Multitude Monday

Here's my continuing Multitude "Monday" post which is part of a series started years ago on Ann's blog, which is a favorite of mine. If you've never checked it out, do yourself a favor and click on over. She's an amazing, gifted writer, a wonderful friend and an inspiration to so many (not to mention a mother of 6)!

"One Thousand Gifts"::

3833. Melting :: the sights and sounds
3834. forgiveness
3835. a clean microwave
3836. temps in the 40's with sun!
3837. a visit from Brie
3838. fresh snow stuck on everything :: SO beautiful! (can you spot the cross in our yard? Joey built that -- with a little help -- it was all his idea.)

3839. a major snow storm and no need to leave the house (our first legitimate SNOW day after 5 days of no school due to extreme cold so far this winter)

3840. Kirby's hard work for our family
3841. the boys watching Olympic hockey at the Hansen's on their snow day
3842. safe driving on nasty roads
3843. crafting with Kaaren
3844. book club night :: can't wait!
3845. neighbor family that shovels out the entire block :: we have the most fabulous neighbors! who does that these days, anyway? not too many people, I imagine!

3846. time with friends
3847. Qwirkle and LOTS of laughter
3848. packing meals for people in Rwanda on a Saturday morning with my parents and the Newmans :: 3 generations volunteering together.
3849. going to Sam's basketball game (and as a bonus, they won!)
3850. going for a run, despite the cold :: I always feel better once I've been running, even if it isn't so fun to actually be doing it (the HAVE DONE feeling is good, even when the DOING is tough!)
3851. lunch at my Grandma's
3852. the funny things Sara says
3853. real mail :: going out and coming in
3854. the library
3855. thoughts of summer :: kids all registered for camp



 May you realize all the blessings the Lord brings your way and take the time to make note of them. (you'll be glad that you did!)

It takes all kinds . . .

I love to people-watch. The variety of people in the world -- heck, just in my neighborhood -- is amazing to me. Some so very much like me and some very, very much not!

• We took the family to The Mall of America {or "The Mall of The Merica", as Joe calls it} the other day and I saw at least 4 or 5 heads full of really bad 80's hair. What's with that? Please tell me that's not coming back!
• I was watching Rebekah at swim practice yesterday morning {while also working on a little project}. Now, in the vicinity of the outdoor pool at 9 am there isn't the variety of people that there is at, say, 3 in the afternoon. You've got the swim team kids at practice, a few lifeguards in red suits and a half dozen or so lap-swimmers {the pool isn't open for general, fun, playful swimming in the morning -- only lap swim, swim team practice and water aerobics}. If it's a water aerobics day, you can add to that about 20 ladies {I'm not being sexist here, it's just quite rare that you find a man in a water-X class} in sunglasses. Occassionaly, there's a swim team parent or two {like me!} watching practice in shorts and a t-shirt, often looking like they maybe brought their kiddo to practice straight from bed {I often fit in this category!}. Practice starts at 8:30. So, as I sit in my chair yesterday morning watching my little fish in the water, out walks a surprise: an overly-perfumed woman in a bikini with a pink bag with "Victoria's Secret" written on it in big letters made from sparkly silver sequins. Now, most lap swimmers wear one piece Speedo-type suits {or if you're a guy, usually tight-fitting trunks}, a swim cap and goggles. There are a few exceptions, but 99% of the adults you see in the pool in the morning hours are pretty much "in uniform". So, this lady didn't quite fit the mold. {I'm reminded of the Sesame Street jingle, "One of these things is not like the other. One of these things just doesn't belong."}. I thought she was going to get in the pool and start swimming laps, so I watched and waited . . . Turned out she just wanted to "lay out" {at 9 am?} and work on her tan and read the newspaper. You see plenty of that at the Y, but not usually at such an early hour!

either/or

i borrowed this from my friend gina's blog today. anyway, i edited it with my own info circled {isn't her handwriting amazing? i love it and am more than a tad "green" over it!}, but my info isn't much different than her original list was, we must be kindred spirits! i couldn't decided between introvert and extrovert {indecisive would have been circled, i guess, had that been an option} . . . i can be a little of both. also on the "neat or messy" i picked neat, because that would be my preference, but often MESSY is what you find around here, given the circumstances that i live under . . . at least in this season of life!

i thought this was a fun idea. gina is super-duper talented. she made our {beautiful} wedding invitations nearly 14 years go and also made jacob's {adorable} birth announcements 11 years ago. and she only gets more talented with time. plus, gina and her husband share our anniversary {or we share theirs, since they beat us to the alter by half a decade}, how fun is that?

thanks for the fun idea gina! have a great weekend everyone!

boo . . . I mean moo (a repeat)

A repeat of a blog post from a year ago. It's one of my favorites! If you read it last year, you can either skip it all together or look again, it's a fun one if you ask me. AND, I rearranged the pictures so they aren't in the same order. You can make a guess as to who's who if you want, otherwise just enjoy! No fair cheating and if you won last year, you can't win again . . . or maybe you can. Sometimes I'm generous!

Happy Halloween. I'm not a huge fan of the "holiday" in general, but what little kid doesn't like to dress up? Plus there is candy involved, so it's all the more fun! Enjoy your day, whatever you're doing::


it all started in the summer of 1999 when we got a bag of hand-me-downs with a cow suit in it . . . since the beginning of time (ok, not quite that long ago, but a long time nonetheless) our kids have been a cow on their first halloween. we're not big halloween enthusiasts, but who can resist a cute little calf? . . . i daresay, not too many.

so, here are 5 cows. can you identify them correctly? there are pictures of 5 little calves in radom order (or are they? maybe they're in chronological order, i've been known to be kinda tricky on occasion. maybe some psychological knowledge of how i think could come in handy for this one!). our family calves: model year '99, model year '01, model year '02, model year '05 and most recently model year '08. each model year had some slight changes from the previous model, but most features remain quite similar.







if you can correctly identify all 5 calves (by model year or name!) you will win a prize. i don't know what it will be yet, but more than likely it will be something i made. more than 1 person can win . . . but hopefully not too many!! (i just don't have time to make millions of prizes). leave your guesses in the comments and no fair cheating by looking at other people answers . . . you're on your honor here, don't let me down!! (i'm pretty sure i figured out how to hide the comments until the contest is over, so i took away the temptation to cheat all together!!) i'll announce the winners (if there are any!!) in a few days. hopefully the waiting won't be too painful for anyone!

Field Day

Yesterday afternoon was the 1st & 2nd grade field day, so I killed two birds with one stone . . . actually, I didn't kill anything at all, but I only had to go to school once to see both Rebekah & Lydia in their field day. As a bonus they were both on the gray team, so I was never divided on which team to cheer for . . . actually, that's not true either since I was cheering for Ev and she was on the white team and for Savannah and she was on the red team and on and on it goes, but my first allegiance was to the grays!

This morning was the 3rd & 4th grade field day, so we returned, once again, to the back field of Falcon Heights Elementary for our final time to be spectators at field day 2009 (we did not need to attend kindergarten field day or 5/6 field day . . . next year I'll have to attend 3: 5th/6th, 3rd/4th & 1st/2nd . . . I'll start gearing up for that soon!).

It was pretty chilly this morning, about 52 and breezy, I believe! Joe decided right away that he would like to go home and watch a movie. Although also a bit chilly, Anna was a pretty good sport {pun intended}! Kirb took the morning off, so he could come too, which was fun and made for more & better pictures of Jacob than we have of the girls from yesterday since, it would seem, I have a hard time both watching and photographing . . . I really can only focus on one thing at a time . . . plus, lots of my friends were there yesterday, so you've got to throw a little lot of chatting in the mix too! Even with the Caribou we picked up on the way we were still none too warm.

Here is a little visual recap of the excitement:

Run, LJ, run!

Rebekah at the "soccer kick":

The girls were on the same relay team.
Here they are about to start,
Go gray!:

Some of this morning's chilly spectators:

Getting directions from Mr. Holty (can you spot Jacob?):

How about now?

Brothers:
(Joe had on his shirt that matches with Jacob's -- under his sweatshirt, that is -- and kept cheering for "matchy boy". It was pretty sweet)

And they're off:

Jacob picked up a little speed right at the end and took 2nd in this race:

Jacob and Jessie got their legs a little tangled here, but Jacob fell over the finish line for 3rd place in this race:

The relay:
(I told him I thought he might be able to run a little faster if he either zipped up his sweatshirt or took it off, but what do I know, I'm just the mom!)

A fun time was had by all, although I'm not sure that the 3rd and 4th graders had too much appreciation for the freeze pops that they got as treats when field day was done . . . I think some soup or something would have been a little more appropriate today! Oh well, they're kids. I'm sure they loved it anyway!

The week in review

Well, Easter has been here and is history already for 2009. Time flies so fast! Yikes, I can hardly keep up. This week seems extra busy for our family. We really enjoyed the 2 days that the kids were off school last week {well, except for the fact that Kirbs was pretty sick for a decent portion of it}. Lots of fun {and not-quite-as-fun-as-we'd-hoped} family time. Here goes a quick re-cap on the past week {mostly in picture form}:

THURSDAY:

Thursday we ventured downtown Minneapolis to take in the Macy's flower show. We thought the kids would be really excited. We've been before and they loved it. Maybe they were expecting something more exciting, but there were lots of grumbles and complaints when we got there . . . except Rebekah, she loved it! We didn't get any nice shots at the flower show, this is the best I could do:

I don't know what to say to try and explain how my 3rd & 4th children think those are appropriate ways to "pose" for a picture:

And, again . . . Joe, over here please!

After checking out all the flowers we took a little walk through the skyways and saw the new Twins stadium construction site. We also had some yummy treats. Unfortunately we met with some absurd amount of traffic on the way home {the Twins game had just gotten done} and it took us 1 hour and 20 {very unpleasant!} minutes to get home! Kind of a bummer of a way to end an outing we had intended to be fun!

Kirb had a {pretty big} role in the Maunday Thursday service at church Thursday night, so we dropped him off at church a little after 5 {the service was at 7} and grabbed a bite to eat with my parents and then headed over to wish "Grandma" Alice a VERY happy birthday. She claims to have liked our singing . . . although at 93 her hearing might not be quite 100%! We loved seeing her!

Happy Birthday Alice, we love you!

FRIDAY:

Good Friday we have a tradition of attending the children's Good Friday service at Roseville Lutheran Church {just down the block from us}. It is a WONDERFUL service, geared for kids and always ends with a project/craft for you to take home to be reminded of Christ's sacrifice for us. This is what we made this year, they turned out great! {Rebekah and Lydia both made one. Joe & Anna stayed home with Kirbs, who was sick . . . Jacob wasn't too excited about making a craft and thought he could benefit from the meaning just as well by looking at his sister's project.}

After the service was done and we'd had a little lunch we ventured off to the zoo in hopes of seeing some super cute little animals at the farm . . . you know, they have "Farm Babies" each spring. Well, I guess the combination of relatively nice weather and lots of people having the day off gave everyone and their neighbor that same idea. It looked more like the state fair than the zoo. Honestly, I hardly saw an animal. You couldn't get close enough. I did, however, see lots of interesting people {and quite a few friends! . . . what did I tell ya? Just like the fair!} It was fun anyhow! We were extra thankful for our zoo membership since the line at the entrance, I heard, took an hour! Thank goodness for the "Members" line . . . only about 10 minutes, I think. That along with the fact that one trip to the zoo for our brood would cost $65 and the annual membership {13 months actually, since I always renew before our old membership expires and then they give you an extra month!} is only $85. That's pretty much a no-brainer. Even if you aren't really a math person!

SATURDAY:

Saturday morning found us in a time warp. I felt like it was 1985! We met some good friends {who we haven't seen in a very long time and don't get to see nearly often enough} at the roller rink. Honestly, it's like stepping foot back in the 80's . . . or as my "more mature" friends thought, the 70's . . . I guess that just goes to prove my point, that roller rinks really are a time warp. I said to Phil "this looks exactly like the roller rink I went to most every Saturday morning in 1986", to which he replied, "I was gonna say 1979, but whatever!". Our friends, the Behrens, had been there {I'm not sure why!} and BOTH of their boys had won the Limbo contest entitling them each to a all-expense paid roller skating party for 20! So Palm Sunday weekend they invited a bunch of friends from school to go skating with them and last weekend they invited some family friends. What fun! The kids all had a blast and even though none of them had ever been on roller skates before they did quite well . . . apart from some sore tailbones and bruised knees!

Rebekah the roller skating girl!

Lydia . . . who made it through the Limbo contest, round 1 {not surprising really if you've ever seen how "bendy" that kid is!} but alas, no party for 20 in our future!

Mom and Joe on the rink:

Nathan and Joe takin' a break . . . check out those skates: now that's what we call vintage!

The whole gang {minus Jill who is taking the picture}. Notice, again, how cooperative Joe is!

SUNDAY:
Easter morning. The 4 big kids all ready for church:

"Christ the Lord is ris'n today. A-a-a-a-a-le-lu-u-ia!"
They look a tad grumpy to be singing about something so wonderful! Oh well, what can you do?
I wish the mother of that kid in the front would have had the sense to not let him wear a Twins hat and suck, it would seem, on BOTH of his thumbs . . . honestly! Some people!

This just strikes me as classic first Easter. Whattaya think?

Ready to hunt for eggs in the yard:

Checking out their loot:

Lots of sibling love while hunting eggs at GG's house {GG is Great Grandma . . . my grandma . . . my mom's mom}. We had a great Easter dinner at GG and Lavonne's {GG's sister} who live nearby.

Our brood:

Haddon's super cute little choppers
What a beautiful handsome little guy:

We hope you had a wonderful Easter!
He is risen!
He is risen, indeed!

MONDAY:

Oh, and then on Monday morning I took Anna to the doctor because she'd been getting up 5 or 6 times a night just miserable for what seemed like forever {in actuality, I think it was 4 nights} and was not at all herself during the day either. Last week Wednesday was her last day on antibiotics for her ear infection. I noticed her acting like she felt crummy on Thursday. This didn't click with me for nearly 4 days . . . I blame the lack of sleep! But, you guessed it . . . her ears are still infected, so we are giving antibiotic #2 a try to see if that can take care of it. I think maybe this girl has some teeny little tubes in her future. We'll see!

Mom's Night

Last night was "Mom's Night" at preschool. Twice a year things are a little different at preschool. There is no class in the morning and instead you come in the evening with your parent. {Dad's Night is in the fall and Mom's Night is in the spring}. I've been to enough Mom's Nights to know the drill: Free time at the beginning, then a snack and circle time to round out the night. It was a fun night. We walked there and held hands {the roads were dry, though, so no opportunities to make footprints} The theme for the evening was Hawaii. Joe has a mind of his own regarding clothing these days, {see here if you want just a teeny little idea of what I'm talking about} so we didn't come dressed in themed apparel, but Joe did wear these: {and took the picture of them himself!}
They aren't super Hawaiian, but I image there are probably ladybugs in Hawaii too . . . although I've never actually been there to know for sure {on the way to the Philippines in 2004, though, our plane landed in Hawaii to re-fuel. Unfortunately we weren't even allowed to get off the plane and it was dark so really all we could see out the windows were some runway lights. We were seated in an exit row, though, so when they opened the doors to take out some trash I was able to breathe the smallest little bit of Hawaiian air . . . but I don't think all of that qualifies as much of a Hawaii experience!}

The classroom theme {at preschool} for the month in the "big room" where they have their imaginative play time is a big sailing vessel. Joe LOVES boats in case ya didn't know! So he is thrilled. We didn't leave the ticket window and big boat all night . . . he even passed on the ice cream! and we stayed in the ship fishing and selling tickets to board the ship and reading books in the ship and whale watching and running from the {big & scary} sharks {two of them} that somehow got aboard our ship and going up to the top deck {loft} to get a better view and selling more tickets and fishing a little more and . . . you get the idea. We did this ALL night! Didn't play with the volcano in the other room. Didn't make a craft. Didn't play in the sand box or water table. Didn't play games. Didn't visit the book nook. Didn't eat our snack for cryin' out loud . . . ALL boats, all night! I pretended to row the boat once but got scolded. {It's got a motor, Mom! Just start up the engine! No need to row.}

in case you didn't know how big the boat is . . . now you do.
It was "this big".

Joey's Ama came to surprise him. That was fun! He wasn't real keen on giving her the tour of his classroom though because that required leaving the boat! She got there just in time for a little playin' and then was able to join us for circle time. So Joe brought his mom and she brought hers . . . so fun! 3 generations. Here's a picture Joe took of Ama at circle time: {sorry for posting it, Mom, but I couldn't resist.}

Well, that's it for Mom's night. Aloha! We'll "see" you later!

SUPER fun new thing!

So, I'm pretty sure none of us really needs a new thing to suck up our time . . . there's already plenty: facebook, blog reading {mine is worth reading, but there are some . . . }, laundry, shelfari, cleaning, YouTube, paying bills, online games {can you say Scramble??} . . . I could go on and on! But, I found a new, very fun, seemingly worthwhile website. Picnik. At Picnik you can do super fun and cool edits to your pictures. Now, you could {and I VERY easily could get completely sucked in, but I'm trying to exhibit a little restraint here} go way overboard and edit every single picture you take to make it absolutely cool and fabulous . . . but really, you don't need to and you know it! Plus that would take you about 25 years and you would miss out on lots of fun life {that you could be photographing} during that time. I almost want to be selfish and not tell anyone else about this cool site because then I could mess around with my pictures and make them uber-wonderful and people would think I was cool and ultra talented and would ask me how I did that and stuff. But I think you would have fun too, so I gave in and decided to be generous and share my newly found wealth of fun and information with you, my friends!

So, here you go. A quick Picnik overview. I took my favorite picture {ok, that sounds a little too decisive for me . . . scratch that and let's say "one of" my favorite picture(s)} of Anna and played with it. I took this picture of Anna in her diaper pail {that diaper there in the bottom is clean . . . NOT dirty, so don't fret} last July. She was about 4 months old. Isn't she just the cutest thing?

Here's what I started with:

And here's some of the fun things you can do to your pictures at Picnik:

Posterize:

Add snow {which would be extra funny if you were outside, say, in the desert}:

Sepia:

Pencil sketch:

Duo tone {you can pick any 2 colors you want . . . I thought these were fun and girly}:

Stickers {all manner of fun stuff you can add to your picture . . . there were TONS of these, I just picked a few!}:

This is called "60's" and it basically just makes your picture look like it is from the 60's {duh} by changing the color and rounding the corners . . . love it! {and since ALL people used cloth diapers in the 60's, I thought it was extra appropriate for this particular shot}:

The possibilities are really infinite, so these are but a few {very few} examples of the range of fun stuff they've got. You can do all the normal stuff like make it black and white and erase redeye and add captions to the pictures and that kinda stuff too. A few other features I like TONS, but didn't really do much for this particular picture are: focal b&w and focal soften where you can focus in on one part of the picture (say, your kid in a group shot) and make the rest of the picture either black and white or out of focus and fuzzy . . . since Anna's face is pretty much the only thing in this particular shot it would not have been a good example! If you scroll down in the blog {or just click here}, I DID do "focal soften" to the picture of Lydia's missing teeth. You can kinda see {if you look closely} that the papers on the desk and Kirbs' arm are a little blurry. Fun, huh?

You can also become a premium member of Picnik for $25/year and do even more cool stuff. But really, there's plenty to do for free, so I don't think that's nesa. Sorry, if you're confused . . . that's a little joke you might not get if you're not from my family. Our favorite movie of all time is "High Anxiety" a 1977 Mel Brooks film. One of our favorite {although there are MANY} lines from that movie is "You don't tell me what's nesa, I tell you what's nesa!" Phonetically, I'm not sure how to spell "nesa", but it's short for necessary, so just start to say "necessary" and interrupt yourself and that's the word I'm going for . . . but I digress . . . You can do a million and one things without spending $25 for the extra premium stuff. So, check it out. But set a timer or something to limit yourself or the next thing you know it might be 2011! Enjoy!