Best Friends Any Girl Could Ask For

Front: Amanda Heather G, Jen, Me, Sharon (due 3/9)
Back: Kelly (mother of 5) Amber (due 8/13) Heather H (hostess) Jessica, Deb, Mary, Stacy, JoAnne & JoAnna

Last night, my friend Heather H from Mankato threw me an amazing baby shower.  We get another shower once we hit 5 kids!  Surprisingly I'm not the first shower she's thrown for someone having their 5th!  She had her house decorated so cute & festive, she had yummy food (olive garden salad and bread sticks and homemade cupcakes) fun party games to play and a non-alcoholic margarita drink that tasted soooo good!  She is a very gifted party planner if you ask me!  The best part of the evening was hanging out with some of my very dear friends.  These women are awesome, beautiful, kind, generous, loving, faith-filled and the best friends any girl could ever ask for.  How abundantly God has blessed me with placing them along my path.  There were a few ladies that couldn't make it and they were missed, but know that they were there in spirit.  Our family received some wonderful thoughtful gifts.  I am so grateful...

Cupcakes, Cream Puffs, limited ed. Kettle Corn with pink sprinkles
Olive Garden Salad & Breadsticks

So Pretty!!  Loved the fun colored puff balls

Heather sewed the circle thingy's hanging from the ceiling!

A funny game that people played while I opened gifts.  They had a baby
frozen in an ice cube in a glass of water.  When their "baby" thawed,
they had to yell, "My Water Just Broke!"  SOOOoooo funny!!

Surprise for a 30 year young'in

Our lovely friend Jessica turns 30 at the end of February.  But her awesome hubby and sister planned the ultimate surprise.  Have a surprise party for Jessica on her daughter's birthday!  Yes, talk about confusing poor Lydia!  There were at least 50 of us, adults and kids waiting in a hotel room for the honored guest to arrive.  Jessica's mom and sister had sloppy joes, chips, drinks and of course cake for all of us to enjoy while we waited.  After the big "surprise" we were all invited to stay and use the hotel pool-which of course was a hit for the kiddos.  Jessica was surprised and Lydia thought it was for her and everyone went home happy. :)   It was a good evening!

Jessica-Finally joining us in the 30's

Polar Plunge 2013

Once again, Brian, the crazy man that he is, took the plunge....The Polar Plunge!  His friend Drew sets it all up and gets the guys and they LOVE it!  Their team is called Nut Migration...haha!  And this is I believe year #5.  But I think Brian missed one of the years.  It was relatively mild out this year and it wasn't too terribly uncomfortable to be in the stands waiting for your loved one to jump into the frigid water, hoping their heart wouldn't stop beating.... :)  This year the guys dressed as super heroes.  Brian was Superman and had tossed around the idea of just shaving the "S" in his chest hair.  I'm happy he decided to just go with the shirt.  Oh...but he did add the cape.  It's a great bunch of guys with big hearts jumping for a great cause.

Poop

Not the most appropriate title for this post but it is what it is.  Natalie is our joker of the family.  She is quirky and she says the funniest things, sometimes, joined with a funny facial expression of some sort.  Well the other day she was in the bathroom doing her job.  She has a system...2 books, the stool under her feet and the door has to be closed.  Oh and she gets naked.  After completing her job, she yells to me "momma, I'm done...come wipe my butt".  So I cheerfully head to the bathroom-with just a little eye roll.  Thinking to myself, she's almost 4, when will she wipe her own butt?  Anyway. I get to the bathroom, wipe her butt and while I'm flushing and washing she's busy getting her clothes on.  But still naked, she says to me.  "I had a hard poopie" and I said "oh, that's not good" and she says "I had to slap my butt like this (which she demonstrates) and then I wiggled (which again she demonstrates...still naked) and the poopie fell out!!"  I said laughing hysterically and in amazment "That's great Natalie!!  That worked huh?"  and she says "yup!"  and on we went with our day! :)  Good stuff....this is what I love about being a stay-at-home mom.  You never miss the good stuff!

Toothless Wonder!

Well, Rachel has become a toothless wonder.  She's lost her front two teeth less than a week apart.  She has  another 3 that are loose!  The tooth fairy seems to have troubles finding our house.  It's been three days since the last tooth came out and she's still waiting for the fairy to pick up the first one she lost!  Ugh...get with it tooth fairy!!!  Sure does change the look of spunky Rachel!

Counting Down the Weeks

Week 32

 It seems as though this pregnancy is flying by.  I have not been good about remembering to take photos this time around.  Well, for your enjoyment here are the last two pictures taken of the belly.  Please don't judge me on my outfit on the first picture.  When i get home I change into comfy pants-they don't always match my shirts!  The picture below is my friends Sharon and Savannah and me.  We are all due to have our baby's within a month!  Sharon is expecting a boy, her second baby and Savannah is expecting a girl-her 1st!  Our friend Annie just had her baby on January 21st.  A girl-Lucy.  Lots of Pregos!!

Sharon (due 3/9) Mandy (36 weeks) Savannah (due 2/13)

Emily turns DOUBLE DIGITS!

I'm not sure where the last 10 years went and why it's hard for me to believe that our dark haired beauty is 10!  It doesn't seem like it was that long ago she was toddling around the house terrorizing Caitlin...oh wait...she still does that!  Ha!  Emily is the sister that everyone wants to play with.  She's the one that would rather play than anything else (homework/piano) and shes the one that cares (worries) about everyone most of the time. :)  She loves Legos and she loves drawing.  She is a great help with Natalie and I'm sure she will be with the new little sister too.  For Emily's big day, she got to go back to school!  She's never in school on her birthday, so she looked at it as a treat.  She chose to go to Pizza Ranch for dinner (good choice).  Then on the weekend she invited 4 friends (thats about all we can handle) to go skating at Gustavus (which was a hit) and then come back to our house to play/hang out and have ice cream birthday cake.  Which of course I tried to shape into legos.  Too hard to do with ice cream.  You gotta work fast!  The cake tasted awesome but looked pathetic!  Emily didn't care and said it was one of the best cakes ever!  Gotta love that girl!