Things to Do In December

Decorate the Tree!



Run Through the Snow!



Take a Little (okay, maybe a BIG) Taste Of the Snow!



Make a "Car Bus" out of one of the many boxes that have been coming in the mail the past couple of weeks!



Wear Rudolf Clothing! It's especially fun if the nose on your shirt blinks and you have socks with reindeer on them as well!



Enjoy what Ella calls our "Beeee-yoooo-ti-ful" Pointsettia that Pake and Beppe sent to us!



So those are the fun things we have been up to lately. Hope you are having a great December as well! (:

Who Wants To Come Over?

Good luck getting here if you do! We have about 11 inches of snow on the ground right now. It's still going - but looks like it will end soon. Here is a picture I took around 10am. I don't think the guy across the street got too far this morning, hee hee.


All of the schools, government offices, and even some malls are closed right now. People are getting their cars stuck all over the place - after spending an hour or two burying them out of the snow. It's a good thing Dave has today off. He worked this past Sunday, so could pick a flex day this week to make up for it. I think he made a great choice!

There's no question that WE are gonna have a White Christmas!

Weekend Fun!

For Halloween/Reformation Day this year I was a good frugal dutchwoman and talked Ella into wearing the same costume that she wore last year. Even though she told everyone who asked that she wanted to be a sprinkler for Halloween, we had no arguments when it was time to put the old kitty-cat suit on once again.

Here she is, ready to go!


It worked out pretty well because we left to go trick or treating at the same time the neighbor girls came out with their parents, so we were able to walk along with them, which more than delighted Ella.

After many blocks, a few meltdowns (not by Ella though), donning of the glowbracelets, bags of candy getting heavier and heavier, and Ella asking "When is it time to go home?" it was finally time to call it quits for the evening.

We had a great time, and what made it a million times better was that the weather was absolutely BEAUTIFUL! Last year we went out for just a few minutes, and Ella had on her huge coat, gloves, and hat. It was freezing, and not really much fun to be outside. This year we didn't even need any extra layers. Definitely a rarity that we thouroughly enjoyed!

Then, on Saturday morning we were up bright (well, dark actually) and early, so that we could be dressed, packed, and ready in time to catch the train to Chicago. Considering the fact that we could ride the metra train an unlimited number of times for $5 each (and Ella was free) for the entire weekend, we thought that would be a great way to travel down to the big city and would be a fun and somewhat cheap day out.

Ella had a ton of fun on her first trainride. Of course she commented on and questioned just about EVERYTHING. But I think she provided a lot of entertainment to those seated around us. Once we arrived in Chicago, we found out that they had trolley busses that ran for free and would take you to any of the major areas and back. So our cheap weekend became even cheaper. Woo hoo!

We ended up on Michigan Ave, and had to go into the American Girl Store. It was pretty crazy and busy in there, so not as much fun as it could have been to browse, but it was definitely an interesting place to be. Dave called it a whole separate culture. And I would have to agree.

We walked around, found a restaurant that served the deep-dish Chicago-style pizza, and looked in a few more stores. Then we got back on our trolley, rode back to the train station, and boarded the train back home. When we finally arrived at out stop, I told Ella that she was becoming a train expert. She replied "When I grow up, I want to be a train expert." A young woman in the aisle started laughing out loud and had to tell us how cute and entertaining Ella was. Yep, that's our Ella!

Painting and Pumpkins!

We've had a pretty exciting day of crafts/special projects in our home the past few days. I must admit that I'm not one of those moms that likes to get down and dirty and messy. I'm usually not planning any type of activities that might involve finger paints, glue, scissors, glitter, or any of those other "messy" arts and crafts items. So when Ella and I made a trip to Hobby Lobby (LOVE that store!) this past week, and picked up some wooden letters, paint brushes, and paint, Ella was pretty excited to be involved in the project that was to come. We covered the table in newspaper, got out all of the supplies, and before long we had the letters E-L-L-A hand-painted to match the colors in Ella's room.

Here's my little artist at work:


And here's our finished product! (completed with just a *little* help from me)



Then on Saturday, we decided to make our way to a pumpkin farm to pick out a few pumpkins. There were goats and llamas to pet, play houses to explore, hay piles to climb on and walk inside, and many other fun things that Ella enjoyed running back and forth between. If my camera display hadn't died on me, and Ella hadn't done such a great job of running away each time we finally caught up to whatever attraction she was involved in, I would have captured a lot of cute pictures. But this is about the only one I got.



We did find a pumpkin for myself, Dave, Ella, and Pumpkin. After a much needed nap, we once again covered our table with newspapers and the pumpkin carving fun began!

Ella was our professional pumpkin-scooper-outter. (:



And here is our new pumpking family - a "classic" smile for Dave, a kitty-cat pumpkin for Pumpkin, a goofy smile for mine, and a scary-faced (chosen by her) pumpkin for Ella.


Ella was less than excited when I told her that pumpkins' home would be our front porch. She really tried to talk me into keeping them in the house where she would then be able to see them all the time. Sorry, they had to be outside where they were able to get a good view of the snow (yes, SNOW!) that we had blowing in the air today. Brrrrr!!

Colors of Fall

So I guess one of the up-sides of living in Wisconsin is that we actually get to experience a taste of the fall colors. I am absolutely in love with the deep reds and oranges that the leaves on some of the trees have turned right now. I can't remember seeing anything so vibrant growing up in California.

So, this past Sunday, Ella was all dressed up for fall as we went to church. It took some fancy talk to get my anti-tights child to put them on, but I think the number of people who commented about how cute she was in her pumpkin tights I think made her pretty happy to be wearing them.

It was such a beautiful, sunny afternoon that I decided to take her outside and try and get a couple of pictures with all of the leaves in the background. Here are a few of my favorites.








So, aren't her pumpkin tights pretty cute? (:

Ella Talk

Well, I figured it was high time to post another enty onto my "abandoned" blog. And I figured I'd let Ella do the talking on this one since she's been amusing me so much lately. Here are just a couple of our recent conversations:

The other night Ella pulled out one of her very heavy and vibrantly illustrated Bibles that we had not really looked at before. We were looking at the pictures of the creation story, and then read the story of adam and eve. After describing how the serpent had tricked eve into eating the forbidden fruit, I asked Ella if that was what God said to do. She immediately said "No." She paused, looked at the picture of the fuit, and then asked me this:

Ella: "Mom, what kind of fruit is this?"
Me: "It looks like an apple"
Ella: "But she didn't even wash it before she ate it"

Oh, how great of a sin that was commited on that day......

Then just this morning we were talking about all of the special days coming up, and started talking about Christmas. I asked her if she knew whose birthday it was on Christmas. She said "baby Jesus." I then asked her where Jesus lives. Her response: "Is it in another state?" Ha ha. I guess you could say that...... Kind of funny though since she's been talking so much about how Jesus and God live in her heart lately. I guess all of this moving and traveling and talking about the different states where different people we know live is affecting her thinking.