Soccer Sisters....

The girls had their first Soccer Practices last night. We were a little worried about Karysn, since she had gotten shots in the morning. She loves her pink band aides. At the doctor's office she was wearing all pink down to her little undies, and the nurse picked pink band aides and said, " I think I have you pegged for a pink girl!"

They were both very excited to go to soccer.
Karsyn stood in her sassy stance most of the time, hands on hips!
Kaydree was suffering while she had to wait an hour for her practice.
Benjy was working during the practices... that blackberry... rings all the time. Job security I guess... we are grateful for that!
It was a little chilly out there by the end of the night.
Once again, thanks to the blackberry, Kaydree took over and started playing some chicken crossing the road game? The whole family makes use of it.

It was a beautiful night.. and we get to go back again tonight!

Kaydree's First Day of School.

What an exciting time. I can't believe Kaydree is starting Second Grade. She woke up 2 hours early and was ready to go. She was a little nervous about her teacher.
We had heard from multiple sources that Kaydree got a very strict teacher. I really didn't mind, I am all about an environment where learning can take place and where there is structure and high expectations. What I didn't want was for her to have a teacher that would curb her love for learning.
She had a Father's Blessing the night before and we said our family prayer in the morning. Karsyn asked for a blessing on Kaydree that she would have a good day and like her teacher. In fact Karsyn told her, "Kaydree, you just have to have a positive attitude." As she approached the bus, the excitement wore off and fear set in. With tears in her eyes, Kaydree got on the bus. I worried about her all day and had a constant prayer in my heart. When she got off the bus she came bouncing across the street with a big smile and said, " Mom, whatever you do, don't switch my class! I love my class, my teacher is funny, she knows when the kids are being naughty (one kid kept burping and she knew right away who it was), she gave some of us stickers for being good, I love school, lunch was awesome, I had sooooooo much fun!"
Ahhhhhh to think about all the un-needed worries. I just love this time of the year and all the excitement. I do miss being able to set up my own classroom for the beginning of the year, but I enjoy living these moments as a parent and being on the other side of the First Day of School.

Labor Day Parade at the Box Car Days...

I am the one behind the camera 99% of the time, Kaydree took this picture on the way to the Parade...it is the only picture of me you will see for the rest of this post.
It has become a family tradition to celebrate the end of summer by going to the Box Car Day's Parade. My grandpa and grandma would take us when we were younger, right before we would head back to Colorado to start school. Now that we are living back in Minnesota, the girls and I still enjoy this tradition. Benjy likes to pretend that he doesn't, but we find him enjoying himself in spite of it. We arrive at 11:00AM to get a great spot for the 1:00PM Parade.
It is usually pretty hot and hit 90 yesterday. This is my Auntie Karen. The girls always know to have Karen close when they start throwing candy, because she doesn't let anyone jump into our area and snatch up our candy! ;-)
This is my Grandma Ruth. I know she misses having Grandpa here with us, since this is something they really enjoyed doing together. I think she does still enjoy it, although the heat is getting harder for her to take. I think at 88 years of age, she is doing great. She often gets a chuckle out of Benjy cracking jokes about sitting in the heat waiting to see tractors and horses.
From Left to Right: My Aunt Linda, Uncle Lee (mom's brother), My mom, Grandma, Kaydree and Karen (mom's sister).

Tracy is a small town and we got a good laugh at the fact that they had this sign in it!

Benjy described this parade to numerous people as having a lot of tractors, horses and candy! What more do you need?

The parade always ends with the horses and I wonder why? Maybe so others won't have to go through the little presents that they leave behind?
I love this picture of my husband, my best friend and my eternal companion with my grandma. It has made me sad to think that Benjy never got a chance to meet my Grandpa Larsen before he passed away. I am so grateful that he has been able to enjoy my Grandma Ruth. We continue to carry on these traditions with Grandma, so that my girls will also have the fond memories of her and an appreciation for the things that my family has always enjoyed together. Just going to this parade helps me to remember the great times that I was able to share with my Grandma and Grandpa and I treasure them and I am grateful that Benjy is a good sport about it!

Helping Hands Make Light Work...

Together we enjoyed an apple tradition by

cleaning jars,

boiling lids and rings,

peeling apples,

cutting apples,

throwing away the curly q's,

packing apples,

finding cute little faces in the apple cores,

making the filling for apple pies and apple crisps,

stirring the filling,
pouring the filling into the jars,

sealing all but one jar,

and finally, making them cute with fall material. ;-)

We finished in a little under 2 hours with 29 quarts of apple filling. We used four bags of apples. We have already picked 8 other bags and plan on picking some more tomorrow. Does this motivate anyone to can some apples? Actually it was really fun and I love that Kaydree and Karsyn already consider this a tradition. They enjoy helping and really enjoy eating apple pies and apple crisp. Hey, all of you in the Anoka Ward, guess what you might see at the next Linger Longer?! ;-) We have had a couple of requests now for some apples and that makes my parents very happy that their apples will not be going to waste. There are some local deer that are grateful for the apples that fall on the ground because they feed them through the winter. It is a lot of work canning, however... Helping Hands do... make the load a little lighter!

Recipe for the filling: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Apple-Pie-in-a-Jar/Detail.aspx

Apples, Apples and More Apples.

This is my parent's apple shed. This summer they refinished it.
This is the new and improved RED APPLE SHED!
This morning was a beautiful crisp 57 degree morning, so we thought it would be a great morning to pick crisp apples. My parents have 13 apple trees that need some pickin'.
So we all got to work. Mom and I were helping, just not in the pics.

I kept getting side tracked by all the apples that have already fallen on the ground. I slipped on them twice and fell, so I started throwing them all to the base of the trees, until Benjy so nicely reminded me by ( throwing an apple at me) that there was work to be done, by picking the apples off of the trees.
We only picked a small, very small portion of 4 trees. This is how many apples we got in an hour. We plan on picking more before we leave. We are now going out to enjoy our last day this summer on the lake and then we will be peeling, coring, slicing, packing and canning apples!

I know in the past that some of you have enjoyed canning apple filling for pies, crisps and apple sauce with these apples. Let me know if you want some more... it will help us decide how many more to pick. I don't want to bring back a car full of apples, if people aren't going to use them....?? I am kind of lazy like that!;-)

A Generous Tooth Fairy?

On Tuesday night we decided to grill a couple steaks. I love to floss. So naturally after eating steak, it was much needed. Some of you may not know but I got braces a couple of years ago, and ever since then, my contacts on my back teeth are very tight. When I pulled the floss out on Tuesday night, a small chunk of my tooth came flying out and hit the mirror. I thought, how can this be possible? I am flossing, taking care of my teeth and this is what I get. Well, I called the dentist right away in the morning, I was a little frustrated because I thought I didn't even have a filling on that tooth, so what the heck? Well, the dentist laughed when I brought in the little piece from a tooth in the back, because it was a tiny porcelain filling. They fixed it in less than an hour and our co-pay was $45. Not bad... so I may have over reacted a little, since I couldn't sleep stressing out about it! Thank you Andrea, for watching the girls on the fly...
Here is a blurry picture of my filling next to a grain of rice. The rice is on the bottom. Here comes the story... All day, yesterday, Karsyn kept asking to see my tooth? I kept telling her it wasn't a tooth. She asked many times, so I finally let her see it last night. She took off running.. saying, " Now I can put it under my pillow for the Tooth fairy." I informed her that it really wasn't a tooth and that the tooth fairy only comes when you put your own tooth under your pillow. Benjy informed me, that no, the tooth fairy would probably come for Karysn. I disagreed, however, This morning this is what the "tooth fairy," put under her pillow!
I mean really???? What is the tooth fairy thinking? Benjy informed me, he has special connections with the tooth fairy! I guess this may have cost $46 to fix?

We've Never Been So Excited To...

FINISH A BOOK...

I have decided to invest my time in the Harry Potter Books. My niece Korin, has been wanting me to read these for years...so I have decided to find a way! I have checked out the first three books along with the audio books. I have to be able to still be productive while reading these books, so....I listen to Harry Potter when I am on the computer, driving and doing house work. Let's just say the girls are not as enthusiastic about Harry Potter, yet! I have finished and returned book 1. GO TO THE DENTIST...

We have an awesome Children's Dentist in Elk River that the girls love going to. They actually were counting down the time to go. When we got there, there was another four year old screaming her head off. When they called Karsyn's name...she jumped out of my lap smiling and ran over to the hygienist and grabbed her hand. When they came back Kaydree was smiling from ear to ear because they had more than just Princess toothbrushes.. because she is sooo passed that stage, you know! The hygienist was laughing when she brought Karsyn back she said, "Karsyn didn't care about the stickers or the toys.. all she kept asking for was a new Princess toothbrush. That is all she cared about!" NO CAVITIES and the dentist told them they were awesome little brushers! I am so thankful they are not scared of the dentist and that they have always had positive experiences there!

TO DO THE LAUNDRY..

We have been fortunate to have a couple home repairs this summer. The last three Benjy was able to fix himself and the dishwasher....well let's just say my leaning up against it, took care of the problem...our washer on the other hand....not sooooo much. After our last one filled the house with smoke, we went and bought some new belts for it and immediately the new belts started to smoke and burn, so we decided our free washer... had finally bit the dust. (sorry dad) We hated to have to do this, but we invested in a front loading washer. ;-O ummm! yeah...it was my dream to get one! I love it. It was only $80 more than their cheapest top loading washer, so we went for it!
The problem is... that I want to sit in my laundry room all the time watching it and listening to it. It sounds like a waterfall and it is so peaceful to watch the clothes getting washed. I hope this will wear off soon, after all, outside summer is coming to an end so we should be out enjoying what we have left of nice weather!