Blog happy...

I have put up quite a few new posts tonight, so don't just stop at this one!!

Have a wonderful day all my happy bloggers!

This is just a cute Elizabeth picture! It sure has been cold around here lately. Pink fluffy sweaters keep us so cozy warm!!

Out our window

The girls and I love the view out our window. During lunch one day, it was snowing and so beautiful outside and we had lots of visitors!

Sweet Sister Moments

My girls really do love each other. They definitely have their moments, which occur everyday, but for the most part they are great friends. I came upon a very precious moment the other day. They had just taken a bath and were all snuggly warm so we decided to make a bed on the floor and watch a movie. This is what I came upon...

The wisdom of Sarah

Sarah is full of many things to say these days. Recently two of them have just stuck with me...

After we were done reading "The little golden book about God" she said, "God hold me" God my friend." How sweet is that!! Faith like a child!


Today while eating lunch at Wendy's, she pointed to my sandwich and said, "Cock-a-doodle-doo"
To which I replied, "You see a rooster?" Excitedly she points and says, "Yes, cock-a-doodle-doo."
I was eating a chicken sandwich....hmm, it didn't taste near as good after that!!! :)


Sweet little thing! She will be tow in one week...I can hardly believe it!!!

Fun blog

My Friend Renee introduced me to this wonderful blog, full of great ideas. I check it often and have many plans to try ALL the projects! Someday I will have more time to do fun projects right?!

Anyway, one day all the cousins came over and the girls always ask to do crafts, so before they came I hopped on flipflops and applesauce and chose a craft we could all do together. I chose the paper dolls and the girls loved it! It was a quick craft to get together at the last minute and it kept them entertained for a long time! Although I did not take pictures of the fun creative process or even get pictures of the older girls' finished products, here are Elizabeth's. She really enjoyed it and had the idea to attach them all. They have been hanging on our door for a long time, it will be a sad day when they have to come down! Thanks flipflops and applesauce for all your creative ideas! Check out her website:

http://flipflopsandapplesauce.blogspot.com/

From the mouth of babes...

Beth … “I Know what ketchup is made out of”
Mommy… “What”
Beth… “Tomatoes”
Mommy…. “What are you made out of?”
Beth…. “Nothing”
Mommy… “Sugar, spice, and everything nice”
Beth…. “NO, I’m made out of Jesus!”
Mommy….. “You are, do you have Jesus in your heart?”
Beth …. “No but every night when I go to sleep and there are things with sharp teeth at the end of my bed I just say 'Jesus, help! ' cuz I’m scared and then the things with sharp teeth leave out the door when it’s open.”



Daddy tells Beth that he is going to the mountains with his friends for the weekend to go play…..mommy says “that means he won’t be here for supper tomorrow, or for breakfast and lunch on Saturday….” Beth interrupts…. “Wow! He’ll be hungry!”

Little Cutie Bugs

Sarah and her good friend Abby were Lady bugs for Halloween...oh, what cuteness!!!!

Tag, you're it

So, I guess I have been tagged, which means that I am now to share with you 7 random/weird facts about myself. And, for those of you who have blogs, you have now been tagged by me and can share your random facts with the world on your blog (which I will be checking regularly!).

So here goes my 7 random facts:

1~ For my 30th birthday, I got myself a tattoo.

2~ I just got my hair permed (I decided I wanted to look a little more like my children's mother! I am just jealous of their beautiful curls!!)

3~ I spent a day on a deserted island in the South China Sea. (I just love sharing this fact, it sounds so exotic and fun - very far from my life these days!!)

4~ When I was about 5 years old I decided I wanted to be a teacher, a mother, and a wife. I am so thankful that I am getting to do all of those things today!

5~ I get free stuff from Walgreens every month...if you don't know about this and want to get free stuff too, just let me know I'll get you in the loop!

6~ Before I had kids I had size 8 feet, now they are size 9.

7~ I have always wanted to live on a farm.

Well there ya go...you are all feeling very good now that you know those random facts about me I am sure!!
Have a wonderful day my friends!

Book Corner

I added a little spot for books I have read lately and highly recommend!(It is on the side at the bottom). It's coming up on that time of year when we will be inside more, perhaps this list will give you some ideas of good reads on those long winter nights!
Enjoy

Pumpkin Carving!

Last Sunday we had a fun afternoon carving our pumpkins. Nate got an idea of how to do his...he makes me laugh, I just love him!

The rest of the story...

So while Nate was coming up with new and improved ways to carve a pumpkin, Elizabeth and I were hard at work with the old fashioned way! Sarah was so funny because right when Nate got out the drill she wanted nothing to do with it..."noisy" she said. Instead she took a chunk of the pumpkin and nibbled on it the rest of the evening! Elizabeth drew the face of her pumpkin all by herself, I just cut it out for her, I thought it turned out very, very cute!

Harvest!

Ah, it is that wonderful time of year, my favorite time of year - Fall! I love the crisp but not too cold weather, the changing of the leaves, and harvest. We ended up having a pretty good crop from our garden this year and we just picked the last of it - the pumpkins!
I am already missing the tomatoes. I bought some at the store this week and they are so pale in color and do not have much taste at all, funny how quickly we got spoiled with good tasting tomatoes.
A few weeks ago, before the first frost, we pulled up all our basil and shared it with the care group - we had a pesto making party! Yummy!

The days have been busy and I am not seeming to find time to post much, although I have had lots of thoughts and cute pictures I would love to share. Perhaps another day, maybe when the snow comes and we are inside more!
May you enjoy the harvest this year!

1,000 words

They say that a picture can tell a thousand words, and although I think the pictures from our trip up the mountain are great, there is still so much that I want to say about it (I know it is hard to imagine that I have anything to say but...)

We truly had the most wonderful weekend together. Not only was the mountain climb great but our time spent the other days we were away, were amazing as well.
Just so relaxing and no agenda. I think we actually had thoughts and were able to say them completely without one interuption! It was nice.

So the day we arrived in Leadville it was very dreary and rainy. The forecast did not look good either so I kept praying and had asked some friends to pray too that the weather would not prohibit us from our sdventure.
On Sunday morning we woke up to a new cover of snow on the mountain and although it made for a beautiful scene it was a bit discouraging. We were going to head out anyway and see what the day held as far as weather.
The first bit of the trail was very dreary and rainy, just a drizzle that felt a bit miserable but thankfully not freezing. My sweet husband bought me a new jacket that worked wonderfully for this type of weather.
My mood seemed to match this weather a bit, I tried so hard to just enjoy the hike but it was a bit of a downer.
Soon however the sun came out and things seemed to look up. However, just as we reached tree line a huge wind came up and before long we were hiking in sleet that hurt our face when it hit us. I was again feeling discouraged and right about that time Nate told me to look to my right. There, as close as any I have seen, was a full rainbow. It was amazing! And to top it off, one end landed right in an aspen grove that was bright yellow...the pot of gold! It was kind of like a little gift from the Lord promising to help me through the day.
Not long after the sun came out, and besides wind, that was the worst of the weather we faced. In the end it was a beautiful Colorado fall day!! Thank you Jesus!

The rest of the day was challenging physically but also really emotionally challenging. When people would pass us either on their way up or down, I would feel myself get down and wonder if I would really be able to do it. The other hard part was that we weren't able to see the summit most of the hike. So it was like we were just moving towards the top of the mountain but it never came. That was really a lot harder than I thought. Finally when we did see the summit, I just broke out into a run. I was SO excited to see it!! I didn't even feel that tired at that point, just so thrilled that I was going to make it. And, when we did actually summit, I can hardly describe how elated I was! It was just awesome.
We were the last people to summit but as we started back down we both thought, "this is awesome, we have the entire mountain to ourselves!" It was really neat.

This has been a journey for me, more than I realized. It became a journey of believing in who God has made me to be and enjoying that person, not the ideal person I want to be. There is no way I will ever run up a mountain and be the first one to the top. But with LOTS of love and encouragement from Jesus, Nate, and all the other wonderful people I have in my life, I am pretty sure I can do anything that I set my mind to.
"So," Nate asks as we are heading down the mountain, "Think we will do another one?"
Hmm, once my feet stop hurting and my calves stop aching every time I walk up the stairs, perhaps I will think about it!

(Don't miss the slide show of pictures in the post below!) (Wendy, I picked this music with you in mind!!)

We did it!!!!

Wouldn't it be funny if...

I could sit in my trash can.

I could be the leader of town and lead everybody to church all by myself.

I went to bed with ice and it stuck to me all over.

I could walk all the way to church.

We could have a frog in our bottom (after mentioning that she had a frog in her throat)

We could write on a pen.

We could have a campfire in our tent in our house.

A chipmunk was swimming on an icy lake.

And so goes Elizabeth's attempt at jokes and humor these days! She keeps us smiling!

Hmm...

Mommy "Sarah what are you eating?"
Sarah "cheese"
Mommy "Where did you find that cheese?"
Sarah "nose"

Hmm...

Cold Camping

No, I guess cold is not the word I should use to describe the night we spent in the mountains this weekend...it was FREEZING!! When we woke up, Nate checked the temp in the ole' van, it was 29 degrees. Neither Nate or I slept well, thankfully the girls actually did - Sarah snuggled in with me in my bag and Elizabeth with a hat and tons of blankets between Nate and I stayed warm and cozy. One of the other reasons that we did not sleep much was because the elk were bugling from about 12:30am to 3:30 am. It was an amazing thing actually. If you have never heard an elk bugle, you must at some point. They are such large animals yet fairly graceful, in the fall the bull elk bugle to get the attention of the females and challenge the other males. It is an amazing sound - high pitched trumpet sort of sounds. Anyway, I have heard them many times before, but never this close. They were literally in our campsite it seemed. We could hear them walking through the woods and I am almost certain we heard some hitting their racks. Thunder was scared to death and yelped his prepubescent yelp that really should be a large bark for the size dog that he is! All of it sent chills up my spine, but it was a really neat experience.

The camping trip was really a great one despite the cold. Spending time together was just priceless. Seeing our girls love the things that we do thrills us so much.

Now, I know I usually have amazingly wonderful pictures of adventures like this but alas, not this time...Our camera was murdered by our three year old this week. Dear little thing wanted me to take a picture of Sarah being cute and I suggested that she take it. With great delight she did and 50 pictures later (I got distracted) she brought me a broken camera. I don't think I will ever know quite how it happened and I blame myself for letting her use it all by herself and not paying attention to the photo shoot she was having. Oh well, it is just a thing and it can be replaced (thankfully for free with our Sony points!!)

So, here's to a picture less blog for once!!

By the way, Elizabeth's summary of the noise she heard in the night when asked if she heard anything was, (eyes all alight) "Yes, I heard something like elephants and the big bad wolf!!"

Homebound

Well, today is the open house/orientation for preschool where Elizabeth would see her room and meet her teacher and Thursday is the first day of school, but we will miss them both...
Last week Sarah came down with hand-foot-and mouth disease (yes it sounds awful but it is just a virus with sores on the hands, feet, and mouth) and on Saturday Elizabeth got it. It is very contagious for the first week. We are so bummed, probably me more than Elizabeth because she doesn't realize what we were going to do today. I was just so looking forward to getting into a routine! Oh well, we can make it another week!
Elizabeth was pretty miserable all weekend, not eating or drinking hardly anything because the sores in her mouth hurt too much. This morning she finally tried to drink some milk and is now on cup number 4 of milk and bowl number 3 of cereal. Thank you Jesus for giving me patience with her!

Rock fun

We had some fun with rocks the other day!

12 going on 14

This past weekend Nate and I did another mountain climb. This one was 12,300 some feet and I feel very proud of myself. We started out later than we had planned (so hard to get going early on a Saturday when the girls are at Aunt Lori's house) so we did run into some thunder storms as we were approaching summit but we pressed on and are so glad that we did. It felt like a big accomplishment for me once again. Next month we are going to try and tackle the 14er.

Rainy Days

A few weekends ago we had tons of rain hit our area (well it felt like a lot to me). Being the true Colorado girl that I am, I began to get weary of the rain with no sun very quickly! We had planned to go camping that weekend but the rains started on Friday and did not stop until Sunday, so needless to say, we canceled our camping plans and stuck around home. So, what does one do when the rains just keep coming...paint and play in the rain!

On friday night I got out a bunch of paints and a big sheet of paper and we all painted together. It was Sarah's first real experience with painting and she loved it. I had a cup of water on the table to clean brushes and she kept putting her hands in the water and "cleaning" her hands and face. In the end her face and hands were covered with green paint.

Then on Saturday morning, without any help from us, Elizabeth took her new umbrella and played in the rain. It ended up to be a fun weekend even though we didn't get to go camping!

Road Trip

At the end of July we took a road trip to visit Nate's family in Indiana. We were a little nervous to make the 20+ hour trip in the car with the girls, but it ended up to be a wonderful trip that we all enjoyed. We thoroughly enjoyed the visit with family. It was a blessing to the girls to get to play and relax with grandma and grandpa Reinhard, to was so neat to see all the cousins together, and it was just the perfect thing to refresh Nate and I after some very busy weeks around here.

I have so many great pictures from our time with Nate's family, visiting my sister and her family in Nebraska, and our day trip to the beach in Michigan, that is is hard to know which ones to share without overwhelming you all with all 200 of them! So here are just a tiny handful of some of the highlights.

All the cousins!

Caroline and Sarah having a moment together!

Elizabeth loved the swings that grandpa hung up

A very old car that brings lots of smiles
One of Sarah's favorite things, besides the Amish buggies going by, was picking up hickory nuts in the yard. She filled the bucket many times!
Both of the girls climbed all the way up the ladder to the tree house. Mommy was kind of nervous with them so high, but they loved it!

The girls loved the beach, we all did! Elizabeth went right in the water and was content all day. Sarah was a bit nervous at first but really relaxed and loved it. Elizabeth and Nicole were fast friends from the moment we arrived at the Hacketts. We were able to be there to celebrate Trey's 2nd birthday.

What a great vacation!!