Memorial Day Weekend

Trace and Andrew

Patrick, Stacie and Andrew

Kianna, Aliyah. and Kaylee

Andrew's Family Party

Trace and Bryker

More sleepover fun

Kids with Grandpa Wayne and Grandma Sue

Cousins minus Andrew

Stacie's awesome hiding spots

We just returned from a long weekend in Iowa. We arrived late Thursday evening and the action started first thing Friday morning when Trevor met his friend, Tod Santel bright and early for coffee. When he returned, I took off to workout with my sisters, Shelli and Stacie. We had some good sister time and even got pedicures. I then picked up the rest of my family and headed to lunch with my mom, Grandma and niece, Rylan who is 22 months old. Kaylee had fun playing with Rylan. She will be an excellent babysitter someday. We spent the afternoon at my nephew, Andrew's graduation party, the reason for our trip to Iowa. Andrew plans on attending the University of Iowa this fall with a major in Finance. We are proud of his accomplishment and what a nice young man he has become. Way to go Andrew!

On Saturday, we spent the day with The Cook's and Langfald's. The weather was cold and rainy, so we made do with some indoor activities. We let the kids run around at The Playstation, went out to eat, took them to the movie "Epic", and grilled out that evening. The night was finished off with the kids having a sleepover at their cousin, Bryker's house where they ate popcorn and watched another movie.  Since Trevor and I were kidless we went to the movie "Star Trek" with our friends, The Issa's. I'd say we all had a pretty great day!

On Sunday, we went to church where we had a great time catching up with friends. We then headed to my dad and Sue's house for the afternoon. The kids had a great time with my dad. He played with them for two hours straight. What a good grandpa! The rest of the evening was spent back at my sister, Stacie's house. My grandma made her famous chimichangas for dinner. We spent the evening visiting and playing games. My sister, Shelli, was awesome with the kids. She had arranged for them to compete against each other in a series of games including: tic-tac-toe, hangman, pictionary, and hide-n-seek. The latter game proved to be the most fun. After the kids took turns hiding a number of times it was time for the adults to hide. Stacie definitely got the prize for the best hiding places. We found her stuffed inside a Chick-Fil-A catering container one time and on top of her kitchen cabinets another time. It made for some good laughs and more fun times in Iowa!

Mother's Daughter Tea Party

Ella, Kaylee and Katie

Kianna and Ada

Silly Faces

Silly Faces

The girls, their dolls and I got all dressed up and had a tea party with some friends. I think this is becoming an annual event, because we all enjoy it so much!

Gaskill's Visit

Grandma Sue with the birthday crown Kianna made her.

Enjoying our hot fudge sundaes

Sauder Village Jail

Trace in old school house

Girls in old school house

Kianna and Trace milking a cow

Kaylee milking a cow

Grandma Sue with the scrambled eggs Kianna made her

Grandma Sue's loot for Mother's Day

Me with my Mother's Day loot

Silly Faces

My dad and Sue came to visit us for a few days. We hadn't seen my dad since October and Sue since Christmas. It was so good spending time with them. We had a lot to celebrate. Sue had just had her birthday earlier in the week and they were here for Mother's Day. In honor of Sue's birthday, Kaylee and I made homemade hot fudge sauce and we had hot fudge sundaes. In honor of Mother's Day, Kianna made Sue and I breakfast, the kids made us cards and gave us flowers. Trevor grilled out steaks. It was a nice day.

In the midst of all the celebrating, we watched the girls' soccer games and made a trip to Sauder Village. We had a great time at Sauder Village, which is a living history farm setup to replicate life in the mid 1800's and early 1900's. We got to see what houses and schools looked like back then. We got to see how jam, horseradish, noodles and rope were made. The kids got to milk a pretend cow, gather eggs from a chicken, see some baby animals and play several games that kids back then would have played. We had such a good time that we bought a membership there. We plan on going back sometime soon. We also had a wonderful meal at The Barn Restaurant. I was honestly full for the entire next day.

CBS Program

Trace and his buddy, Brayden

Trace had his CBS program this morning. He did a good job singing his songs. There is one little boy that sings SUPER loud. We discovered that Trace must not do well with loud noises because he would cover his ears when he was close to this boy. However, when Trace was moved down a few kids he would start singing. Can't say I blame him!

A Bike Breakthrough...

Trevor and I used to bike a lot, that is, until we had kids. We started Kaylee off in the bike trailer when she was about 10 months old, but she hated it. Then Kianna came along. We put both girls in the bike trailer and it sometimes worked and sometimes didn't. Then Trace came along and we got a tag-a-long bike behind one of our bikes and a bike trailer behind the other. It was really hard to pull. Then last Spring, we got rid of the bike trailer and got two tag-a-long bikes for the girls and a seat for Trace to sit in. The problem with this method was that the only place left for Trace's seat to fit was in front of Trevor. Having a child in front of him, meant that Trevor had to pedal his bike with his legs spread apart. Which became painful. Which meant that Trevor did not like bike rides...

Then this Spring, we got rid of Trace's seat. We put him on one of the tag-a-long bikes and had Kaylee ride her own bike. We went for a 45 minute bike ride as a family and it was actually FUN. Kaylee did a great job keeping up with us on her own bike. I think we have finally had a bike breakthrough and I am super excited!!!!

Science Fair

Gym was full of all the science fair projects.

Both girls decided to participate in LCS' first ever science fair. Kaylee's chose to do her project on what liquid will rust a nail the fastest. She chose 7 different liquids and made observations over the next week. In the end it was good ole water that rusted the nail the fastest.

Kianna was one of only four Kindergarteners' who participated in the science fair. She chose to do her project on what conditions make bread mold the fastest (light vs dark, wet vs dry, and closed vs open to air). She observed her bread for 10 days. In the end, it was the bread in the light, wet and closed conditions that molded the fastest. She worked hard on her project. It was definitely a challenge for her because she was the only one who could write in her journal and she had 10 days worth of observations to jot down. That is a lot of writing for a little girl who is still learning proper spacing between words, punctuation, when to use capital letters vs lower case letters, etc. In the end, the science fair was a success and both girls did a great job! Great work girls!

Chicago

Mommy and girls at The American Girl store.

Kaylee in book heaven

Kianna with her dolls

Daddy and Trace with his little lego guys.

Daddy and kids outside of The Lego Store.

Kids in front of a carriage just like the one Daddy took Mommy in the night he proposed.

Kaylee loved the architecture of this building.

Girls at The Cheesecake Factory

Our little statues

Chicago River 

Cloud Gate at Millenium Park

Our family's reflection

Kids at The Buckingham Fountain (attitudes and all)

Trace proposing to Kianna

Trace proposing to Kaylee

Trevor reenacting his proposal

Trace enjoyed sliding down the fire pole at The Children's Museum

Girls digging for dinosaur bones

 

Kids climbing in rope ladder

Girls completing one of their super hero challenges.

Trace the Builder

After having returned from Hawaii on Thursday afternoon, we jumped into the car and headed to Chicago first thing Friday morning. Sounds a little crazy right!? It was a little sporty since we were dealing with jet lag and a 6 hour time difference, but it was fun nonetheless. We met Bob just outside of Chicago for lunch and to do the Grandma Becki exchange. They headed back to Iowa and we headed downtown where we checked into our hotel. I got a really nice hotel room right off Michigan Avenue for $7. It even had a swimming pool. I was able to use our credit card reward points to purchase the room and $7 was all that was left. Can't beat that deal!

We dropped off our stuff and the girls and I headed for The American Girl Store while the boys headed for The Lego Store. The kids were excited to learn that they each had $100 to spend, which was leftover money from Christmas. Kaylee was in book heaven at The American Girl Store. She is really into their mysteries and had a tough time choosing which books to purchase. She ended up with four books and a doll brush. She finished off her money by buying a Star Wars Lego set, which she put together the following day all my herself. Kianna decided to use her money to buy the pink DS she had been saving for, along with a miniature Marie-Grace doll, a DS game and a DS case. I think giddy was the word for her!!! Trace was in lego heaven. He loves the little lego guys and was able to build three little guys right there in the store. He also purchased the Batcave and Lex Luther lego sets. Daddy and Ryan (our friend that is living with us) had fun putting them together the following day. The batcave is super cool. It has an elevator that Bruce Wayne gets into and then exits as Batman at the bottom. Trace really enjoys playing with them. 

Kaylee was such a little tourist. She was taking pictures of the beautiful architecture and stained glass windows with her little camera. She was so cute. Kianna brought her camera too and took pictures of a lady painted silver, pretending to be a statue. Anytime someone put money in her basket she changed postitions. The kids thought that was pretty funny and later pretended to be statues in the hotel room. It was cute. We finished off the day with a trip to The Cheesecake Factory and a swim in the pool. We went to bed exhausted. 

We woke up the following day and walked to Millenium Park and ultimately to The Buckingham Fountain. The kids did AMAZING with all the walking. We were impressed. They enjoyed playing underneath the Cloud Gate. We took pictures of our family looking up into the reflective mirror. The Buckingham Fountain had been much anticipated and was a bit of a disappointment. The girls were excited to return to the fountain to show their little brother the site where Daddy asked Mommy to marry him. However, due to the cold weather the water was turned off, which means that the fountain is pretty drab. In addition, the city was setting up for an 8K race and had the area blocked off. Thankfully, the lady let us take pictures from a distance. Trace got down on one knee and pretended to propose to both girls individually and then Trevor reenacted his proposal to me. It was a fun time as a family!

We went from the fountain to Navy Pier where we spent the remainder of our time at the children's museum. They had a super hero theme going, so the kids had fun doing the scavenger hunt. The highlight for the kids though was climbing through the rope ladder. Trevor and I were a bit unimpressed with the super hero theme. The kids worked hard on the scavenger hunt and earned a hand stamp that said "WOW" as their reward. It was a bit lame. Regardless, it was a fun trip to Chicago. We headed home that afternoon and did absolutely NOTHING on Sunday except rest, get Kianna her DS, and put together legos.