Mia's 3rd Birthday

Mia's 3rd birthday was on May 27th. We celebrated by meeting her little friend Sophia and Sophia's mom Chrissy (mommy's friend) at the zoo. We has lots of fun and saw a bunch of really neat animals and got to feed some of them.
Mia and Kent feeding the goats.
Mia and Alicia feeding the cow. He was pretty eager to get his food!
Mia and Sophia running away from the scary polar bear!
Mia and her cake. Again, this one was flipped on my picture program. I don't know what is up with why it flips sideways. Anyway, Mia asked for a blue cake so I took a white cake and dyed the heck out of it and dyed the Cool Whip too. We all had a slight blue tint to our mouths after eating it.

Easter 2007

This Easter we went to my parent's place. My sister and her husband and my brother, his wife and kids were there as well. It was very nice to get together with everyone.

Mia and Isabelle in their Easter dresses, looking very adorable
Mia, Isabelle, Cole and Brooklynn. Mia just got done eating a blue candy
While visiting, we went out to my aunts farm a few miles from my parent's place and saw all of her new calves. They were eager to be around as long as they got a finger to suck on
I flipped this picture before I download it so I don't know why it is sideways, but whatever. This is a picture of Mia and the cows. Note the purse, a necessary accessory for checking the cows!

Cakes Ablaze and Shiny Rocks!

So I reached a little milestone in my life on March 24th. I turned 30. I dreaded it coming for a few years and I kept thinking it was because I was getting "old". Well, it isn't that. It is that it is an end of an era. As long as I was twenty - something I could goof off and screw up and people would just say "well, she IS only twenty (something)." Now I can't rely on that anymore, I have to GROW UP! Besides my twenties were a blast and so many wonderful things happened in that decade that I am not sure if I can really top it. I became a mother two wonderful times, I met and married my soul mate, I graduated from college, and I had a lot of tough times that built...character. I had a stiff upper lip the whole day, I never shed a tear - unlike my 25th birthday when I sat in a snow bank bawling my head off because I was SO OLD! I made it through with dignity and grace, I guess that comes from being older and wiser!


Now to the exciting part - my present from Kent. For almost four year now I have only had an engagement ring. We were always planning on getting a wedding band, but life happened and before we know it, we are four years with no wedding band. Anyway Kent got me the lower band for my birthday!!! It is so beautiful all put together, the picture does not do it justice. Ya, I'm spoiled, I will never deny that!!

At the Park

The water slide park was where we spent most of our time and we had a blast! Mia was a little unsure about the slides at first but once she went down them a few times she kept wanting to go. They had three of the smaller slides to go on and then they had two big slides that you slide down without tubes and one big one that you go down in either a double or a single tube.

Winter Vacation

Okay, so it has been a long time since I put in a new post, but the truth is, is nothing has really been going on. The winter is a slow time and we kind of get stuck into the winter rut. This year we decided to shake things up a bit and go on a mini winter vacation. We went to Arrowwood Resort just about 100 miles from home and spent some time at the indoor water slide park, antiquing, and of course eating out. These are pictures of us eating at Buggaboo Bay, our favorite place to eat when we are in Alexandria. While there, we had an appetizer of alligator. It was very different tasting. I thought it kind of tasted like goat and had a very rubbery texture - so, not my favorite thing I ever ate. Mia seemed to enjoy it as you can see in the picture! Kent had a burger that was so pack with garbage, we had to take a picture (nerds, I know!). He called it a heart attack on a bun. The other picture is the "kids" watching cartoons and eating breakfast in the hotel room before heading out for the day.

Second Annual Group Christmas Party

Christmas of 2005 a group of us started a tradition. We are a group of eight couples that are all mutual friends. We come together initially because of two things: Friends since high school and/or co-workers at a little place called CashWise - a huge grocery store in our town. Most everyone in the group has worked or still works at Cash Wise. A few of us (including me) even met our spouses while working there. Thank goodness the Cash Wise lifers can at least say they are members of the management team! Anyway, we realized a year ago that all of us are now married, so there will really be no other opportunities just made for us that will bring us all together, we will now have to create those events ourselves. So we came up with our annual Christmas Party. Everyone brings a food to share and we pig out and have fun catching up and talking about our kids and things going on in our lives. We have such a great time. The chemistry of this group of people is so great and I am so honored to be a part of it. It almost feels like we are a member of a club or a secret society. We really don't know when our group "began" so to say and we will work very hard to make sure it doesn't end. There will also be no additions to our group. Member can't leave (and don't want to leave) and we don't let outsiders in. We talked about doing a summer picnic or camping trip as well since the Christmas parties are so fun!

White Elephant

Both years that we have had our group Christmas party we have exchanged white elephant gifts. We try to think of the most hideous and hilarious thing to give. By the time we are done exchanging gifts, most people have sore sides from laughing so hard!

A little Poo

After last years White Elephant gift exchange I had a whole year to come up with something with a little shock factor. Mia's daycare provider gave me the idea of using cinnamon craft dough to make a piece of poop. So a week before the party I mixed up this dough using cinnamon, apple sauce and glue. After I was done "constructing" Kent and I thought it was missing something so we put a couple pieces of corn in it and it was a masterpiece! Joanne was the lucky one that got to open it and she was such a great sport! Everyone got a good laugh out of it.

Sexy Stu

Stu got this beautiful sweater embroidered with a humming bird from Michelle. No matter how girly the sweater looks, Stu could make ANYTHING look manly...may this be a lesson to everyone: Be careful what you do at parties, you might end up on the internet...

New Years Eve

New Years Eve we left my parents in the afternoon and drove home. We had malts and all kinds of yummy snacks (that is why Mia is wearing nothing but a diaper and is sitting on a towel) and we watched the Ball drop in NY City on TV then we watched a movie. Not too exciting.

Simenson Family Christmas

The Weekend after Christmas we went and had Christmas with my family. Isabelle was outside the whole weekend sledding. Mia wore grandpa's hunting hat to fit in to the country scene and she got to even help him blow snow with the tractor. The car in the picture was a gift from my dad to Kent. When they were out pheasant hunting this past fall, they came upon a junk yard by the old coal mine. Miners used to live nearby and this was an old toy that was left behind. When Kent and dad found the car, it was squashed and rusty. My dad, who restores full sized cars for a hobby, decided to fix the toy car up for Kent. It turned out awesome and it was one of Kent's favorite Christmas gifts.

Severson Family Christmas

For Christmas we went up to Kent's parent's house and spend the weekend there. The kids had a great time playing outside in the snow. Kent and Heidi had a little cook-off. Kent made his Dutch Bitterballen and Heidi made her Spring rolls. It was really hard to pick a winner since they both were so good, so I think we will have to have another cook-off next year just to be sure! Note the cute apron Kent is wearing. It even had a "K" on the big heart for Kent!

Present Opening Marathon

Our Christmas festivities don't end in one day, our Christmas spans over a week's time(our house, Kent's parents Christmas weekend, my parents New Year's weekend). So on December 22nd, the day before we left for Kent's parents to spend Christmas up there, we had a little Christmas of our own, just the four of us. We had a special meal of chicken in grape sauce and then we opened presents. The girls were so thrilled to finally get to open these presents that had been sitting under the tree since after Thanksgiving. Kent slaved away for what seems like forever to make them the wonderful doll houses that you see. Someday the girls will really appreciate the dollhouses that their daddy made for them!

O Christmas Tree!

I just thought I would show a picture of our Christmas tree. The last few years we just had a little tree but this year we decided to get a new one and I am very glad we did.

Isabelle's Christmas Play

Every year our church holds a Christmas play that is put on by the Sunday school kids. Now that Isabelle is older, she gets to take a more active roll in the play. This year she was a fisherwoman and had a wonderful speaking part that had a great message about the birth of Jesus. She really loves being in the spotlight and I am sure she will continue to get more speaking parts since she is so good at it!