Monday Morning Video

I spent some time Sunday afternoon videotaping the girls riding their bikes (Hannah finally got rid of the training wheels!) which I'll post later, but this is the short conversation I had with Lizzie on our way home, when she didn't want to be going home.
Hope it brings a smile to your face on Monday morning!

Happy Halloween

Oh what a festive day we had!

First, I'd like to announce that exactly one year ago today we closed on our house so we've officially been here for an entire year. One day I hope to get to the boxes in the basement. But not today.

Today was all about Halloween and parades and candy.

Hannah and Liz both decided about a month ago, that they wanted to be ballerinas, using some of their cousin Shelby's costumes from when she was about their age. Here they are in their cuteness:

Here's Lizzie striking a pose. They've been taking dance since September and you'll notice that when I asked her to go up on her toes (I meant tippy toes) she went up on her actual toes, which I'm sure is very bad for a little dancer to do, but I was pretty darn impressed. Especially since I can't even get up on my tippy toes, these days.Here's Hannah in (I think -- we all know I'm clueless when it comes to ballet) third position. This is amazing in so many ways, not the least of which is that she didn't fall over. Hannah has blossomed in dance class and is way more coordinated that she used to be and downright graceful. They both made adorable ballerinas:Here's a close up of the Hannah Banana:And a close up of our silly Little Bit:

These next two pictures are of the Halloween Parade. All the kids go outside in the parking lot of the school and then march around grade by grade. Then we all went inside for a party. But I love these two pictures because they show the differences in Hannah and Lizzie. Below is Hannah who is so excited that I'm there and that (once again!) I have my camera and I'm yelling, "Hi Hannah!" so she waves and gives me a big smile so I can take her picture. As opposed to her sister ......who pretty much likes to pretend that I'm not around when we're in public together. I remember the summer before her fourth birthday we went to a concert at the local library and I was be-bopping to the music and Lizzie looked and me and said as quietly as she could, "Mom ... please ... no dancing." Here I got just a little bit of a hand wave:Finally, I discovered this picture while I was photo editing something else. It's Lizzie and her friend Ava (whom I met today at the party -- did I mention I was one of the Mom helpers and it was a lot of fun) and if you look closely you'll see they are holding hands. How sweet is that?

Old Friends

There's nothing like an old friend -- even if you're only a few weeks shy of your sixth birthday.

Hannah and Lizzie met Georgia at the Tot Spot Preschool when they were two years old and they've been friends ever since.

And I've been friends with her mom.

I would have loved Kara eventually because she's really cool, but on that first day when we dropped the kids off she and her husband were walking back towards the cars with me and she turned to me and said words of encouragement I'll never forget: "Too bad the bars aren't open, right?"

How could you not love a mom like that?

Well, as you can imagine, having a mom like that, Georgia's a whole lot of fun and Hannah and Lizzie are all about fun.

So at last week's playdate they treated us to their combined fashion sense. First their sweet faces:

And then the full effect:

I can't wait to show them these pictures when they're trying to choose a prom gown in about 10 years!

Lights, Camera, Action

I got a new video camera a few days ago. I wanted to have it to show you the occasional video starring my well behaved, graceful children. Instead, I present you this:

This is what happens when we feed them.

I have no idea why they are yelling.

I apologize for the sudden ending, but I had to get to my card-making class.

Next time I will try to find some well-behaved, graceful children to videotape.

Haunted House

My friend Tina (THANKS TINA!!) gave me a haunted gingerbread house kit for my birthday and today the girls and I decided to tackle it. We made a house at Christmas, too, but it wasn't nearly as well decorated since Hannah ate most of the candy. This time she tried, but Lizzie was the candy police and kept telling her to stop eating the decorations. The house came out pretty well, and they actually did most of the decorating, with me sort of guiding them. Here are some pictures from the creating.

Lizzie worked on painting the roof with orange icing. She was very methodical about it:

Hannah puts some candy on the front of the gingerbread house:

Here's the front of the house. The ghost was a piece of candy, but we designed the rest of the house.

The right side of the house was supposed to have a pumpkin garden made with the orange jelly beans but Hannah ate them all, so now it's a rotting pumpkin garden:
Here's the back of the house. Don't be scared Aunt Tina ... it's not a real spider. I don't know what kind of flowers are growing at the back of the house, but Hannah and Liz thought they were scary:
Here's the other side of the house. This is a spider web that caught some candy as it was blowing through the air:

Here the girls are with the finished product. Should they eat it?...

Or pose with it:

Fun with Sun Flare

Here's one more picture from the wedding. It's really more of an art shot, although Lizzie is in it. I love sun flare pictures and this one in particular because everything looks so autumnal in it. Which is nice considering that it's going to be 82 degrees here today, and therefore not fall-like at all.

Wedding!

We're home from the wedding in the Poconos, and gosh did we have a lot of fun!! Skytop Lodge is nothing short of gorgeous and the company was wonderful. And it didn't hurt that it was fall in the Poconos and the trees were cooperating with their autumn-ness.

I took a million photos (seriously -- not much of an exaggeration) and will try to post them in some sort of way to give you an idea of how much fun we had.

First, the courtyard where the wedding took place overlooked a portion of the golf course so it was lush and green in the distance, but the courtyard itself was filled with mums. This is a picture of Hannah and Liz running around the courtyard after the ceremony (during the cocktail hour.)

Here's a picture from the outdoor ceremony:As you can see, Andrea made a beautiful bride, but the sun angle was all wrong for me to take pictures, so here's a couple pictures of her and Mike (Rob's cousin) after they were married. I thought her dress was stunning ... the perfect color for her skin tone and understated while being quite elegant. This was their first dance together as husband and wife:

Here's another shot of that same dance, where Mike and Andrea are framed by Mike's parents, Rob's Aunt Louise and Uncle Mike:

Dancing was the highlight for Lizzie and Hannah who danced pretty solidly from the time dinner was over (around 7 p.m.) until it was time to leave at 10 p.m. Lizzie ran out of gas at about 9:30, but Hannah (as you'll see in these pictures) was ready to party into the wee hours.

Here, Hannah (and you can see the skirt of Lizzie's dress, too) is dancing with cousins Zach (who was born seven days after Rob and I got married, by the way, and his mother was at our wedding!) and Jen.

And here she is with Zach alone. She pretty much followed him around for most of the night, grinning and flirting and he graciously put up with her. In fact all of their cousins were very accommodating to the twin 5 year olds for which Rob and I were VERY grateful!Towards the end of the evening Hannah just sort of went crazy oon the dance floor and everyone -- including Uncle Mike, father of the groom -- joined in. Hannah thought it was the silliest thing she'd ever seen in her life (Lizzie was off in another room of the resort playing mini-golf with Rob.):Grandma got in on the dancing, too. Here she's dancing with her brother Mike. Doesn't Connie look spectacular?? I cannot believe this woman is my husband's mom -- she looks more like his sister!The bride and groom dance to Sweet Caroline:

Here's John (Rob's cousin Donna's husband) dancing with his daughters:

The wedding was very much about family, as things always are when the Homulak/Rasmussen crowd gets together. Here are some other random shots illustrating that:

Here are (left to right) Rob's cousin Gail, Aunt Louise, cousin Donna and mom:

Do these guys look related or what??? That's Rob with his Uncle Eddie (Connie's brother.)And here's the next generation ... Rob with his cousin Jimmy who will graduate college in May:Donna and Zach and John (and Rob in the background 'gaurding' the dessert table!)I love this picture of Rob's sister Linda. I snapped it while she was salsa dancing:There were rumors flying that Emily (Jimmy's girlfriend, chatting here with Linda) will be the next person to join the clan!Grandma Connie and Hannah (LOVE this picture!!):Lizzie giving her Daddy a hug (love this picture, too!!):Posing with her daddy:Chowing down on the caramel/chocolate covered apples that were the favors for the wedding:And taking a picture of her mom, who was taking a picture of her (yes, I was there!):Here are Hannah and Liz at the beginning of the wedding in their gorgeous dresses! I'll probably find a few more pictures to post later (for instance I know I must have at least one picture of Lizzie dancing!) But suffice it to say that a great time was had by all and we wish Andrea and Mike the absolute best of everything as they begin their life together!!