Mark & Mandy

Elsie had a bath in Grammie’s bath tub – we put in bubbles and decided to run the jets. It was Bubble Soup!

G. G. Ruby gave Elsie a new rocking horse for Christmas … we call the horse “Winnie”

Here Winnie is meeting Rody and the whole gang -

We suspect that Winnie is British because she absolutely loves tea and scones (with lemon curd and clotted cream)

Thank you g.g.!

Mindy and Elsie spent one snowy afternoon making holiday cookies

Elsie was the sprinkle adder

and eater

Here are the masterpieces! Delicious!

A couple of weekends ago we hosted a wine tasting night, we put the last wine glass in the dishwasher around 1:30 a.m. and finally headed for bed. Elsie did her best to sleep in, but as 8:00 rolled around we were still exhausted. We had a lazy sunday and for dinner we all watched The Incredible’s and ate pizza – Elsie was in heaven.

We had a big snow a couple weeks ago and we bundled Elsie up and headed outside to see if we could teach her to shovel the driveway …

Turns out the shovel was too big for Elsie to hold, so dad will have to continue to shovel until we can located a smaller one.

Elsie decided to enjoy stomping in the white stuff…

We have over 30 kids on our block and any time it snows you can count on sledding … Mindy and Jenna got Elsie her first tube sled – she put on her snow suit and headed out. Since it was Elsie’s first time, all the kids came to help her have the time of her life.

Emily and Ruby give elsie a push

Jenna, Emily and Christopher with Elsie

Elsie loves the snow!

Nicholas sent Elsie a trampoline for Christmas – pretty sure this is a ring in baby terms … well niko elsie says YES!

Trampolining is a lot like Cricket, you have to stop the game for some Tea

Even spectators get tea!

thank you Niko for a wonderful gift.

p.s. the trampoline arrived in pieces and I took the first stab at assembly … and failed. It was clearly a test of intelligence – Mark to the rescue (you know he is a “whole different kind of smart” – famous quote by my mom)

Amy snapped this photo in Montana and its so cute! Finally a photo of Mark, Mandy and Saffie – And she is smiling! Isn’t she adorable!

Jenna is giving Elsie her first piano lessons …

Dylan, Lauren and Kevin discovered Geocaching … my mom found a few “caches” located right behind our house in the rims. Geocaching is modern day treasure hunting -  you are given coordinates, some clues and you are off.   Before the hunt they did a practice walk with papa-rodzie

Papa Rod inscribed our initials in the sandstone

Then the hunt was on … the kids went on two different hunts

Mrs. Gadget: This cache was filled with kitchen gadgets (the kitchen junk drawer came in handy) and the other cache was Holiday Schmoliday: this cache was filled with holiday swag.

Here is dylan looking around  for the cache

And here are the successful Geocachers!! Go Dylan and Lauren!