Thursday, January 31, 2019

Frozen

Cool skating pics of Liam at his recent tournament

Liam is very fast!

And Liam is very smooth on his skates


Pin Trading hockey tournament (Liam's team pin on left and Luke's on right).  Both of the pieces in the middle spin around in a circle.

Getting ready to Go!

Liam and som buddies


Night skate on the backyard rink
An amazing save from Luke to help put his team in the quarterfinal game

This is an entirely new definition of COLD

Finn is super proud of the puzzle he worked on all by himself at school!

We have been frozen this week.  Literally.  Our temps have hovered around -40 to -60 for 48 hours. We received a decent amount of snow on Sunday night that managed to close schools on Monday due to the timing and amount of snow.  

When we woke up Monday morning, the roads were covered in deep, fluffy snow and the temps were forecast to drop during the day.  The temps were already in the single digits, but they did manage to drop to -50 overnight on Monday.  Tuesday and Wednesday were pretty unbearable as the actual temperature was around -25 with a windchill of -50 and a decent amount of wind.  Its the type of cold that takes your breath away just walking to the car!  

School has been closed all week due to the dangerously low temperatures that puts kids at risk just waiting at the bus stop.  We have stayed home a fair amount this week, but we still had hockey practice (of course).  We also made trips to the local fitness center to play basketball and burn energy.  And, we made several trips to the new Skyline that opened down the street.  Ironically, Finn goes to a very reliable and dedicated school that remained open every day this week!  All in all, the boys have had a great time.  Who wouldn't want to miss four days of school, sleep in, go to hockey practice, and play at SkyZone in the afternoon?  

Last weekend, Luke and Liam participated in a big hockey tournament with Squirts from all over Minnesota.  There were a total of around 64 Squirt B1 and A level teams.  Luke's team did very well and finished third among the A level teams.  Liam's team also played well, but they were faced with a pretty hard bracket and never made it out of pool play.  The Canadian team that beat everyone in their bracket ended up playing in the championship and lost in OT so its safe to say that  Liam's team faced some good competition.  

We are Heading BACK TO SCHOOL tomorrow!!  Hooray!

Friday, January 18, 2019

A Recap of the Week

Liam's B1 Squirt Black team.  Great group of boys and parents!

B1 Black at the Fire station

Finn loves the ice rink this year

Aiden made a couple designs with these shape things

Aiden with his Golden Knights mascot on the rink

Band concert!!  Luke is in back and middle with trombone and white shirt.  Liam was unfortunately sick, but he plays the trumpet.  He was very sad to miss the winter concert, but there's always spring!

Luke and his buddy, Adam, who plays the french horn

Finn and his hockey book he made at school with his teacher

Finn's book

His awesome teacher had him list out all the players and their numbers to practice his writing.  

Aiden at the WILD game.  It was Old Fashioned hockey night and the Hanson Brothers were in attendance at the game (hence the glasses).  

Luke and Finn at the game

John and the boys.  Sadly, Liam missed the trip to the WILD game as well because he wasn't feeling good.

Nice seats when the Wild played Anaheim Ducks.  Unfortunately, the WILD didn't have their best game.
This week was another busy one particularly for Luke, Aiden, and Finn.  Liam has been sick this week so some of his plans didn't work out as he was hoping, but he made the most of it.  Before Liam got sick, his hockey team took a trip to the local fire station and they got to take a tour and have dinner.  One of the boys on his team has a dad who is a lieutenant at the fire station so he let them try on the clothes, ride in the truck, etc...Liam said it was the best party ever!  Thanks to his awesome managers for all the work they have put into making this a really fun year for Liam after a somewhat bumpy start with tryouts and team assignments.

Luke and Liam had their band concert this week.  They have been learning to play their instruments since mid September and have really made some progress.  Luke is playing the trombone and Liam is playing the trumpet.  In the concert, they demonstrated many of the skills they have learned over the last few months.  The band is comprised of 5th grade kids from six different elementary schools.   There are a total of 312 kids playing band in the 5th grade.  The other 6 or so schools in the district had their concert right before ours.  It was quite the operation!

Lastly, as part of their Christmas gift, the boys got to attend a WILD game.  We have been planning this event for awhile.  We took Finn for the first time last year and he loved it.  Finn has been talking about the game for weeks and was so excited.  Liam, unfortunately, came home from school sick and wasn't able to attend so I stayed home with him and John invited one of Finn's godparents (Kevin) and his son Jack to go in our place.  They literally had 15 minutes to pull it together and head to the game so we were glad they were able to make it!  We have to figure out something for Liam to do, but he was a good sport about all of it.  We watched a bit of the game on t.v. and enjoyed ice cream and cheese dip at dinner (two of his personal favorites).  

Sunday, January 13, 2019

Happy 11th Birthday to Luke and Liam!

Luke with one of his tournament trophies over the summer
Liam always loves animals!


Luke after his big Velocity tournament win

Liam had a HAT TRICK on Aiden's birthday this year!  This is a really big deal for Liam as he has improved so much this year and gained so much confidence to make plays with the puck on his stick.

Fly fishing with Grandpa and Cousin Calvin, Uncle Jason over the summer

Joint trophy in summer hockey for Liam and Luke (Luke skated in this tournament)
Mother's Day with Grandma Carrithers

Liam's new bike over the summer




A fun visit to see Calvin last May and meet Baby Graham

Colorado with Graham and Calvin and Grandpa Morse

Luke at camp over the summer
Iowa game with Grandpa (Liam wasn't feeling well that weekend)

Lunch with Daddy at school
Birthday Celebration for Liam and Luke
Mimi and the boys
Celebrating their birthday at school!
Celebrating their birthday with their entire class!

Colorado with Calvin



Luke and Liam just a few minutes after birth

Liam in yellow and Luke in white
Its very hard to believe that we celebrated Luke and Liam's (and their cousin, Calvin's) 11th birthday this past week!  So hard to believe they are already eleven years old.  I posted a few highlights from this year and a few throwbacks to when they were babies.

Their birthday was on a school day this year, but they managed to get lots of attention at school.  Luke said they needed to "go out of elementary school with a BANG," so they took heavily frosted sugar cookies to school.  Not something I would normally send for a school treat, but this is our final year of elementary school.  We are planning a celebration with friends for Luke, Liam, and Aiden in a few weeks...more details to come.

Happy 11th Birthday Luke and Liam!  We love you both so much and we are so proud to be your parents.  

Thursday, January 3, 2019

Christmas 2018

We enjoyed our Christmas Break and had a lot of fun doing lots of different things.  Here are a few highlights from our week....We skated, tubed, built legos, played with new toys, played in two hockey tournaments, enjoyed some slower than normal days,  and celebrated the birth of Jesus!  We hope you had a wonderful holiday season as well!  Many thanks to Grandma Mimi Morse, Grandpa Morse and Ms Jane, Grandpa and Grandma Carrithers, and all of our aunts, uncles, and cousins for all of the awesome gifts!  We love each and every one of them.  Happy 9th Birthday to Aiden!


We spent some time with friends (Aiden wasn't feeling well that night)



Our trip to Cabela's to see Santa and check out the store
Luke getting his second place medal at the hockey tournament we played in.  Liam's team finished first in their division. 

I made lots and lots of cookies with some other hockey moms

We worked a lot of legos on Christmas Day and the days thereafter

Aiden's new Vegas Knights picture from Uncle Jason

We did lots of skating!

Finn's tool toy from Grandma Mimi
Liam loves legos!

Luke got the next size up in goalie pads and tried them out on the rink

We skated in backyard


We went tubing with Liam's hockey team on New Years Eve.  It was chilly and windy!

Aiden turned 9 years old on January 2 and we celebrated!

BIG NINE!

Finn went to see the Grinch with Daddy before his brothers were out of school at the beginning of our break

Christmas Eve service at church

Merry Christmas 2018!

Super excited on Christmas morning!!!  Finn and Aiden were up for an hour before Luke and Liam decided to wake up

Luke loved all his gifts

Finn got an awesome nerf gun from Uncle Zach and the shirt he is wearing from Grandma and Grandpa Carrithers

New Backpack!

Aiden loved all his Vegas Knights gear

Remote Control Cars that are really cool