Michelle's Birthday

On Friday, March 8th we celebrated Michelle's birthday by going out for pizza and having cake and ice cream at our house afterwards. We went to a new (new to us) place for pizza, Fireside Pizza. It was a bit chaotic and I wasn't surprised. The kids do pretty well going out with us, but the added excitement of having a friend along put things over the edge. We were all much more comfortable hanging out at our house together afterwards! :)

3 Candles--one for each of them

Blowing out the candles with a little help!

 Michelle is due on the 14th and we are very excited to meet Liam's baby brother!

Musikgarden

Our church has a music class offered for kids ages 0-5 called Musikgarden. Last Thursday (3/7/13) they hosted an open house for kids from 6-6:30pm. It was a Pajama party, so the kids got to wear their PJs. It was so much fun--we sat in a circle (while Nora walked around in the middle of the circle and said hi to everyone). We sang songs...the kids got to play with sticks, shakers and scarves!

I would love to sign the kids up for a class, but most of them are during the week (during the day) or Saturday mornings, when we have swimming lessons.

Video

For some reason this video didn't work the first time. I hope this works!

Videos of Bishop at Maia's bday party

These are my 2 favorite videos from Maia's birthday party. I can't figure out how to rotate the first one, so I apologize about that--I must have recorded it sideways.

These 2 videos make me laugh every time I watch them!

Weekend

We had a very good weekend! It was a lot of fun with lots of time together as a family and with friends!

Friday night I went out with my Sanofi-Aventis friends. There were 9 of us at dinner and it was so fun to catch up with everyone! It is a diverse group of women, which makes our times together even more fun. I'm so glad we still get together!! Of the 9 of us there, there's only 1 that still works for SA.

Val, Carla, Kim, Lacey, Jean, Joan, Jane, Marie and Marsha and Baby Kate too! :)

Saturday morning brought Bishop's first swimming lesson. We went home and Nora took a nice long nap (3 hours)....Bishop on the other hand, did not nap. He did clean his room though! :) Luke went skiing while the kids napped, so when they woke up I took the kids for a walk to the library. Bishop walked all the way to the library and on the way home he walked until we were 4 blocks from home--he wanted to ride.....and he fell asleep immediately after getting into the stroller!

He checked out a bunch of books at the library and was literally reading them while he was walking home! I love that he loves to read! 

Saturday night Jesse, Nina and Jack came over for dinner and to play. The kids had a blast together! Jack taught both kids (especially Bishop) how to slide down the stairs on his tummy and go real fast! Bishop probably did it 10+ times and Nora laughed every time! It was the first thing Bishop asked to do on Sunday morning...."Mom, come watch me slide down on my bellybutton"!

The 3 kids took a bath together, which was pretty cute as well! It was a fun time!

Sunday morning we went out for breakfast at The Edina Grill after church. 

I told Bishop to look at me so I could take his picture and this is what he does....in the restaurant! Goof ball!

Bishop making a fish face!

Bishop napped after brunch, while this was Nora's day not to nap (she took a capnap on the way home from brunch). When Bishop woke up we went for a walk to Sebastian Joe's for icecream!

Sunday night we went to the Hennum's for dinner. It was fun to play with Siena and Maia. They are watching Liana's parents dog, Dakota. Nora hasn't had a lot of exposure to dogs and she was quite scared...she held on to me for dear life! She wasn't crying or screaming, but she did not want me to let her go. She became more comfortable and was even feeding Dakota her dinner! ;)

Like I said--it was a very fun weekend with our family and friends! I'm already looking forward to next weekend!

Bishop's First Swimming Lesson

Bishop had his first swimming lesson on Saturday morning. We told him ahead of time that mom and dad wouldn't be getting in the water with him and that made him very nervous!! I didn't know what to expect that morning--he said his tummy hurt (nerves) and he stood pretty close to Luke. There are 4 kids in the class, 2 boys and 2 girls and it seems as though they've all been in lessons before.

The teacher (Miss Sarah) asked the kids to sit at the side of the pool to start--Bishop was pretty reluctant until the teacher asked him if he wanted to play with toys! That's all it took and then he was fine and he did awesome!

Staying close to dad before lessons

They learned how to get in and out of the water, they did the back float and they swam to their favorite toys (with and without a noodle), they also got to jump in the water a few times. Bishop did awesome! He does not like floating on his back, so I was nervous about that--but he did just fine--he was a good listener and he had a lot of fun!

Playing with the toys, singing a song and dunking water on themselves!

Leraning to get in the water

Swimming with his noodle to get his toys

I had intended to bring Nora to the daycare room, but it didn't open until 8 and I didn't want to miss any of Bishop's lesson, so she sat and watched his lesson and she did great! She sat with me for about 1/2 the time, got a little antsy and then sat with Luke.

Swimming without the noodle

After Bishop's lesson we all went swimming together for another 1/2 hour. Both kids had a blast!

After some more swimming we checked out the play area that Bishop can go to for "daycare" while we "workout". It is awesome! There's a Castle to climb up and 3 big slides to go down. There was even a little area for Nora to climb up and go down the slide by herself--she got a big kick out of that! The room is for 3 years and up, but Nora was able to play because we were with her. She even got to go down the big slides a few times with mom and dad!

Nora going down the smaller slide

Nora's turn to go down the big slide-she was all smiles!

One time we all went down together as a family, which was fun!

Bishop, I am so proud of you! You did awesome in your first swimming lesson....all by yourself!! Your love for life shines on! I LOVE it!

Nora eating yogurt

Good Morning from Nora!