The Zoo

On Sunday we went with Brian's family to the zoo because it was nice weather for Chicago in January.  I think it was close to 40.  It really felt nice to be outside!  There were quite a few animals still outside and for the first time we saw the lions, tiger and leopard active.  Both the lion and tiger showed off the power of their voices while we were there.  We discovered later that the lion was waiting to be fed because when we walked by again, they both had very large bones that they were gnawing on.

Natalie insisted on pushing Chloe in the stroller for most of the zoo trip.  She was not the best driver but she was determined to continue.  On a side note, this stroller was so fantastically easy to push!

We had a good time in the penguin building.  Here is Charlie being swallowed by a fish and Chloe enjoying the fish.

 Noah had fun wearing other people's hats and coats during lunch (actually Natalie and Grandpa were having fun too).  We also had fun with the wall of cut outs.

The Hamill play zoo is free during the months of January and February so we enjoyed a visit there.  N2 love the veterinarian space.  They have added some items since the last time we were there including the scrubs.

 Natalie is the acting director of the zoo.  She discovered that the phone in the office actually connected to the phone outside the office.  She kept ordering me to the office.  Then when Brian told her the tigers were loose, she ordered me to capture the tigers.  Hmmm...maybe she has a future in zoo administration!

 Noah painted his face and told us that he is supposed to a tiger.  I'm not sure how many tigers he has seen if this is what he thinks they look like!

Cold Day

The first week back from winter break was a short week for me-3 days off due to the cold, 2 days off for N2 due to the cold.  The first day we had off was a really fun day for us.  We did a lot of things we had never done before.  I'm pretty sure we stayed in our pjs all day (which is actually not a new thing for us but at some point I generally make them get dressed and this day I didn't).

We started out by playing video games.  We have a wii and they have started taking interest in playing it as they have seen Brian playing Zelda.  They have played some wii fit stuff like bowling, tennis and baseball but they are terrible at that and it frustrates them.  We had gone to the library the day before and I figured we may not have school so I picked up 3 kids wii games.  I had no idea what to look for so I found familiar character games.  The one that was the most successful for them was the Dora game I picked up.  They took turns playing.  There were times that Noah needed Natalie to do something because he couldn't make it work so he would ask for her help.  They tried the Penguins of Madagascar but it was too complicated for them since they were inexperienced video game players.  I played the whole game and it was my level of video game!  We also checked out a Cars game and they could play that 2 players but some of the tasks were harder than others.  When they went back to school on Friday, they told their teacher they played video games all day.  Sigh.  I always hated hearing that as a teacher and I really want to explain to her that they did NOT play all day and this was a special treat for them.

Before lunch we made soft pretzels.  I used a Tastefully Simple mix and I did not care for it at all.  It had a slightly fruity flavor.  N2 seemed to really like it though.  I let them make shapes but they had no clue what to do until I started making a shape.  Noah made a banana and something else of that shape but when cooked they resembled slugs so we called them slugs.  He was mostly uninterested in making shapes.but Natalie had a great time.  She made a horse, a family of peas and more that I can't remember.  When baked it was hard to distinguish one shape from another but it was fun!

(I made the elephant, bunny and mouse in the above picture).  You can see Noah's slugs.  Tow of Natalie's peas are in the bottom right corner.

Natalie got an Easy Bake Oven for Christmas and we hadn't had a chance to use it so I figured this would be the perfect opportunity!  The oven was actually a funny gift for my bridal shower so the mixes with the oven were bad so I had to find something else to make and luckily there are plenty of recipes out there.  We made a confetti cake with frosting.  I think the mix was a little too much but only for a tablespoon or so.  We had a really hard time getting the first cake out and it almost fell in the depths of the oven.  I think it was hard to get out because it was too tall and I didn't think the top wasn't done.  So the second pan we baked a little longer and the very top had a scrap mark when we got it out so now I know, fill the pans a little less!  Natalie was thrilled to make her own cakes!

Roller Skating

I have been wanting to take N2 roller skating for a while and we finally made it to a rink the last Saturday of winter break.  We met up with 2 other sets of twins that we have known for some time now.  Anna and Mia are identical twins who were born 2 days before N2.  The other set of twins are Bella and Noah.  All the kids thoroughly The themselves and got a nice amount of exercise!  They have roller skating rink that we went to has a 2 hour Disney skate for young kids and new skaters.  Kids can use the skate pals for free during this time.  It was definitely a great place to learn how to skate.

N2 set off skating with the skate pals.  They each needed one of us with them but they caught on.  Noah fell and bumped his chin the second or third lap and we thought he was done but he bravely got back out and didn't use the skate pal very much.  He preferred to skate on his own.  He didn't always want to hold a hand because he felt like he could keep his balance better without holding on to something.  Natalie on the other hand used the skate pal the whole time but she figured out how to go really quickly around the rink by the end.  For the last 10 minutes she couldn't use the skate pal (they were collecting them) and she thought it wasn't as much fun because she had to go slowly.  They both said they had a lot of fun and would definitely go again.

Sorry for the bad pictures.  I took my point and shoot and the lighting was terrible.

November photos

I know November was a while ago but here are some random pictures.

 Here is Natalie as a lion tamer.

Here they are having fun with our shelving unit.

Gingerbread Men and Houses

Here's the only picture I have from Thanksgiving.

After Thanksgiving since Marcie's family was in town and Aunt Julie was here we decided to make gingerbread boys and gingerbread houses.  The kids had a great time helping to roll the dough, cut out the gingerbread men and putting on red hots.  They liked making cookies for those who really like red hots.

Here are the kids decorating their gingerbread houses.  Grandpa Dueber decorated one as well.  When they saw that Grandma spread icing all over the roof, they needed to have that done too.  It was actually the fastest way to decorate the houses.

December photos

Here are some random pictures from December.  I like the fact that Natalie is wearing a mask while listening to her nighttime story.

Here are N2 decorating the Christmas tree.

Here are Natalie's and my nails.  Santa brought Natalie some Jamberry nails for Christmas.  I bought some for myself.