Esme and I continued out theater journey by seeing our local middle school production of The Little Mermaid. It was so well done and several youth group kids were a part of it.
There were bubbles available for purchase to participate at specified parts.
We got a cookie snack at intermission and a picture with Khali from church afterwards.
We had another edition of #dinnerwithrick this week as well. I got a free letter board sign and made good use of it. We kept it pretty simple with spaghetti and meatballs.
Followed up with video games, of course!
These two are buddies!
Creme brulee for dessert. This was another first for Rick, but he approved!
Last weekend was my annual church board retreat. Friday night we had a social event at Bowlero with staff and spouses.
We had a yummy spread of food to choose from and great company. We have 4 new board members so it was great getting to know them in a casual setting.
It came down to the final frame between Jimmy and I. I barely beat him!
On Saturday we had some team building and future casting conversations with street tacos for lunch.
On Wednesday this week, we played a fun obstacle course game with the youths. They were in pairs where one was blindfolded and being directed by the other. It was hilarious as an observer.
Jimmy has been baking up a storm for his co-workers since his cookie contest win. He made these peanut butter ones topped with Reese's animal crackers recently. They were so good.
Speaking of cookie championships, his name is officially on the plaque at church!
We also checked out a new cookie shop, Insomnia cookies. Their chocolate chip and snickerdoodle were both top notch!
Esme has been getting in to perler beads again and has been expanding her collection of Mario characters. I saw you can print or buy patterns, but she's been building them from pictures she Googles.
Jimmy was home with the kids for MLK day so I took them out for dinner and a walk around Menards.
I was expecting McDonald's to be a lot busier since it was a holiday and a chilly night.
On Thursday, Esme has a science night at school. There was a little "service" fair in the cafeteria. We picked up some goodies and Esme signed up for her very own Hennepin County library card. Next, we made som fun movable puppets with popsicle sticks, construction paper, and brass fasteners.
There was a building room with different size stacking blocks.
I finally got Esme to try on her athleisure outfit she got for Christmas. She said it was uncomfortable without even putting it on, not it's a fave. Another top thing that 2024 brings is professional sports license plates! The van eas due for renewal in December so I put it off until January 1 when these were available to order. The trax was good until May, but I pulled the trigger on new one for that too. They must have assigned numbers in the order people requested them because ours are sequential now!
The colors really pop!
Esme has been really enjoying her new Bible. Here is a little clip of her reading from it.
We've been going crazy for Uno lately, playing non-stop. I couldn't help but take a picture of this situation we found ourselves in. Esme said "I've got so many choices, I think I'm going to win!" She actually did make a good comeback and nearly beat me.
I heard a crash from the kitchen and Jimmy showed the damage. This is one of two mugs we purchased in the Amsterdam airport on our way home from Italy in 2011. Way back then, Jimmy apologized in advance for breaking then someday. Well, nearly 13 years later it finally happened. As my aunt said, it's now my favorite pencil holder. I think I will do just that and bring it to my desk at work.
To escape some of the cold that is finally bearing down on us, we took a trip to IKEA. This was actually Esme's idea. She asked last week to go to "the store with all the rooms." After some additional questions, I figured it out. Both her and Parker love visiting here. We can easily burn 2 hours and grab lunch. We tried the main cafeteria, but they might be a bit too picky for those offerings. I always forget about the cafe after checkouts that has hotdogs and pizza. I think we'll give that a shot next time.
Parker really loved this chari and managed to find it in a couple spots.
This boomerang shot turned out just about perfect. I need to find an adult size one of these.
I've been having some charging issues with my Apple Watch so we took a trip to the Apple Store at Ridgedale. Esme was having a lot of fun testing out the pencil on the iPad.
Parker was impressively patient waiting for me to be called. We headed over to Parker's favorite Ridgedale spot, Dick's Sporting Goods. We were checking out the new Yetis and I noticed they have pre-frozen ice packs, pretty convenient!
We had a shared youth event with another church on Saturday called "Refresh." It was a fun afternoon of worship, fellowship and fun.
Looking forward to getting to know these kids better in 2024.
