A day with Grandma and Grandpa....and a few other animals!

We decided to go out on a little adventure today. Last time G&G were here we went up to Como zoo in the city only to find out it closed in a 1/2 hour. This time we planned better and spend a few hours there. It was well worth the price of admission(free)!!! Then we came back through Owatonna(40 miles to the west of Roch). Bob wanted to check out Cabela's and we wanted to share this new Pizza place we had discovered. It was quite a day. Mike and I found the best pizza place in Owatonna. It is soooooooo good. It is downtown and well worth the trip. If you find yourself that way check it out. They opened right before Thanksgiving. The name is "Jake's Pizza" Wow is it ever good. We went there after our trip to Como today. The pictures are backwards because of the way they load. Sorry!

Mike taught all these cute kids the bad habit of using your own finger as bait in the Koi pond. I thought a few of them were going to fall in.

Who does not love a Giraffe? They are so darn cute! I feel so bad that they have to live in Minnesota.

That creature in the right hand side is a very cute Sloth from the Tropic area at Como. I could have stayed in this place all day. It felt so good! Too bad we were all bundled up for Minnesota winter.

Santa is followed by the Tooth Fairy

As we were tucking Matthew into be tonight he twisted his tooth that has been loose forever...at least a month and it popped out. I guess that it will be a busy couple nights in our house for all the youthful magic of the world. This is number 7 I think?

See it to the left of his top front teeth? How fun that Grandma and Grandpa where here???? Maybe they can fund the Tooth Fairy...heheh!

Mike tries out the new lens

Maybe someday we can live my dream of being photographers and traveling the world!
I was probably blogging

Santa forgot about Charlie.

Matthew finally got all the bones out after hours of digging(we think) Now we just have to figure out how to put the T-Rex together.

Playing with our new toys

Matthew is actually doing quite well with his new snow board.

Starting is the tricky part.

This was taken with my new present! Any guesses?

My kind of Christmas story

Take 5 minutes and read this article by my favorite sports writer. You will be glad you did.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?section=magazine&id=3789373

Matthew's Big Dig

I ordered a dinousaur kit from Missy for Christmas. It came with this large rock and tools to break the bones out of it. Matthew has been working on it all day. Mike wanted to get him the big hamer but I said "NO WAY" I hope it takes him a month to get all the bones out of the rock. Well worth the money Missy! Thank you.

Christmas morning

Here is a few pictures of Matthew opening some Christmas presents. He had a really good Christmas. Merry Christmas everyone.
THANKS Laurie and Craig! I have a funnier picture of him opening this but I did not think posting a picture of a check on my blog would be to smart. I will have to email it to you Aunt Laurie. You will love seeing how excited he got.

Presents everywhere!

Whoa! A snowboard. Matthew said " My friend Jack is the best snowboarder, he can teach me how"

Love the face??? I just noticed that. This is from Grandma Dot. It is really fun. I will have to post pictures of Matthew driving it around the house.

Merry Christmas from the fam..oh...lee!

Merry Christmas to all you Willits that are not with us, see what you are missing:-)

The Willits 1st Annual Gingerbread House contest....you be the judge!

We had a blast making Gingerbread houses today. They were very simple if anyone wants to dare trying them. Matthew made these last year in school. If 20 kindergarten kids can make them so can any of you.
This is house #1. We call it "the shack" Notice the bling on the rat!

#2 This is the "Panda Mansion" complete with pool, flower bed, and fire pit.

#3)This is the classic cottage. It has a nice wooden fence and a great pond. It would probably even have lace curtains if you could look inside.

House #4 is a on a large snow covered lot. The walk way is lined with blue glass pebbles and yellow necco stone. It's seems to have a sad face on the front of it. The dot tree however, adds a little height.

Number 5 screams..."CANDY" we should call it the "I LOVE CANDY" house. This one was constructed with the builder asking "how do you like it now" every 5 seconds if that helps.

here is the neighborhood. Isn't it sweet!

Bob the builder! Can we fix it? Yes we can.

Mr. Perfection! He said that we should have Grandma Dot judge.

Look at that spread.

These are made by using milk cartons as the foundation. That is what makes them easy and stable.

Funny Quote time

Trying to teach a 6 year old what Christmas is all about can be a bit of a challenge. This week after hearing all about Matthew's list of things he wanted....it started out with 2 easy small things! Then he talked to his friends and his list grew to a notebook full. UG! We tried having a talk with him about what he wanted to do for other people and the following conversation occurred:

Me: Matthew, I want to think about what you can get other people for Christmas.

Matt: Like who?

Me: Grandma and Grandpa?

Matt: Mom, they are getting the best gift...(loud sigh)

Mom: What?

Matt: UH..They get to see ME!(with total duh attitude)

I so hope this is a 6 year old thing and not an only child thing. It is hard being a mother of an only child and wondering that. For now I just wonder if this is the making of a narcissist..heheh!

Who knew cold could be so pretty?

My Father~in~law took these cool pictures(no pun intended) at Giant Springs Park in Great Falls this morning. It was a balmy ~28 below zero!!!!! How amazing. He always takes great photos. If money were no object he would be getting a Canon of his own this Christmas.

If our years were eggs we could fill a carton!

Mike and I celebrated our 12th anniversary today. Looking back over it all I am just amazed at who we have become. We started out as kids and now here we are as adults. I am still rendered speechless when I look at my husband. Thank you for the last half of my life(January will be the anniversary of when we met and this year it be half our lives that we have been together)I know God was looking out for me when he put you in my path. Thank you for always making me laugh. I love you. We celebrated by going to a new Sushi place in Roch that we both love. It is really fun in there and the food is....FANTASTIC.
The Sushi artists creating. You have to love the colors of the place. It was really fun to photograph. They are so nice too. They loved that I was taking pictures.

This is the Christmas Carol roll. It had a bit of spice, perfect for Mike. That sauce in the corner is a hot dipping one.

This is called the Burning Flame roll. It was yummy!!!!! The stuff on top is kind of like a crab salad.

Mike and I both loved this. It is made with Topeka. That is flying fish roe. I love when Sushi rolls have this on the outside. It was made by placing rice on the bottom of a seaweed wrap and then filling it with the roe. Very, very. very good. I wish the color would have come out though. Topeka has a very bright orange vibrant color.

Such a pretty place to eat!

The camera again???Are you kidding. I just want to eat I am so hungry!

Ideas for those hard to shop for celebs in your life...

This first one might be a bit too easy. If you are in need of a gift idea for Plaxico you might consider a nice holster. I am not sure if they make one for sweat pants or not. However, I am sure you can get one with plenty of bling.

Perhaps you are in the market for PE Obama? I am guessing there are not a lot of ashtrays in the white house. Maybe, a few left over from Billy but from the sounds of it his ashtrays were kindly relocated to the Pentagon.

(I was just looking for an ugly ashtray online and I thought this was too funny to pass up)

Then there is our good friend from Illinois???hmm???51 years old and your hair is as dark as night? I wonder if you might want to stock up before being sent away. Just in case, send him a case.

I wonder if any of you have ideas?

My heart is already breaking

Jackson just brought over a bag of Christmas candy for us. Inside was this little note. I can hardly read it without crying. He and Matthew have been such pals over the past 2 1/2 years. I can't imagine life without him living next door. Not to mention how I feel about Luke and Selah. There is also the fact that we love Lucy. I can honestly tell you that I do not know anyone nicer than Missy. OK, and I can't forget how many times I have had to call Brad for medical advice(even veterinary on occasion...my favorite line "Monica, I am a PEOPLE doctor" What am I going to do without you? This note has crushed me! I want to deny that come the melting of the snow you will be gone. There is just no doing that. Merry Christmas Missy, I wish it was not our last one next to you. God Bless!

Forgot one

I had to add this picture of Hannah and her ballerina.

Endangered Moments

I surprised Matthew on Friday by showing up in his class. It was the best! He was so excited to see me and even let me give him a kiss in front of the whole class before I left. I wonder how many more of those moments I will have. I had the chance to eat lunch with him even. Just so you know....school lunch has not changed much! This is the computer lab. Can you even imagine what our kids will be able to do by the time they are our age? They zoomed around on the Internet better than most adults I know.

Visiting always feels like I have 2 kids in class. I love having Matthew and Hannah in the same class.

I played Bingo with the kids after we did the craft. It was really fun.

My job was to help make soldiers with the boys. They are going to see the Nutcracker this week and so they could make a soldier or a ballerina. All the boys made soldiers.

I wanted to show you Matthew's slippers that I send with him on non gym days to make the boots and shoes thing go better.

The class was just getting ready for the spelling test when I showed up. It was really fun to see how Mrs. Olson did this. She is such a great teacher and she is always so kind.

Matthew and Hannah working on a word find before the test.