November 2013

The night of Brian's surprise party

Brian's Birthday dinner- ElAgave in St. Peter~yummy!

As an extra special surprise, I reserved the barrel room at our local winery, Chankaska, and invited friends to join us.  It was a very fun evening!  Lots of laughs and lots of good wines to taste.  Brian was pleasantly surprised and we can't wait to do it again!

While Brian was on the Youth Retreat with our church the girls and I headed to Fargo to spend some time with the Lindbo's.  Mom, Laura and the girls joined us as well.  Even though Owen didn't feel well we still had a good time playing with the boys and I had fun hanging out with my sister.  The girls swam at the hotel that Mom and Laura stayed at.  It was nice treat for the kids.  I was thankful that the weather/roads were nice and that the kids were super travelers.  It was nice to get back and see Brian though. :)

Natalie helped me shop one evening at the newly remodeled grocery store here in St. Peter.  They have these little carts for the kids and Natalie just loved it!  She felt like a real helper!

We had Thanksgiving with my side of the family on Thanksgiving day and celebrated with the Salfer's the following Saturday.  Thankful for our family and the good food that we ate.  We are blessed beyond measure.  

Hello???

Yes, i realize that my last post was in fact November 5 2013.  WHat have i been doing in the last 3 months you ask?  Eating bon bons and watching Netflix of course!  Actually its the little people that live with me and countless other things that I should be doing rather than blogging I guess.  But before I completely forget what I did I better start updating.  I blog so that when I get to my scrapbook I will look back and remember what we did.  So here it goes....

Lordy Lordy Brian's 40????

Could it be that Brian is really 40 years old?!  Wow.  Time sure does fly.  To celebrate, the girls and I planned a surprise party for him and he had NO clue and was totally surprised.  There were a few curve balls thrown at us and I didn't know if we would actually pull it off but in the end we did!  I had help from our friends too so that was nice.  The girls wanted to make Brian a special cake-one that required fondant.  Too many episodes of Cake Boss and the girls thought cake decorating looked easy so they thought we should make Brian a "cake boss" kind of cake.  I've never worked with fondant but I had heard it was not easy so I did drag my feet a little but with the persistence of the girls i went ahead and ordered the fondant.  We ended up going to our friend Sharon's to decorate since Brian had told me he was planning on taking the day off (a curve ball)  The girls and I had so much fun and it wasn't as bad as I had expected.  I did let "control" go and didn't care that it wasn't "perfect".  The girls did an AMAZING job-I'm so very proud of them!  We had 35 people at our house for the party-balloons and streamers everywhere!  It was such a fun night and so happy that we could celebrate this wonderful boy Brian.  We also surprised him with a video message slide show of friends and family that expressed their birthday wishes.  It was a gift that Brian will cherish.  Thanks to all who helped!

Then on Monday, his co-workers surprised him by making these t-shirts of Brian and they all wore them....ALL day long!  The girls didn't have school so it was a perfect opportunity for us to celebrate with all of them.  They made us shirts too and we picked up pizza's for a fun office party

Apples & Pumpkins & Treats Oh MY!

Our annual trip to Montgomery Apple Orchard and Corn Maze

This years theme was The Jolly Green Giant

We enjoyed the maze and caramel apple treats and steel brass drum ensemble 

I brought the camera to the pumpkin patch but the battery was dead so luckily our friends the Crowley's were there to snap a few photos.  None for the blog however.  The girls got some unique ones to carve though and had a lot of fun creating their jack-o-lanterns.  

Then it was time for some trick-or-treating.

Caitlin went off to a party

We had the Gilbertsons and Gleisners for dinner

Ella (thing 2) Emily & Grace went off on their own (spreading their wings a bit)

Jeff, Brian, and JoAnna went with the others while Heather, Caleb, Lauren, and I stayed back to hand out over 100 pieces of candy.  

This year's trick-or-treaters
Soccer player, Thing 1, Merida, Pea, & Construction Worker

The Dells 2013

 Celebrating our 5th Year at the Dells with our friends, The Gracks & Gilbertsons!

Kids playing, Adults relaxing....

Eight is Great-Happy Birthday Rachel

Our sweet Rachel is 8 years old, going on 16 some days and 2 other days!  Rachel's smile is the most sparkling one I've ever seen!  She loves soccer, rockstars, playing barbies, polly pockets, legos and restaurant.  She loves to play computer or Caitlin's iPod.  She's a super reader-loves Magic Treehouse series.  She's kind, helpful, smart, beautiful, fun, energetic.  She also is dramatic and knows how to push people's buttons. :)  She just started piano lessons and is loving them.  Rachel always picks fun birthday themes, not your typical girly girl parties.  This year she chose a soccer theme.  She participated in a soccer camp this summer and last and seemed to really enjoy it and wants to play once she's in middle school/high school.  She wanted to go to SkyZone (trampolines) but injured her foot on a trampoline a week and a half before her birthday and it still hasn't quite healed up.  So she decided to go bowling, dinner at Pizza Ranch and a sleep over with her friend MacKenzie.  She didn't have school on her birthday (teacher day) which made it nice to walk to River Rock for a birthday treat to start off her day.  I think it was a successful day and she had her sparkly smile smiling all day!

1st Days of School

Where did the summer go?  I feel as though it just flew by so quickly.  So here we are the first day of school....ugh....sad...happy...anxious....excited...so many emotions for all of us!  It was a successful first day!

  

 Caitlin..oh goodness, 7th grade already!  Seems like yesterday we were dropping her off at her first day of kindergarten.  This year has a lot of big changes for Caitlin.  A new school-middle/high school, WAY bigger than John Ireland.  A schedule that brings her to different teachers and different rooms all day long.  Extra Curricular's-Tennis is the sport she's chosen for Fall and she's been improving each day.  Seems like she grew up overnight and I'm not kidding when I say that.

Emily-5th grade!!
She's got a new teacher and new principle this year.  She also gets to go to different teachers and rooms for Science and Social.  And the biggest news, she is Vice President of Student Council which means next year she's the President!  She is super excited for this!  Emily will be in band and children's choir this year.  It should be a fun year!

Rachel- Our 2nd Grader
This will be an exciting year for her!  She will receive 2 sacraments!  I know that she is looking forward to receiving Holy Eucharist in the spring.   Mrs. Johnson will do a fantastic job getting the kids ready for this big day.  She will also start taking piano lessons this fall.  She's definitely growing up on us!  Seems like yesterday my coffee buddy and I were just hanging out!

Natalie is our Preschooler at Little Lambs.  She is super excited to learn her letters better and play with her friends.  She gets to go three days a week this year which is nice for her and for me. :)  Can't believe that she is one year away from kindergarten!