Memorial Day - WI May 2013

Aunt Arla and Uncle Scott hosted a Memorial Day party that also celebrated Uncle Phil's recent retirement. I'm excited for him and his retirement, but I do miss the cows! At least he still has some heifers, but it does seem odd not to be able to go and visit during milking time. Some of my earliest (and best - I loved my Grandpa Carlson and was truly lucky enough to have the best grandfather ever) memories are trucking down to the farm bright and early in the morning to "help" Grandpa milk the cows. And just like the girls with Uncle Phil I loved "helping" spread the manure in the fields. It didn't make sense to keep the farm going, but I'll miss it and the cows none the less!

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 I wanted to begin this post with a couple big group pictures we managed with most of the people who were able to attend the Memorial Day party at Aunt Arla and Uncle Scott's house.

 We actually began the day by heading up to Uncle Phil and Aunt Dee's to visit the horses. Aunt Dee and McKinley were very excited to meet each other! :)

 Jackson and Reagan riding Taboo

 Jackson decided he'd rather drive the van than ride the horses lol :)

 The girls were happy to ride as long as Uncle Phil, Taboo and Gypsy were willing to provide the rides

 Uncle Phil and Reagan

 After the kids were done with the horses it was time for a 4 wheeler ride with Uncle Phil

 As always, Aunt Arla completely out did herself for the party! The food was all amazing and completely patriotically themed!

 Grammy contributed red, white and blue drinks

 These next pictures were so funny. I had been walking around and noticed the three Schwantes guys were in relatively close proximity to each other. I asked them to stand together so I could get a brothers picture and this was how they accommodated me. lol :)

 Then they turned around and the following conversation ensued:

Brett (in yellow): Hey, Where's my hat?

Chad (in green): Your hat? Where's your hair?

Brett: My hair? Oh no! My hair is gone?!?!?

Thanks Brett, Ryan and Chad for providing me with a good laugh! lol :)

 Great Grandma and Aunt Carol (middle) were married to my Grandpa and his brother, Uncle Dale, respectively. Aunt Carol and her daughter and grandson were able to come and join our family get together. It was so nice to see and visit with them. 

 I think Aunt Arla snapped this picture of Tim and me and I thought it turned out so nicely

 Uncle Phil, his son Brandon, and Erland (splg?) who is a cousin of Uncle Phil's and Grammy's

 This picture must have been snapped pretty quickly because with all the aunts and grandmas around, and McKinley currently being the only baby in the family, I hardly got to hold her! Having said that, we can't wait to meet the two new Carlson great grand babies due in November! :)

 Cousins, Amber and Seth, they are my cousin Julie's children and looking forward to having a little brother in November. Actually, from what I understand Amber isn't quite so sure what she thinks about having another little brother and has already put in a request for additional children. lol :)

 Grammy and her sweet baby

 Uncle Phil and his "freedom" cake Aunt Pat brought to celebrate the day and his retirement. We certainly hope he enjoys his new found freedom!

 Jackson thoroughly enjoying being a "big kid" with cousins Kage and Kolton

 Aunt Arla had sparklers for all the kids. She placed them in play dough inside cups which made it very easy for the kids to hold. What a great idea!

 After the sparklers the kids lined up for a fireworks display put on by Uncle Scott

 While the big kids enjoyed the fireworks McKinley enjoyed some good loving from my cousin Nathan. :) Great Grandma enjoyed all the festivities too. :)

 Great Grandma with four of her nine great grand daughters 

 I love this picture of Missy K and Great Grandma and enjoying a good joke together.

Thank you everyone for making our trip so fun! Wisconsin is such a special place to us because of all you. Thank you especially to Aunt Arla and Uncle Scott who go out of their way to make sure there's never a dull moment and always organize activities for everyone to enjoy. We can't wait for our next trip to see you all again! :)

Snow Play in Wisconsin - 2012

There was a blizzard the day we got to Wisconsin (actually it started as we were driving thru the night - we left early to try and get there ahead of it). It left tons of snow behind that provided many hours of fun for my munchkins during our week in Wisconsin. Here they are out on the first day enjoying icicles together.

 Here are 16 of 19 great-grandchildren playing in the snow together at the Carlson Christmas celebration. Love another generation of Carlson cousins making memories together! :)

 The Carlsons know how to play in the snow! There were a couple of 4-wheelers going to provide rides in the sleds.

 The 5 year olds (there are about 2 months difference of oldest to youngest between these three)

 The Schwantes 5 and 7 year olds

 Missy K, Haydn, Kiara and Reagan

 The Schwantes 4 year olds

 Daniel, Jackson and Reagan

 The kids who were waiting for a ride began a snowball fight :)

 When the waiting got to be too much the kids became creative and found a new way to sled... Exactly how many Carlson cousins can ride at the same time between the 4-wheeler, rope and sled?

 Missy K was the last one standing and Jeremy was nice enough to stay out and play with her after everyone else (including Tim and I) had given up/turned into human popcicles and gone inside.

 It wasn't just the kids who had fun in the snow, the adults enjoyed their fair share too! :)

 

 Lance was awesome playing outside in he snow with the kids. The kids had a great time on the reindeer and penguin sleds Aunt Arla had for them to ride down the barnhill.

 Reagan making a snow angel. You can get an idea of the amount of snow from how deep her wings are.

 The girls with the Phil Carlson grandchildren

 The barn was a good place to warm up a bit while playing outside. The cows are also a great excuse to take a break especially when Lance helped the kids pet the calves!

 When we were kids we use to dig out snow tunnels in Wisconsin when the snow was deep enough. Somehow we got to talking about this and Grand-Dad and I decided to help the girls do this as well. I have to say I'm much faster and more successful at this endeavor than I was as a child! 

 Missy K's up front, Grand-Dad's to the right digging from the other direction and Reagan's in the back contemplating beginning a third tunnel to meet up in the middle.

 Big enough for 3!

Thank you to everyone who played in the snow with us! We had a fabulous time and it wouldn't have been nearly as much fun without all the cousins, aunts and uncles and grandparents! Thank you everyone for so much good old fashioned fun! :)

Christmas in Wisconsin - 2012

Merry Christmas! And I'm only 4 1/2 months late sending those greetings so I'm getting closer to being caught up! :)

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Many of my childhood Christmas memories are of spending the holiday with my Carlson relatives in Wisconsin. Certainly many of my best Christmas memories are there! :) Even as an adult we have continued to go with Mom and Dad so there are very few Christmas' in my life that I haven't spent some part of the holiday season in Wisconsin. It has been a while, however, (over 10 years) since I've actually been there for Christmas Day. I was feeling a bit nostalgic for a big family, White Christmas so we decided to celebrate our 2012 Christmas in Wisconsin with the Carlson clan. I don't know that we'll have another opportunity to do that again, but I'm so glad we enjoyed another Carlson Christmas!

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 Here's a 4 generation picture of Great Grandma Carlson, Grammy, Me and Jackson (2 1/2 yrs old), Reagan (5 1/2 years old) and Kennedy (4 years old).

 The kids tend to open presents slowly so we've learned it's wise to open gifts from Grammy & Grand-Dad, Mommy & Daddy, and Santa at different times or we're likely to spend all of Christmas Day and then some trying to get thru everything. We also decided to open Grammy and Grand-Dad gifts a little early this year so the kids would have some fun new toys to play with at Great-Grandma's house. I couldn't believe how well all three of them posed for me in front of the tree before opening gifts! :)

 Missy K with Caroline's parlor and dining room table and chairs. What an amazing and beautiful gift from Grammy and Grand-Dad for the girls!

 Jackson received a new Thomas Track and Bridge from "Misty Island Rescue" along with some new trains.

 The Sunday before Christmas over 50 members of the immediate Carlson family got together to celebrate at Aunt Pat and Uncle Randy's house. Here are some of the great-grandchildren working on various art and craft activities.

 Meanwhile the big kids were busy watching football and playing pool

 I couldn't believe the kids posed nicely again for me Christmas Eve morning in front of the tree! I may get them trained yet! lol :)

 Aunt Arla and Uncle Scott gave the kids their presents the afternoon of Christmas Eve and as always were way too generous!

 Lance moved back to Wisconsin last fall and so the kids had a great time playing with him throughout the week. Here they were having a fabulous time riding on  his back as he did pushups. Uncle Scott did this too, I just didn't manage to get a good picture. I can't begin to imagine accomplishing this! Very impressive Lance and Uncle Scott!

 Reagan received the American Girl Doll Yorkie, Sugar, for Christmas and Aunt Arla received a real Yorkie, Lucy, for Christmas. All three kids fell in love with Lucy. We all did and who could blame us as Lucy is truly one of the cutest and sweetest dogs I have ever seen!

 On Christmas Eve we mixed up reindeer food and sprinkled it out in the yard for Santa's reindeer before heading to church. The reindeer deserve a treat at least as much as Santa for all the work they do! Great Grandma hadn't heard of doing this before and found the exercise entertaining. :)

 

 In case you were wondering, reindeer food is made of oats and glitter. The glitter is to help the reindeer fly of course! :)

 Spreading the reindeer food in the snow

 Someone must have gotten their holidays crossed! While we were outside spreading the reindeer food we noticed this big black bunny over by the barns. Hope he made it back for Easter!

 Aunt Arla helped us make some special cookies just for Santa

 Aunt Arla even brought a special mug to place the cookies underneath the milk especially for Santa.

The girls were very excited about their stockings Christmas morning

Jackson enjoyed opening some of his gifts and he really enjoyed riding his new Mater

Santa brought Daddy an 8,000 piece puzzle he's been wanting. My understanding is it was pretty difficult to find and Santa had to go all the way to New Zealand to pick it up!

Reagan and me playing Sequence

Grand-Dad and Jackson taking a Christmas nap

Grammy and Great-Grandma

Christmas day was so nice! My kids were the only great-grandchildren around, but Great-Grandma was able to spend the day with 4 of her 5 kids. :) 

A picture of the Carlson crew that made it to Great-Grandma's house for Christmas Day festivities.

Sorry these pictures are a bit mixed up, I'm just doing my best to get the highlights of the last 9 months up here and I'm about half way there! Woo hoo! Hope you all had very merry Christmas' and were as blessed as us to share this joyous season with wonderful family!