First communion weekend

 In Rockford this past weekend we helped celebrate Mason's first communion. The girls got to break in their Easter dresses a week early... although sweaters were a must given the cold temps. It was a great visit and the girls loved spending time with their cousin :)

March sledding

If we had to get 8 inches of snow this last week of March, at least we're going to enjoy it! Family sledding :)

And here is the action shots of Ellie, who once she went down by herself once ONLY wanted to go that way. What a big girl!

Mustachioed

Blackberries are a good look for Katie, no?

General cuteness

Leopard print

Matching shirts, oh my!

Story times

Ellie is becoming a gifted story teller, despite the fact that she can't read the words in her books. She entertains us almost every day with a new version of each book, sometimes loosely based on the pictures on the pages or simply from images in her own head. It's a very fun phase :)

What she loves best...

Katie is almost never happier than when she's got food she loves in front of her... I guess she takes after both mom and dad in that regard. Although I snuck some pizza on her tray in this picture, Katie is very biased these days on her diet. She almost only eats fruits and veggies, when given the option, but we push other stuff to make sure she gets enough protein, etc. I know it sounds like a weird thing to complain about, but the mass volume of produce in Katie's diet spells trouble for her digestion at times... without getting into specifics, it's not pretty. But our little girl is healthy and happy overall, and I'm sure in a few months or a few years we'll be begging her to eat the fruits and veggies that right now she won't turn down :)

Bowling

We took Ellie bowling for the first time this past weekend. It was quite an adventure... with plenty of laughs. I enjoyed the fact that we have someone in the group who bowled worse than me. Ellie recorded mostly 1 mph rolls down the alley (the equipment at the site told us the speed of the ball), and the ball stopped all together on one roll (getting stuck in the gutter and requiring a call to the front desk guy). At least when he came out he also set up the gutter bumpers we had previously requested.... so that allowed Ellie to actually strike a few pins. I think she had a good time trying bowling, but when the lights dimmed and music started playing (for the Saturday evening teen event), we lost Ellie to the rhythm. She is a major dancing fan, so from then on she only wanted to spin and kick her feet (a fairly dangerous venture on the slippery bowling floor)... but she survived. Katie enjoyed the people watching and general exploring, too. Even though we only made it through one game of bowling before calling it a night, I think we'll give it another go sometime.

 

Pig parade

 I took Ellie to her first Cub Club class at the nearby zoo. They do a class every month and feature a different animal. This one was called Parade of Pigs, and we had so much fun! It's about an hour program and they spent most of it learn about different aspects of pigs, then we visited the zoo's barn and met Samson (seen above), and then it was craft time. Ellie made this very cute piggy planter (seen below). A very fun Saturday morning. Hope we get to do more of these!

Bear hunt!

If you're feeling brave enough join Ellie on this bear hunt...

Nashville trip

I'm behind in posting (...again) but here are some shots from the trip we took in February down to Nashville to help celebrate Grandma Schneider's 90th birthday. We enjoyed some of the warmer Tennessee temps and hit the park near my aunt and uncle's house.