Misc. March Iphone Pics

I may have been out of the blogging loop, but I just discovered you can sync your iphone pics directly to your blog! WooHoo!  That's awesome!  I am getting really bad about carrying my DSLR around and usually take so many pics with my iphone.

 St Patrick's Day!!!

Of course the Leprechauns visited!

And we made rainbow cookies again.  Grandpa joined us for dinner of corned beef and cabbage!

The boys and I stopped for Shamrock Shakes while in town.  

Carter had an assignment to write about the person in his life that is worth their weight in gold.  He chose his brother. He wrote 1 1/2 pages about what a good person and brother Alex is!  Melt my heart!!!  I love how my boys are best friends and I should add that the girls are pretty good friends too!

My Birthday was in March.  The kids took me to my favorite place to eat in Iowa so far. 

 Nadya was at a  sleep over so Hallie's Best friend joined us too. Alex ordered their

garbage burger and didn't come close to finishing it. 

Grandpa went to school for Grandparents' Day.  

He had to bop around four different classrooms to visited everyone.

Alex interviewed and wrote a report about Grandpa.

 

And calving season officially began which kept Doug pretty busy.  He checked on his cows twice a day.  Once in the morning and once at night to make sure they were doing okay. Sometimes I would join him.  This little cutie was born on my birthday.

Meet Stormy.  This is actually Grandpa's calf, but Doug and Alex found him in pretty bad shape as he was born during a March snow storm.  His mom had died and left him cold and wet in a pile of snow which is not great for a young calf.  Doug, Grandpa and Alex spent hours working on him trying to warm him up and get him to eat. It was quite a learning experience for Alex. I was a little worried because Doug didn't think he'd make it.  It looks like he is taking the bottle in this picture, but he didn't.  They had to tube him for a few days before he finally decided to suck.  I am happy to report that stormy is doing fantastic and all of cousins have enjoyed having a bottle calf around.  This is stormy the night we found him and after he was dry and warm.

Visitors

We were so happy to have my parents visit this Winter.  They rode the train out.  (It was their first time traveling on the train and they really enjoyed themselves!)  We didn't tell the kids they were coming so you can imagine their surprise when they walked in from school to find Grandma and Grandpa standing in the kitchen!

We had such a great visit.  We taught them how to play two of our favorite games- Ticket to Ride and Joker.  Carter played a few games of chess with Grandpa, we took them eagle watching by the river and even took them over for a picture in front of the Gothic House.  

The puzzle turned out great!  I loved it!

 

 

 

There were sooo many eagles!  It was crazy!

The Gothic House is always a fun place to visit!

We were trying to capture the sunset through the trees.  It was beautiful!

Alex helped Grandpa set up a website for his business.  He was quite proud!

Thanks for visiting Grandma and Grandpa!  We miss you!!!

Christmas Festivities

We opted to cut our own tree down this year. 

We spent a lot of time looking and finally decided we were going to go BIG 

as we had plenty of space.  Alex picked out our tree.

It was big and sort of frumpy, but we loved it! 

I love the lights at night.  

Our tree is rather eclactic, but I love all the different ornaments. 

We have a tradition where the kids each get a different ornament each year.

I try very hard to pick out an ornament that relates to something special about their year.

The kids look forward to getting their special box each year and hanging their ornaments.

It's a fun trip down memory lane.

 (From top to bottom. Guitar lessons for Alex, Gymnastics and  Russian ornament for Nadya, Ice skating for Hallie, Carter's nutcracker as he was the nutcracker prince, and Alex's very first ornament.)

Christmas Break started early around here as we all experienced our first (of many) snow days!

It was good timing considering Alex was sick and I would have been home with him anyway.

Nadya and Carter enjoyed the snow though, while Alex pretty much stayed on the couch.

 

Luckily Alex perked up, so he didn't miss out on sledding in Iowa.

 

Grandpa came over to give Hallie her Christmas gift before she headed off to Utah.

He gave her a very special gift.  She received the watch he had given to her Grandmother on her 16th birthday.  He took it in and had it refinished and it looked brand new.  Hallie wasn't quite sure the meaning of it until she read the card and then they both teared up.   

Hallie was very touched to receive such a thoughtful gift.  She wears it everyday.

Christmas wouldn't be the same with out baking cookies around here, 

so we baked, and baked, and baked.

A few lucky family members each received one of these-

Hallie left for Utah and we had our first Christmas Celebration with the entire Johnson Clan.

Grandpa reserved the Church basement for our family get-together considering we are such a large group.  It worked out great!  My pics are a bit blurry as they were just with my iphone and the light wasn't great, but they do the job of capturing the moment.  

Gpa bought all the little grandchildren and great grand children matching overalls-- 

Blue for the boys and pink for the girls.

(would you look at all that blue!)

(Missing Rexton as he was sick.)

For Christmas Eve we said our good byes to Rudy, our elf.

Rudy left us a special message and I found that Carter left one back rolled up in a napkin.

Alex left one last plea for Santa. (Something about a real 3-wheeler)

The kids each got to open their Christmas Eve Jammies-- Doug and I too!

 

The kids received their special ornament-

They all got the same one.  A Cardinal bird.  

It represents our move to Iowa and their first year at a new school.

The boys tracked Santa as they have for a few years now and then they were all off to bed.

 We have had problems with the kids guessing their presents in the past, so this year we decided to give the kids reindeer names so they couldn't figure out which gift was for who. 

 It was a hit! It drove the kids crazy!  

There was a bit of joking about who was Vixen.  :)

Christmas morning the kids woke us up and reported that Santa 

did indeed visit the Johnson household.  Perhaps they had doubts?

The boys were all about skylanders this year and

the girls were mostly interested in smelly lotions and clothes. 

Alex did not get his 3-wheeler this year as it wouldn't fit in Santa's Sleigh

and he is just not big enough yet.

Santa left chess and checker pieces for the kids.

All the kids have enjoyed playing, 

but Carter has really taken a liking to chess and is  quite good.

 

Later that evening, Nadya and I prepared Christmas dinner. 

 It was my traditional Christmas Danish Dinner.  Yummy!

I love this picture.   It captures my Russian daughter prepping a Danish feast!

Love her! She is always such a help in the kitchen.

The kids all anxiously looked for the almond to see who would receive the extra gift and  I was surprised to see that Carter found it again!
Hallie was super sad to miss out on rice pudding as it is her favorite dessert.
Grandpa gave Nadya a special gift-- Grandma's locket.
He is going to put a picture of the two of them in it.
This was our first Christmas with out Grandma and she was greatly missed.

Of course we had to celebrate again when Hallie came home.
She was greatly missed by all and especially the boys.
When she came in the door the boys ran and yelled her name over and over
while wrapping their arms around her. Melt my heart!