february 2014 insta update

(1) Sleeping so peacefully (2) 2.5 pounds of pork chops, 4 pounds of roasted potatoes and 2 pounds of broccoli for dinner.  Gone.  Ben ate half of the broccoli.  Not looking forward to feeding them during the teen years.  (3) Watching the Super Bowl

(4) Zoe is eying Lexie's Wine Gums (5) Hate waking this sleeping sweetheart to take the other sweethearts to school (6) Decisions

(7) Sitting with Daddy (8) Lunch by the fire at Cracker Barrel (9) Helping make the BEST oatmeal chocolate chip cookies for the big kids' after school snack (and grinning at the dog)

(1) Three months old! (2) Playing "Opening Ceremony Bingo" and enjoying Russian Apple Sharlotka (3) Leftover apple sharlotka makes a delicious breakfast with coffee

(4) Homemade peach crisp (5) All tuckered out after her bath (6) Nick finally finished the display board for his Living History Museum

(7) Ellie loves her quilt (8) Homemade ham and potato soup is perfect for a snow day (9) Snow finally stopped

(1) Hearing about everyone's snowventures wore her out (2) Perfect night for polenta! (3) Ready to brave the aftermath of the snowpocalypse

(4) Heartbreaker pizza and Cupid floats on Valentine's Day (5) Lunch with the birthday boy (6) Loving her new jumper

(7) Cutest lunch date ever at Tupelo Honey Cafe (8) OMG.  Yum. (9) French deliciousness at Amelie's

(1) Nick as Teddy Roosevelt (2) Ready for the daddy-daughter dance (3) Nick and Ben had sundaes while Lexie was at the dance

(4) Nick and his birthday burrito (5) What?! The snow is gone and it's nice outside?! (6) Excited for our morning walk

(7) Laying in bed watching videos of herself (8) Such a sweet face..... (9) Gotta make sure there's room in her mouth for her thumb and pacifier!

february 2014

Ellie turned three months-- she's our smiley, squirmy little bug :)

The kids- and pup- were excited for our second snow day of the year!  We put bowls outside to catch the falling snow for a snack.

Starting to get some good accumulation!!  We made snow cream with the snow from our backyard.  Snow cream is a mixture of snow, sugar, vanilla, and sweetened condensed milk-- and it's delicious!!

After our snow cream snack the kids headed out back to play in the snow.

The plus to having so many siblings is that it's easy to have a snowball fight!

But it's nice to play alone sometimes, too.

All the kids!  The big kids had fun playing out back while Miss Ellie stayed warm by the fire.

When we woke up the next morning, the snow was still falling!!

The swingset out back had icicles.

The kids got bundled up and went out front to play.  Snow angels were the first order of business!

Sweet, snowy faces

It's time for another snowball fight!!

Snowman fun.  All the kids wanted to build a snowman-- we even acquired some neighbor kids that wanted to help.

Nick, Ben and Lexie with their snowmen

Christopher built one snowman with his friends and then started on another one with Ben.

After Ben built his Fire "Snow"Man, he set to work building a snow fort.

By the end of the day, most of the snow had melted and we were treated to the most beautiful full moon.

We celebrated Nick's 9th birthday with a delicious red velvet-brownie cake.

The birthday boy was excited about his balloons and his delicious cake!!

Time for presents!!  And who can resist those baby blues??

We got a jumper for Ellie and she absolutely loves it!!  And Nick loves playing with her while she's in it.

Lexie and Jacob were able to attend the Daddy-Daughter Dance at Lexie's school this year.  Lexie was so excited to get a chance to dress up and go out just the two of them.  They danced the night away and came home exhausted!!

Nick used his birthday money to get rollerblades.  He was a bit nervous at first but by the end of the weekend he perfected falling down!  :)  It only took another day or so to get confident staying up and now he can rollerblade like a pro!