Finally!

Alyssa has been waiting all winter to be able to build a snowman, but every time it snowed it seemed like the snow wasn't sticky enough. But finally, last weekend while I was out of town, there was a good sticky snow, and Aaron took the girls out to build a snowman. Alyssa called me right away to tell me all about it. Here are the pictures of their masterpiece:




Then yesterday we got several inches of heavy, wet snow. We didn't make it outside last night and this morning, it wasn't quite sticky enough to build another one. But we were able to build a super small fort. Alyssa enjoyed helping stack the blocks and Lauren tried to put snow in the molds and pack it in.






I think Alyssa's favorite part though was knocking it down!

A weekend with friends

I don't know who was more excited a few weeks ago - Aaron & I or Alyssa. We had plans to go see some of our friends from Minnesota in Wisconsin Dells. We rented a cabin for the three families, planned our meals, packed up the suitcases, loaded up the cars, and off we went. The whole way there, Alyssa kept saying she was ready to get out see her friends, she was so excited!

The Krautkremers and Skluzaceks arrived before us, so they were at the pool when we arrived. Alyssa borrowed a swimsuit and so the weekend began, with lots of fun! I don't know that we can say it was a restful or quiet weekend...how could it be when there were 7 girls, with the oldest only 4 years old?! But it was a fun weekend.

We adults enjoyed catching up and the girls just enjoyed playing together. They all played so nice together, running from game to game and toy to toy. By far, their favorite thing to do though was play at the pool. The "resort" had the perfect kiddy pool, it ranged from 9 inches to 1.5 ft deep, so even the little ones could walk around in it.

Lauren loved splashing, playing in the sprinklers, and she was even brave enough to go down the slide a few times. Alyssa loved the slide, and she even got brave and went in the big pool with a tube. They all loved the hot tub too!




The big girls shared a bedroom and did so awesome in there together. The little ones slept in the bedrooms with the parents. There were several games of hide and seek,

multiple parades with the musical instruments,

coloring and crafts,

and lots and lots of food.




We tried for a shot of all the girls together and then with the dads & moms and here are a few that we got.




This is my favorite picture from the "photo shoot". I think it captures Lauren thinking "This is boring. Can we get back to playing?"

It was a crazy weekend, and we look forward to meeting our friends for many more fun weekends in the future!