St. Louis Vacation

For our summer trip we went to St. Louis. We had a great time. We started with the Gateway Arch, Nora really enjoyed sitting on the windows over the edge of the Arch.

We stayed at Union Station Hotel, which was built out of a converted train station. It had some pretty cool features.

The next day we walked over to the City Museum. It was very cool, especially the way the girls got to set the pace of our exploration and decide how much to push their limits. Kristin and I did get some pretty good knee bruises.

For a final day we went to the Zoo. We didn't get too many pictures, I think the polar bear and penguins were everyone's favorite.

Abby's 8th Birthday

We've got a lot of blog catching up to do. I'll get started with Abby's birthday, there were birthday pancakes and Abby picked cupcakes as for her birthday cake.

She also had a big birthday party will all her friends from school. As I recall the theme was candy fairies. I do remember we went through a ton of pizza.

Nora's Lost Tooth

Nora lost her first tooth at school yesterday! She was pretty excited, so I'll let her tell you about it in her own words:

"How I Lost My Tooth
I was at school in PE class. I had a loose tooth. I wanted it to come out before class was over. I wiggled and wiggled. Then I pulled and at last my tooth came out. I told a lot of people. My mom gave me a bag to put my tooth in. I hope the tooth fairy comes to my house tonight.
By Nora VanDuyne"

She also drew a picture of the tooth fairy (complete with bags for teeth and dollars) coming to visit while she's sleeping. Apparently Bear has stayed awake when the tooth fairy has come for Abby's teeth and told Nora what she looks like.

It all worked out - last night Nora left a tooth and two cards that she made for the tooth fairy under her pillow, and this morning they were gone and a dollar was in their place. Exciting times!

Daddy Daughter Date Night

The girls and I went to Daddy Daughter Date Night again this year. We had a great time.

They asked to go out to Steak'n Shake for dinner. We tried, but the high school state wrestling tournament was going on and the line of kids was out the door. We decided to switch to Subway. They had lots of dessert at the event anyway.

Yes, Nora's wearing her 'My Mom Rocks!' shirt there.

The main event was at a local gymnastics facility, they girls ran around non-stop for 2 hours. They were exhausted by the end. They also had several moments of bravery, I was proud.

We had a great time!

Christmas 2015

Somehow in the busyness of Christmas this year I haven't made time to post about it. Before we get too far into the new year I should write something down. The weekend before Christmas we visited Grandpa and Grandma VanDuyne. Abby wrote a great poem on the way up, I was very impressed!

Later that week we visited Santa at the mall. Christmas Eve it was so warm Nora got a chance to ride her new bike.

We started out Christmas at our house. Once again the girls had a great time. They're such grateful kids it makes every Christmas special. Santa brought them sleeping bags, and a matching pair of singing Barbie dolls were a huge hit. At least until they decided to bring them in the car to the Wilson family Christmas and we heard them singing the same two lines for 3 hours straight.

At the Wilson family christmas we all got to meet Isaac. That was a lot of fun, but no one had more fun than Nora.

Anyway, a good time was had by all.