We're # 3!

Every Monday night is my night to get out with the girls and play some volleyball. Time away, to get exercise, and hang out with other moms. In the past we've been competitive and placed #1 or #2 in our league. This year things did not click well for our team and many new teams joined the league so we were bumped into a lower league. And there... well we fell apart, ending the season at #3 (out of 5 teams.) Uggh. We need to fix something before January. At least we still love to laugh and enjoy playing together.

Toffee Making Party

I visited my dear friend Wendi for her annual toffee making party in early December. It was such a fun day. Mom joined us too. I think we ( the group collectively) made 170 pounds of toffee! Yikes! Don't worry, we gave most of it away.

Candy Trains & Gingerbread Houses

Lots of leftover Halloween candy led to creativity in Christmas crafts. We visited Oma for our annual Christmas Train creating. The boys ate so much candy I thought they were going to be sick. Nate actually took his candy train to school the following day to share his "Christmas tradition" with his class. We also hosted a gingerbread house building night for Nate and some of his friends in early December. Usually the school hosts a Gingerbread night, but due to lack of volunteers it was cancelled. Those who signed up for it, still received their gingerbread kit. So we invited some of Nate's friends to build them at our house. While we had a fun time, I think most of the night was running around our house with dart guns and nerf arrows. Chaos. The boys did manage to finish a house in the midst of all the running around. It was fun, and we had fun meeting some of the parents.

Polar Xpress

This year we splurged and took the Mt Hood Railroad train out to the North Pole. The boys were super excited when they heard about the plan and could hardly wait to get going. They packed their overnight bags and begged to stay the night there. I told them I hadn't made reservations but would check on availability once we arrived in Hood River (trying to not squash their excitement here). We made it to the train station with 30 minutes to spare, phew! We had enough time to check in, get our tickets and board the train. Since we took an early train there were a few empty seats here and there which was nice. The conductor came through and punched all the children tickets with the letter P. It was quite exciting. Once the train started moving the hostess' offered us hot cocoa and cookies and then read us the book Polar Express. 25 minutes into the train ride, we came to the "North Pole".... aka, a white pole barn decorated with Christmas lights. Santa and his elves were on the side of the tracks waving hello. As a side note: Years ago, I did a "western" themed train ride and we got off and enjoyed walking around an old town for 20 min before boarding the train and heading home, so that's what I was expecting... only a North Pole theme. So I was a bit disappointed when we started heading back. Anyway, Santa joined us on the train and we headed back to town. Santa sat with each child for a few minutes, listened to their requests and gave them a Silver Bell. The boys really had a lot of fun with it, so I guess that made it all worth while. The boys were the perfect age for this adventure.

Pajama Party

The day after Thanksgiving we got together with our cousins to have a pajama party. We showed up to find everyone in pajamas except us!!!! I brought the boys pajamas, but didn't really plan on Ken and I participating. My sis-in-law went all out with matching pajamas for her whole family, elf pajamas ready for the boys, and she invited the cousins on the other side of the family to join in who came in matching pajamas too! Well, it just so happened she had an extra set of pajamas for me.... and we found a Santa costume for Ken so we all got cozy! After pizza we watched a Christmas movie and played board games. Super fun!

Puppies!

My friend from high school camp said her dog just had puppies and we quickly set up time to take the boys out for a visit. Logan was a bit concerned that they would bite him, but warmed up after awhile. I had so much fun catching up with an old friend too. Our time was cut short as I heard Ken sneezing and looked over to see Ken with puffy eyes. Guess we aren't getting a dog anytime soon :-)

Zoo trip

Fun afternoon at the zoo. Beautiful fall day. Love these boys

Science experiments

The boys got to build their own science lab at the local hardware store. It came with directions on how to use the lab and conduct your own experiments. When we got home our cousin came over and we pulled out all the ingredients to create a volcano and other fun experiments.

Basketball Tryouts

Nate is signed up for Basketball! The league I got him in had a little tryout day so they can figure out how everybody's skill level in order to place them on the appropriate team. He made his first two shots! WooHoooo! We are so excited for the season to start....

Halloween Fun

A little pre-Halloween fun at a Monster Mash with the boys. After school we raced out to visit Daddy at work and did a little trick or treating from cubicle to cubicle. The boys loved running up and down the aisle looking for the balloons attached to the candy bowls. We brought our neighbor friend too. Once we had more than enough candy, we went to the café which was setup with games for the kids. We drove home and did a little door to door trick or treating in the neighborhood and then joined our new neighbors for pizza. The boys loved running around with our little neighbor kid. It was hard to pull away, but Nathaniel was looking forward to hanging out with Uncle Stevie and Aunt Betsy so we headed out to a carnival at their church. We got there towards the end, but it was still a lot of fun. Nate and I ate through a plate of whip cream to eat gummy bears. The boys shot at moving targets with the dart guns, and we got to paint pumpkins! It was a crazy busy fun day!