Winter Wonderland

We received our first snow of the season yesterday. The kids were dying to out in the white fluffy stuff and play.
Porter wanted to get out his shovel and help mommy! They both LOVED eating the snow....don't worry it wasn't yellow snow...ha ha!

Snowball fight! Look at that fierce face!

Snow angel

Mr. Rosy Cheeks was ready to go inside by this point! :)

During the night the wind picked up and we are now in a blizzard warning so no playing outside today.....actually probably no leaving the house today! Here are a couple pics of the drifting snow on our deck area.

Santa Claus!

Today Stella, Porter and I headed to the mall to see Mr. Claus!!! :) They were excited and wore their Christmas outfits. I actually got a little shopping done, too!
They saw this reindeer right away when we walked in and thought he was so funny. Stella was climbing all over him! Running up to Santa to give him their lists. I meant to take a pic of Stella's list and now I'm too lazy to upload it! She wrote it out all by herself (I had to tell her how things were spelled). She asked for 5 things: Connect 4, a doll, make-up, wrapping paper (not sure why she wants this!!!) and a HOT TUB!!!!!! (I think that is a good present for Uncle Chris to give her!!!!!! :) Porter also asked for 5 things: blue cowboy hat, blue scissors, movie with spider, frogs and tigers in it (he means the Planet Earth box set, they are obsessed with this movie each time we are at Costco and Santa already has that picked up for him!), Batman, blue water gun and he added All Of Them! (which I guess means he wants every blue water gun on earth!) It was fun to hear what they wanted for Christmas and their crazy requests!!

Going over their lists.

Porter buttering up the ole jolly guy.

Stella making sure that Santa understands everything on her list.

Group photo!

Of course you can't go visit Santa and not ride the train!! Here they are waiting to buy their train tickets.

Choo choooooo!!!

Stella and Porter fight a lot lately! Today I was cleaning the house like a mad man and Porter didn't want a nap. We got the Pinocchio DVD a few days at the library so I let them watch that while I was cleaning. I came downstairs to find them on the couch like this. I about fell over, they were being so nice to each other! But as soon as the movie was over the bickering started up again! :)

Gobble, Gobble!

This year we hosted my side of the family for Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful time spending the day with family and the cousins had lots of fun playing together. We really didn't see much of them it seemed like, they are old enough to entertain themselves. Whoo hoo!! :)

The day before Thanksgiving the kids were helping me off and on in the kitchen. I was cutting up bread for the stuffing and Porter hopped out of the learning tower and ran up to his room telling me he had to get his tool to help. I wasn't real sure what he was talking about so I didn't pay it much attention! Well, he came back down and promptly waved his saw in my face and went to town cutting (sawing!!) the bread to "help" me! This kid is a crack up!
Mom and Dad came up on Wed evening and spent the night. Stella loved Nana's new "Fugs". Let's hope her feet never get this big!!! :)

I picked up a Pin The Hat On The Turkey game for the kiddos to play.... a little to the left, Porter!! :)

Mom and I.

Mom provided the dinner rolls (among other yummy things) for the Thanksgiving feast. She also made each grandchild an initial "roll" for them. They thought that was pretty cool!

Wes and Mike carving Tommy.

Kids table! :)

I found a cute place setting/napkin ring idea for Thanksgiving and made each person into a Pilgrim for their setting. They turned out pretty cute. Here is mom and dad's napkin rings.

We set up our dining room table in the sunroom area. It worked out great, lots of room for everyone and their expanding waist-lines!

Fashion Forward

Porter is rocking such a cool outfit today that I had to share. :) First he found his swim goggles and put them on all by himself (I think they need to be cleaned!!). Then he added his gardening gloves and his cowboy boots to finish the ensemble.

Drinking his juice in all of his accessories. (He is still wearing all of this stuff!).

One of Stella from this morning.

Stella wearing the mask she made the other day. For some reason she had been wanting to make a mask for the a few days and we finally got around to it. She loves looking at this pictures, she thinks she is so funny!!

And on a side note, P woke up puking last night! Fun!! Why does this always happen at nighttime? Anyway he seems to acting fine so far today, so keep your fingers crossed it was a short lived bug.

Cyclone Country!

Today we went to Cyclone Country to cheer our team to victory! This was Stella and Porter's first time attending an ISU football game and I think they had a lot of fun. They were really into the game the first half, but the second half they got a little antsy towards the end. It was a great game and the 'Clones won so we were happy!!!
Stella and Mike at the beginning of the game. Stella and Porter both loved yelling for the Cyclones. It was really funny listening to them! :)

The Cyclones getting ready to take the field! Porter rockin' his knit baseball hat at the game!

Me rockin' Porter's knit hat at the game! :)

Blank Park Zoo

We headed to the zoo this morning. Mom has been up here a few days this week helping paint at Sara's house, so today we invited Haydn to come along and play with us so she wouldn't be stuck at her house in all the mess! :) Dad happened to be up also so he came along with Stella, Porter, Haydn and I to the zoo. It was a great morning for the zoo and the animals were pretty active.

Crossing the swinging bridge.
Checking out the jelly fish.

Getting a pic of them from the other side of the jellyfish tank.

Checking out the flamingos.

Feeding the animals at the petting zoo. Haydn wouldn't feed them! Stella and Porter love the petting zoo.

This photo cracks me up of Haydn! The tiger kept coming RIGHT up to the glass and the kids would scream in glee! It was hysterical!

Stella and Haydn had so much fun with the hand dryer in the bathroom! It doesn't take much to entertain them!!!! :)

And the BIGGEST and BEST news of the day!!!! Porter went #2 on the potty---FINALLY! He is now TOTALLY potty trained!!!!! He's been doing great the last 6 weeks, apart from going #2 on the potty but today he did it and there is no looking back! I've had these whistle suckers tucked away as his "surprise" for going on the potty. They all thought they were very cool! Luckily they came in a pack of 4 since Haydn was here for the BIG DAY! :) So glad that my little boy is potty trained! Can I get a "woot, woot"!!!!!! Here they are playing some tunes on their whistle suckers!

Stella and Haydn all dressed up with no place to go since Porter is napping now we are stuck at home! :)

Jumpin' The Gun.......

The weather was super nice today that we decided to put up our Christmas lights!! We've never ever put them up this early and our neighbors were teasing us, but we figure it's better than doing it in the snow! We had our windows open today, a treat for us in November! :) The kids were excited to see the lights on, don't worry we just had them on to make sure they worked, we won't turn them on again until after Thanksgiving. I haven't put up any other Christmas stuff, although the kids already have their snowflake window clings in the windows! The kids spent the weekend in MA with mom and dad, they got home later this afternoon. I know they had a great time with Nana and Papa!

Mike waving from his perch on top of the house!