Christmas Card out-take

This picture didn't make it into the Christmas card, but I thought it was too cute not to use somewhere!

Christmas Card 2010

I finally got this year's Christmas card ordered! Here's a preview :-)

Candy Canes Green Christmas

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Thanksgiving

Claire and I decided to play photographers over at Eric's sister's house today. We got a few cute pictures of our 4 little princesses along with their 4 little princesses :-)

Elf Yourself 2010

Halloween

The girls had a great Halloween this year. The temps were great so we walked a long way. Our new neighborhood is full of kids so the girls had a blast being out with the swarms of kids :-) Here's a few pictures:

The older girls and I carved 2 pumpkins on Sat. Eric and Chloe carved one at "Daddy and Me" pumpkin night at preschool- I don't have a picture of them yet.

Ready to go!

Pretending to be scared of Daddy's scary zombie mask

Checking out their loot. They made a haul!

Claire's orange room

Since I posted a picture of Emilie's purple room, I figured I should go ahead and show the next room we painted. Claire has 3 favorite colors: turquoise, lime, and orange. We found a bedspread and curtains that she liked before we moved. After we set up her room she decided that the paint color should be orange. I was a little apprehensive about a whole room painted in that color. But I think it turned out pretty cute- and Claire absolutely loves it :-)

Cute quote of the Day

The girls were discussing the upcoming Christmas holidays at dinner tonight. Conversation got around to Santa's visit and what he should be left to eat when he reaches our house. Not just cookies would suffice but he had to have cookies and milk. Then the discussion moved on to what kind of cookies. The older 3 named off a few and then Chloe piped up- "I just want to leave pizza for Jesus."

Giant City

We took our last camping trip of the year with the Trapp family to Giant City, IL. It is a really neat park with tons of hiking trails and rock outcroppings. The weather was fantastic- in the low 80's in the afternoons. The kids had a great time hiking and climbing all over the rocks. We also got in some yummy food both cooked over the campfire on Saturday and the next day with a fried chicken dinner at the lodge. Thanks to Nikki for the pictures since I forgot my camera!

Ready to hike one of the trails:

Elise

Climbing around on the rocks

Chloe- this girl loves to get dirty when we're camping. This picture is probably the cleanest she was all weekend.

Chloe and Sofie- 2 peas in a pod

Group picture: Noah, Sofia, Rylan, Elise, Emilie, Claire, and Chloe

The kids set up stand selling chunks of cedar that Eric and Wade cut up when getting firewood. They were evidently cute enough that a few campers actually came and bought some from them :-P

Ready for the hot lava cakes (brownies cooked in a pie iron over the campfire)

Preschool Trip to the Pumpkin Patch

Chloe's preschool took a trip to the pumpkin patch. Since Elise is in PM Kindergarten, she got to come along too. The girls had a great time- we went on a wagon ride, played in "Pumpkinland"- the big pumpkin-themed playground, and picked up a couple of pumpkins to carve at home.

This was a creepy looking horse, but the girls thought it was really neat!

Tractor tire swing

They climbed to the top of the pyramid of hay

Climbing up to one of the slides

Sitting on a pile of giant pumpkins

Cards game

Eric took Claire, Emilie, and Elise to the Cardinals game in September. He finally got the pictures to me, so I figured I would put them up on the blog :-) The girls had a great time with their dad:

Piano Lessons

Claire and Emilie wanted me to share what they've been learning in piano lessons. Emilie started lessons a month ago and Claire is in her 2nd year of private lessons. Please excuse my piano, it is desperately in need of being tuned!

Emilie's purple room

Now that I've finished training for my marathon, the girls are insisting its time to paint their bedrooms. So they went to Grandma Linda's house this Saturday and I painted Emilie's room. Her choice of paint color: purple. Hopefully I will get to Claire's in the next week or two. Her color choice is orange- should be interesting! Then Elise and Chloe want pink. Should be a colorful couple of weeks! So here is Emilie with her new purple bedroom. (I apologize for the picture quality. It was getting dark and my phone doesn't have a flash!)

Apple picking

Following our usual tradition, a few weeks ago we took the girls to Eckerts to pick apples. They want to do the same things each time: Pick apples first, buy and drink apple cider next, and then look around the store. They start asking every year in the summer when we're going to pick apples. We did it every year when I was growing up, so its fun to continue the tradition with them. And of course then we eat amazing amounts of apples for the next few weeks :-) Yum!

Pine Lakes

Earlier in October, we went camping with the Trapp family to Pine Lakes Campground in Illinois. We found this campground last year when we decided to go to Springfield and see the Abe Lincoln sites. We enjoyed our trip to Pine Lakes so much that we decided to go back there this year and then hit Hannibal, MO on our way home. They have a bunch of Halloween activities during the month of October. The kids love it:

First, they have a pumpkin patch. All the kids get to go and pick one when their number is called out:

Claire with her pumpkin

Emilie and Noah

All the girls back at our campsite with our silly face suckers :-)
Elise, Chloe, Sofia, Emilie, and Claire

We brought paint and other crafty things to decorate our pumpkins with:
From left: Sofia, Claire, Noah, Rylan, Elise, Emilie, Chloe

Later there was a costume contest. Emilie won her age group for her Hermione (from Harry Potter) costume:

Chloe opted to be a kitty cat again this year. Sofia's in the background with her frog costume

Claire in her Katie Bell (Harry Potter quidditch player) costume

Elise as Sleeping Beauty

After the costume contest was Camper trick or treating (the kids favorite part)

The whole gang: Claire, Noah, Elise, Sofia, Chloe, Rylan, and Emilie

In Hannibal, Emilie's getting in touch with her inner-Tom Sawyer

200 year old oak tree- it took all 7 of the kids holding hands to stretch around it

Inside Mark Twain Cave- the kids thought that was really neat:
Chloe, Emilie, Sofia, Elise, Claire, Noah, Rylan

Chloe panning for gold (and other rocks)

Emilie holding up her find