Swimming lessons

Drew has swimming lessons every Monday night and is really learning to like water. That is a good thing since he has a pool right outside his patio door!

Hiking group

Several ladies have decided to do a different hike every Saturday morning. I love it, naturally! The gals are all lots of fun and the beauty of the hikes speak for themselves. The following pictures are from this past Saturday at a Cave Creek park called Spur Cross.

Lots of presents

Birthday slide

Happy Birthday, Drew!!!

Drew is two years old today! He and I are going to make his cake this afternoon and he will frost it. I imagine it will be the prettiest cake I have ever seen. :-) It is supposed to be 75 degrees this afternoon so Grandpa is going to take him to the park, too. He will have a busy day.

Happy Baby

Sunny Tuesday

We are enjoying a streak of above normal temperature in Phoenix. I know back home in Iowa it is COLD, very cold. Sister Jan and family in MN is even colder. Mark and I do not miss those temperatures! Some pictures from the past few days......

Drew and daddy's flashlight

Kayley enjoying the outdoors

Grandma and the kids chilling out

Kayley wearing Drew's hat to keep that bright sunshine out of her eyes.

Sunny Monday

It was a beautiful day to start the work week. Mark and I took both Drew and Kayley outside several times today to enjoy the nice weather. Two short videos of their day. Kayley was in a good mood (nothing unusual there!) and Drew had fun teasing Sox with Andy's flashlight.

Just a walk in the park

For all my cold weather friends, I almost hate to post this. It was just beautiful outside so Mark and I took the kids for a stroll and a stop at the park. They enjoyed it and grandpa and grandma enjoyed the sunshine.

Picture "catch up"

I have been a bit behind with my broken computer so will just post some pics that have been accumulating. A little heavy on the Kayley side, but Drew has had his fair share! I see a couple of "double" posts of pictures, but I am too tired to remove them and plus she is worth looking at twice!

Grandpa and Drew

Drew loves to bowl

Grandpa and Me

My computer died.......

This was not a good start to a new year. One day the screen on my laptop went black. I could "read" it with the help of a bright flashlight glaring on the screen but didn't think I wanted to do that for the rest of my life. I had it estimated for repair and decided that over $700 for a 6 year old laptop was unacceptable. Long story short, my dear husband purchased me a new one and it is due to arrive by UPS on the 6th. Until then, no posts of pictures or videos. Fortunately, Megan and I gave Mark a laptop for Christmas so I can get my Internet "fix", but it doesn't have the right software on it for video editing. I will make a post when my new one arrives. Happy New Year to everyone! Marla

Christmas at the Swensen's

We were all invited over to Sharon and Arne's for Christmas Day dinner and festivities. We had a great time and a delicious ham dinner. The kids had fun with Rock Band.

Matt had a flight out the next day and we hated to see him leave but we were so happy to have him join us for the Christmas holiday. Hopefully that will become an annual affair!

Christmas morning

Oops....I goofed at the end and let the song run after the video was over. When the screen turns black, the video is over. :-)

Cousins from New Mexico

Nephew Erik and his girls Kadin and Gracie stopped by for a visit Christmas Eve day. Drew had lots of fun with them but I wouldn't let him go swimming with the girls!

Merry Christmas!

Thank goodness grandpa's out of Iowa!

The weather in Iowa (and the entire midwest) sounds downright frightful. I saw there were around 220 school closings and as far as I can recall the most I had ever seen previously on the website was around 130 closings. I don't know if it is ice or snow causing all the problems, but probably both. Luckily Matt is in Las Vegas right now so he is dodging it, too. Ironically when he landed in Vegas there was snow on the gounnd there, too. Now the chances of that are really quite remote. Strange weather everywhere. Well, not everywhere....it is pretty nice right here! :-) Matt gets to Phoenix on the 22nd so we are all excited about that. He will be meeting Kayley for the very first time.

I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season with family and friends!

Now, let's play ball:

So close

This video shows Kayley "almost" rolling over from her back to her tummy, a milestone that she had not yet achieved. Later in the day she did finally make it, then kept practicing that feat over and over. Andy has the video of her completing the job on his blog