brian-Batman

Mandy--Curious George

Christmas Morning

Looks like Santa did leave somethings for the kids and our family.  The girls all surprisingly slept in til about 8am and even waited patiently while Brian brewed some coffee for us.  Christmas day is my favorite of all because we don't have to go anywhere, we can stay in our pjs all day long and work on Legos and puzzles and play games with one another.  We can eat candy and cookies and not notice the time, because it just seems to stand still.  

Bye Bye 2015!

We hosted our annual New Years Eve bash once again, having 42 of our close friends here to ring in the new year.  There were 12 people that were unable to join us but we were thinking of them.  It's always a fun night, very loud with kids running everywhere, but in the end we are all grateful to have each other.  New this year was playing BINGO!  What a great game for all ages to play and we were able to contain the kids for a solid hour and a half!  

November Happenings

Brian's Birthday

We started off November celebrating Brian's birthday.  No milestone but a nice evening out as a family to honor this awesome Dad and Husband.  He chose Patricks here in St. Peter for his restaurant and we closed the night with his favorite pie, Blueberry.  Well he had that kind and the girls and I had Reese Peanut Butter Cup pie.  :)

John Ireland Prayer

Rachel and Natalie both hosted prayer at JI in the month of November.  It is quite the job for the teachers to come up with new and thoughtful prayer skits, but they've never disappointed.  Both girls love to lead prayer with their classes and both see to enjoy JI in general.  

Tennis 2015

Caitlin and Emily celebrated a pretty successful tennis season with the end of the year banquet.  Even though the tennis program isn't the most prestigious sport to play in St. Peter I think they have the best girls to play with and be lead by.  We know quite a few of the varsity players outside of tennis and they are a stand up group of girls.  So glad Emily and Caitlin have such good role models.

4-Eyes

Then this happened!  This girl got glasses!  It seems as though she may be following in mine and Caitlin's footsteps.  We both got glasses in 4th grade too!  She is a cute kid, but look at her now!  Even cuter!

Thanksgiving in Fargo

We traveled to Fargo the week before Thanksgiving to my sister's house for a fun over nighter to celebrate Jackson's birthday and Moore Thanksgiving.  We were able to capture a few pictures of the cousins together despite forcing them to cooperate in single digit temperatures outside.  After the "photo session" we took the kids over to SkyZone to wear them out a bit and burn a few calories before gorging ourselves on a Thanksgiving meal.  The kids had a blast!  It was fun to watch them together-a rarity since our schedules and locations get in the way of spending time with one another.

Our Thanksgiving/Salfer Thanksgiving

Even though I didn't capture any photos, we did have a nice Thanksgiving meal together at our house with Brian's parents on Thanksgiving day and then another meal with the whole Salfer clan, minus Sharon and her family,  the weekend after Thanksgiving.  We are very thankful for the delicious food and desserts but even more thankful for our families and that we can all be together on one of my most favorite holidays.  We are truly blessed.....

October in Review

We like to keep our social calendar full here at the Salfer house.  October did not disappoint!  To start off the month, my friend JoAnna turned 50 years young!  I got a few of our mutual friends together and threw together a little party for her with a few surprises and help from her mom to make her day extra special.  We had a great night celebrating one of the most thoughtful people I know!

A yearly Salfer tradition (we have many) mazing it up at Montgomery Orchard and Corn Maze.  This year's theme was Monarch Butterflies.  It was a beautiful MN fall afternoon to relax, enjoy each others company, eat some yummy caramel apples, do a little trivia and soak up the sun.  

Over MEA break we traveled once again to the Dells with the Grack and Gilbertson families!  After taking last year off, the kids and even us adults were excited to make the trip back.  We had so much fun hanging out, playing games, enjoying the waterparks, ropes course, go-carts, etc and being in each others space.  The kids did so well, making sure they were always together and we could definitely tell they were at the perfect ages to have fun on all the rides.  

John Ireland Marathon

We all participated in JI's annual Marathon the first weekend of October by riding our bikes 4+miles and then finishing up with the service part by serving/helping out at The Kitchen.  Both parts to this event were alot of fun.  We had beautiful cool weather for the ride/walk and serving those less fortunate was a humbling experience.

Quarter Break

the kids had school off the 30th for end of quarter so I took them to one of there favorite hang outs in Mankato-The childrens museum of So. MN.  Before we got there we went to a local bakery for breakfast-Friesens Bakery for some yummy cinnamon/caramel rolls.  The Museum is fun for all ages-so many fun things to do and experience.

Pumpkin Patch/Halloween

Off to Grandmas Little Acres once again for a fun tractor ride to the pumpkin patch to pick out the perfect carving pumpkin.  Even though we end up going towards the end of the season we're still able to find a pumpkin or two that hasn't started rotting.   

I think the girls and Brian did a fabulous job carving.  Caitlin got out a power tool this year to complete hers and I tried a more "pinterest" looking white one.

Trick or Treating this year definitely had a different feel to it.  First, Emily wasn't with us right away because she was having fun at "Phantom of the Opera" with JoAnna and the kids.  Second, Caitlin stayed home to pass out candy to the kids who came to our door.  Third, our neighbors were gone and we always, always go to their house first to get the best handful of candy and always get a photo of the girls walking up to their door.  It was alot quieter and easier only bringing 3 of them out.  Our friends the Frey's walked with us since Katie and Rachel were Mario and Luigi from Mario Bros.  I think one of the funnier things was that I hadn't noticed that Lauren was a rabbit last year until after we were out and I wondered why her rabbit costume was so small on her!  That's how much I prepare for my Least Favorite Holiday. :)  

T

September wrap up

Lots of activity happened in September...This is some of the things I took pictures of:

Hanging out with Gpa Tom and Gma and boy cousins from Fargo and Auntie Annie

Being silly with Gma-mom was such a good sport to let the kids "do" her hair!

The same wekend, I took the girls to Redwood Falls to see my Grandma and also the "zoo", which has roughly 8 animals.  The girls were disappointed to say the least.  It took us about 15 minutes to check out all the animals. :)

The backyard patio project got finished!

Lauren and i started going to story time at the library and ran into some friends!

Brian took the girls on their annual Valleyfair trip!

Lauren keeps us laughing with her words and actions.  Here she is pretending to be Sherman from Mr. Peabody and Sherman!

We celebrated this kids birthday, Levi our Godchild!  We got him a sling shot!  His dad was smart and took the bee-bees and gave him beans to practice instead.  We did get eye protection for him too but maybe should have also gotten eye protection for the rest of his family!

7th grade attitudes and drama are in full swing :)

Rachel and Natalie's principal at school took these last two pictures of the girls after one of the first days of school at pick up time.  So cute!

Tennis

Emily joined the Saint Peter girls Tennis team this year and had alot of fun.  Its always interesting watching 7th graders who have had zero or little tennis experience.  We do see improvement from the beginning of the season to the end so thats good!  Emily played only doubles this year but will hopefully get a chance to try out singles next year if she decides to go out for it again.  She has a super strong backhand and a pretty good serve.  It would be nice to see more volleys so she can be challenged on all the strokes.  But in 7th grade, it comes down to serving.  If you can get it in, chances are they won't return it!  

This was Caitlin's 3rd year of tennis and it was a mixed bag of feelings.  She worked hard this summer to improve and had a goal of being on Top JV.  Basically "B" squad.  The problem being is that there were only 2 varsity players that left last year and the top JV girls from last year were moved up to Varsity so it would be hard to "move up".  Caitlin did make Top JV and was told she was #14 on the roster (top 13 actually get recognition) and was told she would be wearing a Varsity jersey.  She was very excited about that.  However, she never did receive a varsity jersey, instead a pit stained one from last year and in my opinion, the coach never even ordered her one or intended to.  So she kind of went through the season with false expectations.  Not good. Not good.  She wasn't the only one though in this position.  She and 3 others were kind of in limbo on the team.  They were the ones with the "special" jerseys and they were always set apart at practice and the coach rarely watched them. I want to blame him but he was hired as the Varsity coach but has no assistant so it is hard to watch that many matches going on at the same time.  She knows what she needs to do next year if she wants to be on Varsity or even noticed.  Its all good and a learning experience both for her and for us as her parents.  We do love watching the girls and are happy that they picked a sport they can do all their lives!

A BIG Reveal!

So in early September we were able to find out what Salfer #6 would be.  Brian and Lauren went with me to the ultra sound and we agreed that we would have a reveal cake for the other girls that evening.  The photo on the left is the cake I made that started self destructing shortly after I had frosted it.  So we ended up covering the half that was "revealing" and showed the kids.  Then Brian decided that we should cut the cake, cover each girls piece and have them guess before uncovering their piece of cake.  Two thought it was a boy, and the other three thought it was a girl.  Natalie informed us that if it was a boy she would start crying!  Lucky for her her guess was right and she was a happy girl.  They were all super excited in the end!  The picture on the right is of the reveal cupcakes that we had at the reveal party that the girls insisted on having.  There was a little discussion before hand though and one of the things they had to do was promise not to tell anyone until the party...which was a week away!  Our weekend of the girls reveal was already packed full of activity and I really didn't want to add one more thing so we decided that the following weekend would work the best.  I made over 50 cupcakes and about 45 people showed up for the reveal.  It was a lot of fun!  I think there were more people guessing it would be a boy or "hoping" it would be a boy so they were a little disappointed when they bit into their cupcake and saw the pink frosting.  As for those that picked "girl" they thought they were super smart and cheered very loud at the outcome.  It was such a nice evening to gather with friend that were able to come and help celebrate with us.  We are really blessed to have such a great group of people in our lives.  Back to the ultra sound that Brian and Lauren were at...After the technician told us that we were having a girl Brian and I both sat in silence to process this information that was given to us.  I really thought it would be a boy and brian thought it would be a girl but was thinking that if it was a boy we could have its middle name be Kenneth after his dad.  So he was slightly let down.  I guess we make what we know best and we are thrilled to add another queen to this family!  We are all hoping though that she has dark brown hair and keeps it so she looks like Emily. :)