Easter 2014

Once again we filled candy eggs and also dyed hard boiled eggs.  Kids always enjoy it, but I think they enjoy the hunt the most:).  Here are a few pictures from the festivities.

 This year the egg dye I bought was not like our usual where you let the egg sit in vinegar water while it changes color.  This year I happen to buy ones that you use a bag and roll the egg around in the bag which of course Nick and I thought was great because there was absolutely NO MESS!!  Needless to say the boys want me to "get the normal" egg kit next year.

 Out we go to find the Easter Eggs.  Ellie was ready and waiting.  She was so funny as she SCREAMED with excitement when she spotted an egg.  Wow, so different then boys!!!

On Saturday we hosted the Waibel Easter dinner here at our house.  On Sunday we went to my parents house for the Gutwein Easter dinner.  Good times and lots of yummy eats!!

San Antonio, TX

 March 30th, Nick was scheduled to preach in Austin, Tx.  So we decided to make the most of the trip and head to San Antonio on Friday and stay along the riverwalk.  Rent a car to travel to Austin on Sunday for church, then head home.  We left Friday morning and went to chicago for the majority of the day.  Did some shopping at the mall, ate at Cheesecake Factory, and went to IKEA.  Flew out of Chicago around 5pm.  I have never been to San Antonio so I was really looking forward to this trip.  Nick had been there but back when he was in High School.  We stayed at the Indigo Hotel(priceline deal:)) which was along the riverwalk a bit up the river(but walking distance to the main part and away from the loud night life).  The weather was absolutely beautiful.  Sunny and 89 degrees!!  Saturday we probably walked(and ran~ a morning run) well over 10 miles.  It was one of our top little WEEKEND getaways.  (San Francisco is our top runner so far:))

 Along the riverwalk.  So pretty.  There are several bridges that cross the river so that you can enjoy both sides of the river and all the little restaurants and shops.

 We decided the riverwalk boat tour looked so fun, so we decided to splurge and take it.  It was the best 8$(a piece) we spent that weekend.  Our tour guide of course made it well worth it.  He was the slowest driver which gave us a 45 minute tour.  He kept letting other boats pass by.  He was extremely funny and he pointed out many great details of the river and the history behind it.  Of course if you were in a hurry and wanted to quick take a tour, then you might not have enjoyed it nearly as much.

 Have you ever seen posters or pictures of San Antonio Riverwalk??  Well, if you have then these umbrella's probably look familiar.  Supposedly these are the famous umbrellas that make it into most of the pictures when showing off San Antonio Riverwalk.  We were going to eat lunch here, but they didn't have any outside seating and it was just way to nice out to NOT eat outdoors.

 Here is our hotel.  It was a pretty nice hotel and we got a great deal on it:).

 Throughout the weekend we didn't really eat a lot of food.  The first night we ate at a mexican restaurant.  I was not feeling very good, but I am a huge addict to chips and salsa and so this place had the best chips and salsa we ate all weekend.  Nick had a small plate of food, but we basically at chips and salsa.....like 3 baskets of chips!!!  (yikes!!)  Then Saturday we just had coffee for breakfast and then "tried" to eat at this other mexican restaurant.  Sadly it was poor service like Ive never seen before.  They brought us chips and salsa and water right away.  Salsa was served hot and it was gross so that was disappointing.  Then they FINALLY came to take our order.  We sat, and sat and sat.  People around us were served, our waters were gone, and we never saw our waiter again!!  We finally decided to stick some money on the table for our chips and salsa and walk away.  We were going to tell our waiter we were leaving but we have no idea when he would ever return.  Since we had chips and salsa we weren't to hungry so we went and just sat in the sun and people watched for 2 hours and ate a blizzard:).  Talk about relaxing and so enjoyable!!!  We decided while sitting there to eat at a nice restaurant that night.  So we went for Texas de Brazil.  This is a Brazilian Steakhouse.  Ever eaten at one??  If not, I recommend it just for the amazing salad bar:).  Ok, if you are a huge meat eater then this is the place to go too!!

We also toured the Alamo of course.  Can't leave that out.  I was not feeling very good so I pretty much sat inside the courtyard while nick walked around and toured it.  It was about two hours later I finally started to feel better so was able to enjoy the remainder of the day.

A pretty neat place to go if you never have been there.  I couldn't make a week long vacation out of it for sure, but a weekend getaway was just perfect.  Thanks to my Dad and Mom for keeping our four little kiddos.  Much....much appreciated!!!

Liam's Trip

While Liam was away for a week in Florida for Spring Break, my in laws would send pictures daily of what they were up to.  Sure enjoyed them and thankful we can do that kind of thing these days.....it doesn't seem to long ago that we had to wait to develope film:).

Here they are at Cracker Barrel at 6am for breakfast on their way to Florida.  Mom said he only slept 3 hours on the way there!!!  Is it safe to say he was EXCITED!!!!

 Every other day they would go to Disney.  On the other days they would stay at resort to swim, putt putt, and play on playgrounds.

Was told at the beginning of the week he wore a life vest and by the end of the week he was pretty much swimming underwater the entire time!!  Way to go buddy.  Grandma is a great swim teacher for sure.

Thanks Dad and Mom for taking Liam to Florida.  He sure had fun and loved it.....and can't wait to have his scrapbook that you are so good and faithful at making.

And he is off......

To FLORIDA that is with Grandpa and Grandma Waibel.  Its HIS turn, the spring break before they enter school they get the privilege of a trip to Disney by themselves with Grandpa and Grandma.  Now how fun is that????  Have fun buddy and travel safe:).

Of course I had to post our fun activities last night on Liam's actual birthday.  His request for a restaurant was one that has "peanuts".  So we took him to Texas Roadhouse. 

He was TOTALLY unsure of this way of celebrating when he got onto the saddle and they took the light fixture and shinned it on him:)

 Ellie sure loved Liam's hat that he got from Texas Roadhouse.  She would scream if you removed it from her head!!!

And off to Walmart we went to purchase his gift.  He picked out this bike and is pretty excited that it has a handle break, the seat can go up and down, and a kick stand!!!  Oh the simple things in life.

Happy 5th Birthday!!

Can it be??  Liam turns 5 years old on March 20th???  He will be off to Kindergarten before I know it.  He is very excited about school and turning 5 because he also gets to head to Disney with his Grandpa and Grandma Waibel in 11 days!!!  We had Liam's birthday party on Saturday night.  He is a puzzle maniac and so we did a puzzle themed party.  

 Here are the invites I found online that were free printables.  After I printed them off, I thought why not cut them up and make everyone do a puzzle to figure out what the picture was and what the back of them said for information on the party.  So this is what it looked like when I put them into envelopes.

 We started his party off with a Menu of Hamburgers/Hot Dogs, Baked Beans, Lettuce Salad, Tapioca Jello Salad, Chips and Drink.  Here is the kids table....

                                       The older boys sat at the bar area as usual.

Adult table

 Of course a birthday is not a birthday without the gifts at this age......so he set to work opening his gifts.

He was pretty excited about his 50+ glow sticks he got.  He loves to use one of these at night as his "night light".  Of course by morning they are no good and have lost their glow, but thankfully you can find these things at the dollor store:).

 I looked high and low for a cake pan of some sort to resemble a puzzle piece.  I looked for decor that had puzzle pieces on them, but sadly was unable to find such things.  I did find a picture of a cake that was for Autism Awareness (as that is what a puzzle piece represents....I had no idea!) So I decided to create my own.  I used a 9x13 pan using 2 cake mixes.  Baked it and then set to work carving it out.  I asked Liam what his favorite colors were and he told me blue and green so I decided to decorate in those colors.

 Made some large puzzle pieces to decorate on the table with and then made a few puzzle piece streamers to hang from the light at the center of the table where the kiddos sat.  Overall I think he had a blast:).  He does keep reminding me that he isn't 5 yet....so I am sure when March 20th rolls around he will gladly proclaim he is finally 5!!  Happy Birthday little man!!  We love you so much.

Puzzles anyone????

Our family enjoys puzzles.  Perhaps its not so much Nick, but we all usually end up working on them.

This Christmas we asked for a few 500+ pieces of puzzles.  We ended up with 5 new puzzles that were 1000 pieces each.

 When we returned from Florida on January 5th we set to work at the puzzles.  Our dinning room table became the puzzle center.  Our first puzzle we completed.

 Elijah got this 3D puzzle from his Aunt and Uncle and this is what we put together next.  This one remains put together since its useful and is in the office for display.

Nick traveled in January for a week and during that week we put together the above puzzle and the next one too. Cant seem to rotate this puzzle for some reason??

 

 Cant rotate this one either, but this puzzle was brought home by my parents from Florida and its a 500 piece puzzle and yep, we had that done in a day too:)

 And this puzzle, its got a story....we completed this puzzle in January and I went to blog about puzzles and couldn't find this puzzle anywhere in my pictures.  So yep, I went down stairs, retrieved this puzzle from the closet and Liam and I set to work on it yesterday at 11am.  By 5pm we had this puzzle completed once again.  It was so much easier the second time around since it was fresh in my mind on what the pieces looked like and where they went!!  Liam was a faithful helper and does an outstanding job on puzzles.  If I have a piece and am unsure of where it goes....I hand it to Liam to figure out!!!

Jerry Gutwein Christmas

This year the entire Jerry Gutwein family headed to Florida to spend our Christmas at Mark and Tricia's place rather then coming this way to Indiana like they usually do.  Our plans were to leave Friday around 2pm and drive as far as we could and arrive in Sarasota on Saturday.  Thursday night we packed up the van so it was ready for when Nick got off work on Friday.  However, while Nick was putting air in the tires, I told the boys that I bet if we pleaded with Dad that he would leave tonight yet:).  When Nick came in from the garage, Elijah got down on his hands and knees in front of Nick and pleaded and pleaded to leave tonight.  Then Caden and Liam did the same.  Before long, they were begging.  Nick hadn't said "no" yet so the boys kept pursing.  Within 30 minutes, I was on the phone to Tricia making sure if we left now it was ok to arrive on Friday in Florida??  With the OK from Tricia the boys were excited and ready to go.  We left our driveway Thursday night at 9:30pm!!!  Arrived in Sarasota, FL at 3:30pm!!  A whole day sooner!!  On saturday we hit up the beach because we weren't sure if we would have the chance to get back there.  Kids sure enjoyed it!

 Here is the "kids" table each night at Mark and Tricia's house.  Each night we took turns cooking.  I was Sunday night and had a Chinese themed meal of Chicken Chow Mein, Egg Rolls, and Chinese Lettuce Salad.

  My Parents, Jason and Joy, and Aj and Raquel stayed at Sun n Fun while we stayed at Mark and Tricia's the whole week.  However, we were at Sun n Fun basically everyday as they had activities for the kids and adults and a heated swimming pool for the kids which was MUCH NEEDED since we had sad weather the entire week:(.

 This picture is a bit deceiving....looks like I am playing well, but in reality if you were on my team you always lost:( .  Guess I need to put to use the ping pong table in our basement and practice up!!!

 The kids did a lot game playing in the mornings before heading over to Sun n Fun.

 Several mornings were cool.  In fact, every day except one day was overcast. Talk about wishing I had packed warmer clothes......BRRRRRR.....  We took the kids to a park rather than water this morning.  What a unique park with some neat older kids activities!!

 This little girl remained on my hip pretty much the entire time.....exhausting!!

 Our christmas was actually celebrated on January 1st.  Wow.....lots going on and very crazy and noisy.  Think maybe we need to get some structure to it:), but its so hard when the majority of the kids are 5 and younger!!

 We had one very nice day.  We were at Sun n Fun by 9:30am so we could get every ounce of the sun on our faces.  Even my kids mentioned "mom, the sun feels so good on my face" and at times I caught them laying in the sun:).

On Friday it was a whopping 53 degrees!!  Granted the sun was partially shinning(once every hour or so) but it was COLD!!  We drove to another park where it was more walking and less playing, but none the less the kids climbed tree's and made the most of the day.  Pretty cool Banyan Tree's at this park.

 Finding a few shells along the beach at this park.

 What????  Ellie wanted to walk alone without me holding her????  Had to document this for sure:)
Then after the park we decided to take the kids back to Sun n Fun for some more play time.  NO swimming allowed:).

 The kids played shuffle board and THIS is what my mom and I did while they played.  I was so cold, I couldn't hardly get warm.  Florida you say?????  Sure couldn't tell!!

 This was fun for the kids.  A bounce pillow.  They loved it and played a long while on it.  Finally us adults couldn't bare the cold anymore and said it was time to go.  (just for the record this day my sister Tricia didn't come to Sun n Fun because it was just to cold:))....
Our original plans were to leave on Sunday morning for home.  After hearing we were going to be getting a major snow storm on Sunday in Indiana we decided to make Friday night our last night and head out Saturday morning at 6am to beat the storm.
Our last night in Florida we went to Olive Garden for dinner.  Kind of a way to celebrate Joy's birthday which was January 3rd.  I have to laugh at this picture because me and my dad are wide mouth and working on our soup while Ellie is wide mouth with a smile and happy to eat her pasta!!

Although the weather wasn't ideal, we still had a very enjoyable time in Florida. On our way home nick mentioned that we shouldn't wait so long to return:).  I think we might see what 2015 Spring Break looks like and perhaps we will be returning!!  Thanks to Mark and Tricia for being such amazing hosts!!  We sure enjoyed our time with you and everyone else.