Today

 It has been a perfect summer day today. I just wish it was actually summer. It worries me that it is so warm and dry right now. I sound like my Grandma, never happy with the weather. But seriously I am choosing to worry about the weather this year. This mild of a winter seems to me that we are going to have a ridiculously hot summer, and this many bugs in March doesn't make me happy either, unless they all die out by the time summer actually arrives. 
Well anyways, we did have a good day today. We did a little of this and a little of that, We got the house relatively cleaned, worked in the yard a little bit, took a bike ride with friends, I banned nerf wars for the day. Life is much more peaceful that way.

When we returned from our ride we washed the van. We aren't perfectionist, but it is much better than it started out. I thought maybe we would also vacuum it, but I forgot to mention it or do it myself. Now we have something to do on an other day. We also watered the apples trees. It seems so dry. 

In between activities a lot of board games were played, I like it when they play them.

Monday we wandered over to the zoo. It was such a pretty day in the conservatory. 
:)
~Anna

Snow

This has been the fall for snow. We have now made it into winter for a week or so, but the majority of our snow all came before winter even set in. Pretty amazing amounts. As we are wondering what to do if we get more and space is running out. God will set in motion his own plan that works really well, as always. He'll just melt it. Today has been sunny and warm, not really much melting yet but they say tomorrow things will change and we will see a diminishing of the snow as rain runs down on it. I guess next up, ice. We will see. I had to go down and uncover the street light censor as it had been buried in snow. I don't remember needing to do that before.

Here follows a few of our snow memories for this 2010 fall/winter season of snow.

November 21 the snow is new and exciting and Beatrice has new reindeer antlers she needs to try out so they load up a bag for Gregory to have with him as he rides in his sleigh. The new Rudolph the red nose reindeer and Santa are born. Our next good snowfall came in the afternoon before Thanksgiving and it was the perfect temp for taking an evening walk to Cub to get a few groceries. I love night time walks in a white snow covered land. They are so peaceful, sounds are more muted.

With more snow and bright sunshiny days where better to be than on our hill.

Then the big snow of December 11 came and we were buried. Traveling in it was horrible. Once we gave up and stayed home we went over to our neighbors and had a good evening of visiting over freshly roasted, ground, and brewed coffee and ginger cookies. What can be better than good friends and that!

When we were properly warmed and soothed reality had to be faced and we brought in wood and scooped the driveway. Here Henry and Travis bring in wood:

Life is hard when the snow is this thick and you have such short legs: It would be fun to have snowshoes for when the snow is like this. It is very dense and there is a bit of a crust. We can scoot across the top using our arms and sitting on the plastic sleds.

Some of the cousins coming into Grandpa and Grandma's after a refreshing sledding adventure on their new sledding hill. December 25.

Enjoying the snow,

~Anna

What to do with a few Rubberbands

These guys have been going through a lot of rubber bands recently.

Aaron is the only one around here that seems to know how to tie them as they call it. Today he told Gregory, "I will show you one more time how to do this and then you will need to do it on your own". But anyways, yesterday when they had made their bow and arrows Nahum and Nati each needed one too and it was pretty cute seeing them ask Aaron for tips on how to put them together and the right sticks for the job.

So the best way to make these, if I have been listening right, is to find the right stick. Smaller guys need smaller sticks. Then get several rubbers and knot them together until you have about the same length of band as the stick. Put it onto the stick ends and find some nice straight twigs for arrows.

Have fun hunting small game. Another thing you can do is make a musical instrument. Find some handily placed knobs and stretch them across.

Have fun making beautiful melodies. These are whatever you want them to be. They thought you could use them like helicopters or lots of things. Knot two bands together and have fun with your imagination.

Thanking God for imaginations!

~Anna

Our Weekend

We just got done with a lovely few days up in Bemidji. It was very peaceful and fun, not exactly relaxing since we probably stayed up later than we needed most nights but we did have a really good time.

I think this is such a homey picture. I love it!

Abner the goat is glad we have all gone home though since somehow he was harnessed up and expected to give many children rides in the wheelchair chariot Dad and Luke rigged up for him. I guess he didn't pull his weight this past fall so now he had to do it this spring! He was given regular rewards of grain to keep him moving. See, Margaret is carrying his rewards bucket. These guys played many games together. Most of the games needed helmets and leather gloves. Jaten thinks Grandpa's rendition of Jesus Loves Me is the very best. And now it is time to say goodnight with one last big smile.

~Anna

You can see more of our weekend pictures here.

Our Week, so far

This week we have had sweet, surprise visitors around our place. At three months this one is not afraid of strangers and is perfectly happy to give lots of sweet smiles.

Margaret can't take enough pictures of Jaten.

We got to take our first bike ride of the year on Wednesday to play at the park. It was down right hot out on March 31st! Such pleasant weather to be out and about! I made gluten/dairy free rumpledoodles for snacks this week. They turned out quite good although a bit dryer than they would normally be. I used rice and corn for the flour.

The lizard liked seeing the warm sunshine, just like us.

This morning I sent my eldest and Nic off on a ride with Travis at 3:30 am to sneak a ride. I expect them home in a couple hours. I hope they have made fun new memories. It ended up they needed to sit in the car quite awhile waiting for things to get organised in the office so I am hopeful they didn't have too much down time, but with their active imaginations it was probably just fine!

Talk to you later,

~Anna

Signs of Spring

I suppose we will get some more snow here before the winter is actually over but, today the sun was warm and bright. It sure did feel like spring was here! With such encouraging weather we got busy with some much needed cleaning. We aired out all the snow boots and cleaned them up to put away until next winter. They'll just wear their mud boots from here on out. I am waiting a bit longer to wash all the mittens and snow pants. I don't like repeating myself, that much.

With the lovely weather we also had some bare chested conquistadors around the backyard! ~Anna

Khufu's Tomb

Up high on the Giza strip looking down on Pharaoh Khufu's pyramid:

Actually you can't look down on his pyramid because it is the tallest structure around! In fact, it was the tallest in the world until the Eiffel Tower was built in 1887.

The original pyramid of Khufu was built about 4,550 years ago. Harrison just built this one last week.

~Anna

P.S. Isn't it kinda cute how Gregory took this picture through another magnetics? I like the effect it has.

Sunny Days

This week we have been blessed with some amazingly beautiful sunshiny days. It just calls you to come out and enjoy the lovely warm rays. So we did.

Tuesday we went over to Cottage Grove and went sledding with some dear friends of ours on a hill near their place. It is a little longer than our hill and kids had made jumps in different places along it. Travis enjoyed the jumps. He and Beatrice went over them many, many times. I avoided them. Gregory and I were a sledding team, we didn't ever use the same sled but we tried to go at the same time always. Margaret hit a jump just wrong and ended up with a sore back and bum for the rest of the evening. I was worried she might not sit well for awhile but it seemed to be better by morning. Today we went out on our hill. There was a slick surface from back when it rained on the snow at the top of the hill so the kids called it their luge. It went pretty fast and they rode their sleds in the appropriate manner of course.

Harrison tends to be a pretty cautious snowboarder. Wanting the conditions to be just right, nice fluffy snow. He decided to give it a try anyhow on the luge since we have been watching some Olympic events in the evenings. He made it to the bottom of the hill and beyond standing tall! I can only make it half way down standing on the snowboards. It is very disappointing, and I only try on the softer, slower snow.

We watched the women's skeleton this evening. It brought a lot of wonderful memories back to me of runner sledding down the road. I wish my kids could have that sort of fun. For hours at night going up and down that hill. I never let my kids play out that long by themselves, I worry to much and that road isn't usable for sledding now either, they keep it far to sanded. Better to drive on I know but it ruins the fun. Oh well. Tubing and basic plastic sleds are great fun too.

Unfortunately I took no pictures this week so these are from earlier times this winter.

Bowling

Thursdays for the month of February Harrison, Margaret, Beatrice and Gregory are learning the fine art of bowling. One of the moms in our home school group set it up. This week the manager of the bowling alley we are using did give them a few tips before they got started throwing that ball. Last week was the first time Gregory bowled in real life and I think he was a little surprised at how it went. He can get quite a number of strikes on the Wii, but not so in the real game. Margaret felt pretty happy with how that one went down :)

Because He Lives!

~Anna

Happy Birthday Wilson Bentley

We had a Birthday Party for Snowflake Bentley today.

He would have been 145 today. His life's passion was snowflakes.

Their many intricacies were very fascinating to him. So in honor of him we,

made snowflakes ourselves! Naturally, we read a book together about Willie. It is a fun book that you might like to read also called Snowflake Bentley. We also made indoor snowmen! Working hard building just the right man. This one is a soldier.

A close up of the soldier.

You have to work fast or you have a puddle instead of a snowman.

Also to honor him we scooped our driveway, again.

Wilson Bentley took amazing pictures of snowflakes. He was the one who discovered that there are not two snowflakes alike. He spent all his winters trying to capture as many flakes as he could.

A pretty interesting guy.

Tomorrow has several more amazing people's birthday's on it. I don't think we will have time for a celebration of them though. To bad.

Blessings to you,

~Anna

Beanie Babies

It all started when Beatrice checked out 10 or so Berenstain Bear books from the library. When I was reading this one to the kids I realized they were talking about Beany Babies and I reminisced to them how people really were quite crazy about these silly little toys while I was pregnant with Harrison. It was fun remembering.

Now for two days these creatures have been attending church faithfully. They are learning to bow their heads when the preacher prays and learning many songs. See the guy at the hockey puck is the minister on his stage. The crew all lined up on the carpet is the congregation.

Peace,

~Anna

the Proper Way to scoop a Drive

First, you find a large scoop. Then, you find your sister. Offer to give her a ride and give her a smaller shovel.

Tell, her to push down hard to pry up any bits of packed down snow and gently, slowly, gradually push your shovel along the way. Work diligently for twice as long as it might take otherwise, but know that you will have twice the fun.

Smile from the pleasure of a job well done :)

Happy thoughts to you,

~Anna

Princess

I present to you,

Bea in her princess room.

It has kept her very busy planning and decorating

that is for sure!