Christmas

We headed back to Pinkley's Red Roof Farms this year to pick out our Christmas tree. They are great there, lots of trees, animals in the barn and the barn is over 120 years old!!! These three helpers are ready to pick a tree!

We found a winner, time to wrap it up, throw it on the roof and head home!

The kids have an artificial tree in the basement that they put all their orniments on, our real tree is mom's "pretty" tree and the boys have specific instructions...DO NOT TOUCH. This year, B got to help mom with decorating!

She did a great job and was very careful with the ornaments and her placement on the tree!

We let the kids open 1 gift at the start of December...their Christmas PJ's!

I found her at the tree one morning just starring at it...she said, "Dad, isn't it just beautiful"

Christmas Jammies!

Kids being kids!

We have the tradition of making Christmas cookies to put in goodie bags to give as "thank you's" through the Christmas season. It's always fun to work together in the kitchen!

Christmas service at church

This year, we hosted Heather's family and had an "Ugly Christmas Sweater" game. Each family had a sheet of paper with a sweater on it, using supplies they had to design their best Ugly Christmas Sweater! Our family went with a snowman and red garland!

The South Dakota VL's got creative with their sweater...

Theirs was Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer and he ate too much Christmas goodies!

The Pella VL's made good use of green and red doilies!

Our annual family Christmas picture! Dressed up for Christmas Eve service at church.

Merry Christmas!

Christmas morning excitement...

What could be in these...

So excited!

Action figures were a big hit for this 5 year old! (side note, Aldi's had these in the "Aldi's Deals" row...crazy good price for these big action figures!)

We went with gifts of "experiences" this year...the boys got tickets to TodyMac Hits Deep tour!

We also gave them a "Yes" day, that is one day where they get to decide what they want to do and our answer will be "Yes"! Can I have pickles for breakfast..."Yes", can we go to Climb Iowa..."Yes"...

It was a great Christmas season, it goes too fast but it is fun to decorate, celebrate and get together with friends and family. Jesus is the reason for the season and we try not to forget that in the midst of our daily lives as a family! Merry Christmas!

Lefsa Rolling Team

Every Christmas season, we head down to my parents house to make lefsa! Lefsa is a traditional Norwegian potato bread. it is made using riced potatoes and making dough balls, rolling those out and than cooking on a 500 degree griddle!

Morgan using the grooved rolling pin to roll out some lefsa!

My dad manning the flip stick, a long tapered stick that you slide under the lefsa to flip and cook the other side! His turner was his mom's, that lefsa stick is probably close to 80 years old!

Garrett and I rolling out some dough!

Blythe, Wade and Morgan hanging out and enjoying the lefsa process!

Our Lefsa Rolling Team!

This year, my parents got my sister and I our own turners (lefsa stick). Pictured in the bottom middle of the grid below!

My sister had these shirts made for us this year, they turned out great! 

I can remember making lefsa at my grandma's house and now my kiddo's are learning how to make it too! What a fun tradition and a great memory to pass on! 

Welding projects

November I tackled a few welding projects. I don't have a welder but one of my co-workers does and he has offered his shop anytime I have a project. So, I took him up on the offer and took 2 projects!

The first one was some triangle Christmas trees made from re-rod. I cut 3 different sizes, 3 foot, 4 foot and 5 foot.

 Layed them out so I new how they should look and them put on the welding face mask and welded them together!

 After a coat of white spray paint, we wrapped them with lights and stood them up in the front yard just in time for Christmas!

 The second project was for inside, Heather wanted two floating shelves on the long wall in our bedroom. The wall is long, so we wanted some thicker shelves that had some visual weight to them. We found these two old beams down at West End Architectural Salvage. The beams are 6 feet long, 2.5 inches thick and 5.5 inches wide! We had them bend the rods for the fronts on the shelves.

 I gave them a light sanding and then tried a clear coat that I had, it brought out a red to the wood that we didn't love...so I sanded that back off...

 Then for the welding. I bought a 2 inch bar of steel from Home Depot and 1/2 thick rods. I ended up cutting 5 rods for each shelf and then we welded the rods onto the steel creating a bracket.

 After that, I lined up the bracket and drilled 1/2 holes into the shelves for the rods to slide into! Mounted the bracket to the studs on the wall and then pushed the shelves onto the bracket. It sounds simple but it took a lot of drilling and some pounding with a rubber mallet

 But the finished product turned out great! 2 floating shelves with hidden brackets!

 They sit snug to the wall and are level!

 ...and we love the character of the old beams!

Big thanks to Brent for the welding help and letting me play in his shop (I do have a little shop envy now) If you ever need reclaimed wood, head down to West End Architectural Salvage, talk to them at the desk on the main level because their lumber shop is actually few blocks down the road in a different warehouse, but Aiden can help you find what you need and they have a lot of lumber there!

Fall Fun

Fall fun is all around our house this time of year! Having fires in the firepit...

 ...and of course, S'mores!

 To raking a leaf maze in the front yard! Trigg put this together with the help of the neighborhood kids...pretty impressive!

 Then we made it into a big pile...

 and jumped till we were tired!

 We carved some pumpkins for Halloween!

 Cut the top to get to the guts!

G pulling open the top...

and the guts!

Trigg digging into his pumpkin!

GUTS!!!

Blythe carving her pumpkin

Focused on their work

G getting some help from Mom!

Trigg wanted to carve his pumpkin all by himself...he did a great job!

Garrett had a different idea for his pumpkin/jack-o-lantern

A football!

B's completed jack-o-lantern

Trigg's finished work...looks a little like him!

And lit up ready for Halloween!

Trigg wanted to be a Lego Man for Halloween this year...so I got to work with some carboard boxes and a cement footer tube. Mocked up and ready for paint!

Painted. I didn't like how you could see his eyes...so i took some old screen that I had an taped it inside the Lego head.

And we have ourselves a Lego Man!

Testing out the head

G wanted to try it too!

B wanted to be a princess...and we already had a Rapunzel dress, with temps dropping into the low 20's we bundled up for trick-or-treating!

Ready to roll; Lego Man, Rapunzel and Iowa Hawkeye football player!

It was freezing but we made it around the block and got plenty of candy!

What do you get when you cross a fish with an elephant....

Swimming Trunks!

Happy Fall