St. Louis Trip 2017

For Spring Break in April we decided to take our annual trip to St. Louis.  It was so nice visiting when it wasn't so hot. We were all more willing to play outside and go on outings with nicer weather.  We would always visit during Spring Break if Joseph's week off coincided with Spring Break.  We took a lot of pictures so check them out if you are interested.

We always make the drive to St. Louis in 2 days.  The first day we drive 9-10 hours and the second day we drive 4-5 hours.  We have always stopped in Richmond, Indiana and this year was no exception.  We found a lovely park and let the kids play for an hour.  They had a lot of fun.  Eden got the "Best Traveler" award. Over the 4 days that we drove on our trip she cried maybe 10 minutes the entire time in the car.  She really is a dream come true!!  The other kids had occasional outburst...think Annika..."I want out!" but we were able to distract them with movies and snacks.

Here is Edie's first time in a swing.  She loved it!

Lincoln had fun on the phone in the hotel room.  We always have to
unplug the phones in our rooms so the kids won't make phone calls.

Easter Sunday

I loved that we were visiting over Easter.  My mom put together little baskets for the kids and they enjoyed hunting for them.  It was wonderful sitting around the table as a big family...Mom, Heather, Chandra, Joe, Christian and then our family of 7.  Holidays really are better with family.

Heather wanted a picture of our family.  It was hard to get
everyone looking and smiling all at the same time.

The picture of Heather and me on my fridge at home is a few years old so we took some new pictures together.

Rebecah loves to visit my mom and Heather.  She calls them her BFFs.  I think it is just so sweet that her best friends are her Grandmother and Aunt!!

Rebecah with BFF Heather!

I really wanted to take the kids to the zoo.  It has been about 4 years since we last visited the zoo.  It started to rain on the way to the zoo and I was so disappointed as the drops started getting bigger and falling faster.  After consulting with everyone we decided to stick it out and outlast the rain.  I'm so glad we did.  After 30-45 minutes of rain the skies cleared and the weather was perfect.  It was one of my best trips to the zoo that I can remember!

At the Zoo

Monkey House:  Joseph promised Annika he would take her to see monkeys so we made sure to visit the Primate house.  She liked watching them.  We even saw a small red haired monkey.  If Annika were a monkey she would look like this cute little guy!

I loved these pictures of Kimball, Rebecah and Christian!

Rebecah with her other BFF.

I don't remember seeing this huge statue display at the zoo.  As you can
see, my finger got in the way, but I liked the picture anyway.

Here are two of Lincoln's silly moments hanging on a railing and walking through a hollow log.

I just love these sweet girls!!

Monday evening Joseph took the big kids to a St. Louis Cardinals game.  The Cardinal were playing the Pirates and won 2-1.  This year the Cards are celebrating 125 years so the kids were each given a little poster.  I was happy I recognized 2 of the men on the poster....good ol' Ozzie Smith and Whitey Herzog. 

Other memorable moments from our trip:

This picture needs an explanation.  Lincoln is playing with my mom's heavy John Deere tractor.  My mom tried to win Lincoln over with this little tractor.  Lincoln LOVED it.  He pretty much carried it around the entire time until we returned home.  He also carried around a plastic knife.  Lincoln loves swords and he carried the knife around calling it his sword.  He developed his sword fascination from watching the end of Frozen where Anna saves Elsa from Hans' sword.  Anytime I use a knife in the kitchen he says:  "That a big sword?" or "That sword sharp?"  I love his cuteness!

Here Edie is taking a nap on Heather's bed.  My mom has this great climbing tree and the big kids enjoyed seeing how high they could go.  I'm just glad they didn't fall!

 

The little ones didn't always get the naps they needed.  Here is Lincoln conked out during a movie with his face on the hard floor!  He still has his plastic knife-sword though!

Heather loved holding Edie--can't say that I blame her.  Edie was very still and not too heavy so it worked out well for both of them!

Kimball did a lot of reading while we were gone.  He set a goal to read all 22 remaining Value Tales that my mom owns and he finished them all.  He is holding his favorite one that he read.

Group picture with the cousins.

One of Kimball's favorite parts of our drive was the 30 seconds he could see this building out the window.  For those of you who don't know it is Lucas Oil Stadium.  It is where the Indianapolis Colts play football and where the Combine is held every year.  The Combine is some football skills showcase event in preparation for the NFL draft.  I'm sure Kimball could explain it better than I can!

I love my family and I just wish I could see more family members each year!

Cazenovia Library and Chittenango Falls

A few weeks ago it was beautiful Spring weather and Joseph had the day off work so we took the little kids on an outing while the big kids were at school.  We went to a public library about 45 minutes from our house that had a museum in it.  The museum was in an old house built in 1830 and in 1880 it was donated to the city for use as a library.  In the 1890s a man who lived in the town, Cazenovia, went to Egypt and purchased an Egyptian mummy and other Egyptian artifacts.  The artifacts were brought back and have been on display for over 100 years at the library.  The mummy was about my size and there is an x-ray of the mummy, too. It was all pretty interesting especially when you consider it was free.

There were other things on display as well.  Most of them were keepsakes from members of the town... hats, old toys and clothes.  There was a reading room with portraits of the original owners of the house and the Frenchman for whom the town was named.  We spent about an hour wandering around the museum before letting the kids relax in the kid section of the library.

In front of the mummy.

Close up of the mummy.

Reading room.  There were multiple fireplaces in the house and they were all unique and very pretty.  I'm not sure what type of rock was used to make them, but if I had to guess I would say marble.  There were white, black, and terra-cotta colored fireplaces.  

Children's toys.

Relaxing in the library.

Lincoln posing with a penguin outside the library.

After lunch we went to Chittenango Falls to enjoy a small hike to the waterfall.  It was our third time at Chittenango Falls.  It had rained multiple days previous to our visit so the falls were full and flowing swiftly.  

Group selfie at the Falls.

Art Camp

Rebecah participated in an Art Camp through the school in March.  It was one day a week for 4 weeks. She had so much fun participating.  Each week the kids drew picture using a different medium.  Rebecah would come home and practice each picture recreating what she had learned at school.

Fox landscape--oil pastels.  Raining shamrocks--paint.

Penguin Reflection Scene--colored pencils

Birds on a Branch--watercolor pencils

Eden--6 Months.

Eden is now 6 months old.  The time is flying by and I just wish she could stay little a little while longer!  At her 6 month well baby appointment she was 14 lbs 3 oz and 25 3/4 inches long.

Edie is a perfect, sweet girl!  She still don't roll over, but she is mastering sitting alone.  She enjoys tummy time so much she is content to look around without rolling over!  She had a few "close calls" this month where I thought she might roll over, but didn't.

Edie sleeps through the night 95% of the time.  A few times I have sent Joseph in to her in the night.  I know if I go in she'll want to eat so I do what's best for all of us and send in Joseph.  Edie will cry like her heart is breaking, but after Joseph holds her for a few minutes she'll go back to sleep.

Just after Edie turned 5 months she started to enjoy bath time.  She now kicks her legs in the water and are happy as long as the water isn't cold.

Sweet girl sitting on the couch!

Aunt Chandra crocheted a baby afghan for her.  I love it!!  Edie now sleeps with it during the day.  She likes to stick your fingers through the holes.  I love that Chandra made this for Eden and me....it's something I don't do so I really appreciated her sharing her talent with me! 

All of my girls have worn this dress!  I love it.  

   

Here are Annika (6 months) and Rebecah (4 months) wearing the dress.

Waking up from a nap in Chan's afghan!

Here she is hanging out on Kimball's bed.

Big girl on my bed!

We love this perfect girl so much.  She truly is living up to her name....delight!

St. Patrick's Day 2017

St. Patrick's Day didn't exactly sneak up on me this year, but it wasn't on my mental radar either.  The night before I realized I hadn't bought any Leprechaun gold so after a church meeting I had to stop at the store on my way home for some "gold".  We usually use Rolos but this year I went with Hershey Nuggets and the kids didn't mind.

For dinner I wasn't excited about spending  a lot of money on corned beef so I just made Irish soda bread and we had spinach burgers to go along with the bread.  For dessert I made a pistachio cake with a pistachio pudding frosting.  It was better than some of the other green desserts we have had over the years.




Lincoln and Annika didn't want to wear any green so they didn't.  I did grab a picture of every else in green at the tail end of the day.

I know the picture frames are really outdated but there's only so much time in the day!

Critz Farms

Last weekend we visited a local farm for a tour of their maple syrup factory.  The tour was fairly small and just in one room, but it was fun to hear about the process that the sap undergoes to become maple syrup. There were little samples of syrup and maple flavored popcorn.  You could also pay for an all you can eat breakfast, but we opted to eat breakfast at home.  (I knew I couldn't eat my weight in pancakes, eggs, and bacon to make it work the $12 per adult and I didn't want to pay $6 for Lincoln and Annika when they might not eat anything or only a few bites.)  I think this was my first experience with real maple syrup and it is good.  The big kids thought it just tasted like honey, but there was a distinct maple flavor to it.  I learned that the color of the syrup depends on the weather the day it is tapped and boiled.  A darker, richer, syrup is produced when the temperature rises or falls a lot during the day.  When the temperature is mostly stationary and on the cold side the syrup tends to be a light amber color.

We also took a ride to the sugar bush grove so we could see the maple trees.  It was interesting to see the trees with the tubing coming out of them and how it is all collected with the help of gravity.  I just thought the entire process was fascinating.  The wagon ride was cold, but it allowed us to snuggle together.  Lincoln especially enjoyed watching the tractor pull our wagon.

The blue line is the easiest to see, but there were white/clear lines, too.

All snuggled together.  It's so hard to get everyone looking at once!!