Coco

Saw the movie Coco today. It was really good. I cried. At the end Leo kissed me and said, "Thank you for taking us."

He also leaned over and asked me what side his dimple was on : Dimple, no dimple, dimple, no dimple

Hotels at Christmas

As we are enjoying our time at the hotel, Leo is pondering what happens when people stay at a hotel on Christmas Eve. 

He thinks that there are three rooms here that are set up with Christmas trees so when Santa comes, he has a place to put the presents.

Visiting Santa 2017

Even though I haven't been posting about it, we have been doing our traditional advent bags.
Today we were to visit Santa. We got everyone out the door in plenty of time to get a good seat, but it turns out I read the time for Saturday instead of Sunday, so we were more than 2 hours early!
We went back home and played a bit before heading back to Bachman's. Relia opted to skip the outing (sniff, my baby is growing up), and FP had to stay and wait for Donna (MIL) to arrive to watch the Vikings game.

This time we were only a half hour early, and the place was packed. Felix found a narrow spot up front for Leo and himself. There was already quite a line to visit Santa after the show. I decided to go get in line and abandon my children to their own devices before and during the show.

I have no idea how they did. But they met back up with me, and we waited and waited (thank goodness I got in line, it went back forever).
We made it to Santa.

Later I got to go shopping for a bit with mom. So much more fun to shop with my best momma.
I think I've got everyone covered!

Christmas Ideas for those who need them

Our family already has memberships for the MN Historical Society and the Minnesota Zoo.
We are open to more. Memberships or gift cards toward visits would be awesome. Usually it costs just as much for a family membership as it does for all of us to go once.
The kids have asked us to go to:
Minnesota Children's Museum
MN Science Museum
Arboretum
Or
Some other cool place we haven't been or thought of yet

The kids all love getting the magazines people gave them last year too.
Some ideas:
Ranger Rick -Felix
Ranger Rick Jr - Leo
High 5 - Leo
Highlights - Felix
Discovery Kids-Felix
Mad Magazine - Relia
American Girl -Relia
Girls Life Relia
Boys Life - Felix

Aurelia is every inch the preteen girl thinking about who she is and who she wants to be. She likes to write and craft. She has babysitting aspirations. She loves to sing and dance and wants to get better at both. Honestly, her love language is attention. She would most love a certificate good for a sleepover,  lunch/coffee date, or any other activity.

Girly clothes
Fun knee socks
"Spa day" type stuff
Anything Taylor Swift


Felix is very into space and loves animals. His favorite animals are the Fennec Fox and the Saber toothed tiger. He loves to build things or take them apart. He is also fascinated by snow globes lately. He also loves special one on one time with adults.

cardboard cutting scissors or a cardboard cutting knife
His own set of screwdrivers -especially the little ones
A snow globe
Legos- Pay no attention to the age limits.




Leo is every inch the artist. He will spend hours on a drawing or some thing he is building. he wants to do everything the big kids do and is frustrated when it doesn't come as easily for him.

He would love a stack of interesting colored paper and a bunch of random stickers.
cardboard cutting scissors or a cardboard cutting knife
Legos - He likes the city legos If the age is under 12, he can probably build it.

Wilber vs. the Wifi

Felix had his theatrical debut this afternoon.
The play was put on by his after school group. It was called Wilbur Vs. the Wifi. It is a follow up to Charlotte's Web, where the animals are sad because the children are too busy with their devices to pay attention to the animals. Felix has been practicing for several weeks and just found out yesterday that "Pig 2" would be able to come, so he took both his Pig 1 lines and Pig 2's.

He did great I shot a few of his parts and put it together into a video. It might be hard to tell what is happening, but you can see he hit his cues pretty well. (The scene where it look like he is dancing is the pig trying to stand on his hind legs.

The video is here

A Christmas Story - The musical

In August I took Relia to see Richfield Lutheran Church's production of Joseph & the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. She thought it was wonderful and wanted to BE one of those children up on stage. She asked one of the narrators how she could get involved. We watched their Facebook page for audition notices for the next month and a half. Finally in September, we got word that they would be auditioning for A Christmas Story. Relia determinedly cajoled me into taking her to audition. She did it. She got in the Chorus. I think she was a little disappointed, having heard the story of her fathers first audition and his getting a leading role right off the bat, but she handled it okay.

It has been a long couple of months with rehearsals at least once a week, learning to do her hair and make-up and trying to do our best to support the program. But WOW, do they do a great job putting on the show. 

Here is a link to a video clip on Facebook

Oh Christmas Trees

2014                                              2016  

2017

This year of firsts

12 months ago we were just plotting to move. We weren't sure if we could actually make it happen.
Could we make the money work? Would we find a house? Could we sell our house?

Then it sort of fell into place. We now sit seven miles south of where we were in a whole new place.

We are learning to do all of our old stuff in our new space.

Birthdays, 4th of July, Vacations, First day of School, Halloween, Thanksgiving
and now all of the Christmas traditions

Opening up the boxes of Christmas stuff has hit me a bit. After 14 years, I had a system. A place for all of the decorations. I knew where all of our stuff went. Now I'm trying to figure it out, and there are a few things that probably just won't fit. What could be an adventure, finds me longing for the familiar. I know that I will get there once again soon. But for now,  I'm struggling and trying to soothe my inner child who just wants to go home. It is kind of strange recognizing that this is homesickness. There are so many good things here, but it is not my home at Christmas.
Not yet.

Oh Christmas tree

This morning we woke and headed for a hearty breakfast, and headed down to Hampton to get our Christmas trees.
It was 40 or so degrees, so we were able to take our time selecting the perfect tree. I think I prefer the bitter cold so that we don't spend time discussing the merits of particular trees, and ending up right where you started.

After we got home Relia had her play practice, so we promised we'd wait to decorate until after she got home. While we waited the boys struggled to find something to entertain themselves until they got outside and began building a winter home for all of the various animals that visit our yard.

Once Relia returned we dove in and decorated our hearts out, even putting together the lego train.

We had quite a bit of awesome siblings working together time.

Black Friday #optoutdoors

Last weekend FP & the kids discovered the Minnesota Valley National Wildlife Refuge a few miles from our house. Ever since, the kids have bee begging to take me there. So on the Friday after Thanksgiving, it was a lovely warm day so we headed back there. 

I brought the good camera along and we took a few picture. Wow my kids are getting big.

Leo kept giving me cheesy smiles, so I started asking him to tell me about things: Here, he is talking about Nana & painting. 

And Relia. I just can't believe how lovely she is. 

The boys came running back down the path saying "You have to come see the Calcifer tree!" 

I couldn't resist photoshopping calcifer in his hearth.

lead safe

Living in a house that was 100+ years old along with lots of other houses that were that old or older, there was always assumed to be lots of lead paint; on the wood, in the air and in the dirt in the ground. We tested all the kids and they came up with acceptable blood lead levels (though not zero).

There are only a few windows that aren't new in this house. All of them have some rot going on. So we are getting them replaced soon. Part of that process is lead testing, which happened today. 

Aaaaand the report came in that we are lead free! 

Luna appears to enjoy the fire

So sweet

On a whim, I let the boys have their bath in the big tub. We almost never do that anymore. I remember when FP used to work until super late and nightly bath time kept me sane.

After bath & jammies, we watched the end of our movie. A few minutes in, Felix climbed into my lap and held my hand with both of his for almost the whole rest of the movie. 

Melts my heart.

Weekend projects

See that?

 That is TWO cars INSIDE our garage! 

That means we have been able to unpack or unload enough stuff to fit both Pagoda and Jiggity-Jig into their own special space. No one has to risk their side mirrors and paint jobs on a narrow ice-rutted street any more. 

To accomplish that, I hung up the ladder on the wall, and things kinda fell into place. I also got two more garage door openers programmed.

Our kitchen is pretty dark. It is biggest flaw (maybe) in our otherwise awesome house. We still need to address the lighting issue overall, including the fact that the refrigerator light doesn't work! But putting in under cabinet lighting is a little thing that actually makes a huge difference.

I guess the kitchen isn't the only place where lighting is a problem. This counter is the space where everyone has decided to charge their tablets. In the evening, it is dark. I got a cute lamp with a bright bulb for the corner, and it helped a lot, but took up a precious outlet. So, I got a USB ready outlet so they could plug in and still have light.

Sore!

I manage to slack on working out for almost a whole week last week. I kept thinking "it'll be easier to get up when daylight savings time ends." Dangerous thinking, right?

Now DST is over, and it is still hard to get up, but I'm doing it! But boy do I regret that week. Maybe I just have higher expectations for myself, but it feels harder than it did when I started!

The soreness is in different places than it was at the beginning.

Getting ready for winter

It is a whole new routine now. At the old house, we got the leaves raked, the outdoor toys inside, ice melt and shovels on the porch, and that was pretty much it. The rest was inside, and we had a system. 

Now, we have to figure out how winter will go here. Today I cleaned the gutters. I've cleaned gutters exactly two other time in my 15 years of home ownership. one of them was in this house. Our old house was so tall, it just didn't ever get clogged with leaves. This one was clogged when we got here - to the tune of trees growing in the front ones. This time was super easy.

Prepping for winter has involved 

Cleaning out the garage enough for one car

Raking all the leaves in our huge-er yards (a few times)

Taking down the swing

Packing away lawn furniture & implements into the shed (It's full now)

Stacking firewood in the shed (YAY for firewood!) 

Setting up our kitchen entry so there is space for boots & such

Setting up the closet for winter stuff

And the afore mentioned gutters

It isn't a crazy list, just different from before. 

I still need to -

Clean out the garage so we can fit TWO cars in it

Find a way to store ladders & bikes

Make a place for snow pants

Then we get to figure out how to get ready for Christmas. I'm so anxious to anxious to start getting ready for Christmas.

Halloween in Richfield

Our first Halloween in Richfield!
We decided to Trick or Treat our own neighborhood this year, and hand out candy too!

Leo and I picked out decorations to put outside last week. At the old house, stuff I put out got stolen or wrecked, so I just stopped putting stuff out.

Our pumpkins didn't make it to today, they were too tempting a treat for the squirrels, despite me dousing them in tabasco.

We set up decorations, a table with a fake fire, a bowl of candy, and an urn with hot cider for adults.

Grandma D & Nana stopped by for a little while.

I want to go to there

Really I just want to make this in our living room

Carving!

After dinner we settled in to carve our pumpkins. First time in the new house. we don't have a nice solid floor like we had in our old kitchen, so we covered the table in plastic and carved the old fashioned way.

 A few of us found internet inspirations, and others just carved what they felt.

 They are learning that they need to anchor their designs. Sometimes the hard way. Relia's "Medusa" plan became an alien when we discovered some bad spots on her pumpkin.

 Leo was very proud to have carved his very own pumpkin.

The results of our labor

We probably carved them a little too early, and not having a porch now, they are out on the front steps. I bathed them in tabasco, hoping to deter the squirrels. 

Fingers crossed.  

Pumpkin Carving

They weren't the best pumpkins to start with, and everyone had grand ideas about how theirs would look. We let them have at it, and some lessons were learned about how you need to anchor a design. In the end, everyone was proud of their pumpkin.

bulbs!

This afternoon I dug up the whole garden trying to sift out weeds, AND put in a ton of bulbs for next spring. I kept telling myself how good it will feel when all those daffodils and tulips come up in the spring. It really will, but my body hurts right now.

And I don't do windows.

Until now.
At our old house, in 14 years, I cleaned a few of the windows exactly once. It was right before we put the house on the market, and it was 6 windows. It took a tall step ladder just to reach the bottom of the window, and then it hardly made any difference because I would have had to disassemble the storm windows to clean the upper sashes. Today I cleaned almost all of our windows in couple of hours with a medium height step ladder!

New neighbors?

Relia came running into the house, "Bald Eagle...in the tree!"
I grabbed my camera and sure enough, in the tree at the south end of the pond:

Another reason to be happy in our new home. 

Pumpkin picking

After our visit to the Eagle Center on Saturday left us pumpkinless, we decided to hop on a trolley to see if we could have better luck by lake Bde Maka Ska. 

On the way to the pumpkin patch we got to ride on "the other trolley" that we'd never ridden before.