new year thoughts and Christmas recap

I know it's been awhile since my last post, but we were away for Christmas and I am just now starting to feel the routine of normal life again.  We've also all been fighting sickness, so much of my "break" was spent lounging and resting (as much as possible with a 3-year-old and 9-month-old).  With that, I'm going to start my first post of 2011 with a list of highlights/events from Christmas and also some thoughts going into this new year.

Christmastime for our family included:

~five church services

~five days at my parents' house

~four Christmas celebrations

~three Christmas dinners (one being pizza)

~three presents for each of our daughters (because Jesus received three gifts)

~one wonderful afternoon/evening spent with some of my favorite Minnesota people

~one visit with two great high school friends

~many days to have my beloved husband around (something I missed throughout December)

~one morning spent singing and playing instruments at a nursing home

~many lovely memories of one of my favorite times of year

We really did enjoy a bit of a break from the busy December we had.  We spent a few days at my parents' house and then a few days at our house catching up on things, relaxing and trying to get well again (and still working on that last one).  

And now for the new year...I never have been much with making goals as a new year rolls around.  Sometimes I think about a few things I'd like to do or change about myself, but nothing really concrete.  I always enter the new year wanting to grow more in my faith and continue to be the wife and mom God wants me to be, so I guess that's my main "goal" for this year.  I pray that I would fall more in love with my Savior first and foremost and then continue to become more selfless in my relationship with my husband and more patient in my role as a mom.  I have so far to go, but am so thankful I am loved and accepted by God in my imperfect ways.

This year, our church is also being challenged to read through the entire Bible.  I would love to say that on December 31, 2011, I accomplished just that.  I have tried in years past to complete the whole Bible in a year, but usually get behind by the middle of the year and don't seem to catch up.  Please pray with me that I stick with my daily reading and that God would use his Word to teach me and show me Himself in new ways.

Happy 2011!

snow day!

Right now, I'm supposed to be making my debut playing French horn with the Chippewa Valley Symphony Orchestra.  But, a blizzard has blown through the midwest and has shut down pretty much everything within a one-hundred mile radius.  And my parents made the trek over from southern Minnesota to watch me play in my concert tonight.  Alas.

Despite our change of plans for the evening, we truly have enjoyed our snow day.  It's one of those blizzards that you wished for every winter as a kid, but never got.  There's just something about an epic snowstorm that brings you back to your childhood wishing and hoping school just maybe would be closed for the day.  Maybe that's just me?  Either way, it's just been fun watching piles and piles of snow adorn our sidewalks and driveways (and watch Matt and my dad shovel and snowblow four separate times throughout the day).  We've also been able to bake cookies, listen to Christmas music and spend time together.  It's been wonderful!

And, on an unrelated note... we were blessed to have someone gift us with a Christmas photo shoot for our family and I got three of the pictures in my email today (a mom of triplets from our church did the shoot--check out her blog and photo blog).  There should be more coming soon.  The girls did pretty well for the whole shoot and I'm just so excited to have some great pictures to choose from for our Christmas card now!

musings on moving from montana

My last post about Montana was sort of left "to be continued," so I thought I best continue a bit on our very quick jaunt out to Montana to move Matt's mom back to Wisconsin.  For lack of time to write a completely detailed post about everything that happened while we were there, I am going to make a list of some of the more noteworthy things that happened, or things we noticed and/or discovered along the way:

*Spending hours upon hours in a car calls for a lot of food.  We had every junk food imaginable: chips, cookies, candy, and cupcakes (I guess all of our non-healthy food started with 'c').  We had a few healthy things, too (apples, carrots, and sandwiches).
*iPods, a sermon series, Christmas music, movies and chatting will help pass the time driving.
*Seeing the mountains always makes me so in awe of our Lord and His creation.
*It takes a lot longer on the return trip when you're hauling a massive trailer and driving through a blizzard.
*November in South Dakota, North Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Minnesota and Wisconsin is cold.
*Gas mileage is cut in having when you're hauling a trailer.  That's important to remember when it's 9* and the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere in North Dakota.  You may be very, very close to running out of gas before you find a gas station and may call 911 because you were really that close to running out.  God provided us with gas when we literally had none.
*It's always good to have friends in Fargo who are willing to house three very tired people at 3:00am so that you can catch just a few hours of sleep before continuing the last five or so hours of the trip.  Thanks, Ryan and Emily!
*God answers prayers.  We know we had so many people praying for us on this trip and we could see how He watched over us the entire time.  We were able to leave early and got ahead of a big snowstorm that we didn't even know was coming (although we did go through part of it).  We were safe through the storm.  We made it back in good timing.  We fit almost everything into our trailer.  And, we did have some fun times together despite a lot of things that were potentially stressful!

2500 miles

...is how far Matt and I traveled in the past four days.  I will attempt to write more of a detailed post about our quick turnaround trip to Missoula, Montana sometime soon.  We drove there to move Matt's mom from Missoula to Wisconsin and conquered a blizzard, a vehicle almost running out of gas, climbing three flights of stairs with many, many boxes, lack of sleep, icy roads, and cold temperatures.  But, we are glad to have her back and enjoyed seeing the mountains for a few days!

More to come...

caps for sale

Anyone remember that wonderful book? I'm pretty sure I still have a copy of it somewhere. Anyway, I was reminded of it when my sister-in-law Kim came down to my parents' house yesterday and snapped a few pictures of Miriam and Abbie modeling the hats that she has for sale. So, anyone want to buy a hat?

just me, my mama, and my auntie and uncle

Miriam and Abbie have wonderful aunts and uncles. We are so thankful for our brothers and sisters and love that they like to spend time with our girls! Well, the day after the 4th of July (or July 5th --which I guess would just have been easier to put in the first place), Miriam's Uncle Ryan and Auntie Kim invited us to go to the good 'ol Minnesota Zoo with them. Uncle Ryan had the day off and we thought it would be fun to show Miriam the zoo (and also while it's still free for her to go... we've only got about a month left for that). We thought it would be easiest to have Matt stay with Abbie and just take Miriam for the day. So, off we went.

We weren't sure if it would be extremely crowded because of the holiday, or if that would actually be in our favor. It ended up being not too bad at all. We were able to get through the exhibits without having to wait too long and still see most of what we wanted to. Unfortunately, one of the paths we had intended on going on was closed for construction, so we had to take a different route. Because of our detour, we passed by these huge fountains that people can run around and play in. We did bring Miriam's swimsuit with the intention of her being able to play in them, but we were hoping she wouldn't see them until the end. So, she saw the fountains right away and spent the next hour or so asking every minute if she could go play in them. I'm sure she would have actually wanted to stop and watch the animals a little more if she wasn't so anxious to play in the fountain. But, oh well. She still had a good time and did end up having a wonderful time in the fountains, too. Here are some pictures from the day.

Here is Miriam greeting the prairie dogs.

Yes, those are grizzlies 20 feet behind her.

She had fun playing in this replica of an archaeologist dig.

The wonderful fountains.

Thanks for the fun day, Auntie Kim and Uncle Ryan!

four months on the fourth

Abbie turned four months on the fourth of July. It's hard to believe! We had a family gathering in Hudson on the fourth with some relatives visiting from California and Oregon. It was fun to see them and also to have them meet Abbie! The girls were nicely coordinated in patriotic attire as well. We had a great day followed by a fun evening watching fireworks. Miriam watched them for the first time and surprised me by not being scared at all. She thought they were great -but was awfully tired the next day!

lions and tigers and tornados... oh my!

Well, minus the lions and tigers part. I'll explain in a moment. I've had a bit of a blogging hiatus as of late because Miriam, Abbie and I have been visiting my parents in southern Minnesota for the past week. In fact, we're going to still be here for the next two weeks, as well. There's always something great about being "home" again that makes me want to keep coming back. One of my best friends is getting married in a few weeks and I have the wonderful privledge of being her matron of honor. Because of that, I have a few things going on in the next few weeks that I thought it would just be easier to stay with my parents instead of carting the girls back and forth every time I had somewhere to be. Plus, we're just enjoying the company of my family.

Now, back to the tornados part. We arrived at my parents' house last Thursday in the midst of some hot and humid weather (thank you, Minnesota summers). As the evening got closer, the prediction of some strong storms became a reality. We closely listened to the radio as we heard of some possible tornados popping up around our house. I put both girls to bed in hopes that nothing would come of the storms... but sure enough, the sirens went off and we had to decide whether or not to head to the basement. Before anyone gets too concerned, the sirens have gone off many times during the summers past with nothing resulting... so we wanted to make sure before we woke up the girls and headed down. Well, after we heard reports of tornados touching down 10-15 miles from our house, we decided it would be best to grab the girls and head down. We listened to the radio for awhile, intently waiting to hear the path of the storm. Miriam kept asking questions (of course) and we tried explaining what was happening as best as we could. Abbie slept on my shoulder. Well, after all was said and done, we were thankful nothing did come close enough to do any damage. However, we saw picture the next day of what did go through about 10 miles away. This was the biggest tornado that had come as close as it did and we were glad we spent that 45 minutes or so in the basement. My post above shows a short video of the tornado for those who are wondering.

In the mean time, I will do my best to keep up with a few posts while we are "vacationing" in southern Minnesota.

A new career in advertising?

I think we look pretty good, if I do say so myself!

weekend with Grandpa and Grandma

completely random thoughts...

This picture was taken at my extended family Christmas a few weeks ago. I love the picture, but we're really hoping Miriam understands what to do when we say "smile" soon. She's almost there... at least she usually will look at the camera now!

Matt took this picture with his iPhone a few weeks ago. Miriam has been sleeping in her "big girl bed" for a few weeks now, but we finally just got a picture. She has been doing so well with the transition. We weren't quite sure what to expect, but I think she was just so excited to be able to sleep in it. The best part is that she'll still even stay in her bed until we come in and get her! Hopefully that will last awhile...

And last, but certainly not least, this is a picture of Matt and my brother at our immediate family Christmas displaying their Christmas gifts. In celebration of the Vikings big victory yesterday, I thought it was appropriate to include this picture, too. We're so excited to watch them (hopefully) beat the Saints next Sunday!!!

Christmastime is here!

With the snow falling right outside the window, I finally feel like it's officially Christmastime. What a wonderful time of year! It's been so much fun watching Miriam get so excited about the lights, ornaments, decorations, Christmas movies, baking, presents and everything that comes along with Christmas. We've been doing our best to remind her that even though we do all those things at Christmas, it is ultimately to celebrate the birth of our Savior. She usually seems to understand that -even though there are some times that she says the baby in the manger is Moses. She has a Moses book and movie that I think confused the issue a bit... but anyway, we are all excited about this time of year!

Here are a few pictures of Christmas happenings...

Decorating Christmas at Grandpa and Grandma's house. Miriam had a great time!

Before we had our tree decorated, our cats enjoyed climbing up into it. After we put the lights and ornaments on, they have managed to stay out most of the time. We still need the spray bottle occasionally to keep them out.

Enjoy the Christmas season!

Miriam sings the ABC's

Miriam sang the ABC's tonight while she was taking a bath... it was the first time I've heard her make it all the way through without getting distracted with something else! :) Thanks to Auntie Samantha for recording it!

An afternoon in Owatonna

On Monday I (Matt) visited with Becky and Miriam before I had to go back up to Eau Claire to work. We went down to Mineral Springs Park to visit some of Miriam's favorite things.

Miriam likes to go see the statue of Princess Owatonna.

I think Miriam was looking at Becky in this picture. It still looks pretty great!

Miriam loves playing with this natural fountain.

She's trying to get a drink here.

Miriam's swinging, of course!

Swinging in the other swing.

Here's a closeup of her foot!

When Papa and Mama are away...

Miriam has had the privilege of staying at both my parents' and Matt's parents' houses over the past few weeks. She was in Owatonna with my parents while we were in Colorado and in Stanley with Matt's parents while we went to a wedding in Fargo. We got a few pictures from our parents from some of the things she did while we were away... and we clearly had nothing to worry about :) She was in great hands and obviously had a wonderful time! We're so thankful that we have such great parents that love spending time with Miriam as much as we do!