President's Day

 Ben went with the youth to this fun place to sled last Saturday and was going to take the kids with him but since they had an amazing and unexpected amount of youth show up, he didn't have room in the car for the kids. Since the kids and Ben had the day off today because of President's Day we decided to go today. The kids loved it! and sledded down the hill a lot. They took out a bunch of people, ran over people's feet and and generally caused ruckus, so it went well. :D

 Ben eating his kebab.

 After sledding for a long time we went over to this field that were behind some trees. The snow was extremely deep and perfect for igloo building according to Ben. The kids got stuck in the snow a couple of times but had a lot of fun exploring and looking at animal tracks. Ty was trying to help Laney get out of the snow or trying to pull her arms off. It looks a little bit more like the latter to me but whatever….!

 Ty belly flopping on the snow.

 Nyah was standing next to a big pile of snow and decided that she needed to see what the white fluffiness tasted like.

 Mmmm not bad. Not bad at all.

 I was trying to capture her softness. Ooh she's just so squishy and soft.

 Ty found the beginnings of an igloo and frolicked in it for a while.

 Ben and Nyah looking at animal tracks.

 So pretty and white and blue.

 So I don't enjoy this picture at all but I had to put it on here to show you how deep the snow is. My foot fell through the snow and the snow was up to my knee…and my foot was not even touching the ground. It was craziness.

 Nyah sledded a couple of times too. At first when we got there she DID NOT want to sit on the sled AT ALL. But by the end she liked sledding and even let me pull her back to the car.

 Ty was pulling Laney and Ty on their sled back to the car and let go of them so they sped down another little hill. We almost lost Ty but he did what he always does and just rolls off the sled when he's done. It looks pretty funny.

 He was a little annoyed though, because he was pretty tired and then Ben pushed him off into the unknown and he had to trudge back up to us. But Ben ran down and saved him.

Looking back on the little lodge and sledding hill. Fun day!

Valentine's Day

 I realize that this post has a ridiculous amount of ridiculous pictures of me, so let me explain….I wanted to make the kids a valentine and put it in their lunchbox so they would get it at school. Well, the day before Valentine's Day was pretty crazy. I had a lot of stuff I had to do and it was just crazy crazy all day. I had plans to make the kids' Valentines and make heart shaped cinnamon rolls for breakfast on top of all the other stuff that day and then Laney came home and said she needed a Valentine's box to bring to school the next day. So anyway, I took this picture at like 11.30pm the night before, wrote on it and hurried and printed it out and got it ready for the kids' lunch boxes. When the kids came home Ty told me that his teacher saw it and passed it around to other teachers!!! Great!!

 The weekend before we made Ty's valentine's box (which is pictured further down) and since Ty's was pretty cool….if I do say so myself ;D….Laney wanted a cool one too. We found a picture online of one that looked like this and I made it Monday night since Laney had to get to bed after being done with homework, piano blah blah blah.

 Our heart-shaped cinnamon rolls and strawberry milk. Yum!!!

 I had planned on posting the picture that I took for the kids' Valentine on Facebook as Ben's Valentine also but I wanted to take a new one since the first one was taken late at night and wasn't that great. So this was my Valentine's to Ben. It said, "I mustache you a question….Will YOU be my Valentine?"

And last but not least…..Ty's Valentine's box. Phew….thank goodness Valentine's is over…..bring on the next holiday!!!

January

 Well, not much going on here in Eschenbach so I thought I would just post the pictures that we did take in January. I have found that I'm really happy that I post pictures on here. I started scrapbooking all our pictures again and it is really helpful to go back and figure out when pictures are from or what pictures I'm missing and what order things happened in.

 So anyway, here's a picture of our little slaves working. This is how they pay for their room and board….work work work!!! Just kidding. On saturday we normally clean in the mornings and the kids can earn some money if they help out.

 More pictures of our child laborers.

 The kids, especially Laney, were so sad that we didn't have a white Christmas. I guess they very quickly got used to our last winter and the tons and tons of snow we had and expected the same this year. But alas, we didn't get much. But on this day in January we got a little bit so the kids hurried outside to build 2 snowmen, sled and otherwise frolic in the snow. I made up some excuses to keep me indoors and nice and warm.

 About 2 weeks later we got a lot more snow and the kids once again ran outside to play in the cold  fluffiness. This time I went with them but not before digging out my snow pants and jacket so I could stay nice and toasty.

 I have the hardest time getting Nyah to keep her mittens on. She wants them on but after about 5 seconds she gets REALLY frustrated and starts freaking out and shaking her hands until the mitten fly off. After this particular snowstorm the temperatures dropped dramatically and we find ourselves yearning for the days when the temperatures stayed just above freezing.

 I tried to get a picture of the kids on the sled but Nyah was very grumpy and tired so this is the best we got.

 After the picture we went to the playground and the kids used the hill that normally has a slide on it as a sledding hill. Ty surprised us by going down the side of the hill that was the steepest. Normally he's a bit more cautious but on this day, he threw caution to the wind and flew down the hill, all the while giggling and eating the snow that flew in his face. Laney on the other hand was a bit more careful and chose a side that was less steep and after measuring and calculating carefully how she was going to execute, she plopped on the sled and went down.

 Nyah watched the whole thing and really could care less. I tried going down with her but I think she was too tired and probably hungry and therefore not very impressed.

 Aaah bliss!!!

 Nyah found joy in wandering around the playground making tracks in the snow.

 After a while we walked back home where Ben was still shoveling our driveway. Oh I'm sorry, I forgot to mention that it was only me and the kids who went to the playground. We unfortunately only have one snow shovel and since Ben was using it, the rest of us couldn't help out in anyway….so we went off to play. :D Laney plopped down in a snow pile and started throwing snow.

 …while Ty directed Ben. After that, Ty plopped in snow pile and I piled snow on top of him.

Meanwhile, the youngest Campbell wandered the streets of Eschenbach. And that was January….