We had a VERY fun and busy weekend! On Friday night, Mark and I had to grown up parties, so Kamber kept our kids over night. We had tons of fun at both parties and enjoyed hanging out with adults.
Saturday we had the Christmas for kids at Yellowbook, and I our kids got some great gifts! We met our friends Brian and Serena there and Quinn was thrilled to get to hang out Maddie for a while.
It was my dad's 65th birthday on Saturday night and we surprised him with a limo ride to look at lights. It was so much fun and everyone loved it! My poor nephew Louk (who is 1) ended up getting sick as the limo was pulling up, so Matt and Louk didn't go with us. We were sad they weren't there, and Jamie who had to work.
Sunday we had Cookies with Santa at school . It was so much fun to see all the staff kids and they had fun seeing Santa.
So much fun but I found myself crying Saturday night on the way home after the Limo. This is such a hard time of year when someone who was such a huge part of your life is missing. Every time I hear "Grandma got run over by a reindeer" I sob. It use to be Grams song, the one we all teased her with. Maybe some day I will be able to hear it and smile...but not this year.
Love ya Gram.

It's been a long time....

It's been so long since I have posted to this blog. Since the last blog I had spent lots of time with my Grandma. It's hard for me to even type this now, because she lost her battle with cancer a few weeks ago. She loved this blog and I know I need to keep up on it. Her last few months of her life were filled with us getting as many memories and loved squeezed in. She was such a huge part of my life and she is now gone. It feels like a big hole in my heart. It will fill as time goes on, but right now is hard. The holidays will be extremely hard. I don't know the last time I didn't spend a Thanksgiving or Christmas with her. I am sure in my whole life I may have only not been with her for one or two....and that is because we were on a family trip. She was always here, always supportive, and always ready to help out.
Her funeral was beautiful and just like she would have wanted it. My sisters both gave amazing talks. My sweet Quinn got up and talked about the Gigi she loved. Quinn continues to struggle with it on a daily basis, and her fuse is very short these days. My uncle wrote a song for her that was very fitting, and the best part for me, was we all sang "You are my sunshine". This was her favorite song and we sang it to her every day in hospice. She loved the sunshine and every sunny day I will now smile thinking of my Gram. She will always be "grandma groovy" "our gigi" and a person that I love. She faced the cancer in the end with such amazing strength and belief in God and the knowledge she would be soon joining her parents in heaven. I know she is happy and in a better place now, but I will miss her for a long, long time. Here are some photos taken only 3 weeks before she passed away. She looks beautiful and I am so grateful for these last pictures together. LOVE YOU GRAM!!!!

Quinn's first day of 2nd grade and our Camping adventure!

Katie Gram, and Kamber hanging by the fire
cooking hotdogs over the fire
Grandma and my mom hanging out
Papa took all the Grandkids for a cruise in the convertible
Kids after sleeping in the tent all night...
Enjoying the air mattress for a few more minutes
Bella was an awesome camper..who knew?!?
Enjoying the fire the next morning.


We had a great time camping! The Boeckmann Family and our family actually pitched the tents to camp out at Palo, but everyone else came out to enjoy it with us. We all had hot dogs, brats and hamburgers over the fire. We sat around talking and watching the kids play. It was so nice Grandma felt up to coming out with us. It made it so much more special, and I will always remember that night.
Summer is getting close to its end...got to enjoy it while it lasts!

Summer fun!

Wow! What a fun and busy summer we have been having! I am really trying to do a good job with the blog because I had the first year printed into a book, and it was a GREAT way to journal what goes on with our lives. I can't believe I didn't blog at all in July! We have been doing so many fun things. We took the kids and Quinn's BFF Rachel to a drive in movie. We saw Toy Story 3 and it was so much fun! I wish it were closer, the hour drive home after the movie was kind of tiring! But it was so worth it for the experience and all 3 kids fell asleep on the way home!
We celebrated Louk's first birthday at the end of June and Maclain's 3rd birthday in July. Maclain is so Toy Story crazy that the whole theme was around Buzz and Woody. We can't go many places any more without being dressed as either Buzz or Woody. He is so darn cute!
Quinn was on swim team again this summer. She is a little fish and her favorite strokes are butterfly and front crawl. She learned to ride her bike without training wheels really well this summer and has been such a great big sister! She plays so well with Maclain, looks out for him, and includes him as much as she can. She is so sweet and I am proud of the 7 year old that she is!
Mark and I celebrated our 10 year anniversary this summer! I can't believe it has been 10 years!
We went to Minneapolis for a short get away, and had a great time. We love our kids so much, and it is hard to leave them for a few nights, but we did enjoy ourselves. Our good friends Rocky and Karla live up in the cities now, and had a baby just a few days before we went to visit. So we got to meet baby Nikko and see their other kids Gabi and Jaden too! It was nice to see them, and it made me realize we need to make it a priority to see them more often. Baby Nikko is SO sweet and I loved holding him...
School starts next week for me! So I will be posting 1st day of school pictures soon!

Great America & the zoo

We had a great weekend! We went to Great America in Illinois on Saturday. Maclain loved it because there was a whole Wiggles section and a Wiggles show. He was singing and dancing...it was so cute! He also rode on 2 roller coasters! The first one was kinda scary and fast. I couldn't believe he was tall enough to ride it. He kept yelling to get off, and then said he liked it when it was over. The last roller coaster we did was a little one and he held his hands up in the sky for some of it. Quinn also loved the roller coasters! She also talked her dad into going on the log ride and the raging rapids ride. Both rides they got soaked on, which didn't look fun to me at all. Thankfully Maclain didn't want to get wet either, so we just walked around while they were on those rides.
On Sunday we went to the Milwaukee Zoo. It was also another perfect day. The weather was nice, the animals were all up and moving and we enjoyed spending the day together. It was Father's Day, so there was a lot of families there celebrating. We left the zoo at closing and got home just in time to see some local fireworks.
We had a great time and the best part was just watching the kids! Love them to pieces!!!!