Mission Festival

Jayna is a penguin!!!!

Tonight was the NHCS Mission Festival--geography around the world was the theme and it was SO FUN! The only bad part was that it ended too soon!

The 1st graders were part of "The Arctic and Antarctic" and they wore appropriate penguin colors to go along with their cute penguin glasses they made in art class. Their area was full of hands on activities--building an igloo, reading books about the region, matching games, puzzles, and reports on the different "life" in this region. They also had an outdoor portion--we had NO idea what that was all about...but we quickly found out!

The above picture is of Jayna next to her penguin creation; the Humboldt penguin, next to the igloo of white boxes, and a snapshot of her Crabeater Seal report. It was cute to hear her talk of this night...."Mom, in my BEST handwriting, I wrote my report!" ☺

In this picture, Jayna and Ava were reading fun books, and Ava sitting in a real kayak!

Here was the outdoor portion--It was really fun--here all these kids were, on a hill that almost has no snow (because we live in the NORTH where it snows ALL the time....) and no snowpants on the kids, and Ava had no hat or mittens....

Yet the happiness was just oozing out of the kids, they had such fun! Ava jumped right on the sled with Jayna and away they went!

After 1 short hour of browsing "around the world", we all went into the Worship Center to hear the children sing a couple of songs. Precious, just precious! (Jayna is smack in the middle w/ the white bow in her hair.)

And Ellie....where is Ellie, you ask?
Well, she was at home, watching the Olympics; but not the live Olympic figure skating--she found the taped downhill skiing--much more adventurous, you know! Yesterday, she came home with a fever and it made itself right at home in her little body and hasn't left yet tonight! Our super babysitter Amy wasn't fazed by a fever and happily babysat Colin and Ellie while we had fun at the school.

The 3rd graders had the continent of South America; Ellie's country was Ecuador. She was most sad at 5am this morning when I took her temperature and told her she was NOT going to the festival. One of her jobs was to tell people about Ecuador AND teach them to sing "Jesus Loves Me" in Spanish! Andy did get a snapshot of her posters on Ecuador and then 2 other groups of her classmates with their reports. We spent so much time with our little penguin that we didn't get to all of the 3rd grade stations!

Enjoy 2 short videos--one of Jayna reading her report on the Crabeater Seal and one of all the children singing! It was a wonderful evening, what a marvelous experience for the children (and families!).

Milwaukee Museums

We have a big family.....and our current favorite "free time" activity is taking advantage of our various memberships....we have enjoyed the YMCA's gymnastics center on the girls' 1/2 day of school, we run down to another YMCA for some good family playtime on a Sunday afternoon, and this weekend, we went to Milwaukee--for the cost of lunch at McDonald's and our gas, we spent the entire morning at the Milwaukee Children's Museum and then the afternoon at the Milwaukee Public Museum. It's amazing how these memberships we have end up paying for themselves when you factor in 6 admission fees at these locations. Fun fun!

It had been a couple of years since we were at the Betty Brinn Children's Museum and the children had a blast. Every turn we made, Colin would yell "YAY!!!!!" as he discovered new and fun things in which to play. Ava really got into the play "newscaster" area, Ellie LOVED the theater area, and Jayna just loved it all. The children just floated from play area to play area. When we left, it was around noon and the kids just sat in the van glazed, exhausted from the morning!

In the afternoon, we happened upon the Milwaukee Public Museum....wow....what a place! We'll be going back there again, when we have more time and when we don't have a fussy 1 year old who was in desperate need of a nap. The displays were amazing and the butterfly area was beautiful. It was just a fun day!

Enjoy the pictures....



These Colin pictures are too funny...they had a kid's computer with a Clifford game on it...and Colin first tried to make it work by moving the mouse as he had seen us do many times on our computer. When that didn't work, he just took the mouse up to the screen! And then the horse...there was a gigantic horse in the baby area of the museum....what we captured with the camera was hilarious--almost like "Awwww...nice horse..." and then "WHOA....HORSE."
This last picture was taken at the Milwaukee Public Museum were cameras were not allowed to photograph the displays. Colin had been woken up after sleeping for 10 minutes and he was not his usual "happy chill baby" self. We told him he could be out of the stroller IF he held someone's hand and this is what we saw for quite some time. It was too cute NOT to photograph! And...it's not of a display anyway right?!?!?

Loving Love Month

Whew! It's only the middle of "Love Month" and we've had so many "love it" experiences! :)

The above picture was taken of our family at the Disney Princesses On Ice show last Wednesday night. Remember the crazy Christmas Eve tradition of eating fast food after church? Well, since our usual McDonald's was closed, we happened upon Wendy's where you could register to win tickets to see the Princesses on Ice. I entered....after all, I never win anything....and wouldn't you know, I won! "All" we had to do was listen to a scphell on fire safety (no sales involved) and really, fire safety had been on my mind anyway since we now live in a 2 story home.

Andy was supposed to arrive home from South Carolina the afternoon of the show--that was plan A. Plan B happened when the first plane delays occurred--it involved us leaving a little later than planned for the show. DELAY was the word of the day and Plan C involved us picking Andy up at the airport so we all could go to the show together...then Plan D was us leaving a ticket to the show in Andy's car and he'd meet us in Green Bay. Well....as I was leaving the ticket in his car, he called my cell phone and his plane had not even left Detroit yet. ARGH!!!! Plan E then became "girls go to the show, Andy gets home and just relieves the babysitter who was with Colin". What a bummer! But, we made the best of it and went onto Green Bay in anticipation of seeing the princesses. You can imagine our happiness when 40 minutes into the show, there was ANDY! His plane made great time and he was able to alert the babysitter that Plan F was now in play and he was going to meet us in Green Bay! The best laid plans....

Some funny sayings were heard on the way to Green Bay by Ava:
"There are a lot of road signs with my name on it, Mom!" (Available was what the billboards actually said!)
"We're parking at Lambeau Field? I can't wait to see MY Brett Favre!"
"Look! Green Bay even has a twinkling hat sign!" (The old fashioned big Arby's hat that is outlined in white lights!)

It was a really fun night; we all enjoyed the skating; Ava sat at the edge of her seat the entire time--she was in awe of the characters!

(If you click on the collages, you will be able to see the photos larger!)


If you care to see video, click on these links:
A Whole New World (all princesses from 1st half of show)
Snow White's Dwarfs
Ariel and Snow White waking up
Beauty & The Beast and Sleeping Beauty



And finally....Valentine's Day!!!!! After church, the girls noticed 3 little packages on our fireplace mantle. They tore off the paper to find matching "love" pj's and promptly put them on for the rest of the day! :) Colin snatched Ava's heart bow that fell off her head and kept patting his head with it. Once I clipped it in, he went on a laughing chase around the house! It was a fun day filled with love! Happy Love Month!

Happy Birthday Grandma!!!!

Last Friday was Andy's Mom's birthday!!!! We made a last minute decision to just 'show up' at her house, to surprise her for her birthday! So we packed, and packed and then drove 3 1/2 hours south and when we pulled into the driveway, Rebekah was outside. She took us in the front door and Andy's mom was coming up the basement steps when the girls said "Surprise! Happy Birthday!" What a fun surprise it was, for everyone!

The above picture was taken just prior to us leaving to go HOME to WI....(we didn't even think to take photos when we arrived!) The girls were all excited to have new headbands and we came home with a few handfuls of new bows for our collection!

For an unplanned trip, we had a good time! The girls did some jewelry beading with Andy's Mom, Ellie and Andy went to see Jimmy swim at the conference swim meet ("Mom...they were FAST swimmers!!!!") the girls learned how to play Skip-Bo, we discovered cool toys that Rebekah has.....and there was also some wii playing....

Above, Ava is playing boxing on the wii. As you can see, she gets very into it! :)

And Colin...he also discovered the Skip-Bo game....so THAT'S why it was suddenly so quiet....

Many of you know that Colin has never been a great traveler. He did not cry at all in the van this time (1st time we've trekked without crying EVER in 21 months!), but he still didn't sleep well. After the first night, we switched the room arrangement up a little--Andy had a "slumber party" with brother Jimmy and then Ava and I had a slumber party with Colin. At 4am, Colin's night was "done" when he lost his pacifier and we all cuddled in bed together. If you know our family, you know our kids don't ever sleep anywhere but their beds....so it was very fitting that I captured the above picture--this is what I woke up to--Ava and Colin snuggling!

This photo is of Sunday morning's breakfast--homemade donuts! YUM YUM. Ellie has never had a donut. I remember trying to make them from scratch a long time ago and they were nasty. She says she remembers something yukky from Wal Mart that was supposed to be a donut; it must have been so yukky that I've removed it from my brain! At any rate, we've never had success in finding something tasty that doesn't have milk in it. HOWEVER....Andy's Mom created safe donuts!!!! They were very tasty too! She found safe breadstick dough, made them into a circle, fried them a bit and then dipped them into cinnamon sugar. YUMMMMMMY. Ellie absolutely loved them!

And finally....we got home in time for Andy to un-pack, re-pack, and fly out of town....he's enjoying the 50 degree weather in South Carolina while we watch the non-stop snow fly in WI. And Colin? Well....his shirt says it all......Happy Valentine's Month, everyone!!!

It's been awhile....

Someone very dear to us mentioned that she had memorized the "Aunt Megan visits" blog entry...when was I going to update again!??!?!?!

The thing is...we've not really had anything "big" going on--we're enjoying just the day to day routine of life, now that we're unpacked! Ellie received a camera for her birthday and something was up with it--the photos it took were very muddy and grainy. She got her replacement camera and we've had fun seeing what she captures on "film". The above collage is one of "Ellie camera" photos--Andy in his beloved Orange bowl shirt, me making a run to the basement fridge for soymilk (I often wonder why we can't figure out a system to always have a fresh soymilk waiting for us in the morning, when we don't have a lot of extra time to run and get a new carton!), Jayna doing piano theory, Ava cuddling her Bitty twin, Ellie and I wearing our matching purple (it DID happen to be the Vikings' last game...we were supporting Brett Farve, not the Vikings! LOL!) and then 2 pics of the 3 girls on "mis match day" at school. They had such fun on that day, finding things that did not match!

We've also been to another swim meet for Ellie--this one was in Green Bay. We actually had her skip warm ups--for the Fox Cities, warm ups were from 6-6:30 AM!!!! We would have had to leave our home by 5:15 am! YIKES. Ellie is doing great on the team, we're so proud of her. She's just 9, and as you can see by the left photo below, she is quite small in the age group of "10 and under"..but she has consistently trimmed time off of her events, so she's moving in the right direction. She's made some good friends and still loves it--it's a great sport! The photos below were taking in January at the Green Bay Winter Meet.


Ava and Colin--what can we say about these little cuties? Colin has moved into the next stage of "baby"....he now will sometimes mimic what we say, still loves to wear dress up necklaces, and is really into "dancing". He now is obsessed with us reading to him, his favorite is "Goodnight Moon" and when I read it to him, he has the deepest belly laugh, it is adorable. Every morning, I get him dressed and he starts to say "Dada...dada...dada..." as he finds his Moon book and toddles into our bathroom looking for Andy. He will wait patiently while Andy finishes doing whatever he is doing, and then they start off the day reading "Moon"! He is "totally boy"....he now dumps things that he used to handle gently, and he is often seen running little cars along the wall--I keep telling him that they sound neat on the wood floor too...but apparently the scratching on the wall is just so much better!

Ava is almost 5...and that is a joke now in our house. I keep saying "You are almost 5" and she will respond "Tomorrow?!?!" She's working on Valentine's for her preschool class right now--and it is hard work, so we're going very slowly! She plans her 5th birthday cake/celebration almost everyday.....it is very anticipated!

While Ellie goes to swim team, the little girls go to swimming lessons and Colin sits in the puddles on the YMCA pool deck watching. It's a good (wet) time.

The girls are still playing piano; and I have a video of Jayna playing a song that all Gordens will remember....check it OUT! In fact, since today is 2/2/2010, for Uncle Tucker...consider this a "Happy Birthday to you" song; my memory is of Uncle Tucker playing this song OVER and OVER and OVER and OVER.... :)

Here are some additional vidoes to enjoy of the Glynn kids:
1st 2 are capturing Colin doing his dancing...
3rd one with Ellie in the white shirt is her saying a tongue twister--wow.
4th and 5th ones are of her swimming in the Green Bay meet.
And finally....the last video is Ava with her groundhog puppet, singing a little song she learned in preschool yesterday!

Happy February, everyone!!!!