November 2014

The first weekend in November last year, Greg and I took a day to ourselves and rode the train up to Chicago.  It was early...lovely morning eyes in this pic!

Our reason for going was to see a musical called Amazing Grace, based on the life of John Newton.  Whoa, talk about powerful.  As soon as it was over I wanted to rewatch the entire show!

Pic in the beautiful theater!

Steph sent us this pic...the kids were just missing us terribly, can't you tell?  At least A. Stephie didn't buy them a 4 wheeler!

Greg went to an ACYF evening one Sunday night, so I decided the kids and I would get ourselves a treat.  Shakes, hats, and cars for everyone! :)

My dear Grandpa Gramm finished his earthly race and won his heavenly reward.  As much as we miss him, knowing he is perfect in heaven means we wouldn't want to wish him back for anything.

My mom's family doesn't get together super often, so it was sweet to see our kids with some of their second cousins.  Tirzah was eating up the attention from the older girls who were kind enough to let her play cards with them.

Max and Jack were good buddies as well!

Our anniversary is at the end of November and Greg and the girls convinced me to try on my wedding dress. :)  The girls were so excited!

Great minds think alike!  Janelle and I were twinning accidentally when she hosted potluck.

The annual Beutel family weekend was held a little closer to home this year (Grizzly Jack's) because of the two new babies.  Max surprised me by being really patient and loved holding Gwen and Sammy!

Love Sammy's sweet face!

The dads took the kids on a hike since we were so close to Matthiessen park.

Oh, these five!
No pictures of them, but the kids loved the zip line, bungee trampolines, bouncy houses, and Max even got to play paintball at the arcade by the hotel.  They liked all of those things almost as much as the water park inside the hotel!  It was a tiring but fun weekend.

Our carpet kept being wet in one corner so we had to move furniture to dry it out.  We finally figured out that the humidifier on the furnace was leaking!  I took one last picture with my dried bouquet from our wedding before deciding it was time to let it go.

This little buddy (18 months in this picture) started saying, "Bus!" and loved watching for the big kids to get home after school!

Another twin!  My family took pictures for my parents' 40th wedding anniversary, and the colors were gray and mustard yellow.  Amanda and I discovered we had the exact same scarf! :)  I will have to find our family pics from the session and upload them...we got some great ones, thanks to Elsie from Signature Photos!

October 2014

Hmmm...I guess I should have stuck that video in October since that's when we let the snake loose...here is one more picture to remember it by.

Brotherly love at its finest!  Griff is wearing the 'Max' suit that Max wore when he was 2...I was so so so sad this year when it was too small for Griffy!  It's so fitting that they both wore it...they are both wild things!

And then, we got the much anticipated news that Josh and Sheila had their baby!!!  We loved getting all of the pictures of baby Samuel Elijah!

Greg was the lucky one who got to go to the hospital several times to visit.

So sweet!

I did finally get to go and snuggle him, though. :)

Tirzy looking all grown up with a headband and one of her favorite shirts

I rarely take pictures of myself and when they do, they usually involve one of my kids. :)

The annual Beutel Cousins camp out at Lake Wapello was over Columbus Day weekend in 2014, which meant we camped for three nights instead of two.  Having it in October meant it was colder than past years!  Max loved the huge lily pads!

As usual, most of the younger cousins' time was spent at the playground!

One of the best parts of this weekend every year is seeing our kids be such good friends with their second cousins.  What a crew!  And yes, Max and Bryce are a wee bit outnumbered...even with Griffin there! :)

Here's the best part of the camping trip...or any trip we go on, really. ;)  I love this picture so much it's now the background of my phone.  Love you, sweetie!

Huddling up to stay warm!   Nora, Audrey, Darcy, Max

Two goofballs

Nora's favorite part of visiting Daryl and Christy's house was the kitty!  We had a fun weekend as usual!

Mohawks are in style, right?

I think I have written before about the kids and Greg and I playing 'Chopped.'  This time, Max was on my team and the girls were on Greg's team.  Max wanted to make an ocean, so we used vanilla pudding tinted blue, graham cracker crumbs, candy rocks, M&Ms, white and chocolate chips, and pearl sprinkles.  I think we won for presentation. :)  The two cups behind the platter are Greg's chocolate mac and 'cheese.'

Note the blue/yellow starfish and the three crabs on the ocean floor...all Max's creations!

15 days after Sammy arrived in the world, Gwendolyn Rose joined the Beutel family as well!  Such a bright eyed beauty!

Max in his favorite climbing tree

One Saturday we babysat the Sauder girls as well as Elena and Annika.  First Greg played in the leaves with them by hiding a football in a huge leaf pile and everyone dove in to try and find it.  We got some pretty hilarious videos and it kept them entertained for quite a while!  Then it was off for a hike in the timber.  Londyn and Tyra posed at the top of the hill for a picture.  So cute!

I don't know what the green brainy thing is, but Tyra thought it was pretty cool and was proud of finding it!

The stalwart hikers.  About 5 minutes into the hike, as Greg tried to help all the kids across a stream, Anni fell backwards on the opposite bank and fell smack on her bum in the water.  I was super impressed that she kept going in spite of being wet and we all finished the hike!

E and A actually stayed overnight, much to the delight of our kids!  These cousins love each other!

We had to get a picture of all of them in their matching fox nightgowns.

One day Nora asked me to braid her hair for school into two braids.  Much to my amazement, it worked!

On our annual visit to Tanner's Orchard, we tried once again to get a pic of Griffin on the CAT tractor for Grandpa Beutel.  Not perfect, but decent!

Love.

Nora trying out her Halloween costume.  Love my beautiful butterfly!

I sent my mom this little blast from the past.  When I was younger, I used to suck my pointer and index finger (like Griffin in an earlier picture on this post) and then with my left hand twirl my hair.  I'm sure this frustrated my mom because the hair on the left side of my head was always broken off.  Thankfully none of our kids acquired BOTH bad habits, but Tirzah is a hair twirler.  In this case her finger was totally suspended by the knotted up hair.  I suspect my mom said it was darling because it was her granddaughter, not her daughter...

I hadn't hardly gotten to see Elliot since the hospital, so I took Tirzah and Griffin over to visit one day.

He was just so smushable and sweet!

Greg drilled holes in the shape of the older three kids' initials and then carved a smiley face for Griffin.  They turned out cute!

Finally it was Halloween!  We have a vampire princess, fairy tale princess, another vampire princess, an adorable giraffe, a butterfly (who is cold!), and a teenage (or 6 year old) mutant ninja turtle.  Everyone ate supper at our house and then we proceeded to trick or treat until the bitter end (as in, dark and getting very cold!).  We found out that our subdivision is bigger that we thought!  There was a whole street we didn't even get to that we were planning on doing.  Josh and Sheila even brought Sammy, though of course he stayed inside.  Too cold and too much for a 3 week old!