Merry Christmas 2013!!

Christmas 2013 has flown by.  It's New Year's Eve as I'm writing this and my winter break is almost over.  I have really enjoyed the holidays this year- the girls are at really fun ages.  One of my favorite memories will be on Christmas morning when the girls woke up early and came out to the tree to see the presents.  Maggie looked at the names on the gifts and made piles for her and Ruby.  She was so excited for Ruby to open the present that she picked out for her (a little Tinkerbell).  She found that one first and anxiously watched as Ruby opened it.  Then she started in on her own gifts.  So sweet!
This year we spent Christmas Eve out at Grandma and Grandpa Demullings.  It was a cold day, but the dads still managed to give the kids some snowmobile rides!  Grandma and Grandpa spoiled all of the grandkids once again this year and they came home with way too many gifts!
Christmas Day we actually hosted at our house.  All of the Souvigniers were together- even Chad and Terese and kids who traveled here from Tucson.  The girls woke up early in the morning to open their gifts and see if Santa left anything!  Santa did- Ruby got a baby doll and Maggie a camera.......just what they asked for!  After we tore through our family gifts, we headed to church and then came back to get ready for our company!  The weather warmed up quite a bit and it was a great day for skating out on the ice.  We played outside for a good portion of the day and then headed in for a fondue dinner and gift opening.  The girls are pretty lucky because once again they got spoiled by Grandma and Grandpa! 
The next day we cleaned up and got packed up for our weekend at the winter cabin- Boyd Lodge in Cross Lake.  We had a nice time up north with all of the Souvigniers- made a HUGE snowman, went in the hot tub (Dad and Maggie were dare devils and ran out in the snow straight from the hot tub) and even had a little Talent Show involving everyone at the cabin!  The girls had lots of fun times with the cousins! 
As the year comes to a close today, I want to wish everyone many blessings in the New Year! Here's to another great year of family, friends, laughter, and joy!  God bless!
  

Our visit with Santa!

 We had a very fun filled weekend!!  It included a visit with Santa at Lake Minnewashta Park!.  We first hiked on some of the trails (looking for reindeer tracks).  Then we went to the warming house and met with Santa and saw his reindeer too.  There was a nice bonfire there to make smores and warm up with hot chocolate too! 

 The family across the street had a Gingerbread House making party with some of the kids in the neighborhood.  The kids had fun decorating while the moms tried to make sure the houses didn't fall apart!  It was a fun time!!

We've been getting plenty of snow this winter!  The girls helped shovel the rink so that it's nice and smooth to skate on.  There are a few more pictures uploaded in the picasa web album too!

10 weeks of skating class.......look how far we have come!

Happy Thanksgiving 2013

 Happy Thanksgiving!!  What a fun weekend!!  We got ready for Thanksgiving again by making our Turkey sugar cookies!  Maggie is getting to be a pro at these.......with a little help from Ruby and me! 
We got up early on Thanksgiving morning to head down the road for the Tonka Turkey Trot!  It was a great 5k and the kids did a little 100m dash in the Minnetonka Dome.  Not so sure if Maggie liked it (as you can see in the picture above), but Mom loved the 5K and will definitely do it again next year!  I think Ruby liked it too! 
After the race, we went to Grandma and Grandpa Souvigniers for a nice dinner.  Chris and Jen and the kids were there too!  It was great to get together!
On Saturday, we hosted Thanksgiving Part Two!  Grandma and Grandpa Demulling, Toni and John and kids, Trent and Aimee and kids, Jack &Rhett, Margo and Dan, John and Steph, and Sara and Sam and Bill & Bernie all came over.  It was really nice to see everyone.  It seems like it has been awhile since we have all been together like that!   Grandma Alice brought over two different crockpots- chili and a yummy soup.  I made another crockpot of white chilli.  The food went over well and the day was lots of fun!  We exchanged Christmas gifts with Trent and Aimee's kids since they will not be in town for Christmas.  They stayed overnight with us and left for Omaha on Sunday morning. 
On Monday after Thanksgiving, we got our first snowfall!!  As you can see above, the girls were busy making a snowman in the backyard. 
Every year as I write this Thanksgiving post, I reflect on how thankful I am to have such an amazing family and extended family.  I will never take for granted how fortunate I am to be surrounded by such great people!  They help make this journey of life so much sweeter! 

Halloween 2013

Our first Halloween in the new neighborhood went well.  We found out that there are not a lot of trick-or-treaters on Kral Rd.  Those that had their lights on were happy to see us and told the girls to take LOTS of candy.  We met up with some of our new neighbors and got a chance to meet a few more neighbors as well.  We even got a phone number of a possible babysitter! Score!
Maggie was kind of bummed out that we didn't have any trick-or-treaters come by after we got home.  She was looking forward to handing out candy like at our old house (I was too).  Her and Chuck still had fun sitting by the fire and waiting it out while I put Ruby to bed- she was tired out!  We did a lot of walking!  There are more pics in the web album.  Some of the girls and their cousins at the Victoria Halloween party that was on Saturday. 

MEA Fun!

We had a great MEA break!  Friday the girls and I went to the Twin Cities Corn Maze with Grandma Bernie and on Saturday we went on the Pumpkin Train ride with Grandma Alice and the Dauwalters!  Chuck and I even snuck in a date night in!  More pics in the picasa web album!

Ice Skating- Lesson #1

The girls just started ice skating lessons!!  It was a rough class- lots of falling down, but they each learned out how to get up all on their own.  I was hoping at the end of the half hour session they would still like it enough to want to come back the next week.  Turns out they loved it!!  They both wanted to stay extra for open skating after class!  I'm hoping that each week gets a little easier for them and they can keep up those positive attitudes!! (Ruby is in the purple and Maggie's in the white sweatshirt) 
Also, I just uploaded a bunch of summer pictures that I took on my phone to the picasa web album.  They are located in the September album.