Early February

February was Valentine month!
Hannah made Valentines with knock-knock jokes on sticky paper for all her classmates, and stuck them to Fun Dip. (Her favorite candy.)
Noah wanted to make Minecraft Valentine stickers to stick on juice pouches again this year.
They used teamwork to assemble the Valentines.

Our Valentines Day parties were fun!
Then, when we got home, we got to see our Aunt Angie before she flew out for vacation. We got to have a fire in the fireplace and have s'mores.
Yum!

She likes peanut butter in place of chocolate on her s'mores

He loved his peanut butter s'more - chocolate, peanut butter, grahams and a toasted marshmallow!

Angie left early in the morning, so we had a whole day to hang out.
Hannah started a sewing project: a bag for her Kindle Fire.

Noah worked on a puzzle.

A puzzle he finished the next day...

The first week of February

Since the second Saturday in January, Hannah has been playing volleyball with the city's Park & Recreation department. Some high school girls coach a group of 7-9 year olds and a group of 10-12 year olds in skill drills and skill-building games for an hour, then spend about 45 minutes playing a few games of volleyball.
She loves it. Surprisingly, the hardest part of the game for girls at her age is to know where the ball will land (so you can move toward it) and who should take the ball. After that is mastered, then it will be easier to perfect the bump, set & spike skills they've been working on.
Since the second week, the 10-12 year olds have taken 1 or 2 girls from the 7-9 year old group to play with them. (So each group has 5-6 players per team, instead of 4 or 7.) Each week, Hannah has been chosen to move up and play with the 10-12 year old girls. It's been so fun to see her play with a more mature group of players, and has pushed her to hustle, talk and hone her skills.

Serving up the ball in the 10-12 year old volleyball game.

At the end of January, we were doing final preparation on our Pinewood Derby Cars.
One of the biggest events of the year for a Cub Scout is the Pinewood Derby. The week before the derby was spent working graphite into the axles of the wheels, putting the wheels on, making sure our cars weighed EXACTLY 5 ounces, painting & finishing cars.

Weighing all our car pieces with Daddy before putting her Pinewood Derby Car together.

Finishing touches: rubbing decoration onto his Pinewood Derby Car with Mom

February 7th was the big day. We had weighed in & checked in cars the night before. Hannah entered the open division and came in EXACTLY 5 oz. Noah checked in and weighed 5.1 oz, so Dad helped him to take some weight off the car and weigh in perfectly at 5 oz.
Noah's car did well and came in 9th place overall in his den of 2nd graders. (He has a very large den, so 9th is right in the middle of the pack.) Pretty good for his first race! Then, Dad tried one tweak to his wheel and ran the car down the track a little bit later, and he went from 49 mph to 56 mph, which would have taken one of the top 3 spots in his den. He was proud of his car, and was VERY proud to have won the Best Cub Scout Themed car in the entire pack!

Best Cub Scout Theme car in his Cub Scout Pack

Hannah entered the open division with a car she decorated herself. Her white car with pink glittery paint was definitely the most unique, girly car of the entire day! She was quite proud of her car and got a lot of compliments on it. She, too, came in around the middle of the pack of open-division racers.

Hannah with her pink glittery car, complete with flowers and "bling" stickers

On our way home from the Pinewood Derby, we stopped at a friends' house to drop off our good friend Dylan. And, we stayed until Daddy came home and had supper at Dylan's house. It was a fun day with the Derby, capped off by an even MORE fun time at our family friends' house that evening.

Spirit Week

At the end of January, Noah participated in a fishing derby with the Cub Scouts.

Fishing on Medicine Lake with the Cub Scouts

He won the contest with the largest fish of the day: an 11" perch!

Noah with his winning fish

It was a fun day. Noah enjoyed fishing, and Dad enjoyed being able to help teach others to ice fish.

The next week at school was spirit week at school. Spirit week is our favorite week at school! We get to dress up in all sorts of fun out-of-uniform stuff for the week while we raise money and have penny wars with other classes to raise money for cancer patients.

The week before Spirit Week, Hannah and her friend set up a time to go shopping for matching tops so they can be twins on Twin Day for Spirit Week. She had so much fun shopping and playing with her friend! Hannah and her friend thought it was really funny when the salesperson asked if they were twins when they were shopping for matching tops. Hannah's friend's mother explained that they were NOT twins, but Hannah DID have a twin brother at home.

Unfortunately, she didn't get to see Daddy's friend Eric, who came to visit from Maryland, but she loved playing with her best friend!

Monday was Spirit Day, We got to wear clothes to support our favorite team or cause or whatever we wanted! Noah wore his Twins t-shirt and his Minnesota Wild sweatshirt. Hannah wore her Alexandria Beetles shirt with her Gophers Sweatshirt. Noah said there were a few Wild supporters in his class, and Hannah said there were a couple of other Gopher fans in her class.

Tuesday was Twin Day. Hannah had been looking forward to this for weeks.
She and her best friend had gone to Old Navy to get matching shirts & scarves, planned to wear skinny jeans and matching ribbons in their hair, and even matching boots.

With her Best Friend on Twin Day

Noah took the opportunity on TWIN day to wear his Tori Hunter baseball jersey. He was pretty excited to find that the baseball jersey mom bought for him at a thrift store suddenly became cool when the Twins acquired Tori Hunter 2 weeks after he got his jersey!

The Twins on Twin Day

Hannah loves her puppy

Wednesday was Mismatched & Wacky Hair day. Noah decided his uniform was wacky enough - he almost wore a tie with it, but decided to wear his uniform since a few of his friends were also wearing theirs that week. Hannah, of course, decided go all out! She found as many colors & prints as she could find in her drawer to look like a crazy dresser!

Mismatched & Wacky Day...Hannah chose to be Wacky & mismatched, Noah chose not to be wacky at all.

Thursday was Throwback Thursday! Noah decided to dress like a 1980's rock band groupie in his jeans and rock band t-shirt. Hannah took the 80's seriously in her oversized neon t-shirt, leggings, big hair bow and leg warmers.

Rocking throwback Thursday

Friday was pajama day. Pajama day is always our favorite dress up day! We earned reading time with a blanket & stuffed animal, too so it was a really fun day.

Ready for pajama day with blankets & stuffed animals

It was a fun week. Unfortunately, our classes did not win the penny wars, but we enjoyed dressing up.

Noah & Hannah

January

January flew by!

Our first weekend of January was our last weekend of winter break.We had taken down the Christmas decorations on New Year Day, so there was not much Christmas left in our house.

Noah & Dad went to start working on Noah's pinewood derby car on Saturday morning (Jan. 3). They got his car planned and cut at a woodshop in Apple Valley, then spent the afternoon at Dad's friend's house (of course, Dad is good friends with the Cub Scout Den Master) sanding and working on the car a little bit more.

Marking out the shape of his Pinewood Derby Car before cutting

While Noah was away, Hannah took an opportunity to use some of her new Christmas gifts. She sewed a few things on her new sewing machine. She also started working on a new chandelier decoration for her room.

The next day was all about Mom. It was her birthday. We checked out a church service close to our house, then we went to Cub so we could make Mom's choice: Wild Rice Soup.

Making wild rice soup with Dad

Happy Birthday, Mommy!

We got Cheyenne back the day after we got home from Arkansas. She is happy to be home - and we're happy to have her! She didn't take much time to get comfortable at home.

Comfy, cozy Cheyenne

And, Hannah spent some time working on one of her Christmas gifts: a chandelier for her room. She decorated it herself.

Putting together her Chandelier

We were ready to go back to school on Monday. We missed our friends!

Unfortunately, our week was cut short because it was cold enough on Wednesday to cancel school. Mom & Dad both had meetings at work that they couldn't miss, so we got to go stay with mom's friend Renee. It was fun to hang out with her, but her kids got to go to school so it was just her and us. Since it was Renee's kids' birthday (she has twins, too), we got to visit one of her daughters at school for lunch. It was fun to visit her school. (It was a really nice school.) Hannah even helped to make a birthday cake for the girls.

The weather cleared up enough for Dad & Noah to enjoy polar camp on the 10th. They had so much fun! Even though they played games outside all day, they had a great time!

Ready for Polar Camp!

Tubing at Polar Camp

Hannah got to hang out with Mom at her volleyball tournament while Noah & Dad were at camp. One of Mom's teammates got injured really bad, so Mom's team didn't have their best day. (And there were no kids at the tournament, so it wasn't the best day for Hannah to be at a tournament.) Hannah did get to bump and play some volleyball with mom, though. And, it was a whole day to play Kindle and read while Mom played ball.

After we got home, we all went to Lars & Juanita's house for dinner. We got to play video games with their son, and fell asleep there after a long day. It was fun night!

The next week, we got to help Daddy do some pushups.
Do you think we looked helpful?

Work it, Dad!

Hannah also got to start volleyball with the Park & Rec Department on Saturday. She loved it in the fall. She was put on the waiting list when Mom signed her up late this winter, but luckily got in! She was so excited to get to play volleyball.

We also helped Daddy by helping him with meals. The weekend of the 18th, Noah helped plan the entire weekend of meals. (It also helped him earn a belt loop for Scouts)

Making Tater Tot Hotdish for the family

Hannah made the most of the warm weather and the snow in our backyard.

Do you wanna build a snowman? It was too nice to stay inside!

It's been a fun January of warm & cold, but it's gone fast!

New Furniture. New Year.

Tuesday the 29th, both Mom & Dad had the day off work again. So, we decided to go to Ikea. They'd been wanting to get new desks for their office for a while, so today was the day.
Ikea was SO BUSY! So busy that Smaland (the play land) was full. Bummer. So, we made our way to the office area.
We were glad we got to stay with Mom & Dad because we saw our old neighbors, Dan, Melissa & Griffin walking through the office area. They were getting shelves for their new Lego room. It was fun to see Griffin! We really miss him. Hopefully we can have him and his family to our new place sometime.
After chatting with our friends, it took a while to figure out what desks & shelves Mom & Dad wanted to buy. Then, Daddy spent a long time waiting in line. By the time we finally got home, it was late, so mom & dad took us to Broadway Pizza for supper. (We had free birthday meals for our birthday month.) Yummy! It was delicious.

She didn't want a Sundae, but decided the ice cream would be perfect if they put NO toppings on it.

He couldn't decide whether he wanted a chocolate, strawberry or caramel sundae, so he sweet-talked the waitress into bringing him all 3 toppings to put on his sundae. (Too bad Mom spilled the cup of chocolate sauce all over the table!)

Not only did we get a pizza & ice cream sundae, but we got a teddy bear with a Broadway Pizza t-shirt. He's so cute!

We spent New Year's Eve putting together our new furniture.

They look really nice in our house! We did a nice job helping Daddy.

We celebrated New Year's Eve a little bit early (about 9 o'clock) with a toast. We had lemonade, Dad & mom had some wine. 2014 was a good year. Here's hoping 2015 is even better!

New Year's Day was a laid-back day to hang out at home.
Hannah and Mom continued the tradition of Hannah trying on Mom's wedding dress and taking a photo.

Trying on Mom's wedding dress: an annual tradition. 

She sure has grown over the years!!!

Tomorrow, Mom has to go back to work. Her vacation is over. Ours will be over in a few days.

Happy New Year!

Noah & Hannah

Christmas at home.

Sunday the 28th, we were happy to wake up in our own beds.
We let Mom & Dad sleep in because they stayed awake to drive us home.

It was great to have a day at home hanging out, doing our legos and unpacking.

Monday was our Christmas. We hadn't opened our family gifts yet, so we were very excited to get up and have our Christmas.

We got some fun stuff! It was a great day to just open gifts and have all day to play with them.

Merry Christmas!

Noah & Hannah

Heading home, with a stop at Lego Land

We woke up on the 27th excited to head back home after being on the road over the Holidays for more than a week.
We took our time enjoying our hotel before leaving. We loved this hotel! We slept in until about 8, then got ready to swim. The pool was warm, so we didn't want to get out.

Having a blast in the pool. (Even Noah wanted to keep swimming!) 

Alas, we had to be drug out of the pool kicking & screaming (well, almost). But, that meant to got to have some breakfast! All of the food was delicious. They even had a mini-waffle maker!

We didn't get a very early start - we left Conway about 10:30am. Mom & Dad said we'd probably drive until we got tired, stop at a hotel for the night then get all the way home tomorrow.

Shortly before we got to Kansas City, Mom & Dad asked if we wanted to stop at LegoLand Discovery Center. Hannah wanted to stop but Noah just wanted to get home so we could play with his own legos. After some debate, we decided that it might be our only chance - we don't know when (or if) we'll be back in Kansas City for fun, so we'll stop and check out LegoLand Discovery Center.

Before we got into LegoLand, we enjoyed the fun holiday display in the downtown area.

The big Christmas Tree in Crown Center in Kansas City

Lunar Lander

Apparently the soldiers have a guard shack in downtown Kansas City

Checking out the train.

That's a big nutcracker.

We were very excited to enjoy LegoLand!

Ready to check out LegoLand!

The first thing they did was take our picture.

Our family photo as the bricks fell on us at LegoLand.

Then we got to go into the "Lego making factory" (it was truly just a pretend factory) & see a Master Builder at work. He had some really cool stuff.

The Master Builder's office

Choosing the plastic granules to create a yellow Lego

Checking out the "Lego Making Factory"

After the factory, there was a really cool ride. Noah was afraid to take it, so Mom & Hannah rode the ride. They said it was fun - shooting spiders & saving the princess.

After the ride, we went into a special display of Lego Star Wars stuff.

A couple of droids wanted their pictures taken with us

The displays were all so cool!

The next room was a room with a whole bunch of buildings set up to look like Kansas City. There was the downtown area, some churches, the Chief's stadium and even the Kansas City speedway (where we got to race each other).

Three race cars actually raced around this track. We competed to see who could go the fastest.

The Royal's lego stadium was also a pinball game.

They also built Oz.

Hannah couldn't resist finding the cake.

Since it was Christmas, they had the trees decorated very nicely. Daddy loved the ornaments.

Then they had a big play area where we could build a gingerbread house, get a snack, play in a big maze, build a machine to compete with others in races and other contests, explore the Lego Friends house, ride another ride and take  class with a Master Builder.

The faster we pedaled, the higher our glider went

Since we were on a short timeline, we didn't get a chance to explore the Lego Racing area or take a class (or two) from the Master Builder. It would have been fun, though!

It was a very nice break to stretch our legs before we got going.

We stopped to eat just outside Kansas City and Daddy and Mommy told us that they'd try as hard as they could to get us home. We said we could sleep in the car if they could drive us home that night. It was hard to get comfortable in the car, but after a movie, we got comfy and fell asleep shortly before we got to Des Moines.

They said it was a long drive, but they stayed up until 3 o'clock keeping each other awake as they drove.

When we got home, they shoveled the driveway (at 3am) and brought us into the house. We were so tired, they let us sleep in our clothes.

We were so happy to be home! Merry Christmas to us.
Noah & Hannah