Easter

The Saturday before Easter we went to Granny Louw's for a visit so Charl could finalize their taxes. Granny had an Easter goodie bag for Anders and Holly. Anders got a chocolate "race car", which he absolutely loved. Holly has a nose for candy...as you'll see in many of her pictures, she is always holding candy and trying to figure out how to open the wrapper.

This is for me? Thank you!

This is a really cool car! Thanks Granny.

Tastes good, too!

The kids Easter baskets. They got books, flip-flops and sunglasses. Holly's shoes were too small, so I'll have to exchange them. I made the chocolate covered peanut butter eggs. That was the first thing that Holly grabbed! I had to take it away from her because it was making a mess on the carpet. Andersen still hasn't eaten his candy because he's been sick. He wasn't feeling well and he came down with a fever and ear infection. I'm trying my hardest not to eat ALL of his candy.

Holly is raiding Anders' basket while he is consumed with his stickers.

Anders is saying I don't want to wear pink glasses.

More candy.

Carrying this basket is a lot of work.

"Mommy, open this one, please."

Interested in candy more than posing for an Easter picture.

Anders checking out his basket.

He loved his book of stickers. It kept him fairly quiet during church.

On the hunt.

Sharing the love with cousin Gwen.

Valentine's Day 2009!

Last year I tried taking a cute picture of the kids on Valentine's Day. Well, I took a lot of pictures, but the kids didn't have the same idea of "cute" as I did. This year, I thought I'd give it another try, but this time the camera is to blame. It died. For the past few months, it has been acting up, but it would mostly work. Now it is really dead, so I have no pictures for this post.

This is how the kid's day went:

Andersen got a special present from Mommy. I bought him a Lightening McQueen car a few weeks ago, but Charl didn't want me to just give it to him for no reason, so I used Valentine's Day as my reason. I love this little boy and I knew the car would make him so happy and Valentine's Day is for making the special people in your life happy. We should have bought him one at Christmas, and for whatever reason, we didn't. (He got a set that had Doc, Sally, Chick, Mater, Filmore, & Guido.) He's been obsessing about the McQueen car ever since because 2 of his cousins have the car and he was always so sad when he had to leave it behind when he went home. Now he has real races between McQueen, Chick, and The King.

Holly spent the day miserable suffering from a bad cold. Her nose was non-stop dripping. She started running away from us as we'd chase her with a tissue. She didn't have an appetite and was really fussy, however Motrin did give her a little relief. On a positive note, one of her top teeth broke through. A few days shy of fourteen months...and now 2 1/4 teeth...doesn't make for easy eating. The other 3 top teeth should hopefully pop through any day. Oh, I did get Holly a little gift, too; some cute hair barrettes.

This is how Charl and my day went:

In the morning, Charl decided to make us all some waffles, but we were out of pancake mix. He looked in a cookbook and found a recipe and made some delicious waffles. I don't think I'll ever buy pancake mix again...these were sooooo much better. After breakfast, I had a basketball game at the church. Charl stayed home with the kids...if Holly wasn't sick, they probably would have come to watch. It was the first round of the Stake Tournament and we won. Next week, we will have a much tougher opponent...the team we lost to in the finals of the Regional Tournament last year. Then we just had a lazy day...I think everyone napped except me, but I should have napped. I think we were starting to catch Holly's cold. We decided to get take out, so we went to Chili's. I had Monterey Chicken (my favorite) and Charl got a steak, but we shared and got the best of both. Andersen got pizza and chocolate milk while Holly wasn't really interested in eating. I was going to make some cinnamon rolls or mint brownies to go with our take-out, but that never happened. I can't believe we had a Valentine's Day dinner without dessert, specifically chocolate...I think that is a sin! (I'm typing this a few days after Valentine's and I definitely have Holly's cold. When I'm better, I'm going to get my chocolate!!!) Charl got me flowers...red, pink, and white tulips. They are very pretty today now that they have all opened up. I always tell Charl not to spend money on flowers, but he loves giving them to me, so I'm happy to enjoy the beauty they bring into our home. Thanks! I love you, Charl.

Sunday Before Christmas

December 21st: the Sunday before Christmas. The morning was a little hectic as always...trying to get ready for 11 am church. Charl had to be there early to practice with the choir, but he came back to help me load the kids in the car and get back to church (Advantages to living 100 yards from the church...and yes, we drive when there is snow.). I dressed the kids in their new outfits. Holly's new shirt had a hole in the sleeve...oh well, she wore it anyway! Andersen probably could have used a smaller sized sweater, but he'll be able to wear it next winter, too. I was worried about how well I'd be able to handle the kids while Charl was singing in the choir, but it actually went pretty well and the choir sounded great, too. We sat in the back overflow and I brought a "new" truck for Andersen to play with and that seemed to do the trick. After church and naps we headed to Granny & Grandpa Louw's house to celebrate Holly's birthday with everyone. Granny also pulled out the costume box and we acted out the Nativity. Here are some pictures from the day.

The birthday girl getting lots and lots of attention from her cousins (Zane, Micah, & Emily).

Anders with Zane and Izak.

Silly Boys!

The best dressed wise men you will ever see!

Big shepherd and Little shepherd.

A whole family of shepherds.

Holly's thinking "Another cake?" and "What a big candle!" Andersen just isn't sure he can wait for the Happy Birthday Song to end.

Holly finding and eating chocolate cake crumbs from the seat of the highchair.

Opening lots of fun presents from Granny & Grandpa, the Pews, and Aunt Teresa.

Holly and Zane playing with Holly's new toy...Clipo Table.

At the end of the night I tried to get a nice family picture taken so that I could use it in a Christmas card, but Anders never seems to cooperate in "nice" family pictures. Charl was tossing him up in the air and catching him...so we got a lot of pictures of him laughing, but we didn't get a picture of him smiling and sitting nicely. Someday I may get a "nice" family photo. For those reading this, you may be wondering where that Christmas card is...yeah, it never got made, but we still hope you had a very Merry Christmas and we wish you peace, love and happiness in the New Year.

Odds and Ends of Holiday Fun

These pictures are some odds and ends from Thanksgiving and the few weeks after.

1- TRAINS: Andersen loves trains. So he decided to make a train using my cake pans. He's so creative. Notice how the nut chopper is the "smokestack."

2- Granny Louw bought gingerbread kits for the kids to do after Thanksgiving dinner, but we never got around to doing them. So she gave our family one of the kits to do. We attempted to build our train last Friday night. Andersen soooooo loved the candy and frosting.






3 - Decorating the house and tree. This year I kept most of my decorations in the boxes. This is all I have decorated on the main level. We put our tree in the basement, so that it would remove some of the temptation. It's not a very sturdy tree and we were worried that it would fall over when little hands got a hold of it. We hope to buy a bigger, more sturdy tree for next year for our main family room. I miss looking at the tree and the lights, since we spend more time upstairs than down.


4- Thanksgiving Day. I really didn't take many pictures on this day, but I did get some "dessert" pictures. Gwen got to lick the beaters from the whipped cream and she was sharing with Holly. I got Andersen eating his pie which. by the way, was the only thing he ate that day. I also had to document Granny eating her "killer" pie. It had caramel, macadamia nuts, pumpkin, cream cheese and who know what else. The caramel set up too much and it was too hard to cut or put a fork through it, so you just had to pick it up and eat it.

Granny's "KILLER" pie.