Prepping for the Holidays!

Where has December gone? The kids are officially on winter break, we've got most of the holiday tasks checked off the list, and we're honing in on what we want to get done before the big day. It's been a snowy and frigid month so far - that's what had been predicted, and it's come true. Although it's forecasted to be above 40 degrees on Christmas Day! As long as there's still a bit of snow on the ground, that'll be ok.

Zootopia 2 with the fam (Scott and Arya were there but didn't want to have their pics taken)

Rolling the butterballs for Christmas Eve dinner...yummy!

G and I went to the GLOW Festival in St Paul on a very chilly Sunday night. We saw beautiful light displays, drank hot chocolate, made s'mores, took a break to warm up, and then made some "67" art. It was an excellent way to end a weekend with my little guy!

Accidentally twinning at work with Tina!

This pooch could barely keep her eyes open one night - she's definitely not a night owl!

We continued the tradition of baking Christmas cookies. My mom made the sugar cookies and brought them over for the kids to decorate. And then I tackled the chocolate peppermint kisses, the peppermint snowballs, and the fudge. They all turned out great!

Another pic of sleepy Pria, snuggled up on a cold Saturday morning.

Tonight (Saturday), we were going to go to Sam's Christmas Village in WI, but the windchills are going to make it unbearable to be outside. We're going to try again next weekend when the temps won't be so bad. Instead, we're going to go through a drive-through lights experience in another town, go out for dinner, and then enjoy Christmas lights on the way back home. I'm glad that we have these traditions each year to look forward to. It'll be different next year without Arya here all the time!

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Exploring Local Places

Last Sunday was the perfect day to explore an area that neither Arya nor I had been to before. We headed east to walk around the Vermillion Falls/River and Greenway area. The path was nicely paved, with lots of overhead shade from trees; there were so many families out on bikes and walking, and we had a nice view of the Vermillion River. Arya got some great pics, and I enjoyed spending time outdoors with my sweet girl. This weekend, G and I will be heading out to explore a creek area in a few towns just south of us. And I've already got an idea for another creek I want to walk by next month (it's a bit further away, and I'd rather put that aside until Arya is off at college) The tree leans to find the sun On the way home, we stopped at the DQ in another town (we have a love/hate relationship with the DQ in our town, so I wanted to avoid it.) The warm weather felt great, and we enjoyed some sweet treats while watching the world drive by. We're counting down the days unti...

What a Week

The weather has been unseasonably warm this fall, so we've been able to extend our outdoor projects just a bit. This past week Scott's been working in the garden, cleaning everything out, and repairing the back wall of our garage. Ava was such a good little helper, scooping up dirt, but still trying to keep her hands clean while doing it! I swear, a box is all she needs to make her happy. Princess Darla. Princess Darla has had enough. I personally like how she and Ava have the same expressions in this picture. Apparently Spanky was bored - check out that yawn in the background! We went down to Grand Meadow this weekend, and as always, it was so fun to see Ava and Isabel play together. They actually had several little conversations with each other - and they were so polite while doing so! We even had them share a room last night...boy, that was a challenge. I think they finally fell asleep around 10:00pm. And of course, Ava wa...

Preparing for Vacation

We had a low key week, which is rare in this house. Oh sure, there were fun field trips at Summer Power, a visit to the splash pad on a hot day, and a few crazy, rain storms, but it was an easy week. Well, there was that one time when we were out for dinner with G (Ava was with Grandma Karen and Grandpa Doug for an overnight stay and a trip to the Dakota County Fair - fun!) and G decided to hide behind my chair and puke all over me and the floor (at the restaurant.) Ugh. The good news is that he was just too full of chocolate milk...no illness! A quiet week, once in a while, is an okay thing! We're starting to prep for our vacation to the Wisconsin Dells...we don't take too many family vacations, so this is a big event for us. (Funny, I took a break from writing this post as Scott just asked me about planning a trip to Disney...we were debating the differences between going to California vs. Florida...pros and cons to each!) Yesterday, I showed G a video from one of the wat...

Go, Go, Goers!

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