Spring Break 2014

Adam and I had an amazing time in the British Virgin Islands! Meeting up with John and Deb from Zumbrota and staying with Bill and Tricia who we see a few times a year when they come to the states made for a great week.

I have a few pictures here on the blog and you can see the rest on shutterfly. I am in the middle of making an album on Shutterfly instead of scrapbooking it - because of time (I am soo far behind on the boys' books). 

So here is a glimps into our past week:

The view from Bill and Tricia's home. They are part of a resort/estates and have access to the pool you see in the middle. We spent our time on the beach (although I wanted to sit by the pool and use the swim up bar - next time!)

Our new favorite past time - snorkeling! I think Adam would stay in the water all day if he could snorkel.

Our first island visit was to this great spot for lunch. Its called Pirate's Brick on Norman Island. We enjoyed a drink under the umbrella and moved to the tables (behind us) for lunch:

Here's the view of our lunch spot from the boat:

 We took a tour of the island and stopped for a few photos at this beach. Here is the group:

One afternoon we went to a remote spot on an island for a picnic. Here the guys are assembling the 'table'. There is lots of 'stuff' washed ashore here so we made our table out of a broken lawn chair and a piece of board. A nice beach towel on top and we were good to go!

Each day would not be complete without rum punch! A new favorite of mine!

We thought we'd play 'Gilligan's Island' and try cracking open coconuts.

It worked, thanks to Adam and his aim to get the coconuts down from the tree (I had 2 rum punch's in me and we hadn't eaten yet so my aim was not real good!) John found a 2 x 4 with a nail in it that they used as a hammer. It worked great!

The boat

Enjoying our spot in front to and from the islands

The rest of the crew - Bill took care of the anchors etc and Tricia was quite the driver. Adam assisted Bill as needed.

A view of their home - loved that the wall folded open so it was light and airy inside as well as on the deck:

The other direction of the living space. Off to each side were the bedrooms.

A view from a little island just off of Tortola. 

The restaurant on that island.

Friday we left and it actually rained. I didn't think it ever rained because our weather was amazing! Tricia said the heavens were crying because we were leaving. 

A conch shell Bill found for us when we were snorkeling and he was hanging out on shore. It looks great in our family room and is a wonderful reminder of the amazing week we had!

And now we are back to reality - cold and wet! We missed the boys but had a relaxing time. It was a great treat after the winter we had. And the great thing: Adam was bummed going home so now we have a voucher to use within the next year....perhaps we will go back next spring break?

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!!