Floatilla Fun!

Birthday Celebrations!

We headed up north to enjoy some time at Alicia's cabin this weekend. We celebrated Liesl's birthday with swimming and cake (she preferred the icecream). We then watched the 4th of July boat parade. Dave thought this was one of the strangest things ever. So here are a few photos for those of you who have never seen this sort of thing before. All of the people get dressed up and probably drink lots of "stuff". Then they head off around the lake gathering more and more boats to follow at a steady 5 miles per hour or so! It is a riot. My favorite float boats this year were the Mexican Fiesta boat (for the 4th of July, hmmmm?) And then to top it off there was the boat with a man dressed in complete army fatigues and sitting behind a camoflauge blind shooting his b.b.gun in the air. Amusing? Frightening? I am not sure!

Superior Little Lady Turns 2!!!!!

Wow. What an amazing 2 years. Liesl is so full of life and laughter, and tears but mostly laughter. We are all enjoying the whirlwind of learning and testing that goes along with growing up. Liesl loves to go to the park and usually asks to go swinging and sliding the moment she wakes up in the morning (usually 5:30 a.m.). She also is in love with bugs and worms, but still really loves dresses and pink and purple. So we have requested that Nana make a worm shaped cake for our little b-day gathering (gluten free of course). I can't imagine what we ever did before Liesl, and I love that!!!!

Girls who Hike!

Fun times at the river! My girlfriends and Liesl's girlfriends, Erin, Isla, Erin and Esmae, Liesl and I all went for a little creek walk and dip in the coooooold water. It was fairly short lived due to the bugs. Then back to the yard for some playtime! We are having a great summer in our new house.

Just some nice pics!

Smile!

My two monkeys!

My Little Yogini!

Liesl and I love to stretch and do yoga together. She is much better than I am at many of the poses but I have more focus, I think.

Bootiful!

Spring is "bootiful". Above you can see a photo of one of our trees, an ornamental crab apple, the robins love it! At one point I counted 18 robins in the tree at one time!!! I have never seen anything like it. We went for a little walk down the street to check out the waterfalls (we can hear them from the yard). They are really rushing and roiling with all the melting. The photo does not do it justice.

Interesting.

Cute eh!

Books Books and more Books!

Liesl loves reading books (thank goodness). It will be so neat to all relax and read books by the fireplace someday. In the meantime we will continue to read animal books and enjoy the learning process. Here is Liesl's rendition of one of our favorites.

Spring Mud!

Here is Liesl doing her favorite thing these days, playing in the mud puddles. We play in the mud pit that is our alley right now every chance we get. Believe it or not this dress did not get a speck on it!

Everybody Deserves a Lifetime!

I am using this blog space not for photos of Liesl (for the first time) but to send out a note about an amazing fund raising event I am participating in this September. I am walking in the Breast Cancer 3 Day Walk. This is a 60 mile walk all over the Twin Cities to raise awareness and funds for breast cancer research, education and early detection. I have to raise at least $2,200 to participate so if you feel inclined please visit my web page at www.the3day.org then click on donate now and enter my name as the participant. Every dollar helps. Some of you may have already received emails about this. Please at least check out the site.

I am very excited about this event and hope that you can find it in your hearts/pocketbooks to support me if you can.

xoxoxoxox
Jodie, Dave and Liesl :)

Happy Spring!!!

We in the Cope-Schaeffer family really love celebrating the seasonal changes. The spring equinox is upon us. So enjoy the celebration of spring while you eat your lovely eggs and chocolate bunnies and think about the fertile ground springing up with new life!
ps. auntie manda and uncle brian I love my stickers!

Incredible edible eggs!

I love dying eggs but I don't like eating blue and green eggs the next day (what exactly is in those little pellets and packets). I decided to look into natural dyes and foods for egg coloring and here are my masterpieces (no hot pink or teal blue but they are beautiful anyhow). All I used was different combinations of onion skins, cabbage leaves, tumeric and beets!

Smile!

Liesl and her many faces. Enjoy!

Scrub-a-dub

Bath time is the best! Especially with the "california baby" bath bubbles with the bubble wand!!!!

The Gal Pals

Here are Liesl and her friend Isla. We always snap bunches of photos of these two but never seem to get both of them looking and smiling. What do people with twins do?

Tiny Dancer

Liesl (okay mom and dad) always love getting the next installment of fashionable hand-me-downs from her cousins. We have not needed to buy a single item of clothing thanks to the many bins saved in Auntie Alicia's closet (it is slowly emptying now).
This little number inspired Liesl to dance and twirl all day.

Baa Baa Black Sheep

Liesl loves to sing songs and baa baa black sheep is an absolute favorite along with twinkle twinkle little star and the abc's. Notice they all have the same tune. She doesn't sing all of the words but it sure is cute! Here is her rendition along with some action from the little woolen sheep. Enjoy the show!

Drinkin' and lookin' like it!

Liesl thinks that she is really cool drinking out of the "big girl glass" we were cracking up at the sight of her drinking out of her little root beer glass with her hair a-flyin'(it is not beer it is Kefir, a yogurt drink)