February Weekends

February has gone by quickly. Jay and Jenny were ecstatic with the Green Bay victory in the Superbowl, and Jenny proudly wore her Packers sweatshirt to school the next day. She was thrilled when her teacher announced that anyone wearing a Green Bay Packers sweatshirt could lead the class into the gym for recess.

We also went to Grand Rapids to visit Jay's niece at Calvin. While in Grand Rapids we went to the Fredrik Meijer Gardens and walked through their nice (and warm) greenhouses. They have a butterfly "house" where we could watch the butterflies emerging from their cocoons. I'd never seen that before and it was pretty cool.

This past weekend we went on our somewhat annual trip to the Chicago Auto Show. We went with some friends and, as usual, we had a very good time. The ride back was filled with a lot of "If you had to buy a car right now, what would you buy?" Jay likes the Honda Pilot, I liked the Ford Explorer. However, we are not in the market to buy a new car, so we could spend our time looking at the cars we wish we could buy. Jay continues to dream of a corvette, and I continue to like the 7-series BMW. We also checked out vehicles for Dave and Shelly and came to the conclusion they should buy a big conversion van. On the negative side they get 12.5 miles/gallon, but they do have two gas tanks and plenty of room for everyone. :)

We are looking forward to a trip south later this spring. I'm getting antsy for some warm weather.

Snow Days

Another snow day! It's rare we get one snow day in the Chicagoland area, so to get two days off in a row is pretty nice. It seemed like most everyone was off of work yesterday as the roads were not passable.

We had plenty of notice the storm was coming, so by Tuesday afternoon the kids and I were home. Jay and Jenny went to fetch Jay's niece as the buses at her school were not going to run due to the approaching storm. The storm hit Tuesday afternoon and it seemed to pass through by Wednesday at noon. We've gotten a lot of snow before, but this storm was different as it was accompanied by high winds. In the pictures you can see some of the drifts are pretty high. It took Jay about 4 hours to dig us out. Needless to say he was pretty tired last night. Shoveling snow is hard work. Most of the roads have at least one lane open, but some of the subdivisions still need to be plowed. That, combined with extremely cold temperatures, caused most schools in the area to cancel again today.
I think the temperatures are supposed to climb this weekend and we are hoping to be able to take the kids outside to do some sledding.

Almost February

My Packer Fans!

Jenny and her snowman.

Andrew driving the bus at the Children's Museum in Stockton.

It was a perfect day for skiing.

The whole group

Once again it's been awhile since my last post.

December came and went and we enjoyed a good time in CA celebrating Christmas with my family. Jay and I were able to spend a day skiing with the siblings while Mom and Dad graciously watched the kids. We had a great day and we hope to do it again some time. It had been years since either Jay or I had skied, but we picked it up fairly quickly and we both had a very good time. The seven of us had a lot of laughs. January brought another trip to CA for my Grandpa's funeral. It was a sad trip, but good to share fun memories of Grandpa. It was different to travel with no kids. I enjoyed hours of uninterrupted reading on the plane. I think January and February are the worst months in the mid-west. The days are short, it's cold, and it seems to drag on forever. Jay and Jenny took advantage of a relatively warm day (30 degrees) to go outside and make a snowman. They also did a little sledding. We spent a lot of time this month hanging out with friends and watching football. The Bears/Packers game was a good reason to get together. Ours was a house divided as I enjoy cheering for the Bears and Jay has successfully brain-washed our children to root for the Packers. Jay was ecstatic the Packers were able to pull it out and Jenny has been praying for a Packer victory in the Superbowl.

Last Friday we took the kids to the Shedd's Aquarium in Chicago for the afternoon. Periodically the Shedd offers "Free Days" so we took advantage of it and spent a few hours battling the crowds and looking at the variety of fish and other aquatic creatures. We've been there a few times but it never gets old. God's creation is pretty amazing.

We've also begun the admission process for kindergarten. It's hard to believe Jenny is old enough for school. Where has the time gone?

We're supposed to get a huge snowstorm this week so I am hoping for the snow day. Even though I'm barely part-time it's nice to look forward to a possible day off.

November

It's been awhile since my last post and it seems a bit silly to post Halloween pictures as we approach Christmas, but these are about all of the pictures I have from the last month.

November went quickly as we were busy with work and other activities. Jenny is continuing to enjoy school. We had parent/teacher conferences and the teacher says she is a good listener and she has a good vocabulary. Andrew's vocabulary is slowly growing and he is doing a pretty good job of copying sounds, not necessarily words.

We had a nice Thanksgiving. Jay's oldest sister hosted some of the family, and that included Steve and Alyona. We had a nice time and an excellent meal. After dessert we headed to a waterpark to spend the remainder of the weekend relaxing and swimming with Jay's family. Jenny liked swimming in the pool, she didn't really like the slides yet. Andrew wanted nothing to do with the waterpark. Maybe next year they will be a little more adventurous.

About 3 months ago Jay and I began P90X. For those of you who are not familiar with this term, it is a fairly intensive workout regimen - six workouts a week ranging from an hour to an hour and half. We are 5 workouts away from being P90X "grads". We're proud to say we have not missed a single workout. Jay's results have been more impressive than mine, but we are definitely in better shape than when we started.

We're looking forward to Christmas and some more time with family.

September

September has flown by. We've enjoyed a lot of fun things this month. I returned to work at the end of August. I teach one period and I aide in the library for two periods. It has been good to go back to work; I thought it might be weird to go back after a year off, but I felt like I slipped right back into the groove of things. Jenny also started preschool at the beginning of the month and she seems to be enjoying it again. We went to the county fair over labor day weekend. Jenny and Jay enjoyed some rides. For being quite timid, I am always surprised at how much Jenny enjoys the various rides. We ate a lot of junk food. I was both intrigued and repulsed by the chocolate-covered bacon. (I didn't partake.) We hung out with Jay's family and saw part of a demolition derby as well. Jay got up early with some of his family and friends to go skiing. He was quite pleased that he can still bare-foot.
We are officially an antennae family now. We got rid of our cable. It doesn't seem to bother us much with the exception of Monday Night Football. Fortunately the Bears/Packers game was on regular TV.
We also spent a day at the zoo. Both kids (and parents) enjoyed the animals. I especially liked the grizzlies and the wolves. I think Jay enjoyed the macaws and the buffalo. Jenny claimed to like the elephants, even though we didn't see any.
Andrew continues to be very busy. He is working on his vocabulary, although he can only say "mama", "dada", and "baby". His favorite noise is to bark like a dog.
The leaves are beginning to change, and the days are getting cooler, so we have tried to get outside as much as possible. Whenever possible we try to make it to the local playgrounds. Both kids enjoy being outside. Andrew will try to put on whatever shoes he can find and stand by the door and grunt.
We're looking forward to October. Jenny starts a basketball camp that runs for 6 weeks. We had to go and buy her some athletic shorts because I was determined that she would not show up in jean shorts. Jay continues to be quite busy with work. The months before Christmas are very busy in the packaging industry. I have a teacher convention later this month. I'm sure October will fly by as well.



Jenny by the grizzlies.




Both kids checking their heights.



Jenny on the first day of school.

Jay and Jenny going down the slide.

Andrew showing us how big he is.

Jay is barefooting.

Trip to WI

Last weekend we were able to take a short trip to WI. On Thursday afternoon we left for Prairie du Chien which is an old town right on the Mississippi River. I had never been to western WI before and I was surprised at the beautiful scenery. We had a nice hotel that had a great pool for the kids, and we enjoyed seeing some of the area and visiting some historical sights. On Friday afternoon we drove through a torrential downpour as we left for Madison, WI. On Saturday we enjoyed a great day seeing the sights in Madison. We wandered around a huge farmers market, we toured the state capital building, and we spent a considerable amount of time at their new Children's Museum. The kids had a great time, and Jay and I enjoyed it as well.



The kids along the Mississippi River




We hiked up to the top of the capital building. The view was pretty amazing, but you can't really tell it in this picture.



Jenny enjoyed the Children's Museum.

New floor

It's been awhile since I've posted anything, mainly because I have been terrible about taking pictures this summer. We had a great trip to CA, Jenny claims her favorite part was walking on the beach with Grandma. Andrew enjoyed exploring Grandma and Grandpa's big house. Jenny also took swimming lessons in CA and she has been swimming very well since our return. She has not used her floaties at all, and she seems to enjoy swimming. We've had terribly hot and humid weather so we've had a lot of opportunity to go to the pool. We've also had a lot of rain/thunderstorms. In fact, our church flooded because we got so much rain in such a short period of time. The ground was saturated and the water pushed up through the floor. We were fortunate that our house stayed dry.

Jay and I also finished up another year of city league softball. We play on a coed team with a group of friends and most of the time it is pretty fun. We were able to win the championship game this year. I did not contribute anything to the victory, either offensively or defensively. Jay had two nice catches in the outfield. We are done now until next spring. I'll miss seeing everyone, but I won't miss the 9:30pm games.

Due to an unfortunate Jamba Juice spill, Jay had to replace the flooring in our living/dining room. He had never put down flooring before and he accomplished this while the kids and I were in CA. It turned out real well. We now have to get some furniture and put some stuff on the walls so it does not echo so much!