A Winter to Remember

Here are a few pictures from this winter. We will never forget 6 snow days - 5 due to the temps being TOO cold and 1 due to actual snow...Here is hoping this is the end of the winter and spring is on its way:

L - R: Emmit, Gerrit, Emma, Blake

Emmit and the bank of the driveway. Our little snow blower couldn't push the snow much higher than this:

Note the mailboxes....

The utility boxes between the houses were almost buried!

A view from our street:

Our walkway to the front door:

Emmit, Gerrit and Jacob playing on the bank of the driveway:

At first it was too cold to go out and enjoy the snow, then we got too much snow and it was too hard to play in the snow! 

Thankfully we think we are in the clear for spring to come. We can see the grass! 

Working off some Steam

We spend an afternoon at an indoor park. We were at a birthday party and thankful to burn off some steam on a cold January day!

Emmit loved the lower hoops:

Gerrit loved the blob:

Adam enjoyed bouncing the boys and I enjoyed the steam they worked off!

Happy Belated Birthday E!

I just checked the camera in preparation for our trip and found some OLD pictures! Yikes, poor Emmit's birthday photos have been on the camera and not shared.

So here they are...nothing big, just him opening his gifts. We had a quick gift opening before the neighbors came over to celebrate New Year's. 

Emmit now has his own sled like Gerrit's - just blue. (No more arguing!)

His favorite gift:

Yep, we have our own Ninja Turtle in the house!

We ended his celebration with cupcakes and singing with the neighbors. 

Special Visitor

Gerrit's teacher is a HUGE football fan and the 2 of them have a special bond. They talk football at lunch and beyond. Ms. Hunt's son plays football for Rutgers and Gerrit paid special attention this fall to how Rutgers was doing. (They didn't do real well, but made it to a bowl game.) Gerrit thinks its cool that Ms. Hunt has a son who plays college football. 

This fall, Gerrit wrote a letter to Andre and Ms. Hunt sent it to Andre. Andre did not write him back as he was busy with football. (He was a walk on this year and played offense in high school. He recently learned he was switched to Safety and potentially will get scholarshiped next year! It was fun hearing about his experience with a bowl game and all the perks the got through the whole ordeal (Ms. Hunt told me all about it!)

Today, Gerrit (and the class) had a special visitor - Andre! Ms. Hunt wanted him to stop in before he headed back to college so Gerrit could meet him. She took a picture of the 2 of them together and Andre gave Gerrit a Rutger's pencil. No one else in class got a pencil but Gerrit! At dinner Gerrit said: "I've never met a real football player before". He was in shock that he didn't say much to Andre. There is a chance Andre will be coming back to the class this week and hopefully Gerrit will step it up and talk to him! 

I have a feeling that we will be going to a Rutger's football game in the future now that they will be in the Big 10. Gerrit still is a Duck's and Spartan's fan first, but there is a special place in his heart for Rutgers! 

Christmas Michigan Style

Gerrit wanted to learn how to snowboard so who better to learn from than Uncle Jeff! We mentioned it to Jeff and he was all over getting the equipment and spending time with him. Christmas Eve we went to a nearby sledding hill to give him a few pointers.

Emmit didn't mind because he LOVES sledding! Mia took her board and Max and Ella went sledding. Emmit seemed to make the rounds sledding with everyone - even Uncle Jeff!

His favorite way to sled - on his tummy, head first!

Gerrit got 'new' snowboard equipment (Max's old board and boots)  and Emmit got a helmet! Adam made the boys wear their helmets earlier in the week when they were sledding because of the ice storm! And now Emmit thinks he needs to wear it every time he sleds...not a bad idea!

He was even laughing with all the snow in his face!

Even Adam got in on the action with Max. Jeff thought the 2 of the maxed out the weight limit on the sled!

Here he is in action! 

He took a break from snow boarding too:

Our new little snowboarder!

After sledding/snowboarding we met back at Jeff and Erika's with the rest of the family. Here is "Santa" Ella and her elves...

2 boys really excited for presents!

We even had time later in the week for a few birthday celebrations. Max, Emmit and Bill (who was sick) all have birthdays with in 2 weeks of each other....Max kindly stood next to Emmit for the annual picture by the cake:

We visited Grandma and GG with Travis and Millie and saw Grandpa Bob and Geri too. The rest of the trip was cousin time! Hockey, sledding, snowboarding (at a real ski hill), presents, and hanging out pretty much sums up our trip this year. It is fun to see the cousins play so well together - they pick up where they left off the last time they saw each other. It makes living so far away not so bad. We look forward to the cousins coming to MN this summer!!

It's Happening Already!

Today when I picked Gerrit up, we walked to his locker to get his stuff. Inside his locker was a folded up piece of paper that read: From Hattie to Getter (Gerrit)....and when I opened it up it read:

"I saw you at basckball (basketball). Why were you shy? Because I thot (thought) you were. You are good at basckball (basketball). Alomst (almost) every time you make a bascgit (basket). Ples writt (please write) me back. When you writt me back plea put it in my mel (mail) box plea. Thank you!

From Hattie to Getter 

I read the note to Gerrit and so far he has no interest in writing her back. Stay tuned to find out if he responds...

Thanksgiving Weekend 2013

Travis and Millie joined us for Thanksgiving. A small and intimate dinner that was a bit later than planned. I thought I'd try the convection setting on my oven....only to have the turkey take a wee bit longer than predicted! Guess my turkey was larger than I thought! None the less, it was worth the wait - juicy and the rest of the food stayed warm during the wait!

Travis is sportin' Emmit's pilgrim hat he made at daycare....

Friday we went to get the tree....Just as we arrived, Santa (Ho Ho if you are talking to Emmit) and Mrs Clause (Mrs. Ho Ho) arrived at the tree farm. This was the first time Gerrit got close to either one of them without crying or holding on to an adult! Emmit still isn't there yet.

Of course, I'm behind the lens....

All ready to find the perfect tree! Took the wagon to the far end of the farm:

So many great trees to choose from. Finally we settled on one. Being in a new house made for an interesting pick - we don't have the nice tall ceiling where we plan to put it. We tried to go small but our its so deceiving out in nature!

Adam doing double duty - carrying Emmit and dragging the tree. Gerrit hit Emmit in the face with the measuring stick (on accident). 

The boys on Sunday morning in their Christmas duds. It was pretty easy to get them dressed - Emmit thought his pants, shoes, and new coat were 'army' clothes! Gerrit had khaki's on but changed to jeans last minute. I wasn't going to argue with him.

Oh, the black eye and missing teeth you might ask about??? A week ago, Gerrit got into a fight with the slide at school. Came home with a real goose egg above his eye which of course left the eye a nice black and blue. The swelling is down and now its looking yellow. The tooth came out when he pulled it (it was pretty loose). The bottom 2 are finally coming in. Yes, he looks like a hockey player!

Emmit, hammin' it up. He had just refused to have his picture taken too!

Our very own Mr. Ho Ho in the tub! Having fun with bubbles!!

And I was able to get a little sewing in over the weekend. I made both boys cozy pants as we call them around here. Emmit chose Gopher fabric and is showing off his new pants!

Somehow the Lego dudes took over the boys' nativity set....