New Hats and Haircuts!

It was Linnea's turn to get her haircut last Friday and my turn on Tuesday while she was at preschool...here is the result of mine...nothing too major just thinned out and trimmed, layered a bit more and the bangs are fixed.

Harper got an adorable homemade gift in the mail from my cousin Kim and her family. You wouldnt guess from this picture that Harper likes it but she does and so do we! We also got two nice burp rags which are totally needed with this spitter we have! Thank you Kim!

Happy Thanksgiving!

My dad and I started Thanksgiving off with a very fun turkey trot at Battle Creek Regional Park. We are used to skiing here and know it is a beautiful place with many trails! Many hilly trails so we were a bit worried about running here, but the course ended up not being so bad and we didnt have to walk nearly as much as anticipated!

  

After the run I went home to get the rest of the family, the food and of course get myself ready! We made it back to my parents around noon and we were eating at about one. And as usual, the food was delicious! All the traditional treats were there...the bird, stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn casserole and green bean casserole (both made by me), cranberries, rolls and then of course pie.

We had pie later on when I was actually hungry again so that worked out well for me. Im not sure about everyone else :) In between, the kids played inside and we even headed outside for a walk and playtime at the park. 

We ended the fun day with Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and eating the dip/spreads I also brought over. Erik and I also packed up plenty of leftovers! Yum!

I couldn't be more thankful for such a wonderful family...especially these two little ladies.

I have a few more pictures to add...but as I was uploading I was told I had no more storage space which seems weird...so I will ask Chris about that :)

Turkey Crafts

We have done a few turkey crafts on our own here at home...most of the Thanksgiving crafts were done on our trip with our family but I saved these to do just with Linnea...one of them would have been far too messy and the other one I dont think I had enough supplies. So here are our turkeys:

this guy is made on cardboard and we used popcorn kernels, lentils, rice, sliced almonds and fruit loops! fun to do using just we had on hand.

and here we have a glittery turkey made with glitter glue, contact paper and construction paper...again just using what we had on hand. I LOVE crafts and am so proud of Linnea for working so hard on these and pretty much on her own. She is usually not nearly as excited about these things as me but does them anyways and does enjoy them in the end :)

Ian's 5th Birthday

Happy 5th Birthday Ian!

We had a great time jumping and going down slides at the bounce house and eating pizza and cake and watching this great lil guy open his presents! Cant believe he is 5! I remember going to his 2nd birthday party!

Woodbury Lakes Holiday Open House & Lefse Weekend

The girls and I had our second first whole weekend with daddy working 36 hours in 3 days. We kept super busy so it flew by but we missed daddy at the fun events. Friday morning Linnea had tumbling and then we got her haircut for the holidays! We went on a little evening walk before supper, shows and waiting for daddy to come home.

her new hair...mostly its just shorter and the stylist did this pretty braid :)

Saturday morning I scrambled around the house packing up stuff for our day and night at grandma and papa's. We stopped at the Central Library to see the Zoomobile on our way to Woodbury. We had lunch with my parents and then wanted to visit GG but turns out there is flu-like illness going around GG's floor (and she actually had it on Friday) so us girls headed back to my parents so Linnea could nap before our fun evening.

The zookeeper holding/showing us a chincilla! so cute!

Our fun evening was dinner with my aunts, uncles and cousins and then heading to Woodbury Lakes Shopping Center's Holiday Open House. That's kind of a mouthful :) We have been going to this the last three years and I absolutely LOVE it! The weather was soooo much warmer this year than the years past so it was much busier and we didn't get to ride the reindeer drawn sleigh, BUT we did get pictures with Frosty and Rudolph, danced to the Okee Dokee Brothers, ate mini donuts, welcomed Santa and saw an amazing fireworks show set to Christmas music.

waiting for Santa!

still waiting...

Here he is!!

not loving the festivities...pretty sure this was fireworks time.

waiting for the fireworks!

decided to just go to sleep.

loving the fireworks this year! Last year daddy had to take her into a store.

and the big tree is lit!

After all the festivities we headed back to my parents for our sleepover. Linnea crawled into uncle Bob's chair and he read two bedtime stories to her.

Harper smiled and almost giggled for my mom.

All those smiles and near giggling was hard work! Goodnight!

Sunday we made lefse! Cheryl and Dwight and their kids came out to help...it still took all day but we love doing it and carrying on such a special and delicious tradition :)

Professional Pics

Remember about 12 or so weeks ago when I was 37 weeks pregnant? Well we had professional family pictures taken by a friend of ours and I am finally going to post them...all of them so warning this a post of 25 pics! Sorry it took sooo long! This is all of them and we love them! I made an album with them and now have to get some up on the walls. 

We plan to get more Harper really soon for our Christmas card and Harper's birth announcement which sadly hasn't gotten done. Linnea's was also combine on a Christmas card ;)