We had a great time celebrating Daddy’s birthday on Friday–here’s the photographic proof!

Jon’s mom & dad made him a special sloppy joe birthday dinner–it was super yummy!

Olivia explaining to Jon that these are pajama pants, and that he should go put them on and take his shirt off, since that’s what the guy in the picture is doing.   

Everyone loves underwear for their birthday, right?

Rascal Flatts downloads! 

Norah and Grandpa Rick 

Daddy, the girls, and Mama’s cake creation… 

Koopa Troopa on a Bullet Bike, from Mario Kart Wii!

Singing to Daddy

Just a cute photo 

Blowing out the candles! 

Still trying…  LOL! 

Since Jon was iced in at home for a couple days, he took it upon himself to rearrange and reorganize the playroom.  It looks fabulous!  Of course the girls trashed it right away, and Jon had to organize everything again.  As a contribution to the matter, I spent today taking photos of what goes where and what it should look like when it’s clean.  Then I put a label on each photo, printed them, and posted them in the playroom.  This way the girls can easily see what goes where and which toys go in which bins.  Apparently, Norah did not understand the system…

Then she shut her finger in the door–ouch!  She’s bawling in this photo, you just can’t tell, LOL.

But still wouldn’t get out of the kitchen, ha!

And our own version of “Where’s Norah?”

More ice photos, this time in the daylight…

This one is my favorite:

The girls enjoying the ice… 

Norah trying to walk in the grass 

We have now officially experienced an Arkansas ice storm!  Luckily, Rustad Baby #3 is showing no signs of wanting to join us for it, as we are not going anywhere anytime soon.  Here are some neat photos we got late Monday night.

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Jon picked this from a bush in our yard.

This is the bush: 

It’s a little difficult to make out, but these are Jon’s footprints in the grass–like walking on individually frozen blades of grass!

And the tree outside our dining room window:

It was too cold to get photos of anything else. 

Okay, this post really isn’t about Fort Branson, but it is about a fort and Branson! 

Tonight Jon and I built a fort for the girls to play in, and I suggested quietly to Jon that they could sleep in it if they wanted to.  Of course Olivia overheard me and loved the idea, so tonight Liv & Norah are sleeping in the fort!  At least they think they want to, and they’re still in there–though they’ve only been in it for about twenty minutes now.  Ask me again in the morning, LOL!

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Then last Sunday we went to Branson, MO, for the night to stay in a waterpark hotel (off-season and on a Sunday, so actually fairly reasonably priced).  We had a blast!  Here we are mini-golfing.

Jon showing Norah how to putt.

Norah putting the way she wanted to. 

Olivia had a pretty good swing! 

Her short game was a little funny though. 

And Daddy rescuing Norah’s ball from the middle of the tunnel.  She threw it in, but not quite hard enough.

Notice that hole five was as far as we got with photos…about as far as the girls made it golfing!  Jon and I hurried through the rest of our eighteen (good thing we didn’t opt for 36!) and we were on our way to the outlet mall. 

Hope you enjoy!

We woke us this morning to a half inch of snow on the ground this morning!  The girls were so excited to see snow.  They wanted to go play in it immediately.    I checked the local news website, and Bentonville schools were closed!  Now spending the first 28 years of my life in South Dakota and Minnesota, I find this quite humorous.  Seriously, half an inch of snow???  This is not a big deal.  I can still see the grass poking through it!

Jon and I both found out this morning that they have their reasons!

On his way to work, Jon slowly slid down a Bella Vista hill, avoiding braking to avoid fishtailing into a car trying to make it up the hill.  He had to slide into the grass a little bit, but no damage done.  He called me from work to tell me to be careful driving this morning, and I’m so glad he did!

I was on my way to drop the girls off at a friend’s house, I tried three times to make it *up* a Bella Vista hill.  I finally had to go back down the road a quarter mile or so and get a running start at it.  I still spun out all the way up, but we made it!  Olivia and Norah thought I was crazy.  Olivia kept asking what I was doing and why we weren’t going.  Norah piped up, “I think we need gas!”  Too funny!! 

Now we are both seasoned winter drivers.  I myself have spent fourteen years driving in winter conditions.  It really isn’t about the drivers like I always thought it was.  It’s about the hills, the condition of the roads, and the lack of equipment to appropriately take care of the roads once they are snow or ice covered.  Am I officially an Arkansas now? 

Chelsea and I were cleaning out some boxes and we came across a picture that was pretty neat: Jon, Lesy, and Jess at an abandoned gold mine in Lead, SD.  That was a fun trip!

Blog to you all soon!

This morning we were lotioning and clipping fingernails after the girls’ shower, and Jon was quizzing Olivia with math questions.  She got an amazing amount correct!  She did both addition and subtraction, but the subtraction was a little trickier.  Jon would ask, “If I have eight apples and gave three to you, how many would I have left?”  She would answer, “Six,” because she counted (in her head) eight, seven, six–instead of seven, six, five.  She is a whiz at addition though! 

Anyway, right at the beginning, Jon asked her, “If I had seven apples and you gave me one more, how many would I have?”  She answered, “Eight!” 

“If I had eight apples and you gave me one more, how many would I have?”  “Nine!”

“If I had eight apples and you gave me two more, how many would I have?”

“Ten!  And I would be sick from all those apples!”

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Olivia would now like to type her name for you.  Here it is:

OLIVIA

She also used the shift key to make each letter uppercase (because she wanted it that way) and the backspace key to erase her mistakes. 

Here are some more photos from the warm (and not-so-warm) days during Jess & Leighton’s visit.  They had to go back this morning, and we all miss them already! 

At the school playground Saturday late afternoon.  Norah is a natural rock climber!

Awwwwwwwwww…

Cutie! 

Okay, pregnant women, do not try this at home.  Or at the playground.  Doesn’t work. 

Me walking the balance beam.  Thanks to the Wii Fit, I have wonderful balance.  But look at that big baby sticking out in front!

Just a pretty photo.

Sweet… 

Now these are from yesterday, when we all went to Eureka Springs after my midwife appointment.  Sadly only about 1/32nd of the shops and things were open due to the season, but it was still fun! 

There are a lot of stairs, ups, and downs in Eureka.  Enough to make a pregnant woman pant.

Empty storefront window 

Walking downtown.

Peeking in the store windows! 

Posing for the camera… 

Putting on a show for the girls (and pasing cars). 

Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your…..long hair?

Sitting on a wall, just because it had a bench.

Caught this one before they saw me…

This one after, LOL!

And a bunch of pretty ones that were Jess’ idea–didn’t they turn out great??? 

That’s all for now.  Enjoy! 

Yesterday Jess, Leighton, the girls and Jon and I went to Tanyard Creek and had a picnic!  On the second day of January!  It was about 65 yesterday, and looks to be the same today.  We had a lot of fun!

Four going on fourteen…  She’s such a poser!

Then we went up to the Cooper Memorial Chapel.

My artistic nature shot.  I’m still not great at those, LOL!