North Shore- 2014

We took our annual camping trip to the North Shore with Garrick's family and had the most perfect weather ever! We spent hours at the lake shore, Emi and I must have thrown in about 1000 rocks. When she missed the lake or it didn't go where she wanted, she said "try again, oops" in the most calm voice I have ever heard from her!

 We also took the kids for the first time to Lutsen to do the alpine slide. We weren't sure what Emi would think of it, but she loved it, screamed the whole way down the mountain and giggled. Peter actually took control of the slide and did the lever the whole way down. We actually came into the bottom too fast one time and crashed over the edge of the ramp. He still said it was fun.

 We also went for some short hikes, to the local school to play on their amazing playground and had lots of campfires. Peter's favorite parts had to have been either playing in the hammock OR our night hike where a fisherman showed us the whitefish that he had caught.

One time that we walked to the bathroom, Peter started to go into the first potty, and then stopped himself and said- No mom, you can have that one, I like the other one better- it has an owl picture in it. And sure enough- there was a poster of a great gray owl on the wall!

There is also a natural spring down by the bathrooms that Linka LOVES to drink out of and that the kids would stop to take a big gulp from each time we walked by, Emi straddled the fountain (instead of leaning into it from the side) and WOOP, slipped and landed right under the stream of water! Poor girl. She came back and seriously told me, "I feeeel in under the water".

And Lainey. Well she wandered around the campsite, ate a lot of food and was the best baby camper that we could have asked for!

Valentine's Day

I don't get into the hype of many extra holidays, but for some reason, we have hooked onto Valentine's day and enjoy it! We did a lot of talking about love- how we love, who we love, why we love eachother... aside from the usual answers- I love granma and granpa-- Emi did tell me and Peter one night, "I love Peteh because he is ma best Friend!" which was especially sweet. And the general consensus was that we all love Lainey- She isn't causing too much trouble (yet).

 We decorated cookies with Mike and Julie .

 Made Valentines Cards.

And dressed up for school. (past years)

Christmas Lights-- Everywhere.

We saw the usual sets of lights- the Holiday Train (which was very very cold) and the Rotary Lights (which was nearly perfect weather). The nice thing about the Rotary lights is that you can pick which day you are going to go and try your best to find a warm-ish night.

 The kids loved  looking in Santa's house and seeing him in there and seeing the pen of reindeer outside. Peter especially liked this little line of penguins outside and they ducked under the ropes to join them.

trains and trees

We went for the first time to a tree farm to get our tree- until now, it had been the gas station, grocery store, garden center... but I think we have found "our spot". Wait and see why that is...

 A field to pick your own tree out of...

 Finding the perfect tree!

 Cutting it down...

 Then... Playing on trains! 

 Watch out Lainey! Pete and Emi are driving!

 Hot cider in the caboose

Memorial Day Camping

We usually head up to the north short to camp for the weekend with Garrick's family, but the last few years the weather has been iffy and we weren't sure about going with a 2 month old in 30 degree weather. Lucky for us, everyone- and a few extras even- agreed to come to Trempleau to camp for the weekend instead! We hiked, biked, had fires, went for walks around the campground and ate and ate of course. The kids did a great job of sleeping in the tent and Peter loved getting to pee in the woods. Linka had her big parachute hammock and we brought ours as well and that was one of the best parts for the kids- wrestling in them or lying quietly with grandma, reading books and looking at the trees. It did sprinkle on us a few times, but for the most part it was great weather and lots of fun.

Christmas Lights

This year it has been all about the Christmas lights and decorations when we drive or walk around town. Pete likes (of course) to watch for the green lights and Emi just likes how they are all "spark-y".  So we knew that this was going to be a really fun year to go to LaCrosse and see the lights. We always try to wait until there is snow but to go before it is -10*. That is a hard balance- but this year we lucked out- it was 32* and that day it snowed 2 inches!

 I finally got smart and put the kids in snowpants, heavy coats and boots- so they would be warm.

 Emi wanted to try all of the holes in the pictures-

 Peter spent half of the time looking for green lights and the other half dragging his feet making train tracks. At one point he veered off to the right, backed up exactly on his tracks to the point before he started to turn and continued on straight- he then looked back at me and said "Do you like my siding/switch that I made?"