story telling

On some of those cold days my kids love sitting in front of the heater together to warm up.  This particular time Nolan actually sat on Gracie's lap and she told him stories.  Too cute!

make over

Gracie's idea of a makeover does not always include clothes and make-up.  This time she said she wanted to do a make-over with Nolan which meant making over his stomach I guess...

he was a willing participant!

Happy Visit Birthday

Last week Sheila & Breckyn came out to visit.  It's very rare that we get Sheila for more then a weekend so we got to put a lot of fun into our time.  We shopped a lot, we had great Chicago food, we had movie nights, troy and I had a date, and for my birthday we went to the Shedd Aquarium.  It was a fun busy week.  We were very sad to see them go!

 movie night watching Frozen

 our visit to the Shedd

 Gracie loved using the map

 spider fish thing so gross

 lots of touching

we get to see lots of divers feeding the fish even the sharks

 oh pictures are so interesting.  I can take several.

this one gracie is posing weird, I have no idea 

what she is doing and nolan cheesy cheese

 oh this was good hurry get nolan

 and then we get this nolan with a look of disgust.

yeah big fish

Birthday

Gracie attended her first birthday party of the year.  She got to make a craft, eat pizza, enjoy her first Barbie cake, and play with friends.  It was a fun way to spend our Saturday morning.

Cincinnati

At the end of February I loaded up the car and headed to Cincinnati with the kids.  Troy had lots to do  and my mom had being bagging us to come so we did.  It was nice time to catch-up and have a low key time with family.

snuggle time with pappi

a cheesy lunch

There is this store in Milford that I love all vintage clothes and apparel.

You can find some of the coolest things in here and I love exploring 

through all the racks.  Who doesn't love vintage?!

getting sometime at the park

I even put in a few hours helping clean out the basement and got to see my friend molly as a surprise. I turned our Skype meeting into a live meeting.  I love surprising friends for some love and catch up time!!

Mini Vacation Continued...

After our fun days in Madison, the 3 adults and 4 kids piled into our van and headed about an hour and a half further north.  Her husband Josh was going to take and early day from work and meet us up at the cabin.  If you are at all familiar with Wisconsin we were about 30 minutes past the Dells.

Short Story:
My husband has never been pulled over for speeding and he likes to gloat.  One our way up to the cabin Troy got pulled over by one of those cool under cover cop cars.  The cop came to the passengers side of the car and just stated matter of fact like that he was deputy and was on the traffic control task force.  He stated "sir you were speeding, can I see you license and insurance please.  Your from Illinois, I will issue a situation and try to help you out."  He then walked away.  He was not rude at all just very factual.  When he came back he brought his speed gun and showed Troy what he clocked him at in a 55.  Then he told us the ticket based on speed should have been $295 but he issued Troy a missing seat belt ticket and that is only $10 with no points against his record and if we wanted to dispute it we could.  I was so happy I almost hugged the guy.  He then proceeded to find out or weekend destination and explain how the area in which we were headed was pretty cool.  This was the strangest encounter I have ever had with a cop(not that there is a lot) and I was very happy for the end result.

On with our awesome weekend unclouded by the recent ticket cost.  We got to a cabin and don't think Cabin think gorgeous house on the lake.  I would live there.  We had a great week relaxing, catching up, playing, and swimming. Enjoy the pictures below!

my version of a link log cabin

 gracie's

 the allotment had a workout area, basketball court, and mini water park

perfect for us and empty in the mornings, the kids loved it!

 sorry all of these are per my iPhone

 warming up in the hot tub

iPad time

an adventure walk on the frozen lake

yes this scared the mess out of the mommies

you can't go to a cabin without having smores

cuddle time