Project Life Tuesday

I know I just posted about 8000 pictures last night, but it is Tuesday so that means I have to post more! Here is a peek at our week (hey, I am a poet!) ...





Monday, May 24



All weekend while we were camping, Ryleigh was limping. So I made an appointment to see Heidi today, just to check things out. We had some x-rays and everything looks okay with her foot so Heidi thinks that she may have bruised the bone somehow. This is the cute little patient sitting on the exam table waiting for Heidi to come back with the x-ray results.





Tuesday, May 25

If you look closely, you can see tiny little baby robin beaks sticking out. Momma bird was a little concerned that we were so close to the babies so she quickly covered them up.

Wednesday, May 26

Today was Ryleigh's last day of preschool. I need to post her first day picture too so we can see how much she grew and changed over the course of the school year. She is looking so grown up!

Thursday, May 27

I am cheating with this picture just a little. You can see from Ry's outfit that this picture was actually taken on Wednesday. Mom, the girls, and I ran down to Sioux Falls for a quick supper and games at Chuck E. Cheese. Ryleigh had been there before, but she could not remember it. She had a blast playing games. She even posed for a picture with the "real" Chuck! Tricia kept getting "credit cards" made instead of playing games.

Friday, May 28

Another cheat for the week ... but this was a huge part of our holiday weekend! The three dogs swimming in the lake. The old man beat the puppies every time he went after a stick. And we'll just say that Belle is not the most graceful of swimmers. Holly did pretty well for her first time swimming. She needs to get some speed, but her form is good!

(Oh, and happy birthday to me!)

Saturday, May 29

And this is the after-effects of too much swimming. Poor Holly was plum tuckered!

Sunday, May 31

The sunset over the lake was very pretty Sunday night. I went over to the dock to snap some pictures. In this picture you can see the boat landing where the dogs did all their swimming.

Another week down ... I have printed most of the pictures, but still have not found much time to take care of the journaling cards. I really need to get on top of that!

Remember to head over to Jessica's website to check out the other Project Life blog posts.

Memorial Weekend

Here is our weekend in pictures! The Nissen family was camping at Split Rock Creek State Park with Grandpa Dick & Grandma Peg and Troy, Patty and Olivia. Oh, and don't forget the four dogs ... Henry, Reno, Belle and Holly.

There was campfire ...


Lounging in lawn chairs ...



Chilling with cousins ...



Playing in the water ...



Beautiful sunsets by the lake ...



And more playing in the water ...



Oh, and don't forget the FOOD! If there is one thing our family does well, it is camping food! This weekend we had even more yummy stuff since Grandma brought a chocolate cake with fudge frosting for my birthday and Dave surprised us all by making both a strawberry and a pecan pie! We enjoyed tacos, hamburgers, salmon, and steak this weekend. SUPER GOOD FOOD!

Because of the holiday, we stayed at the campground until today when we left for Holland to attend the Memorial Day service and the dedication of the new Veteran's Memorial. We marched from Main Street out to the cemetery as usual, the kids waving flags.




Grandma Darlene, as auxiliary president, laid the wreath during the ceremony at the cemetery.



And then we walked back, up the hill to the senior center for treats before lunch at the park.


The dedication ceremony was very nice with short speeches by veterans, several songs and another 21-gun salute.



More than anything, these two very special ceremonies reminded me that my freedom most definitely was not free.


So now it is back to reality and more importantly, back to laundry!

Project Life Tuesday

Tuesday, May 25 ... time for Project Life again! You will see from the pictures that it FINALLY got nice here in Minnesota. Almost a little too nice, if you ask me. I want some 70's before we hit 90's, thank you very much! Anyway, here is our week!

May 17, 2010

I won't bore you with the details since I did such a huge post about the dance recital last week, but here is a shot of the girls together after it was done. Their last time wearing these costumes ... good thing too, because Ryleigh's shoes do not fit any more!

May 18, 2010

These are the flowers we bought for the girls at their dance recital. The flower sales are used to help offset the cost of going to the competition up in the cities each year. They came from Wendy's in Edgerton and were just beautiful!

May 19, 2010

So here is momma bird hanging out in her nest. I still have not seen or heard any baby robins, but I would assume they are here by now. Momma was not too sure of me getting even this close to her nest ... she definitely kept her eye on me while I snapped a few pictures.

May 20, 2010

Dave mowed the lawn tonight in preparation for camping this weekend. I love the smell of freshly cut grass. (As a side note, Dave mentioned that every time he went by momma bird in her nest, she was on the ground flopping around to distract him from the nest above.)

May 21, 2010

Ahh, the first campfire of the season! YIPPEE! We camped in Ihlen this weekend. It was Holly's first time camping and she did really well. She slept in her kennel in the back of the truck and the only time she made a peep was when I walked "up the hill" early Saturday morning and did not take her with. The weather was beautiful all weekend and we had fun helping mom do her campground host duties.

May 22, 2010

In my many trips to and from the campground today (I brought Tricia to Ihlen to meet the girls for her Sioux Falls birthday party, then Ryleigh and I went to a birthday party in Jasper, and finally back to Ihlen to pick Tricia up after her party.) I kept seeing these turtles basking in the sun on a log. They were there every time, so I just had to go snap a picture. It is not the greatest picture since I used my little camera and had to zoom, but you get the point. There were even more turtles hanging out on a couple of rocks further down as well ... remind me never to jump in here!

May 23, 2010

Just because I am crazy, I decided to make our weekend even longer by taking the girls to see Shrek Forever After. It was okay, some funny parts, some parts that scared Ryleigh a little bit. But it was just fun to hang out with the girls.

So there you have it ... another week in our lives. I got a bunch of pictures printed and put in the album. I am into May as far as printing pictures. Journaling, well, not so much. I brought the stuff with me to the campground but did not get much done. I think I am into March for journaling. At least I have my blog to keep track of the pictures and my thoughts after taking them!

Remember to head over to Jessica's blog to see all the other Project Life posts!

Dance, Dance, Dance!

Are you ready for total picture overload? Because that is what we have here! The girls had their end-of-year dance recital last night. It was a wonderful show, but I think you'll see just how wonderful after all these pictures!



This is Ryleigh with her best buddy Riley! They are in preschool together this year and dance too. Watch out when these two get together because they like to make trouble!

This is a majority of Tricia's group backstage before the show. They wore their Super Girl costumes for the first time tonight.

Ryleigh's group did three numbers tonight ... Pirates, Splish Splash, and Butterfly. Seriously, little kids in plastic tubs - oh, I mean pirate ships - does it get any cuter?

Oh, there it is, even cuter! Now they are in metal tubs for their splish splash song!

The little girls just love this song. It is a Miley Cyrus song and they get to wear butterfly wings and run around the stage like they are flying. They were so excited by this time, that they missed the ending of the song completely. But really, when you are this cute ... does anyone honestly care?

Yeah, I thought not!

Tricia's group did two numbers. They did their competition song, Sneaker Night, and Super Girl. This group of girls has some real talent. They look great on stage and the smiles are awesome. You can tell that they truly enjoy dance. I hope they all stick with it a few more years!

The girls performed Super Girl for the first time. They get to do some fun stuff in this dance.

Like the roller coaster ...

Dancing on and hopping on and off of the blocks ...

And a really cool lift!

But this is really their best dance ... Sneaker Night. This is the one they performed at competition and did really well with.

They show a lot of attitude when dancing.

Show their strength by lifting the littler girls.

And show their flexibility by doing scorpions and splits. I think that most of the girls are able to do really great splits, but Tricia especially loves them! Great pointed toes and smile!

And, okay, not the greatest picture of Tricia since her eyes are closed, but more fun tricks for the final pose!

These last two are from the finale of the show. Miss Cindy has all the girls come on stage and do the same dance. They just have a blast and it is fun to see so many different ability levels working on the same thing. The stage is just a mess of girls wearing different costumes! So much fun!

The show was fairly long last night ... we got home a little after 8:30. But it really was a great show. Miss Cindy has done a great job with this group of girls!

ps - Don't say I didn't warn you about the pictures!

Project Life Tuesday

Here we are again ... Tuesday! I have no idea how many weeks I've been doing this, but since we are almost in June, I am getting close to SIX MONTHS of documenting our everyday lives by taking a picture every day.

Remember to visit Jessica and the other participants in Project Life Tuesday.



Monday, May 10, 2010

Rain, rain, go away! It has been raining and icky for a long time here. I want some SUN!



Tuesday, May 11, 2010

I made camping reservations today for this fun place. A bunch of my classmates are going to get together for a weekend of camping! The campground has over 500 sites! Wow.



Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Just a silly picture of Ryleigh eating her Goldfish Soup wearing a duck hat I got at school!



Thursday, May 13, 2010

I did it! The girls and I hopped in the car after work tonight and made a quick Sioux Falls run. We only made two stops ... KFC and Barnes and Noble. I got my NOOK tonight! SO MUCH FUN!



Friday, May 14, 2010

Today, I took Tricia to the Science and Nature Conference at the college. We had fun. Don't ever let anyone tell you science is boring! But really, the highlight of her day was getting to come to Breezy Meadow with me for a few hours. Tricia got several pages done before Dave came to get her about 8:00. Because we were so busy, I did not manage to get a picture of the two of us together! BAD MOM! For this picture I will insert the little "Welcome" card that was on my bed.

Saturday, May 15, 2010

This time at Breezy Meadow it was not a full house so each of us had our own room. I stayed in the Grandpa's Cabin room. I COULD NOT fall asleep tonight and was up until 3:30. Darn quiet house!



ps ... I got 54 pages done this week! I am up to August 2009 in the scrapbook!

Sunday, May 16, 2010

On my way home from Marshall I stopped at HyVee and got camping provisions! We are so excited to get the camper out for the first time next weekend.


Stay tuned! I'll be posting a major photo-fest of pictures from last night's dance recital later today!