A New World Record!!!

Becki's mom & Becki took the kids to participate in an attempt to set a new world record for the number of people in a chain eating ice cream simultaneously. It was "sponsored" by a local college - Augustana College (to celebrate their 150th anniversary), and Whitey's Ice Cream. The previous record was set in 2009 in Spain with 2,500 people. All 2,694 of us got to try the new Whitey's ice cream "Augustana Viking Pride" - a vanilla ice cream with peanut butter, fudge swirl & oreo bits! It isn't official yet, but the record was broken!! It ended up being a very long night though...we got there at 4:45 to wait in line (start time of 5:30) and left at 7:30. All that time, we were standing and waiting...hard for 4 little kids to do, especially when they are hungry!! All in all it was worth it and will hold memories for us & the kids.

Here is Becki's mom with the kids - standing inside Erickson Field waiting for everyone to get lined up and eat our ice cream!!

Katie Hart's Seed Business

Katie has been quite the entrepreneur the past few weeks! She has come up with a seed business. She has collected a container of seeds from the school yard and wants to sell them! Here is the brochure she made at school last week:
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The Katie Seed Shop

Owned by Katie Hart, Assisted by Alex Hart

$0.01 Membership

$1.00 per seed

Buy!, Sell!, Trade!, Return!

Great Deal!!! Buy 1 seed get 1 free! Deal expires May 17th, 2010. 2 drawings in May! Get your membership now! You can get 1 seed free with your membership card! Enter for drawings May 17 & 18! Help save Earth before Earth Day. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, plant seeds! Just save Earth with seeds! Come today! You just wait and see! See you! Katie Hart (and Alex Hart)

Warning: Don't let 4 years old and under buy seeds. The seeds could be dangerous! Thanks, Katie & Alex Hart

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Katie worked on membership cards one evening - they are ready to go - are you willing to become a member??? She is VERY excited about this new business venture!

Hitting the Trail

We traveled to Princeton & Peoria, IL today for some letterboxing. We stopped to grab the Box of the Month box in Princeton...and to say hello to Shorty. We then traveled south through the beautiful Illinois River Valley to Peoria. We weren't able to get all of the boxes that we were wanting/hoping for due to church commitments this evening. We know that we will be back there soon though and maybe we can enjoy the zoo too (hint hint to Matt!!)? Either way, we were able to find the new Simpson box with too many stamps to count!! Rather stressful trying to get all of those stamped into 5 books! Great carvings and well worth the time! While leaving this box, the girls asked if they could pick some of the purple wild flowers. I am generally one who says to let things be...but the girls were so excited to have their own bouquet of flowers, I couldn't resist! You notice that Will was less than amused with the flowers...

We finished our day at Avantis finding another letterbox and wishing we had more time to go in and eat - we have heard wonderful things about their food! Next time for sure!

Thanks to Shorty for the great carves and for helping us with last minute directions! You can't trust your GPS to get you there if what you are looking for is new!!

Anniversary Trip to Wisconsin Dells

Matt & I just celebrated our 11th anniversary. We decided, last minute, that we would go as a family to Wisconsin Dells. We wanted to get away for a few days and enjoy the last few days of the kid's spring break. We knew that we would be able to get some great deals with the cooler weather...and smaller crowds! Just what we need for our young family!

We left at 8:00 on Friday morning. Our goal was to hit a handful of letterboxes in the Madison area and get to the hotel by dinnertime. Our first stop was to grab the "I-39: Dead Too Soon" box. Another beautiful carve by Krait! Quick stop for lunch and onward to Verona, WI. We were able to snag 4 boxes - "Reading by Matchlight", "Hometown Letterbox", "Happy Birthday Green Bird" and "Morning Delight".

We got to the hotel, checked in and drove into the Dells to witness the "Waterpark capital of the World". Even the twins sat in awe! We decided on Moosejaw for dinner. I was hesitant to take 4 young kids (who had been in a van all day!) into a sit down restaurant on a Friday night! I was pleasantly surprised with no wait and the family friendly atmosphere (I don't know why I didn't expect that??). The kids were given moose ears and chalkboards to color on.

It took a while for the kids to finally drift off to sleep...but they finally did! We woke up the next morning and headed out to do the touristy things!! First stop was at the Welcome Center to get discount coupons...but they weren't open yet, so we headed back to Baraboo to try to find 2 letterboxes. With a little luck, we were able to find "Pugzo the Clown" and "Mounds of the Midwest Series: Man Mound". Cool history for both of these places!

We headed back to the Dells to purchase our tickets. We first headed to the Lost Canyon. It is a horse drawn "carriage" ride into a canyon carved by the glaciers so many years ago. It is beautiful...

We decided it would be good to eat lunch at this point before the restaurants got too busy. We headed to Buffalo Phils and boy, that was probably the favorite part of the trip for everyone! We got there early enough and asked if we could sit by the train (it delivers the meals). We were able to get the "bar" seats and have front row seats to see the train. The kids absolutely loved it! They also received buffalo hats and a pass/tokens to play at Knuckleheads (next door).
We left Buffalo Phils and made our way to the Wisconsin Ducks. This was the one thing I wanted to do. When I was a child, my family went to the Dells but we did a "regular" tour boat ride. I really wanted to do the Duck ride so I said that at some point I would go back and do that for myself. We went looking for another letterbox but couldn't find the park (even after stumping a few welcome center clerks!). We decided to stop at the R & GN railway to take a ride - another success!


We stopped at Knuckleheads on the way back to the hotel and used our free passes from lunch. The kids had a blast in the big play area - we were there over an hour. We picked up dinner for the kids and headed back to the hotel - leaving just enough time to swim for an hour or so. The kids fell asleep instantly! Matt went to Subway and we celebrated our 11th anniversary over sub sandwiches and watching Deadliest Catch!

We got another early start Sunday morning. We had a handful of boxes that we wanted to get and still get home at a decent time. Mount Horeb Troll was the first stop. A great stamp and we loved looking at all the troll statues in town...very cool, even for non-troll fans!

We looked for "Ebbenezer says..." and "Mushroom Mania" in Blue Mound...but only successful with the latter box. It got too muddy and long for use to continue on. We decided to forego and move on.

"Mining Wisconsin" was the next box - we loved reading the rich history of Wisconsin through so many clues / boxes!!

Our last stop for letterboxing was in Platteville, WI. I have seen this M since I was a child...now I got to climb to the top...all 262 stairs!! It felt wonderful to do this as a family. My kids never cease to amaze me.

We arrived home around 6:30 - just in time to unload and give quick baths to get ready for back to school! I found that we brought home some extra souvenirs - ticks!! urgh. I shutter as I type!!

New Hair

Last time I trimmed Alex's hair, she asked for a shorter "do". I told her that we would talk about it again in a few weeks (to see if she truly wanted it short). I also am not comfortable cutting her hair that short, so I knew that I would have to have it cut by a professional. While out running errands yesterday, I decided it would be a good day to have that hair cut for Alex. Unfortunately, I didn't have a camera with me to get a "before" shot...but I did take this picture last night of the "after". Pretty cute!!

The Great Egg Hunt

The Annual Egg Hunt was held at Becki's parents last Sunday. Most eggs had a piece or two of candy plus change!! To say that the kids are spoiled would be an understatement!! They loved going shopping with their egg money on Monday! Thanks Grammy & Grandad!!

Maddie & Will "patiently" waiting...

Ready, Set, Go!!

Will proceeded to open the first egg he found...and promptly lost the quarter under the deck!

HUNTING!!!

Easter Portraits

We went to the John Deere/Butterworth center again last weekend for some Easter portraits. It seems like our sessions are getting easier!...still stressful, but easier. Will didn't want to cooperate very much, but we got some great personality pictures!!