January 2008--The year in review!

January was a long cold month! We had much craziness, stuck inside...lots of special reading time, and fun outside playing with Daddy in the snow!

February brought a last minute weekend trip to the Schinschke's cabin and boy, was that fun! The girls got to walk on the frozen lake, see an ice fishing hole being drilled and had fun sledding down the hill right onto the lake.

Ellie received her Bible at church, and also participated in the science fair at school. Loving orange, she picked "Clown Fish" as her topic. Shortly after the fair, she determined that no longer is orange her favorite color....after 7 years of loyally loving orange...she is now onto blue!

And, at the end of the month, the bunkbeds were back up in the pink room....our next task was moving all 3 girls into the same room to get ready for Baby Glynn!

March 2008

March--what a fun, end of winter month! We started the month off by moving Ava out of her bumblebee room and all 3 girls have done AMAZING sharing 1 room.

We celebrated Jesus on Easter and then took of for our spring break trip to Chicago! Oh, what fun we had! We stayed downtown, went to numerous museums, endured the crowd at the Shedd Aquarium and feasted at one of our favorite Chicago eateries....Portillos!

April 2008

April was a busy month for us!

We started out celebrating on the 6th with Ava turning 3!!! Happy Birthday sweet bumblebee Ava!

Then, Andy took some time off to work on the baby's room....goodbye yellow bumblebee room...hello blue frog room! All the girls participated in the painting...and NO, we did NOT know that the baby was going to be a boy! If Colin was a girl, she would have STILL had a blue room!

Finally, for Katie's birthday on the 28th, we went to Door County and BRRRRR was it cold at the end of April! We shivered our way through the weekend...and definately enjoyed some peach cherry pie from Sweetie Pies!!!

May 2008

MAY!!!!! The Baby's Due Month!

We had a busy month--1st it was "Dad's Night" at Jayna's preschool--the girls have LOVED this event!

Then, Ellie was chosen to participate in the Mother's Day church service. In Sunday School, she had written "I'm thankful to my Mom because she cooks for me." which was SO touching; she has a thankful heart for all the extra cooking/baking I do for her allergies. What a tender heart! We also made one last trip to Door County for Mother's Day...and wondered...would the baby be born in Door County?!

Jayna graduated from preschool on the 17th--whew--no baby yet, I was SO nervous I'd miss her graduation!

And finally.....on May 19th, 1 week overdue, we had a baby! "IT'S A BOY!" said the doctor and Katie said "Are you sure?!?!?" What a big boy he was...9 lbs 9 oz!

Everyone was waiting to hear if Baby Glynn was a boy or girl and Ellie announced it by wearing a blue uniform shirt to school!

Welcome to the world, little Colin...our frog baby!

June 2008

June brought the end of Ellie's 1st grade school year, much holding of Colin, fun playing outside and Andy's 34th birthday on the 30th!

July 2008

July brought our 4th of July tradition--spending the holiday with Andy's family. Andy saves all of his birthday money to buy a stash of fireworks and he and his brothers put on an amazing fireworks show in the backyard. The girls enjoyed swimming and Colin pretended to cheer on the Cubs.

Andy also traveled to Arizona for his cousin Daniel's wedding to Jenna! We also celebrated a wedding anniversary--12 years!

August 2008

August brought Jayna getting her ears pierced, a trip to the zoo, Colin smiling and laughing and Jayna's 6th birthday! She had her 1st friend party--Happy Birthday dear Jayna!

August also brought the start of school! Ellie was off to 2nd grade and Jayna off to afternoon kindergarten! They LOVE school!

September 2008

September started with one last trip to Point Beach...and the kite festival! All 4 children really enjoyed themselves!

September also brought MUCH Iowa Hawkeye football watching--Andy insists that Colin loves the Hawkeyes. (Don't tell Andy, but Colin likes anything on TV!) We also visited the apple orchard a few times!

September also brought the passing of Andy's Grandma, Anita Evenson. We traveled to Amery for the funeral, which was beautiful and the weekend ended up being a mini family reunion on Lake Wappogasset, complete with playing at the cabin and boat rides!

October 2008

Ellie's Date with Andy--to Lambeau Field. YES, she IS a Packer fan!!! She and Andy enjoy the games, especially when Ellie roots for Green Bay and Andy roots for Chicago!

Grandparent's Day at school, a fall trip to Door County (Sweetie Pies!!!!!), New Hope Christian School Soccer team, and Colin moving into a "big boy" carseat....

November 2008

Fun at Chula Vista in Wisconsin Dells.

The many faces of Colin--out of the 4 photos, which one is NOT Colin?!?!?!?! (One of them is someone else!)

Ellie turned 8! We went bowling as a family and she had a 'fish' birthday! Happy Birthday, sweet girl!

December 2008

December--Much family fun--"A Night In Bethlehem", Grammie and Grampy's visit, Christmas, Ava baking, Jayna's Date with Andy and LOTS and LOTS of SNOW!

Doorbuster Fun on Christmas Vacation!

This is a collage of the fun the girls have had this morning painting.

The day after Thanksgiving, I met Andy's mom and sister at Toys R Us at 5am and snagged 3 "suitcases of fun", full of paint....a DOORBUSTER per the TRU ad.

This morning, we opened up my great doorbuster find...and while it is TONS O FUN for the girls, I had the wonderful task of opening 60 paints--unscrew the cap, twist off the brush piece, and then peel off the seal of the paint. Then, twist back on the brush and screw the cap back on......60 times!!!!! What a doorbuster! :)

But, the girls are having a blast creating surprise creations for our family and the babysitter who is coming over today--they are in painting heaven!!!

Christmas Trip to Illinois!

Here is a collection of photos from our trip to Andy's parents' home to celebrate Christmas. If the images are too small, just click on the collage and it will fill your screen!

From left to right:
1) Andy's Dad, Jim and Ellie working the keyboard for Christmas carols
2) Jayna, Andy's Mom Margie, and Ellie looking for the gift the Tooth Fairy left Jayna at Andy's parents' home.
3) Jayna having found her gift--a turtle snowman. Those of you who don't know about turtles and Jayna should ask her the significance!
4) Katie and Ellie....and a diet coke! Have a diet coke and a smile!
5) Andy's parents, Jim and Margie.

1) Jayna beaming with her missing 2 front teeth!
2) Jimmy, Andy's 2nd youngest brother. In the past, our children have been afraid of Jimmy--but Colin loves him, so naturally, Jimmy has a special place in his heart for Colin!
3) Ava and her Fancy Nancy doll....who looks like Ava!
4) Happy Birthday Jesus cake! Andy's mom put trick candles on it, the girls thought it was cool!
5) Andy's 1st younger brother, Ben, and Ava. Ben LOVES babies and he had the best time with Colin!

1) Colin at the start of the sledding experience.
2) Andy and Ava coming down the hill--Ava thought it was the best, but didn't like walking UP the hill!
3) Rebekah and Jayna walking up the sledding hill--holding hands!
4) Ellie and Ben sledding down the hill!
5) Jayna and Rebekah having a good time sledding!

1) Ellie and Ben starting a snowman.
2) Colin toward the end of the "fun". His look said "WHY do I have to sit here for so long!??!?!"
3) Ellie 'snowboarding' down a mini hill--Ellie IS our athletic child!
4) All the children by the snowman that was built at the sledding hill!
5) Ava....she was exhausted by the end of the day. I said "Ava, are you alright?!" Her response: "I'm ok, I'm just eating this yummy snow!" YIKES!!!!!! It was not fresh snow and she said it was YUMMY!?!??!

Video from Christmas in Illinois

Here are a couple of videos of our Christmas Trip...

One tradition with Andy's family is SINGING....a lot!!!! Andy's dad plays all the carols and everyone sings very loudly--it is beautiful. Here is a bit of Joy To The World.


Here is Ellie playing Grandpa's piano....or is she playing a trumpet?!?!?!



Here is video of Andy's Mom sledding--especially for the Whipples and Knoechels! She had not been sledding in decades and she was a little apprehensive of going down the hill. At the top of the hill, Jayna said 'It's ok Grandma, You can do it!'

The Glynn Children on Christmas Eve

Here is a snippet of our children today, as we opened our Christmas gifts. The girls were so thrilled--Ava got a "comb it's hair" doll, and the big girls got American Girl dolls AND matching doll/girl PJs.

And little bumblebee Ava...when we moved her into the big girls' room, she gave up her bumblebee room. I saved her valence material and Andy's mom made her a pillow case with matching doll blanket. Andy found bumblebee fleece and now she is once surrounded by bees!

And Colin...he loved the wrapping paper, and Grammie and Grampy couldn't resist buying his first John Deere....

Merry Christmas!

American Girl Gift Opening Video

The girls thought they would NEVER receive an American Girl doll. Not only did they get the dolls, but they also received a matching PJ set.

Merry Christmas Eve!!!!!

Merry Christmas Eve! Our house is quite excited today, as Andy and I were getting up, we heard all 3 girls in their room singing "Happy Birthday Eve"....to Jesus!!!! What precious hearts they have!

We continue to be singing the girl's Christmas program songs and it prompted us to do a search for our current favorite one "It's About The Cross"....here is a very touching video clip with the full song...it will bless your day, please view!

Everyone, have a wonderful Christmas!!!!

And finally, AVA'S Christmas singing....

The preschoolers sang today at church and here is a small snippet of what we were entertained with....such cute (scared!) children!!!!

Hairstyles by Ava....

Ava LOVES combing hair right now and she asked if she could help with Colin's bath last night. As soon as he was dressed, she said "Will you sit him up so I can comb his hair?" It started out real calm with her combing and then she had to add some flash--her feather tiara, a necklace and chunky bracelet!

Tooth "winner and loser" of the weekend.....

It has been a busy tooth weekend.....Colin gained 2 teeth (teeth gained count 4!) and Jayna lost her other front tooth (teeth lost count 6!).

We decided that it is most likely really rare to have your 2 front teeth missing for Christmas....so "All She Wants For Christmas Is Her 2 Front Teeth"!

Jayna's Date With Dad!

Today, it was JAYNA'S turn for "Date With Dad"! Andy used to just take the girls to a park or out for a little treat...and now he has changed it up a bit...less actual dates, but when he takes them out, they go all out.

Today, we pulled Jayna out of kindergarten (Thanks, Mrs. DeYoung!) so Andy could take her to Nutcracker In The Castle . Both Andy and Jayna got dressed up and Andy kept the location of the date a secret until they got to Oshkosh, after lunch. He kept giving her clues, and the final clue was "Anna Rose has one of these", and the answer was NUTCRACKER!

Those of you who know Jayna will smile at her reaction when we told her that she "got" to miss school for a date......SHE CRIED....and didn't just cry, but she SOBBED. You see, they have jobs in kindergarten and last Friday, she saw what her Monday job was going to be and figured out that on THURSDAY, today, she'd be the leader. I had to do some fast thinking on this one. I then realized that there was no way that they'd do jobs on Wednesday, the day of their program, so I told her that I was pretty sure that she wasn't going to be the leader on Thursday, but would probably be the leader on FRIDAY. That appeased her for the weekend....and now, we are faced with the possibility of a snowstorm cancelling school on Friday, so she is worried that she won't get to be the leader TOMORROW! We have told her that IF she misses out on being the leader, we will find something during Christmas break for her to LEAD the family on!

She loved her date, she beamed the whole time; she treasured all the attention from Andy. As a momento, she picked out a Nutcracker and a Nutcracker ornament.

And, for more humor, the first thing she said upon walking in the door was "Mom! Dad took pictures...for you to put on the blog!" Yep, high tech children!

Enjoy the photos!