Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Carlson 4 Generation Pictures

While we were in Wisconsin the beginning of October we wanted to get a four generation picture with Great Grandma and Jackson.
We had moderate success adding the girls into the pictures :)


Great Grandma with her little Lueker Munchkins



Thank you Aunt Arla for working so hard to help us get some good generation pictures!

Monday, October 25, 2010

October Visit to Wisconsin

Grammy offerred to take us to Wisconsin during her first week of Fall Break the first week of October. I was pretty nervous about how that would work but in the end we decided to give it a shot and we had three super little travlers. Thank you Grammy for taking us and thank you to all our family for helping us have such a great time!
~
The primary reason we went was to visit Great Grandma Carlson. She is the only great grandparent that the kids have now. She loves babies and Jackson was no exception! :)

Grammy and Reagan giving Jackson some well deserved loving after a long night/day
(we ended up leaving about midnight eastern time because the girls were so excited about the trip they couldn't get to sleep) in the van.
Aunt Carla and Uncle Pete brought their grand daughter, Amber, over Saturday evening to visit us for a little while before church. Note the awesome Ladybug boots from Aunt Arla Reagan is wearing. Amber decided they were super cool too and had to try on Kennedy's.
After supper Reagan was more than ready to go see Uncle Phil and his cows. On our way to the barn we passed Brandon on a tractor. He very nicely offered the girls a ride. Reagan was so excited but Kennedy was a bit nervous. Even though she's going through a shy period her shyness kind of surprised me because she's fascinated by trucks and tractors right now.

The girls love a special kind of string cheese, called whips, the cheese factory Uncle Phil's milk goes to makes. Reagan had told me the first thing she was going to do when she saw Uncle Phil was ask him if he could get us some. Little did we know how quickly Uncle Phil could deliver and that he keeps some in the milkhouse on hand for his grandkids!
Reagan enjoyed talking to Uncle Phil while he milked the cows.
Great Grandma put Jackson right to sleep for a Sunday morning nap while we got ready for our picnic up on the "hill."
Oops, these got a little out of order... After nap time Sunday afternoon Jeanna and the kids came up to see Jackson and play with the girls. Here Aunt Arla is helping Ariel hold Jackson for the first time.
Kolton loved holding Jackson :)
Reagan adores Kolton (he's her "Prince Charming") and she especially loved sharing and showing off her baby brother
During our Wisconsin trip Reagan discovered she loves to take pictures (she definitely has some LaBar blood in her). Grammy had me take this picture especially for Uncle Andrew and Aunt Jen to enjoy.
Aunt Arla got all the kids this tent and tunnel to enjoy at Great Grandma's house and they all loved it! :)
Sunday morning we headed up to the "Hill" to enjoy a picnic/cookout on some of the boulders in the woods. Here the girls are waiting for their ride while sitting on Aunt Arla's pumpkins.
Such a little cutie pie!!! :)
Uncle Scott ready to drive Aunt Arla and Reagan up to the woods
Grammy carrying Kennedy in (After a month of spending time with grandparents and aunts and uncles I think Kennedy has forgotten that she has legs much less how they work... lol :)
We had lots of great pictures from our picnic/cookout. Thank you to Uncle Scott and Aunt Arla for arranging everything!



Even though Uncle Scott didn't eat anything himself, he roasted all the hotdogs and marshmallows for the rest of us. What a guy!!! :)



Reagan is not a big hot dog fan and from the picture below you can tell she thought Aunt Arla was pretty crazy to suggest sharing one! lol :)

Kennedy tried to create a S'more without roasting the marshmallow but it didn't quite work out... :)
Sharing some "CHOC-O-LATE" with Grammy
Reagan loves
and adores her Uncle Scott!



Reagan is a pretty big Aunt Arla fan too! :)
Sunday night Reagan wanted to head back down to the barn to see Uncle Phil and the cows again. We were too late to see the cows but Reagan was able to help with some of the chores. I thought this was a neat picture of Reagan looking for the cows.
And of course Reagan needed some more cheese!

Grammy brought Kennedy down to see the heffers with Reagan. Bless her heart though she kept trying to tell us they were cows and not heffers. lol :)
The cows and heffers are pretty shy but Reagan managed to get them to let her pet a few of them. Uncle Phil also helped her pet a "friendly" cow in the big barn. Uncle Phil also let Reagan help feed the calves some milk on Sunday evening but I somehow didn't manage to get that picture uploaded. Not surprisingly Reagan absolutely loved having the opportunity to do that!
The girls both love playing hide and seek. I think Kennedy is so cute while she takes her turn counting!
On Monday my Great Uncle Dale and Aunt Carol came along with their daughter, Nancy, (who was visiting from Jackson, Wyoming) to visit and have lunch. Aunt Arla and Aunt Carla came to enjoy their visit too. Thank you to Aunt Arla for the great lunch!
Grammy and her 3 Lueker Munchkins
Grammy and her smallest munchkin (this munchkin picture was much easier to take lol :)
Tuesday we went down to the Marshfield park with Grammy and Great Grandma for lunch. We were able to enjoy the beautiful weather on the playground and looking at the animals such as Elk and Buffalo.
Kennedy creatively getting off Grammy's shoulders lol :) - again the child's legs don't work anymore...
Reagan and Great Grandma walking together, so sweet. :)
Ariel was so cute when she just popped into the house Tuesday afternoon to see if she could hold Jackson for a minute. :)
Tuesday evening Aunt Pat, Jared and Lydia came over to visit with us for a while. Reagan lovdes them and was super excited to see them. Here Jared was helping her touch the ceiling and then they somehow decided to change head attire. lol :)
Having so much fun!
Reagan wanted to take a silly picture
before she woudl take a nice picture :)
Wednesday morning Aunt Arla brought Reagan (who spent the night with her) and Delilah up to Great Grandma's house to get pictures of everyone with all their pumpkin PJs.
Karoline and Peter were nice enough to come visit us Wednesday morning/afternoon. Grammy suggested we go to McDonald's for lunch and so the kids could enjoy the playland. It was Jackson's first official visit to McDonald's and his first picture with Ronald McDonald.
Peter and Reagan are less than a month a part in age and had a great time playing together
Wednesday afternoon Great Grandma looked out the kitchen window and asked "Is Phil moving the cows are they out?" Sure enough they had gotten out so Grammy and Aunt Arla went running to help get them all rounded back up.
One of the highlights of our trips to Wisconsin as become going to feed and ride Uncle Phil and Aunt Dee's horses Gypsy and Taboo and this time was certainly no exception! :)


Kennedy was a bit nervous about feeding the horses and appreciated some assistance from Aunt Dee
I thought I had uploaded a picture of both girls on the horses but I guess I missed that (too many great and fun pictures to sort through!) Kennedy as funny because she wanted to get on the horses but as Aunt Dee said she looked like she was in "agony" the entire time she was on them. Kennedy was also funny because when she got off of Gypsy she stood there saying "Thank you Gsypy, thank you Gyspy." :)


The girls enjoyed eating a few apples along with the horses. After a while Reagan determined it was more fun to jump for the high apples rather than pick them up off the ground or get the ones she could reach off the lower branches.
Thursday morning we headed down to the barn because Uncle Phil had told us earlier in the week that was when he would be cleaning it. We were a bit late to watch the manure being removed from the barn but here Reagan was inspecting it outside before Uncle Phil took it to be spread on the fields.
Then Uncle Phil invited Reagan to join him on a tractor ride and to help him spread the manure! I remember doing this with Grandpa Carlson when I was a little girl. I guess it sounds like a bit of a strange thing to be excited about but it was so much fun to ride along with Grandpa on his tractor! :)
Away they go!
Reagan wanted to check out the haymow when they came back
After that they hopped on a different tractor and used it to feed some heffers across the road
Finally they took a ride on Uncle Phil's 4-wheeler to take care of a tire that was down by the barn. What an adventure filled morning! Thank you Uncle Phil for all your patience and for sharing your cheese (which Reagan polished off before finishing the chores).
We went to lunch at Aunt Carla's house on Thursday afternoon and Thursday evening Grammy treated a group of us to pizza in the park. Kennedy wanted to hold both Great Grandma's and Aunt Carla's hands on the way to the picnic tables.
They had cut down several trees since our visit earlier in the week and the kids loved climbing all over them.
Aunt Carla, Julie and Amber checking Jackson out
I captured so many fun Carlson cousin playground moments

Some grandmas enjoying their grandkids


Aunt Arla and Grammy wanted to know if we enjoyed their "pole dancing" :)
Grammy had some Dilly bars from DQ ready for the great grandkids who had time to stop by for dessert at Great Grandma's house after the park
Aunt Arla thought it would be fun to carve pumpkins with the girls Thursday evening.
Kolton took the time to try and show the girls how to dig in before he left to go home for the evening.
It was a good thing that Uncle Scott had prepped the pumpkins and pretty much emptied them because the girls wanted absolutely nothing to do with touching the insides.
Using scoops made it a little more appealing

Uncle Scott finally gave up on the girls scooping everything that he had loosened out of the pumpkins and just shook them upside down. lol :)
A very brave Missy Reagan touching the pumpkin seeds
A not so brave Missy K refusing to even attempt to touch a single pumpkin seed
A very proud Missy Reagan for holding a single pumpkin
Then it was time to go inside and carve the pumpkins (or watch Uncle Scott carve the pumpkins as the case may be :)
Silly paci girl!!! lol :)
Sharing her paci with her pumpkin
Back to work for Uncle Scott!

I changed the ISO on my camera so that it would take a better picture in the dark after we lit the pumpkins. I thought this picture turned out kind of cool especially since the girls were pretending to be ghosts.
Thank you to the entire Carlson family for helping us have a fabulous visit and to Grammy for being willing to take us along with her! :)