Trip to Chi-town

I was honored to be asked to be Amanda's daughter Sofia's Godmother.  So I took Francine and we went up to Chicago. We stayed with Cari and Raym and family.  It was great to spend more time with Penelope and Sofia.  They are super sweet girls and were happy to share all of their toys with Francine. 

We were able to see Emily and Shari who are both pregnant and super cute.  Francine loved Emily's dogs, and they loved to give her kisses!  We had a wonderful day at Amanda's and the baptism went great.  I think Sophia loved the water!  Amanda and Chris made some delicious food for lunch.  WE are so lucky to have amazing friends.

Happy Halloween! (a month late)

We went over to Nik and Kelly's for the 3rd year in a row.  We love going over there to celebrate the Holiday with them.  Francine rode the whole time in the wagon and Gavin kept coming over to dump his candy into the wagon.  By the end of the night she was "swimming" in the candy, and trust me she loved it.

Wedding Weekend part 2 (a little delayed)

We have had some laptop computer issues (we think that we have solved our problems).  Anyway back to the wedding weekend in Milwaukee...
After we left Jennifer and Tony's house we went back to the hotel and they had an amazing breakfast area and they said that the Ginther Family could gather there Friday night so we could all watch the World Series Game 7.  We ordered pizza!  BOb even set up his computer to watch the Blues game.  The BLues lost, but the Cardinals won the world series!  It was so much fun.  The kids were with us for a while and then my mom was sweet enough to go upstairs with them.  (we had ajoining rooms)
Saturday, the day of the wedding we had a big breakfast and then headed to the pool!  The kids had so much fun in the pool.  I can't wait to get Francine back into swim lessons.  I think that she will be back in January. 
We had a nice lunch from a mircobrewery.  Jessica and Troy were even in town from California, which was sooooo nice. 

Then off to the wedding.  Brian and Nicole were a super sweet and beautiful bride and groom.  My dad and Francine paced at the back of the church for the entire wedding.  The kids couldn't wait until the wedding.  Francine and WAlt met  a lot of their 2nd cousins (or my cousin's kids) and they couldn't wait to be out on the dance floor.  It was an amazing night.  The kids were so good.  It was an awesome weekend.  We even got home in time for walt to go to Hockey. 

Walt Snoring

As most of you know, Walt had his tonsils and adenoids removed this past summer. The main factor in that decision was the fact that he wasn't sleeping well, and was specifically diagnosed with sleep apnea. A few days before he went in for surgery, I took some video of the noises that he made while sleeping. Keep in mind that the videos are dark because it was dark in his room, so there's nothing wrong with the video itself, it's the audio that I was looking for. I always said that he sounded like he was a 60 year old smoker when he snored. Obviously when viewing the videos, you're going to want to make sure to have the volume up:

 

Sara and I are both happy to report that since the surgery, he's had a more normal experience sleeping. It's rare that he makes any noise at all, and I know that he's been sleeping more restfully as a result.

Francine Francine the Dancing Queen

Our great friends Jill and Tal got us 2 Francine titled books as a gift when Francine was born.  One of them was called "Francine Francine the Dancing Queen".   She has taken these words to heart, and she loves to dance.  Her dance is a little bit of a bounce.  This was a video last week after Walt's hockey practice.  Sorry for the loud street noise, but we could not resist the beautiful day to sit outside. 

Action Figure and Octopus

I can't remember if we told you about Action Figure and Octopus, Walt's first pets...Hermit Crabs.  They are pretty "out" in this video, but trust us, they do not come out much unless they are in their bath (like they are in the video).  And some sad news to pass on, Action Figure has passed.  We will miss him and his super cool name. 

Wedding Weekend part 1

What an amazing last weekend in October we had.  We traveled on Thursday night up to Milwaukee to not only go to my cousin Brian's wedding, but also to see Jennifer and family.  It was an amazing drive up to Wisconsin because we were listening to game 6 of the World Series and it was a crazy day where the Cardinals kept getting behind and then coming back... By the time we checked in it was in the 11th and as we were getting all of the luggage in, David Freese hit the game winning home run!  We couldn't believe it and could not stop smiling!  We celebrated quietly with the kids sleeping and went to sleep finally after 1am. 
The kids were of course up around the normal time, bob was still so excited about the win that he took them down to Breakfast.  I was so thankful to sleep an extra hour. 

Then we headed out to see Jennifer and Tony and the family.  By chance, Diane and WAlly were up in Wisconsin as well.  So all of us Wichards were together.  The kids loved some cousin time.  

I am surprised...

I am still surprised how much walt is enjoying Hockey.  He loves it every week.  He is in the red jersey.

Boo at the Zoo 2011

Walt loved Boo at the Zoo last year, so we knew that we wanted to try to make it again.  They let you in starting at 5:30 and then you can walk around to parts of the zoo and there are some activities.  We watched the show at the Children's zoo and rode the carousel and enjoyed all of the "spooky" decorations.  It is also fun that the kids get to wear their costumes for another day. 

Day at the Park!

So we have had a little problem with the format of some of our pictures, so we apologize for the delay in posts.  We had a beautiful October here in St Louis.  So we spent a lot of time outside.  We went to Soulard Park one day, the kids were in sweatsuits, which photographed very "cute".   Francine is getting more and more adventurous at the park.   She is also getting more and more verbal.  She still has about 6-8 words, but she does a lot of grunting.  :)