snow and such

We got a great big wonderful snow storm last week (*please insert a tiny bit of sarcasm around the words "great" and "wonderful"*)  Anyway, it was a big storm and left lots of pretty snow that happened to be fantastic for building with. Will and Andrew [mostly andrew] built an amazing igloo in our backyard which has provided hours of entertainment for both of them! :)

 

I got a spurt of love for the snow the night it started coming down and talked andrew into going out to shovel at almost midnight. it was actually very beautiful and quite a lot of fun.

 

here are the boys with the beginnings of their igloo

 

Ready to start digging it out!

 

Done!

 

It was so big they even ate lunch in there together.

 

I'm a bit claustrophobic, so they took a picture from the inside of me at the outer entrance- showing how long the tunnel to the main cave was. pretty impresive, i'd say. :)

 

 

Hot chocolate time

And lastly, here's a picture to show you why the snow wasn't super appreciated- we were having lovely "take your socks off"  kind of weather several days before.oh well. :)

This is a pic. of my adorable niece and nephew enjoying one of those warm days on the grass. They will be a year old next month!

will at the park and with dinosaurs

Will had a dr. appt. in denver this week so A. and I thought we'd make a whole day of it with just the 3 of us. We played and had a picnic at city park, then spent the afternoon at the nature and science museum.

 

 

 

We could barely get will through the main entrance doors once he saw the huge t-rex.  when we did get him through the doors he literally freaked out: couldn't walk, cried and clung with a death grip onto andrew. it was crazy, but once andrew held him and talked him through the dead dinosaur part he actually kinda smiled and allowed us to take a picture. ;)

These dinosaurs were outside of the museum and were super cool- even though they were still pretty scary.

 other cool wildlife we met and took pictures with

A "FULL HOUSE"

Andrew and i were so proud of ourselves for coming up with the "full house" costume idea. I made the kids 3 Aces and he and i were a pair of 5's....Sadly however, he got called for a flight a couple days before our party. So.... i found my brother's old John Wayne life-size poster and created our stand-in Dad :)

 

 

 

 

here you can see "andrew" in the background wearing his costume and enjoying the party!

 

a kiss for the cute 5 of diamonds guy

the day before the snow came...

We (and i use "we" very loosely) finished raking our frost-bitten green leaves on tuesday and on wednesday-thursday snowed and kept snowing until 13 inches had been dumped on us.

 

the girls loved watching Will go crazy in the leaves

 

Will was really, really into the leaves this year....

Daddy with the girlies- sophie on left, madeline on right

Will dumped a pile of leaves on us 2 seconds before this picture was taken. thanks for the lovely "fall" effect, dude.

pumpkin carving!

 

Will's original design that Andrew had the privilege of cutting out for him.

 

This was Andrew's FIRST pumpkin to ever carve! He was a natural.

 

 

And...our very own homemade pumpkin pie. Will was dead set on making a pie out of a real pumpkin. In fact if i hadn't bought a baking pumpkin for him at the grocery store he probably would've refused to carve our other pumpkins from the farm. Anyway, it was a lot of work for something you can just open a can for,  but it did taste great and was a nice little bonding experience for the two of us. :)