Just Some fun Pics

Dancing in her St. Patrick's Day best!

Doing a jig!

Cute

We have been very into face painting lately and pull it out whenever possible! 

Liesl and her good friend Zoe having some breakfast.

Notice the face paint again.

Speeeeeed!

Today we went out to Uncle Jim's to try out snowmobiling with Benjamin.  He had a little lesson from Uncle Jim then very quickly got comfortable enough to zoom around the lake on his own (he informed us later that he reached 70mph ugh!).  Liesl even road on the machines, which is pretty impressive since she really does not like loud noises.  I think the fact that she had my cousin's pink helmet made everything happy!

This may have been B's favorite activity of the whole visit.  Big thanks to Jim and Jodie for letting us play with the snowmobiles for an afternoon!  It was so cold outside that my camera battery died before getting a good video, bummer!

Benjamin Visits!

Liesl's  cousin Benjamin is visiting from Florida this week.  He has not really experienced snow or cold weather much so we are trying to do as many things as we can to give him a good taste of MN winter fun!  We started out with sledding in the 25-50mph gusts of wind and 15 degree weather (why not?).  Then somehow I convinced Dave and Benjamin to do the Polar Bear Plunge!  This entails you and about 800 other crazy people to jump in to Lake Superior!  The temp was around 15 and they had to clear the ice chunks out of the jumping area.  We quickly made phone calls to raise the required funds, for the Special Olympics (no this was not just for kicks, it was a great cause).  I think Benjamin could definitely be a Minnesotan (if only we could get him to zip up his jacket!). A great first 2 days don't you think!?

Benjamin was really questioning our sanity as we made him put on layer after layer after layer.  When we got outside he began to understand.

Whoa!!!

10 for originality 8 for skill

Minnesota fashion!

Liesl went into hyper show and tell mode the moment B arrived! 

toasty toes

learning letters - what a good cousin!

Through the polar bear to the lake!

Check out the Slush!!!  Brrrrrr!

Here They Go!!!!!!!!

Still smiling and alive afterward!

Winter Fun!

Winter is flying by.  We have been having so much fun skiing, making forts, doing art projects, and learning to fly.  Liesl and Dave spend many weekend mornings jumping off of things in every fashion you can imagine trying to get lift off.  Here is a hodge podge of photos for you.

Beautiful night for playing outside in the fluff!

snow in the eyes!

we have dug a snow fort around our largest tree in the yard.

when you are in the fort you must hide from every person walking by,  so this means most time is spent on the ground .

what a great winter for playing outside!!

Liesl has also been doing cross-country ski lessons this year.  The program is really fun.  The very last day there is a race for the kids and Liesl rocked it! If you notice one ski is broken, lucky for us that happened after the race or we might have had a real problem.  So I guess since she loves it so much we are now looking for "fast skis" as Liesl likes to call them.

She was soooooo proud of finishing the race.  It was 1/2 K through the woods, without us.  She just took off and about 5 minutes later there she was racing for the finish line with a huge grin on her face. 

Sad ski, I guess we won't be handing these down to anyone!

Liesl has also decided that she will be an Artist when she grows up.  So we have been practicing many different kinds of art.  This day we were sculptors.

Concentration!

Liesl named each sculpture.  This is Star Flower.

From Left to Right - Curl Cottage, Star Flower, Cake Top, Fairy Twinkle Star, and Twinkle Cottage.

Sunny New Year!

Here we are in Florida visiting Dave's family.  We had a wonderful trip filled with family time and fun.  The weather cooperated and was just perfect for our MN bodies!  Sunshine and 70ish every day.  I have posted some highlights of our trip.  To be sure this is just skimming the surface of the wonderful time we had.  Huge thanks to Karen and Chris for hosting the whole crew.  We always feel so welcome and at home when visiting.  And thanks to Gram and Pop Pop for helping us get there!  As Liesl gets older it is more and more fun to visit, and more and more important to us for her to see her family that is so far away.  Thanks to everyone.  We miss you already.

Here is the gang. 

I love this photo, because this is how it really is! 
Check out Pop Pop and Jonathan's death stares (what on earth!)

Blue Springs Park - this is where many manatees go to get warm.
 The manatee count for the day was 271!  It was very cool

It is hard to see how big they are in photos.  I think they look like surfboards!

Liesl and her cousins.

Dave and Alexander

Jeff and Zhen. 

Jonathan got some caterpillars and while we were there they came out of the cocoons.
  It was time to release them to the warm Florida sunshine.

Watching the butterflies fly away.

This sums up Liesl and Jonathan's relationship.  They were absolutely inseparable the whole week.
  I have never seen two people get along so well.  Imaginations ran wild!  Cardboard boxes were a huge source of entertainment, used as sleeping bags, wings, rollers, pokers, tables you name it!

This turtle was also a huge hit.  They filled it with water and dirt and woodchips,
 and here they are sailing in a rubbermaid container. 

Screaming because the boat was tipping!

I believe the sticks with various bowls and toys hanging from them are the lost and found trees.

Zhen picked out a beading kit for Liesl for Christmas.

The decisions were difficult.

Ta Da!  The finished products.

Here we all are for the De Leon Springs Half Marathon and 5k. 
Dave, Karen, Chris and I all ran the 1/2 marathon.  The boys and Craig and Pop Pop ran/walked the 5 k.

Dave finishing strong, spares a wave for the camera.

Yay!!!  I made it, and with a smile too!

Just Checking to make sure our medals were indeed gold! 

After the race photo.

Dave ended up 11th overall and 2nd in his age group.

What is a trip to Florida without picking grapefruit and oranges!

Yum!