Davy Crockett!

Yesterday Beckett and I had to run to the Duluth Trading Company to pick something up and there was a display of coon skin caps. Isn't he handsome?

Four Thumbs-up!!

That would be 2 from me and 2 from Kurt! We had a little date night last night for my birthday since he'll be working on the ACTUAL day. We both really wanted to see Lincoln and then we buzzed to Galena for a nice dinner. I've read a couple of places that Daniel Day-Lewis will win an Oscar for best actor, no matter who else is in the category, which I agree with. I also think that Tommy Lee Jones will be snagging a nomination for best supporting. We'll find out if I'm right, LOL!!!

City Boys on the Farm

Once a month, my extended family on my Dad's side gets together on a Sunday for lunch, rotating amongst different Aunts and Uncles houses. A couple of weeks ago it was at my Aunt Denise's and just up the road is a little farmette that had a new 2-day old donkey. That meant taking a tiny road trip to go see him =) Besides the donkey's there were lots of sheep, some goats and a few kittens. Parker wondered if the goats were safe because they were "staring him down" (his words, HA!) Beckett was so proud of himself because he was able to catch the kitty he is holding all by himself. There was LOTS of looking down while we walked, if you know what I mean!!!!

Date Night (in the Afternoon)

This afternoon Arielle was sweet enough to come sit with the little boys so Kurt and I could go see Argo. We've been wanting to see it and had heard great things--and we agreed. We both enjoyed it. Suspenseful even though I KNEW how it was going to end =) Our last movie was Hotel Translyvania and next weekend we want to see "Lincoln". Our movie tastes are all over the map!

Hurricane Sandy--as seen by a Wisconsinite!

I am usually a "people picture" type of gal, but when you plunk a Mid-western girl in the middle of a major weather event on the ocean, things shift gears =) These are just some pictures of the Atlantic doing its thing during our portion of Hurricane Sandy. On Monday the water found a way to get to us, without even coming up over the dunes and down the access road we used from the beach. And once it started coming, it came hard and ran fast!! You can see that the tire tracks stayed put during it all. Our house is about 3 rows back from the beach, so our yard/driveway never flooded, but the road right along the house did. That became a barrier to us being able to get out. Luckily we were able to tack a day on and the water went down enough for us to drive through it to get ourselves on the beach. Mother Nature is not someone to mess around with---especially water, it is a powerful force and I can understand how things (including people) get swept away in fast moving currents.

Labor Day Camping

We had the opportunity to camp a few times this summer. I even purchased a tent and big fat air mattresses for our "comfort". Kurt has to work most weekends, so the boys and I just glom onto where my parents are camping. They (them and my cousin Courtney) have the bulk of the necessary supplies, so we're pretty lucky to get to horn in on their plans! These are pictures of the boys "celebrating" Labor Day in style--HA! Paxton is our little pyro--it is his personal mission to be in charge of burning all paper products in the campfire. In fact, Courtney will hoard some things and when he thinks he's out of material, she'll pull it out in exchange for an "I love you" out of him =)

Hotel Translyvania

This afternoon we took the boys to see Hotel Translyvania. Super cute, the boys loved it. About halfway through, Beckett leaned over to tell me "We need to get this on DVD", which is as good as any 4 star review =)

Big 10 Football

This is us at an Iowa Hawkeye game!! My Boss has been a season ticket holder for as long as I've known him, and I'm certain before that. They were unable to use their tickets for the game on Saturday and offered them to us =) I'm not a die-hard football fan, that is for sure (gotta own some Badger apparel though! Pro football I couldn't give 2 licks about) but it was a BEAUTIFUL day to be sitting outside, AND the home team won. At halftime (it was homecoming, so lots of activity) they introduced the man who had coached gymnastics at Iowa for a few years, who then went on to coach a certain little girl named Gabby Douglas---she made kind of a splash in London if you followed the Olympics at all.

Annual Fire Department Picnic

A summertime must-happen here is the annual picnic that the fire department has for its volunteers and families. After an unGodly hot summer, it turned out to actually be a very nice day for this years event! As usual there was yummy food, games to play, face painting, rides in the ariel ladder and the big moment this year was that Beckett won the "Grand Prize" drawing of a brand new bike and helmet! Which was great timing as he was outgrowing his old bike. The helmet was a little big, but no worries--it fit Paxton perfectly!!

Attempting to get back in the groove

So my last published post was back in January =( I was having a TON of trouble getting pictures to post on my blog, and, let's face it, who wants to read a blog without pictures? Not me!!! So with any luck, I can get back on the blogging bandwagon and get a certain family member or two off of my back, HA!!On Saturday, Kurt and I took the boys to Cave of the Mounds near Mt. Horeb. It's a natural cavern filled with stalagmites and stalagtites (if I'm even spelling them right!), and is a very popular destination for area school districts for field trips---in fact, Paxton went there this past Spring for his. But the rest of us had never been. The tour was very interesting and of course there's the gift shop when you're done. The boys got to sift for treasure buried in bags of sand that we bought and they dumped that into screens and swished it in the moving water trough that's set up there. They each came home with a nice little bag of crystals!

Mommy/Little Boy Movie Time

Last week before the boys started school again after Xmas break (Arielle still has weeks off) I took the little boys to see The Adventures of Tintin. I didn't realize until later that this is Steven Spielberg's first animated film. I thought it was very good, but probably was a bit old for Beckett. Paxton enjoyed it a lot and watched intently, but Beckett was asking for my itouch about 2/3 of the way through it. Since there were only 3 others in the theater and they were sitting way ahead of us, I did let him have it to entertain himself with (since my $38 expenditure was failing, HA!)
That's 2 kid's movies I've seen in a row now and I am ready for something geared towards older movie-goers!! My Week with Marilyn and Tinker Tailor Soilder Spy are on my list =)

Arthur Christmas

Kurt has three 12 hour shifts this weekend, so rather than stay cooped up all weekend long missing Daddy, I took the little boys to a movie this afternoon. I had it narrowed down to the Muppet Movie or Arthur Christmas. AC won out =) It was a very cute movie and we enjoyed it. I'll bet we would have enjoyed the parts we missed during 2 separate bathroom breaks too....

Buffalo Phils

So, turns out, these kids still want to eat even though we're not at home!!! I always pack a cooler and a big canvas bag of munchies and sammie fixings, but we usually do venture out of the hotel for one meal a day, last night it was supper.
My sister and her family live very close to the Dells, and USUALLY one of my nephews come up to spend some time at the water park so Parker gets to do some rides without a squealing girl sitting across from him, HA! Turns out, he's grown accustomed to eating as well. Kurt had a dinner meeting so it was up to me to take 5 of them out--we chose Buffalo Phil's (not to be confused with Buffalo BILLS, which may cause some sore of copyright infringement issues). They have a room where a model train will "deliver" your meal, but wait-time was over an hour and seeing as we couldn't get good WIFI connections, keeping the boys entertained on iTouches was not going to happen, hence "regular" seating for us =)
Regardless, kids meals come with "buffalo horns" and the 4 boys at the table happily wore them, even is posing for a pic was NOT done happily...