Spring is here!!!!!!!!!!

Spring is finally here. I had to try out my new camera and got some pretty good shots of some flowers.

This is how I found my daughter after nap. She changed her clothes to stripy shirt, stripy pants and stripy socks. She even has a stripy bunny. Now I just have to find a stripy pacifier.

More stripes later on.

Bowling night

Lillian is a chocoholic

Lillian likes her chocolate (she got that from me...smile).

My hubby

Just look at this picture and focus on my husband's nose and his hair.

Look at the nose again. Yes, it is broken. He broke it during a basketball game. Or should I say it was shattered. The nose was actually a bit more to the side. Andrew put it back...ahhhhhhhhhhhhh! The little cut you can see was cause by the bone cutting through...grose.

"Surgery" a week later. It took the surgeon only 10 minutes to put it back.

Now, look at the hair again.

What do you call this stage? Midlife crisis? It is kind of cute.

SMILE

Girl time

Lillian likes to do everything what I do. So when I got ready for a date with daddy, Lillian watched me intensely. Of course, she wanted to try the makeup too. I did let her use my lipstick. She was so proud!

Yes, it has been quite a while since I posted on my blog. NO excuses. I try to be better.

Lillian decide to have tea party this morning. We are totally snowed in and so we need to keep busy indoors. I have been taking a tone of pictures of the kids, because we got a new camera, a Nikon D 90. I absolutely love it. The pictures are amazing. I am still learning.

What a smile!!!

Peach Vanilla Freezer Jam

I never made jam in my life before. So when I had these organic peaches left over (they were a bit too hard to eat) I knew what to do. It took me about 2 hours to make 5 jars. And my goodness is there a lot of sugar in there.
I put a bit of vanilla in. I heard about that on public radio. I hope the kids will like it.

24 hour camping trip

We decided to go camping this last weekend.Yeah!!! Our dear friends Paul and Nicole, and their 3-year-old daughter Georgia decided to join us in this fun. We were lucky enough to borrow a camper from another friend. This meant access to a air-condition, shower, toilet, refrigerator...and try beds!!! Total luxury!!!!! The daddies were supposed to sleep outside in a tent. It took us about a day to load the camper. You would have thought we are leaving for a 2 week trip - not a 2 night outing.

And so the story begins...
Everyone arrived Friday at lunchtime at Hickory Hills campground in Wisconsin. The parents set up camp, and everyone had a really fun day a the beach. Of course the kids had not napped and at around 5-6pm they started to get a bit cranky. The adults thought : yeah, a whole evening without kids!!! So wrong!
The 3-year-old decided she wanted to go home. She had no intention of sleeping in a camper. The 2-and 4-year-old did not show any interest in sleeping yet and kept peeping out of the camper window. So their parents decide to get them up again and let them run off a bit more steam. They also got to eat a couple more roasted marshmallows (which in Lillian's case was probably a bad idea). At about 8:30 pm the mommies tried the whole going to bed scenario again. The 3-year-old did fall asleep eventually. The 4-year-old wanted to go to sleep, but his 2-year-old sister was bouncing up the walls (overtired + roasted marshmallows...dah). It did not help that they both had to sleep in one bed. At about 9:30pm the mommies were sick of being eaten up by a million chicken size mosquitoes and decided to join their munchkins. One mommy(myself) cramped herself next to the 2-and 4-year-old (which were both still awake). The 2-year-old kept pocking her mommy in the face until the daddies came to bed. They had decided to also sleep in the camper. One Daddy(Andrew) somehow cramped himself next to the 2-year old, the 4 year old and the mommy. They slept opposite ways (I had Andrew's feet in my face all night). After a couple screaming episodes the 2-year-old fell asleep.
So imagine inside one camper there was one full size bed with 2 adults + a 2-and 4-year-old, one twin bed with 2 adults and one twin bed wit one 3-year-old( I don't know how she got that gig). Shortly after midnight everyone was surprised to hear lightening, thunder and rain. They did NOT expected this kind of weather that night. It turned out to be quite a storm. One poor daddy(Paul) was sent into the pouring rain to save children's books, toys... It rained until early morning. Nobody(other than the children) was able to sleep. The kids woke up somewhat chipper and of course hungry at 6-7am. The mommies and daddies were so tired after that night that not even a huge pot of coffee could help them. The campground situation was not much better. The mosquito tent was broken by the storm and the camping area resembled a swamp. Mommies and daddies had enough. The idea of a hot(92 degrees), muggy, wet, muddy, mosquito, no sleep, whiny kids day totally turned them of. They packed up their camp stuff and were home before lunchtime.

And that is our 24 hour camping trip. We still had lots of fun and lots of laughs. We are not discouraged and will be trying this in the next couple months again.

I also have to add at this point that it all was for the better good. Lillian woke up on Saturday night with a fever of 103 degrees. I could not imagine spending a night with a miserable, sick 2 year old toddler in a camper with 6 more individuals.

Lillian's 2nd birthday!!!!!!!!!!

Lillian had her 2nd birthday on Tuesday. Yeah! It rained all day, but we still had so much fun. Especially considering the fact that Grandma came to visit.
Here is Lillian before the cake.

Here she is after the cake. Yummy barley chocolate cake!!! The cake was a new experiment of mine. It turned out to be absolutely delicious.

Bubble time!

Oliver, Lillian and Grandma in the Thomas tent reading books.

My babies

Lillian will turn 2 years next Tuesday!!!!!! I cannot believe how the time just flew by.

My little goofball...almost 4 years old.

Ahhhhhhhhh.....

My first official race!

Yeah!!! I finished my first official race. 20 kilometers-12.6 miles I believe. It rained up to the 7th mile. It was a great first race. Not too hot, not too cold. Stupidly, I forgot my inhaler (left it at the hotel) so I had to run extra slow. It took me 2 hours and 28 minutes. Next time I am shooting for around 2 hours. Still, I am so exited that I did it!!!

I had wonderful company. Here are Tracy (my sister-in-law), me, Kristi (a friend of Tracy and now a friend of mine) and Dee (my sister-in-law).

Tracy and I cleaned up nice after the race-Didn't we? We went to a wedding of one of Andrew's college friends. It was a beautiful party with some monsoon -like rain.

Ine of these very rare pictures. Me and my hubby Andrew.
Tracy with her hubby Matt (Andrew's brother)