Chris & Amanda

April

This year the Heit grandparents came out for Easter. Here are some of the things we did.

This one is not really from Easter. It is from June but it shows Kate and Kairi singing a song for Wesley's 2nd grade class. They are practicing being brave and speaking in school.

Here is a trip to the zoo that we took with the Heit grandparents. As you can see we discovered a new polar bear statue at the zoo so we got a picture. We have Kate, Kairi, and Gemma.

Wesley decided that he was tired so he stole Gemma's stroller for a while. Michelle was nice enough to let us borrow it. We don't use strollers anymore so I didn't have one with me. You can also see Grandma and Grandpa.

Polar Bear.

Grissley bear that just woke up from hibernation so they posted a funny sign on the window. Come on guys stop making fun of his fur!

Grandma/pa showing us a book at Michelle and Allen's house.

Michelle was hosting a baby shower for a friend but the rest of us went on a hike around Blue Mounds. The only mishap was when Gemma stepped in mud.

Cheese!

We also played at Legacy Academy (The climbing place). They have a new Tot Lot on an upstairs level. Here are the lovely people of Grandma and Wesley.

We did several crafts with the grandparents including straw blowing rocket ships and paper bag easter baskets.

Gemma finding her Easter eggs. We made them really hard.

Kairi finding an egg.

Kate found some too. So did Wesley.

We toured Epic's new building The Wizard of Oz. There is a lot of green in this area.

May

We attended the annual park construction days again this year. Here are a few highlights.

Kairi, Kate, Wesley and Chris building a snap unit that lights up.

Kairi and Kate got their faces painted.

This is how the kids look when mom buys a small tripod for her phone. (Wesley, Kate, Kairi)

This is how the parents look when mom buys a small tripod for her phone. (Chris and Amanda)

Birthday

For Amanda's last birthday living in her 20's we went to Chicago and visited the Shedd Aquarium. After that we got to partake in Medieval Times.

Beluga Whales.

The girls favorite: penguins.

Dolphins

I enjoyed looking at the sparkling piranhas.

Wesley liked any exhibit that had a turtle. There is one above his head.

Kids in the Amazon at the age of 6 learn to paddle canoes. We're still working on riding bikes without training wheels.

Medieval Times:

We arrived early before the show stared. We had VIP tickets and sat in the second row. Our team was the "Black and White" team. Our champion was named Santiago.

Here is the arena before the show stared.

Here is my favorite horse.

This is the prince's valiant stead.

This is our knight! He ended up winning the entire show.

There was a red knight, black and white, yellow, blue, and green.

During the show a falcon swooped right over our heads and eventually caught a bag of snacks that the trainer was spinning around.

Our food consisted of chicken, potato, corn, garlic bread, pound cake, a slice of chocolate cake because it was Amanda's birthday celebration. Amanda got a candle in her slice. She was allow announced specially by the king before the show. He said "Happy birthday to Queen Amanda Heit."

The knights lined up.

The program showed the knights spearing rings and jousting. It was hard to get the jousting pictures as they were really fast.

The Blue Knight catching a ring.

There was also hand to hand combat both off and on horses. I was pleased that I got one where it showed how the swords would sometimes spark when struck together.

Here is a video of the events. Before you wonder, no, you are not crazy. No one else can understand what the announcer is saying either.

We also got to go inside the train at Epic now that it is open. The girls liked to dress up in there.

Wesley is in the back, Chris, Kairi and Kate

On Memorial Day we watched a parade in Monona.

Dancing at the parade.

So I knew it had been a long time since I updated the blog. I didn't realize how long it really had been until I looked at my last post.... By Golly! And the post before that was when the twins turned 5 and they just turned 6 two weeks ago. I'm only like 6-12 months behind ya'll. Enjoy the pictures of the random things we do. :)

July of 2016

We go to Little Amerrika for the 4th of July and ride the rides. Here you can make out Wesley in the blue shirt sitting beside Kate. Chris and Kairi are in front of them.

We camped outside in the backyard. The kids had mom (Amanda) in there with them so it was a little crowded.

Kate took swim lessons and managed to not be as scared of the water now, although she still does not put her face in it. She is the second child from the left in this picture.

We had Chris's annual work picnic called Epicnic. Kate and Wesley are jumping in this picture.

The Henry Vilas Zoo finished their new polar bear exhibit and my kids got stuck there.

We watched a bubble show at the library. It was pretty cool and bubbly.

Since I am writing this from February of 2017, the lack of snow looks pleasant. We had a large rainstorm last year in July.

August 2016

I took the kids to a "new" for us beach. Kate is doing a cartwheel, Kairi is blocking Wesley, bu he is standing behind her.

The fledgling baby birds that lived in our deck got fed and then learned how to fly.

I found this, so I think I liked my hair in August 2016.

We visited the Milwaukee natural history museum and went through the butterfly room.

At that same place we watched a 3D movie.

Chris got his Vive virtual reality headset that some of my amazing readers have already seen.

Allen and Michelle's house had bees in their garden hose.

September 2016

We babysat the neighbors fish that they were babysitting for someone else and it died.

We got to see Epic's new addition to their castle building that included moving pictures on the walls.

Kate started Kindergarten. In Mrs. Nolan's class.

Wesley started 2nd grade in Ms. Blakeman's class.

Kairi started Kindergarten in Ms. Joswiak's class.

The across-the-street-from-us neighbors kid crashed his parents car into our fence by rolling it down their driveway. I think it took 3-4 months to fix it because I had to keep bugging the dudes who installed the fence to come put in a new post. The style they had previously used was discontinued, but I talked them into cutting something to size to fix it.

Chris had a birthday with a castle cake.

Chris and Kate played basketball. They did make this shot.

October 2016

We got our picture taken at the kids school.

I went on a tour of the capital building with Michelle and Gemma.

Kate attended a Chuck-E-Cheese birthday.

I crocheted an elephant for Wesley perhaps.

We took a picture at Epic's cool wizard statue that was made in 2016. The ball glows in his hand at night.

I went on a field trip with Wesley's class to a nature center.

On the field trip we caught a few bugs.

Wesley with his class.

I went on a field trip with Kate and Kairi to a farm. We learned how they process their apples into apple cider. The girl in the gray coat is Kate.

Everyone here is pointing at the bee hives that you can't see in the picture.

Chris and I took the kids to a Lego event. We have Wesley, Kairi, Lego dude, and Kate.

Kate and Kairi with Lego bear and Lego friend Stephanie.

Wesley made a crown.

Kate and Wesley made castles.

You've got to pose with Wild Style!

This is my niece Cathryn. She is my sister Amy's baby and is one month old here. She was born in September.

We grew a watermelon in our backyard! We had about 4-6 more but all the other ones rotted.

We went to a pumpkin patch. Here is Kate, Kairi, Chris and Wesley.

I even got a picture of myself at the pumpkin patch! Pictures of me are scarce.

I babysat my niece Gemma so we had to play on the trampoline.

We had Halloween.

We have Gemma the (ahem horse/cow). Chris and I are steampunk people, Kate and Kairi are princesses and Wesley is a Lego Nexo Knight.

We ate a pumpkin Pizza!

And our house looks cool with our Halloween lights.

November 2016

I made a new Thanksgiving Decoration.

Chris thought I was too cool to be contained so he stole a video.

We had visitors come to town for Thanksgiving.

You can just make out the orange stripe of Wesley's coat, Uncle GR, Amanda, Allen, Gemma, Michelle, and Marisa. Kate was the one who took the picture for us.

Uncle GR and Kairi at the staircase that cuts off halfway inside Epic. Just think "Harry Potter."

Lounging at Epic with Michelle, Wesley, Marisa and Kate.

More lounging after lots of walking with GR, Kairi, Kate, Marisa, Gemma, and Allen.

Guess what? It snowed in December.

Kairi (left) and Kate went sledding.

Kairi, Wesley and Kate visited with Santa.

The elf on the shelf tried to find new places to be. His name is Apple Cinnamon.

We build a snow fort with help from Uncle Allen, Aunt Michelle and Gemma.

Ta dah! I lasted the weekend before it rained and knocked the roof in. Then it became half a snow ice fort.

We reenacted the Nativity Story with Michelle, Allen and Gemma.

Christmas came!

Kate is modeling a super hero suit.

We checked out the new upstairs of the "climbing place."

Kate and Kairi

Chris vs. Wesley at Hello Kitty air hockey.

Wesley scores!

January 2017

Amanda and Kate are hood buddies.

Kairi and Kate had a birthday and turned 6 years old. They chose a jungle theme. Here is one of the things we did, a bean bag toss game.

We had a separate birthday dinner for Kairi and Kate on their actual birthday. They opened a few presents then from Allen, Michelle, Gemma and us.

Kate, Kairi, and Wesley.

The girls had a lion birthday cake that looked like this.

Here they are waiting for the birthday party to start. I didn't get pictures of the actual event since I was in charge of the whole thing. So we played bean bag toss, hunted for plastic toy animals inside a box filled with balloons, fed a green "crocodile" by playing golf into his mouth, decorated paper bag puppets, went on an egg hunt where they found gems inside the eggs, colored on balloons to turn them into animal faces, pinned the nose on the lion. The girls had three friends from school come.

Here is the lion nose game.

Wisconsin Dells currently has an ice castle that is made from dudes who came here from Utah. Aren't they nice? Kairi had to wear her Elsa dress to visit the ice palace.

Kairi, Kate, and Chris at the entrance to the ice castle.

There were about 2-3 tunnels the kids could climb through.

We got there at 5pm so we could see the place during the day and during the night. At night the ice gets lit up with cool color changing lights. You can see a Wisconsin Dells roller coaster in the background.

The kids went through a small ice slide. We all went down a larger one later, but only Chris got a picture of that. My fingers were freezing at that point and I was done with taking pictures.