All About the Kids Today

Grace and Anne had a "Red Carpet" fund-raising event for cancer kids at their school. The girls went through their dress-up box and found all the shawls, broaches, purses and clip on earrings they could find.  They asked me to wear the dress I wore to lunch on my wedding day.  They slipped on my finest ruby red shoes from my pageant days and away we went to dance.  James took this photo for us just before we headed out.  I do say for being three he managed to take a great snapshot!

James creates the best sandwiches.  Lunch is usually eat as you want around here, so I was glad to see he's making some healthy choices.  This is his apple cheese sandwich.  He likes me to use the circular appleslicer I try to keep hidden away.  Now he stuffs the apple pieces with cheese slices and has a sandwich.

We are in a co-op preschool.  For our teaching week we focused on firetrucks.  We practiced "Stop. Drop. Roll."  We cracked open a pinata, painted fire, made construction paper fire engines and had fire engine jelly sandwiches.  Anne thought the sandwiches were great and wanted to take them to her kindergarten class.  Making 25 sandwiches just isn't that fun at 6am!  This was a moment of insanity....I forgot my motto...

KEEP IT SIMPLE!

These two boys enjoy being together all the time.  James is wearing his "RED RANGER" shirt we made and he's training Johnny in the ways of a ninja/power ranger fighter.

Today Grace's teacher sent home a copy of Grace's journal entry.

"Last night mom kooed one of my favrit meal. Chicken noodel soop.

I love that stuf.  I aet three bouls.  I was with my mom dad James Anne John."

There was another entry about going to school.  Grace drew a fabulous picture and wrote, "I like to ride my bike because rideing in the ca is cinde of boring."

I love reading the school journals they tell me so much about my kids and our home life.  Anne is still writing one line sentences....she's on track to get the job done with the least amount of effort.

January hiking adventure

 The weather has been abnormally warm for January. We decided to take a hike through parts of Mormon Handcart Park. Several Handcart companies started out in Iowa City back in 1856. Before they hit the trail they camped just west of town to build their handcarts and get outfitted for the journey west.

 This is one of the kids favorite parts of the park. It is a little marshy through this area, so people have built up the path with logs.

 A fallen down tree makes a great bridge across this small stream.

 We got to play on some of the ice that has formed on clear creek.

 Don't worry we didn't go out in the middle where it was melting.

The kids all found walking sticks and some grass to nibble on.

World's Greatest Snow Fort Ever

I think the above picture was taken in the winter of 86-87, because Richard looks about 2 years old. A fierce blizzard blew for several days. After it let up we needed to get some energy out of our active little bodies. Special hand carving techniques were used to cut snow blocks from the drainage ditch along the north fence. We spent most of the day cutting blocks from the quarry, hauling them to the building site in red plastic toboggans, and meticulously stacking them so they didn't fall.  Dad engineered some support beams for the roof and, Viola! The World's Greatest Snow Fort Ever. Thanks Mom for documenting the memories.

Trip to Idaho

We had a lot of fun on our recent trip to Idaho. Uncle Daniel married a pretty girl and the kids got a new Aunt Becca. We can't wait to play more with her next time we are around.

 The girls had fun sleeping with Grandma Peggy. Here they are getting cozy in the living room with just enough pillows.

 Tyanna came over for some sewing time. Please disregard the scantily clad barbies. They are in the dressing room.

 Grandma Peggy got together all of her gingerbread house kits she's been saving and we had a huge decorating party.

 Christmas Eve James got the stomach flu, in Grandma's bed no less. Here they are trying to recover from being up all night.

I didn't want to tell anybody why our plane tickets were so cheap to come home for the wedding. We decided to rent our own plane and fly home. It was a little breezy on the way there, so we got these goggles for the way back home. Here the kids are posing in the cockpit. OK, just kidding, this picture is from the children's museum after we got back home.