Treats of all kinds...

We had one full week of treats....treats of all kinds!

The biggest "eye treat" was this book that arrived in the mail, a full 2 weeks earlier than planned!
The children went NUTS...inside this book was the entire blog of 2011. Andy and I went a little "nuts" too...reminding them to be careful with it--it is not easily replaceable. Jayna read it cover to cover, Ellie may have finished it by now and Ava and Colin looked for their favorite parts of the year. Yes, you all are right...Colin was fixated on the entries of the Wiggles concert!

Those of you who are wanting to print your blog...we are very happy with the quality--it's a nice hardcover book. HOWEVER, since I use a lot of collages with the blog, they often appeared a bit small. You can still see them, but photos with captions written IN the photo are hard to read. Easy fix though--just attach a magnifying glass to the book! :)

We also got another "treat" in the form of recognition of our little ballerina!

Ava was selected as one of 3 "purple girls" from her ballet class who get to attend an "exam" in February. Two professional ballerinas will be at the Valley Academy for the Arts and for 30 minutes, will critique the ballerinas. We don't quite know what to expect, but we're pretty proud of Ava...she's already in a class with 2nd-3rd graders and for 4 weeks, has been bumped up to the next level with 3rd-4th graders as she prepares for the exam in February! Go Ava! She does love ballet!

And finally, treats for the tasting...
Before Christmas, we made a LOT of treats. At first it didn't seem like it would be that much...but once we got started, it was a huge project. We dipped pretzels (not pictured), Oreos on sucker sticks, marshmallows for hot chocolate stir sticks, and we made sugar cookies. I was more than happy to forget about dipping with bark and non-perils...

until Jayna came home from school with an assignment to create a new candy or candy bar. The 3rd grade had just finished "The Chocolate Touch" and it was very funny to us--Jayna *HATES* chocolate! In trying to come up with an idea for the new candy, we realized that Jayna likes bark, and Jayna LOVES Sweet Tarts. SO...we dipped pretzels in bark and then rolled them in crushed Sweet Tarts for....drum roll please..."Sour Sticks"!

She shared them with her class and told me that everyone loved them! I'm telling you...the world needs more "non chocolate" treats! :)

The letter "S"...

This week's wrap-up is brought to you by the letter "S".

No, this is not a new preschool-type theme with the blog...
No, we have not been watching too much Sesame Street...
No, we are not re-enacting last year's week brought to you by the letter "S"...after all, THAT blog post included the Packers playing in the Super Bowl..and THAT is not happening this year!
It's just how it's working out :)

We continued to LOVE the snow.

This photo below is how Colin posed himself...in a hole of snow. I tried, I really did, to get his happy face. So either we've been taking too many pictures, or he was just really cold and not thinking straight...

The kids have been outside every chance they can get, we love it! On Saturday though, they ate breakfast and immediately got their snow gear on and all 4 went outside. Andy and I looked at each other and said "Now what?!" We're not quite used to having all 4 playing outside yet. We also thought back to life on S. Berry Drive...this type of thing would never have happened...we have the best set up for winter playing and it is so safe...we are surely blessed with where we live!

This photo is Ellie and her friend Janey from down the street. They were working hard on their fort and worked at it a good couple of hours after I snapped this photo!

Andy had asked the big girls to climb on the trampoline and move the snow off...and the next thing we knew, we looked out and Ava and Colin were on top of it moving the snow around! First instinct was "The little kids are on the trampoline with no walls!" But they were fine and had a blast jumping and 'shoveling' the snow.

And what do you think about Colin's rosy cheeks? I can't get enough of this look on the kids--it makes them look so healthy in the middle of the winter!

We also took a day to go skating.
NHCS was renting out the roller rink for the entire school to go skating during spirit week.
Sounds fun huh?
Not to the 2 little Glynn Girls.....for various reasons, they did not want to go.
Then the DID want to go....then they did NOT want to go...then they DID want to...you know how that works.
So we did a test run...Ellie got to invite a friend from school and I skated with the 2 little girls.

We all had a really fun afternoon and the little girls approved big time of Ellie's friend from school. Jayna's comment was "She's nice and doesn't just care about Ellie!" (How's that for a middle child comment?!) And she was right..Jayna took a fall on the rink and Savannah was almost the first one to Jayna to see if she was ok...gotta love compassion in 11 year olds!

Of course, in a family of 6, there was more to the week than just snow and skating...but for now, consider this IT!

Happy WINTER!

Happy WINTER?!

Can you tell what the above picture is? January, in Wisconsin.....we went on a family walk one evening this past week. It was spring-like!!! Of course, it got dark early, so we banked on flashlights and reflection off the kids' jackets...and we stayed on the sidewalks! The above picture is of the children laying on the sidewalk, gazing at the moon and sky full of stars! It was a fun end to our warm weather...the next day, the snow started!

But before we get to the snow, let's back up a few days....

I've written before how much we love our babysitters.....and 2 of them are related by marriage. I still haven't accepted the fact that they are moving onto the next stages of life and that they don't exist to babysit the Glynn kids whenever needed....(I'm working on that acceptance!). Perhaps they have not accepted that either, because again, this Christmas season, they had a fun afternoon planned for the girls....they wanted to teach them how to scrapbook!

The above photo shows what the girls created during their 2 hours with Amy and Cindy. They loved it. Ava especially loved it...she came home and you could hear all sorts of scissors hitting the table, tape being torn off the roll and markers rolling around. When she came out of the gallery, she said "MOM! THIS is scrapbooking and I made it for YOU!" Precious.

Thank you, Amy and Cindy....we LOVE you!

This past week, the 5th grade band students from 2 Neenah schools provided "pre-meeting" music for the Neenah Public Schools School Board Meeting. This was something that was rescheduled from just before Christmas. These children have only been playing their instruments since October and had NEVER played as a collective group before! Ellie LOVED it. Looks like we're on the "buy the flute...not rent it" plan now.

If you are interested in hearing the students play Good King Wenceslas, click HERE.
To hear Jingle Bells, click HERE.
To hear Jolly Old St. Nick, click HERE.
I love Ellie's music teacher/band instructor. From the first correspondence with her, I was impressed---she is passionate about music and about teaching the kids to love music. Prior to the school board meeting, I was reading the posters that were outside the administration building...Mrs. Shebesta was voted teacher of the year! Looks like others have noticed her passion too!

Finally...we get to the snow that "Snowstorm Angela" dumped on us! Oh, it was so exciting to see it fall down and so exciting to anticipate finally getting to play in it. We had lots of talking about what snow can be eaten and what snow should be avoided! Ellie came up with an awesome idea, seen here below--she filled a soccer cone with snow and then turned it over--perfect clean "snowcone" for Colin to enjoy!

Since the snow last week, the kids have been out playing in the snow almost everyday. Our house is in the perfect location--we get a lot 0f the cul du sac snow dumped in our yard and there is very little traffic from the 5 houses in the court. Currently, we have a stage created for a Wiggles type show, a fort, and a path forged in the snow. There are a lot of rosy cheeks coming inside looking like this:

We love winter!

RRRRrrrrrRRRRrrrrr!

This 1st week in 2012 was brought to our family by the letter "R"!!!!

We returned to work/school....we returned items that didn't fit...we swam a relay and had record breaking times (personal best times...this was Ellie...not the entire family!)....we read books....we wrapped ribbon....we ripped open our upper gum...we had a very eventful week!

We must pause though, to all remember and enjoy that beautiful snow we woke up to on New Year's Day! What a joy it was to hear the 4 children say " Can we shovel for you, Dad?!" Sweet! Our drive was the only one cleared for hours...even days! Since this might be the only snow photo we get this year, here it is for your enjoyment...

Now...about that really fun ribbon activity. Colin was so sad when I started un-decorating the Christmas tree and he found it very funny as I walked around and around and around the tree unwrapping the beautiful plaid ribbon. As soon as I finished, the phone rang and I dropped the ribbon....as I was talking on the phone, I just started laughing...Colin was running through the rooms of our main level, weaving and pulling ribbon while singing "Follow The Leader"! I don't enjoy un-decorating, and Colin's happiness definitely put a smile on my face!

Enjoy these photos I captured...all while talking on the phone (scheduling another pull up study, of all things!)...he didn't even know I was snapping photos, it was wonderful! The middle photo here shows Colin holding onto a drawer pull saying "It's tight Mommy!" as the ribbon was caught on something in a different room!

And the end result:

We also had a scare on Friday night...when Colin RIPPED his upper gum open! He had piled pillows on Ellie's bed and then plopped onto them...but instead of plopping onto them, he plopped into her headboard! Ouch. Mouths bleed A LOT...and we had no idea what to expect. After a few minutes, he was running around like nothing had happened, asking for his sippy cup and ready for dinner...it was at that point that Ava just started sobbing, she had been so scared that something really bad was going to happen to him. 2 peas in a pod, let me tell you! :)

This photo is a tad bit graphic:

And yes, he is 100% fine, and his mouth is almost fully healed 24 hrs after the injury!

Finally, we finished the week out with the first swim meet of 2012 for Ellie. I told a friend that when I ran races, it was all about the free tee shirt each runner received. Well, with this meet, if you tried a new event or won your heat, you received a free swim cap! We were all over that one! Ellie tried 2 new events today--the 100 yd backstroke and the 200 yd individual medley. Let me just say that she rocks the backstroke but does not enjoy it--she hit her head once and that was the end of her desire to enter these events! She did wonderfully today though--had the lead the entire race and then got 2nd by just .49 of a second! It was a fun swim to watch. Also fun (and tiring) to watch was the 200 IM. Yikes. I surely could not do THAT one. She said that she was so nervous, she was shaking as she waited by the starting block. BUT...it wasn't as bad as she thought it would be and she established a new time to work off of on that event.

BUT...by far, THIS result was our highlight of the day:

This was the first meet of the new age bracket and we did not have high hopes for anything since Ellie is a young 11 and isn't very tall. She did amazing in the 50 yd freestyle, shaving 5 seconds off her previous best time AND winning her heat! It was a fun swim meet, for sure.

If you are into swimming, here are 3 of the 4 events she swam today:
50 yd freestyle, click HERE.
100 yd backstroke, click HERE.
200 yd IM, click HERE.

And one more "R" for you....it was a week of resolutions! Jayna said she wants to try new foods this year....this week, she tried sushi and banana muffins! I want to make new recipes...52 this year...and I completed 2 new recipes, that the family LOVED!

Happy 2012!