The 50th Anniversary

After Christmas in Olathe we headed to St. Louis for another big celebration. Andy's parents were celebrating their 50th Anniversary! All of the brothers were in town for the occasion, and it was wonderful for all of us to be together. A lot of family and friends were there too, and it was a great party.

Kansas Christmas

We took advantage of the holiday leave period and launched off on a 10 day whirlwind holiday tour of the mid-west…first stop, to visit Grammy & Pop-Pop for Christmas in Olathe, KS. The kids had a great time playing with all of the toys in their basement...and Pop-Pop had a great time feeding the kids pie with extra whipped cream (usually three times a day). Brittany and Pop-Pop finished two pumpkin pies in three days! Yikes!

We had a wonderful Christmas. It was so great to spend the holidays in Olathe. We loved being with Grammy and Pop-Pop. We were also fortunate enough to meet up with Dave, Jen and Ed for dinner and drinks. It is always great to catch up with our friends. Our last night in town, we spent the evening with Dan and Angie (who had just returned from Angie's folks). We did yet another gift exchange, and it felt like Christmas all over again. We are blessed to have such wonderful family and friends.

Let it snow!

We have had about 10 inches of snow over the last couple days. The kids are in heaven! They have been introduced to sledding and snowball fights, and they have responded to each with great enthusiasm. Not as much fun, however, is the 30 minutes of prep time just to walk out the front door. Also, a note to parents who are new to the cold: when you tell your kids to put snowpants on, make sure they keep their own pants on underneath. This will save them the embarassment of taking their snowpants off at their friends house with nothing on but underwear. :)

Army Football with our cousins

We invited our cousins (Bob, Lorraine, Lauren and Nick) to West Point to enjoy the last home football game of the season. There was one major difference between this game and the last one...the weather! We were prepared though: we had sweatshirts, winter coats, hats and gloves...what we lacked were three kids willing to keep them on and zippered. :) We had an awesome time at the game, but I think we had as much fun looking at the fans as we did watching the football game (go globeheads!). Nathan was also quite entertaining, compliments of the 2 tubs of popcorn Bobby bought. Turns out he is a popcorn eating machine (we're blaming this on the Peterson genes). After the game we came back to the house for some chili. It was so great spending the day with the Ankoskos. :)

Alex's Birthday

The countdown started weeks ago...every morning Alex would check his calander to see how many days were left until Nov. 8th. The wait was agonizing! But finally, the magical day arrived. There were fireworks, clowns, ponies and cake. Well, there was at least cake. :) We celebrated at home on Thursday night, then had a party with his friends on Saturday. (Cake two times, how cool is that?) Alex is now officially six! Wow!

Halloween

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
What a fun day! There are so many families in our neighborhood that it felt more like one big block party than Halloween (except for the fact that everyone was in costumes, of course). The Army Pep Band even came around the neighborhood in the back of a truck, playing the Army fight song and throwing out candy. It was great! After that we went around the neighborhhod trick-or-treating for about 45 minutes. I'm not sure which is better, dressing up in a really cool costume or getting tons of candy, but either way it makes for a happy night. :)

Jersey

We went to New Jersey for the weekend to hang out with our cool cousins. Our cousin, Nick, got confirmed on Saturday, and afterwards there was an Open House. The kids had a blast playing in the ultra-cool basement (imagine drums, foosball, a pool table, remote control cars and tons of toys all in one place...oh, and to top it off, a door you can close to keep out all the racket). Yes, we all need one of these basements. On Sunday we went to a local farm to pick a pumpkin and go on a hayride. We had a lot of fun, and it was great hanging out with the Jersey crew.

Niagara Falls

The kids and I met my mom in Buffalo for a weekend get-away. We had so much fun! On Saturday we drove to Canada to see Niagara Falls. It was beautiful! We took the "Journey Behind the Falls" tour and got to see the waterfall up close. We all looked great in our cute, yellow raincoats! Poor Nate wasn't too sure about it though. I should (more accurately) say "Poor Mom", since his fear meant I had to hold him the entire time. :) We saw a couple beautiful rainbows which especially excited Brittany.

After the falls we went to the Hard Rock Cafe for lunch. The burgers were great, but my favorite food purchase of the day was definitely the chocolate covered strawberries at the Hershey store. Thank you, Mom! You are the best! I even forgive you for laughing at my answer to the border authority when he asked me what was at Niagara Falls. In my defense, though, it turns out I was right. It was, in fact, a really big waterfall. :)

Army Football

We took the kids to their first Army football game. The kids were SO excited to go. Alex couldn't wait to see the football players...Britt couldn't wait to wear her cute cheerleading outfit. We stayed for the entire game; surprisingly, the kids didn't even want to think about leaving early. Nate did manage a nap in the 3rd quarter though (which benefitted us all).