Sycely's class was doing an Iditarod project and each child got to bring home Elim, the stuffed husky to spend the night. Only, Sycely's turn with Elim just happened to come as we started 11 days off for Spring Break, so Elim got an extra long visit with us. Each child made a page for Elim's memory book detailing the adventures they shared with Elim during their time together. Here's our story of our time with Elim:
http://www.asdk12.org/staff/wheeles_lem/pages/Elim.pdf
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Monday, April 26, 2010
Lem's Birthday
Lem got to enjoy what we like to refer to as a Birthday Extravaganza this year (meaning you get to celebrate with more than one special event over a couple of days.) We kicked off his celebrating with a special Night Away date. Nanny and Papa had a sleepover with the girls at our house, which went MUCH better than our last attempt when the girls stayed at their house. Lem and I had dinner at Simon's, dressed in our finest (any excuse to dress up fancy, you know?) It just so happened that Lem's Aunt and Uncle ended up being seating at the table next to us! So, we got to not only enjoy a delicious, kid-free meal, but great company as well! At the end of our meal our server told us out bill had mysteriously fallen into other hands. Gary and Lynda had paid for our dinner for us! So sweet and generous! Probably the best tasting free dinner we've ever had :)
We were spending the night at one of the new hotels in town. Lem's gotten in the habit of doing online surveys to earn Rewards Points. He'd stocked up enough point to earn us a free stay. Lem got to open up some presents from me and then went on a very late night run to Dairy Queen for some yummies for us. The next morning we had a scrumptious breakfast at Village Inn before heading home to our girls.
We were spending the night at one of the new hotels in town. Lem's gotten in the habit of doing online surveys to earn Rewards Points. He'd stocked up enough point to earn us a free stay. Lem got to open up some presents from me and then went on a very late night run to Dairy Queen for some yummies for us. The next morning we had a scrumptious breakfast at Village Inn before heading home to our girls.On Lem's actual birthday we had his fam over for dinner and cake. I was pretty stoked to be doing my first round of bday decorating at the new house. Sycely and I made and decorated a cake and we opened presents before Papa had to head to work. The next weekend we were able to enjoy some drinks and appetizers to celebrate with some friends as well. Technically, it was an extravaganza but next year is sure to be the most spectacular yet as Lem turns 30!
Mr. Hopps
We got to host Sycely's class bunny from pre-school for Spring Break. This was supposed to be a treat for both the girls, but it turns out Ella is in LOVE, I mean, obsessed in love with that bunny! She typically heads straight for his cage when we drop Sycely off at school and it's not unusual for her to leave crying and upset when I tell her to "Tell the bunny bye-bye." So we brought the low-maintenance house visitor home for the vacation. The rascal did chew through my laptop cord but redeemed himself with snuggly lounging in front of the fire place for hours at a time. He sure didn't end up spending much time in his cage-he was either snuggled up with us or sprawled out warming himself pretty much all daylight hours :) Ell would wake up and ask to "get the bunny out" as we were picking her up from her crib in the morning. For about a week after he went back to school she was still going to the office and asking to get him out. She'd cry, brokenhearted every time I reminded her we'd taken the bunny back to school :( Here are some pics of our time with Mr. Hopps.
Spring Break
Spring Break really didn't hold too much excitement for us. We didn't go anywhere tropical (quite the contrary if you read the details about our trip to Homer!) We did get our master bathroom painted and get to spend some good quality time together just chilling as a family. We were also able to host a couple dinner dates at our house. We had Jeff and Lea and baby Benjamin over for dinner and had Ian, and his friends Chris and Laura over another night. Nanny and Papa were gone visiting Eris in Arizona so we didn't get any dates in either.
Really, our trip to Homer was the big excitement for Spring Break so we spent most of the rest of our time painting, watching movies and enjoying our time as a family.
Sycely was finally up for taking a spin around the rink with Mommy so I took her out for a skate before our Special O practice. She still hasn't quite got the confidence to skate on her own, BUT she's got skates on and she's on the ice, so that's progress that makes me smile!
Really, our trip to Homer was the big excitement for Spring Break so we spent most of the rest of our time painting, watching movies and enjoying our time as a family.
St. Patty's Day
As is annual tradition, I went wild with the green food coloring on St. Patrick's Day again this year. The girls enjoyed a breakfast of green pancakes, green eggs and green milk.
They both dressed in their finest green attire and we headed out to take Sycley to school where they did lots of creative, fun green-themed activities to celebrate. We had some green apples, grapes and yogurt dyed green for our lunch/snack then followed up dinner with green vanilla pudding for dessert.
The girls had a blast in their green bath that night and Ella even snuggled up in her green towel afterwards!
They both dressed in their finest green attire and we headed out to take Sycley to school where they did lots of creative, fun green-themed activities to celebrate. We had some green apples, grapes and yogurt dyed green for our lunch/snack then followed up dinner with green vanilla pudding for dessert.The girls had a blast in their green bath that night and Ella even snuggled up in her green towel afterwards!Homer
The first weekend of Spring Break we took a spontaneous trip to Homer for the weekend and encountered what is sure to be known as "the Great Blizzard of 10." Homer got about a foot of snow on Thursday and Friday then had a little break Saturday. We drove down Sunday, enjoying a beautiful, clear sunny drive and got there just a few hours before round two of the big snow dump started. We rented a 3 bedroom vacation home with a breathtaking view that worked out great for us and the girls (and apparently it came with its own pet moose who bedded down or a few hours and disappeared under a blanket of fresh snow). My Dad and Kate came out to the house for dinner Sunday night. The snow had already started coming down, and not just floaty little flakes, I mean big, GIANT, fluffy, sticky flakes. It snowed all Saturday night, all day Sunday and was STILL snowing Tuesday morning when we left town. To add insult to injury the wind was blowing like 80 miles and hour and gusting so bad they actually closed the road down to the spit because they were afraid of cars blowing off the road! Schools were closed, alot of businesses were closed and my Dad was plowing up a storm around town. Sycely even got to help run the plow on his truck while he plowed 15 inches of fresh snow from his store parking lot (that was Monday afternoon and Tuesday morning we couldn't even find the driveway it had snowed so much more).
Sycely and I braved the sideways-blowing snow on Monday to do a little shopping. I turned in the wrong driveway on the way back to the rental house and got stuck off the edge of the neighbor's driveway (apparently it hadn't been plowed since the snow started!) Fortunately, I'd packed up all our snow clothes into the back of the car so I got on some snowpants, boots, gloves and a hat and got Sycely (and Elim) bundled up warm and covered them with a blanket, threw Lem's boots into the sled we had in the car and pulled Sycely down the neighbor's driveway, onto the main road and all the way up the steep driveway to our house (while Lem enjoyed watching these crazy hard-core Alaskan antics from the picture windows next door!) It was quite an adventure. My Dad brought his plow truck over and got the Explorer back on the road without too much trouble. Later I watched the one ton plow truck go off their driveway in the same spot while trying to clear their driveway-I didn't feel so bad then :) The snow was so bad and visibility was nonexistent that my Dad and Kate brought some dinner up to the house and then headed straight back down the hill to get home safely asap. Visibility was so bad on their drive down the hill back to town that they had to roll down the window and stick their head's out to try to find the edge of the road!
The weather was just as crazy the next morning, but we decided to brave the storm so to speak and hit the road home. The weather report on the highway didn't look too bad, baring the avalanche around Portage, but that was estimated to be cleaned up long before we'd hit that part of the road. Ironically, the drive through Homer was the worst of it. Once we got about 10 miles out of Homer the skies cleared, the snow stopped and the road weren't at all snowy.
The girls both slept for a good long stretch on the drive home and things were pretty smooth sailing until we got about 2 hours from home. Then we stopped seeing oncoming cars. Then we saw a road closed ahead due to avalanche so we spent some time trying to get cell service and figure out what was going on along the highway. Turns out the first avalanche (north of Girdwood) was cleared but there was a second avalanche (south of Girdwood) so we debated what to do-head toward Seward, keep on toward Anchorage and get as close as we could, hoping it'd be cleared or close to it by the time we got there? So we decided to get as close to home as we could and got almost to Portage-nothing worth doing in Portage was open so we decided to head to Seward and have some dinner there, let the girls have some out of the car time to run around, etc and figured by the time we'd be getting back to Portage again things should be cleared and the highway should be opened back up. So we started toward Seward, got to the cutoff and noticed the highway closed ahead sign wasn't up anymore, so we called traffic info (again) and had Ian check via internet and found out the highway was back open all the way to Anchorage-sheesh! What a run around! Needless to say, it was a very LONG (close to 9 hour) trip home but the girls did amazing, we had lots of snacks and munchies and movies and coloring supplies so everyone held up just fine!
Sycely and I braved the sideways-blowing snow on Monday to do a little shopping. I turned in the wrong driveway on the way back to the rental house and got stuck off the edge of the neighbor's driveway (apparently it hadn't been plowed since the snow started!) Fortunately, I'd packed up all our snow clothes into the back of the car so I got on some snowpants, boots, gloves and a hat and got Sycely (and Elim) bundled up warm and covered them with a blanket, threw Lem's boots into the sled we had in the car and pulled Sycely down the neighbor's driveway, onto the main road and all the way up the steep driveway to our house (while Lem enjoyed watching these crazy hard-core Alaskan antics from the picture windows next door!) It was quite an adventure. My Dad brought his plow truck over and got the Explorer back on the road without too much trouble. Later I watched the one ton plow truck go off their driveway in the same spot while trying to clear their driveway-I didn't feel so bad then :) The snow was so bad and visibility was nonexistent that my Dad and Kate brought some dinner up to the house and then headed straight back down the hill to get home safely asap. Visibility was so bad on their drive down the hill back to town that they had to roll down the window and stick their head's out to try to find the edge of the road!The weather was just as crazy the next morning, but we decided to brave the storm so to speak and hit the road home. The weather report on the highway didn't look too bad, baring the avalanche around Portage, but that was estimated to be cleaned up long before we'd hit that part of the road. Ironically, the drive through Homer was the worst of it. Once we got about 10 miles out of Homer the skies cleared, the snow stopped and the road weren't at all snowy.The girls both slept for a good long stretch on the drive home and things were pretty smooth sailing until we got about 2 hours from home. Then we stopped seeing oncoming cars. Then we saw a road closed ahead due to avalanche so we spent some time trying to get cell service and figure out what was going on along the highway. Turns out the first avalanche (north of Girdwood) was cleared but there was a second avalanche (south of Girdwood) so we debated what to do-head toward Seward, keep on toward Anchorage and get as close as we could, hoping it'd be cleared or close to it by the time we got there? So we decided to get as close to home as we could and got almost to Portage-nothing worth doing in Portage was open so we decided to head to Seward and have some dinner there, let the girls have some out of the car time to run around, etc and figured by the time we'd be getting back to Portage again things should be cleared and the highway should be opened back up. So we started toward Seward, got to the cutoff and noticed the highway closed ahead sign wasn't up anymore, so we called traffic info (again) and had Ian check via internet and found out the highway was back open all the way to Anchorage-sheesh! What a run around! Needless to say, it was a very LONG (close to 9 hour) trip home but the girls did amazing, we had lots of snacks and munchies and movies and coloring supplies so everyone held up just fine!
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