Gingerbread!

We rounded out the holiday season making gingerbread men (or a gingerbread girl, in Ava's case) with some of our favorite peeps!

I swear he was having fun - we just could not get the picture to prove it!

And, in keeping with the theme, here's a picture of Ava with the gingerbread house she made at school. Each student got to bring one special adult (yay, it was me!) to decorate a little gingerbread house together - here's the finished product.

Christmas 2011

We had a fun, busy, (but not too busy), holiday season. We started it off on Thanksgiving weekend with a trip to downtown Minneapolis for the 8th floor Macy's Christmas display and the Holidazzle Parade.

This sure beats last year when we did this outing and Charlie had a big green cast (well, as big as an 18-month old's cast can be) on his broken leg.

We needed to fuel up with some hot chocolate before the parade...

I wish I could have truly captured the wonder in the kids' eyes during the parade - it was one of my top moments of the whole holiday season.

We tried to do one fun Christmas-y activity each weekend, leading up to our trip to Eau Claire for the big day(s). As always, we spent Christmas Eve with the Reiters and Christmas Day with the Walkers. We got some great video footage of the kids opening their presents Christmas Eve, but I'm afraid it would take me hours to get it uploaded here! Here are a few of my favorite photos, though:

Charlie and Great Grandma Lois

Ava and Great Grandma Twila - wish I had remembered to take a picture of the kids with Great Grandma Reiter - they are some lucky kids to have three wonderful great grandmas! (They love their Great Grandpa Bud, too!)

Santa made a surprise visit Christmas Day to see how the kids were enjoying their new toys!

It was a wonderful weekend - we saw just about everyone in our immediate families (except for Katie and Ben, although we did get to Skype with them) and the kids made out like bandits. :) The kids stayed healthy right up until the night we came home; it was good to have the week between Christmas and New Year's to hang out at home - Joe took most of the week off, and with nothing on our schedules, it was a great end to the year!

Halloween 2011

Here they are, with the wait over and all ready to go trick-or-treating: Charlie the cat and Ava as Princess Peach!

Just for comparison's sake: remember this cute little kitty, three years ago?!

And, because wearing the costumes once just wouldn't be enough...

Here they are at Kowalski's annual trick-or-treat event the week before...

...and at dance class...


...and doing the cake walk at our church's harvest party...

...and, there was the school party as well. I just didn't take any pictures that day...whew! At least we can say we got our money's worth on this costume!

And, finally, here's a group shot of most of the neighbors out trick-or-treating...notice Ava's comrades: Mario, Luigi, and Toad! :)

Ava is Six!

What a big few weeks we had in September, with the start of Kindergarten and celebrating Ava's sixth birthday. I always try to take some time around their birthdays to write a little something about what the kids are up to and what they're like at this exact moment, so I'll have a snapshot of them at each age. Ava is still our smart, sensitive and loving little girl. She has always been easy to parent, and I know this may not last forever, but for now, we are enjoying it! Her love for Charlie continues to amaze me, though as he gets older, I see more of the typical sibling behaviors (those two know how to push each other's buttons, let me tell you). Ava loves reading - she flies through chapter books - I can't even keep up with what she's reading and what she's read. She loved the Ramona series and is reading a lot of the Magic Tree House books. She just got Mario Kart for the Wii for her birthday, so she's been using a lot of her allotted "screen time" for that - it's crazy how quickly kids get good at video games. I think she's happiest, though, when she's playing with her friends/neighbors - she loves to be social, and is always asking me if she can call her friends to play.

That said, you can imagine what a great time she had at her birthday "slumber party:" eight girls, pizza, cake, hair, nails, jewelry craft, movie and popcorn. The friends didn't actually sleep over, but they did come in their pajamas and brought sleeping bags.

Right before the guests arrived


Papa John's (Ava's FAVORITE!) (And how happy is Charlie to be included?!)


Besties

Whoa! Check out that crazy hair!


We celebrated later that weekend with all four grandparents and two great-grandparents. The centerpiece of Ava's gifts was her American Girl doll, Rebecca. She was so excited to receive her from Grandma and Grandpa, and Oma took her to the American Girl store at MOA to pick out some new outfits.

Isn't that what you look like when you find money in a card?!


Another favorite: Grandma's eclair dessert - yum!

Happy 6th Birthday, Ava - we love you more every day!!!

Ava's First Day of Kindergarten

Well, I knew it was coming, but all of the preparation in the world and the confidence that she was more than ready didn't make the day any easier...for me. (While I hid behind my big sunglasses at the bus stop the first day, Ava hopped on the bus like she'd been doing it for years). She started full-day kindergarten this fall, and so far, she is loving it (though she likes to play it cool and pretend that it's just "okay" - man, that kind of thing starts early, doesn't it?) She gets on the bus every morning at 7:50 and gets home shortly before 3:00 in the afternoon. Ava has a great teacher, and there are 21 kids in her class (13 girls and 8 boys according to the chart she made on the first day - not a bad ratio, if you ask me). :) Her favorite parts of school so far: recess, lunch and phy ed - ha! Everyone keeps asking me how Charlie is adjusting, and frankly, I don't think he thought much either way. He likes waiting with all of the neighbor kids at the bus stop, he wishes he could get on the bus too, and other than that, I think he's kind of enjoying being the only child for a few hours a day. Me, after the first day, I adjusted quickly, but you'll find me looking out the window and tapping my foot impatiently around 2:45 every day, anxious to reconnect with Ava (assuming she doesn't just throw her backpack in the driveway and go play with the neighbors!)

Here she is with her "schultute," stuffed with fun surprises for the first day:

Big sister and little brother


There she goes!

3-Day 2011

What? A post that doesn't involve the kids?! Don't worry, they'll be featured in a couple photos.

After hemming and hawing, (mainly because of my aversion to fundraising), I decided to join my neighbors for this year's Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer 3-Day. What could be a better reason to step outside my comfort zone (ha! no pun intended), raise some money and really commit to an important cause? I did the walk back in 2004, so I knew what I was getting into, and I'm so glad I decided to do it again. I'm pretty sure everyone who reads this blog is someone who knows about the walk and most likely supported me in it, so I won't reiterate the details of the event - you know what it's about and probably received a letter detailing my experience. (For those of you who didn't, I'll paste the body of my thank-you letter at the end of this post. And, pssst, if you donate to me next year, you'll get your very own thoughtfully written thank-you, too!) Yes, because I can't imagine missing out on the experience next year, I'm signing up for the 2012 3-Day.

Our team on Day 1: Shelli, Steph, Me, Jodi

Day 2!

Joe and the kids at one of the four cheering stations they came to!!!

The homestretch: less than a mile 'til the finish & we ducked into a bar in St. Paul for a celebratory drink!

The whole family at closing ceremony at the capital

As promised...my thank-you letter:

You are receiving this letter, because you so generously donated to our fundraising efforts for the 2011 Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer 3-Day here in the Twin Cities. The walk was an amazing experience that I shared with my three friends and neighbors (Steph, Shelli and Jodi), along with over 2,100 other walkers and hundreds of volunteer crew members. We walked through neighborhoods and trails in Edina, Minneapolis, St. Paul, Shoreview and Maplewood, to name a few. The cheering stations along the way kept us going, especially when we saw our own supporters among the masses. (Joe and the kids came out FOUR different times to see us along the route!) There were muscle aches, blisters and tired feet, but there were also lots of laughs, inspiration and friendship during those three days. (My favorite laugh of the weekend was for a shirt that read: “What?! I thought you said 3 miles in 60 days!”)

My inspiration this year was my teammate Steph (pictured in the middle) – she truly is the poster-woman for early detection, because without the very diligent radiologist who read her routine mammogram, her treatment and prognosis would have been much different. She is a 3-month survivor – if she could walk all 60 miles, I knew I could, too. So women, PLEASE get your annual mammograms!!!

Did I mention that the Twin Cities 3-Day raised over 5.3 million dollars this year?! And you were a part of that, so I thank you again for supporting this cause and for supporting me!

Arrowwood

For the second year in a row, we took a mini-vacation up to Alexandria and stayed at Arrowwood Resort. It seems to be the perfect spot for us, with our kids at these ages - namely lots of swimming options, indoor and out, which entertains them and thoroughly tires them out!

This year, we took my mom along for moral support, babysitting duty and the occasional heavy lifting (e.g., picking Charlie up and lugging him around). :)

We started out our mornings at the indoor swimming pool, which we tended to have to ourselves (what with our early-rising and ready-to-go-immediately-after-breakfast kids).

Then we'd head to the indoor water park for the rest of the morning - Ava is definitely adventurous when it comes to rides/water slides, and now that she's swimming pretty well, she could do everything herself this year. Charlie is a bit braver, too, and he loved playing in the wading pool and doing the smaller slides. The lazy river is more my speed...

We'd have lunch and while Charlie napped, the grown-ups took turns accompanying Ava to the Kids' Activity Center, where we did crafts, played games and watched movies. Later in the afternoon, we swam at the outdoor pool, rented a jet ski, and checked out local playgrounds and a beach. Ava and Joe were determined to catch a minnow - look closely: here's the proof (and one happy little girl).

We did spend some time in our suite with books, games, and...the very handy portable DVD player (thank you neighbors!)

The kids really are good little travelers; maybe next year, when Charlie's three and a little more flexible with naps, we'll branch out a little for our vacation...we'll see!