Scenes from Katie's visit

Morning Coffee

Snowing for about 48 hours.

Holden on our neighbors' sled.

Grace pulling Holden along.

Happy to just sit in the snow.  (He hated his boots.  He refused to walk, even indoors, with his boots on.)

Swinging with Grandma.

Aimee bearing evidence of a direct cranial impact during a snowball fight.

Waiting for the Easter Bunny

Katie Leaves Today

My Mom Katie has been visiting us for the last week and playing with her Grandchildren.  She flies home today.  We had a great visit.  Aimee and I went out on a couple of dates, including going to see U2 in 3D, which I heartily recommend to any u2 fans out there.  It has been snowing for the last 24 hours, so she got to experience a Winter storm and relive old memories of her days living in the Midwest.  

I learned something new about Katie, too - apparently, she has always hated The Joker.  I tried to point out that you are supposed to hate the Joker, since he's the maniacal bad guy, but it goes much deeper than that with her.  Which just goes to prove that there's always something new to learn about people you know, even after 40 years.

Shameless Cup and Muffin Plug

Just a reminder for you Northwest residents to stop in at the Cup and Muffin when you're in Kingston. Mark and Amy have remodeled the place and business is picking up.

Happy Number 6, Grace

I am remiss in my duty of proclaiming my daughter's birthday to the
world. Happy Number 6 Grace. We party, tomorrow afternoon, here on
the seminary campus.

Waiting for the lamb

1 degrees outside this morning - March is currently a lion, and we're waiting for the lamb.  

In other news, My sister, Lindsey, has been named winner of the University of Montana Presidential leadership in the Davidson Honors College - full tuition plus a stipend.  She also has a scholarship offer from Western Washington University. 

Worried about tornadoes

Grace is worried about tornadoes. She spends a good amount of time thinking about them and worrying about them. She just got out of bed because she was worried about tornadoes. We're promising her that there are no tornadoes in the winter and certainly no tornado tonight. Unfortunately, there is the new threat of basement tornadoes, but we're not telling her about those.

Year of the Frog

I'm sure you're all aware that 2008 is the Year of the Frog.  Here's Grace getting in touch with her internal amphibian at the Como Park Zoo celebration of the Year of the Frog.

Living outside of the U.S.?

Grace: "I don't want to live outside of the United States, I want to
live in another country."

Grace's thoughts

"Is heaven real? You're always on the Earth, even if you're dead.
But maybe part of you is in heaven, right? Heaven is just a dream,
right? It could be just your imagination."

"I was a Spring baby, but now that I'm in Minnesota I'm a winter baby."

"Easter Queen Dog"

On another note, our little budding artist really enjoys this website.

Como Park Zoo

Nelson's brother Eric is in town for the weekend. Eric, Anne, Nelson, Holden and Grace went to the zoo and conservatory for the afternoon.







The polar bear was putting on a show. Here's Grace and other kids getting an up close look at the polar bear.

Junior

Aimee's Mom and Charley added a new member to their growing family: a
new puppy.

Ash Wednesday

We submitted Grace's story from Ash Wednesday last year to The
Lutheran magazine. They finally printed it in the last issue - you
can find it about halfway down the page by following this link and
looking for the story submitted by Aimee:

http://www.thelutheran.org/article/article.cfm?article_id=7017

Grace-asso

Grace says this is a picture that has something to do with tires.



This is Grace experimenting with cubism. It's quite good - you can see how the background and object planes interpenetrate one another to create the shallow ambiguous space.

Grape on a Fork

Holden is obsessed with using a fork. He whines if I don't give him a fork whenever he's sitting at the table. He likes spoons too, and of course knives - but forks are his first utensil love.

100 Days of Kindergarten

Tomorrow is the 100th day of Kindergarten for Grace and her classmates. Tomorrow the diminutive conscripts will celebrate 100 days of confinement by presenting 100 of something to each other: 100 pennies, 100 grapes, 100 dalmatians. Grace chose to share 100 photographs she took. Here's 40 from her collection.

It's Still Cold

And that's an understatement. -40 degrees windchill factor this
morning. Church attendance was probably down all over the cities.
It was too cold for the very young and for the very old. With all
the cold, we're basically hibernating - like bears with indoor
heating and peppermint schnapps.

Nyah Nyah Nyah Nyah

Today we found this self-portrait by Isabel on our Imac.

General Cuteness

You're probably wondering when we got a baby elephant.  But, if you look closely, you can see that it's really a baby in an elephant costume.