Grand Rios Water Park

We decided to take advantage of the fact that all 4 of us are on vacation from school and spend a night at a waterpark. What fun! While the hotel attached to the waterpark wasn't the most glamorous and the waterpark itself was packed, we still managed to have a lot of fun. The slides were amazing...and as to be expected Hans spent most of his time tromping up the stairs to go down them time afer time after time. Gunnar split his time between the slides and the pool with the basketball. Orn and I split our time between the hot tub and reading along side the pool. A fun time was had by all!! Luckily, we hit the road home to St. Cloud early in the afternoon today as the area was getting hit with yet another snow storm. We got home in time to see a fresh coating of 6.5 inches of snow on our driveway. Oh fun. ;)

Mark and Lou get some new Kittens!!

After our visit with Lisa we popped into Excelsior to do some skating on Uncle Mark's rink. Of course, we also had to use that opportunity to meet the new members of the family - Sam and Harriet! What a couple of cute kittens...it made both boys want to get more cats...to which Orn and I quickly replied, "But Cinder and Tigger would not be happy with more animals in the house!" Phew...dodged that one! :)

Christmas at Lisa's!!

Today we had our annual Christmas celebration with Lisa (Gunnar's Godmother). We had a wonderful brunch to start our visit - as always she spoiled us rotten with wonderful cinnamon rolls, eggs, bagels, and mimosa's! Once brunch was over we got to the important activity (as far as the boys are concerned anyway), gift opening! We've developed quite the fun traditions - we give Lisa her journal for the upcoming year and update a homemade calendar for her kitchen counter along with other goodies. Meanwhile, she never ceases to find the perfect gifts for both boys and for us! This year she got Gunnar and Hans a LEGO Starwars ship that is amazing along with a remote control vehicle that can go on the ground, on snow, or on water! And of course a couple long sleeve shirts with a sports related theme. Too fun! We had a wonderful visit with both Lisa and Magic!

Christmas at the Meldahl's

After a relaxing morning at home, eating a feast and playing with new games, we headed into Excelsior to my parents house for a round of visiting. Most all of us Meldahl sib's were able to meet up there and visit while exchanging gifts amongst the offspring here and there. We enjoyed a nice fire and a meal of ham and potatoes later in the afternoon. A good time had by all as evidenced by the pictures!

Christmas Morning Fun!!

After checking out what Santa had brought them, the boys set about opening their gifts from us and the cats. We made sure that they opened their big gift last...although it became apparent what it was when they started opening various accessories. What was the big gift? A Wii play system! I had to laugh at Hans's first comment upon opening the Wii - "Now we don't have to go to Kyle's house all the time!" Yep, that was indeed one of the main reasons for succumbing to the video game pressure. At least this way they are in our house AND we can monitor the amount of time they spend playing various games.

Of course the fact that Hans has had many days of practice on the various games is readily apparent. I (Mary) have not won a game off of him in tennis...in fact, I've barely been able to scratch out a point. Pathetic...but way FUN!! :)

Christmas Morning - what did Santa bring??!!

These pictures probably need no explanation. Tradition has it that the boys are required to stay upstairs until Mom and Dad have had enough coffee to be able to approach the morning. Once we give the okay, they race down the stairs to see what Santa has brought.

Classic Gunnar and Hans...Gunnar was thrilled with the NERF Vulcan as that was what he had been requesting for what has seemed like AGES. Hans hadn't really asked for anything, but as to be expected the CANDY in his stocking was what he went for first.

I love the fact that Cinder is discretely eating up what Santa and the reindeer didn't finish during their visit last night!

Christmas Eve and the Almond Gift

This evening we had a wonderful Christmas Eve meal which started with rice pudding as is our tradition. Through the eating of the rice pudding we find out who has won the Almond Gift...this is a Scandinavian tradition where an almond is placed at the bottom of one of the bowls before the rice pudding is doled out. Through no planning on the adult's part, for some reason the youngsters in this house have won the gift year after year, and this year was no exception! Gunnar won - as illustrated in the picture. Luckily, the actual gift is typically some chocolate which is then enjoyed by all of us.

After a fabulous dinner of prime rib, potatoes, red cabbage, and bread it was FINALLY time for the boys to open their one gift (they open one on Christmas Eve and the rest on Christmas morning). They chose to open their gifts from Richard and Donna. Great choice as they were games that we could all enjoy! The comical thing was that the game for Hans is a Cranium game called Matching Madness which is obviously tailored to people under the age of 40! The boys killed us game after game. They loved it (as did we)!! :)

Sledding and Skiing at Riverside Park

This has been a FABULOUS Christmas Eve for outside activities. While it is cold (about 7 degrees above zero), there is still much that a family can do when there is an abundance of snow and you have two willing boys. After warming up at home, we headed out as a foursome over to Riverside Park in St. Cloud (across the river from the university). They have a wonderful sledding hill and groomed cross country trails...something for everyone!

We started out sledding and found that two on the green sled meant going the fastest and the farthest. The new blue sled was good but took some wicked turns without any warning. Orn wasn't appropriately dressed so he spent some time warming up in the van while I did a loop on the cross country ski trail. When I got back to where the boys were sledding they had abandoned the normal hill for the one with JUMPS! The first thing I saw was Hans going airborne by about 3 feet as he flew on his stomach over the jump. The kid has no fear and a high pain tolerance. I immediately figured that I would take some Advil on his behalf when we got home!! :)

Building and Sledding at HOME!

We are DEFINITELY having a White Christmas this year. Today, on Christmas Eve, the boys decided to head out to work on their forts. Gunnar has one going by the mail box (note the Flag up on the mail box...that would be our Christmas Cards about to go out!). Hans has his fort at the bottom of the yard where the snow plow dumps a big load each time he comes by. Hans is no dumb bunny when it comes to building forts.

The boys are also very helpful at slicking down the driveway. For those of you needing this sort of advice...have the neighborhood kids use your driveway as the local sledding hill and you are destined to exit your driveway much quicker than you ever anticipated. Getting back up the driveway is a completely different story!

The BEST Christmas present EVER!

Today Orn and I received the best Christmas present ever. Some of you have been aware that for the past 6 months we have been monitoring Hans's blood platelet level. Well, I'm happy to report that today when we met with a Pediatric Oncologist/Hematologist from Children's Hospital, Hans's blood work came back with extremely good results. For the first time in over 6 months his platelet level is within the normal range and it appears that the platelets themselves are more robust looking. All signs point to what Hans's pediatrician has suspected all along - Hans was suffering from a case of Idiopathic Thrombocytopenic Purpura (ITP). Essentially, it is a blood disorder of unknown origin that typically self resolves. Finally, his case appears to be resolved. There are more tests being run down at the Mayo clinic on his blood, but we are extremely confident that it will all come back and confirm what we believed in our hearts all along - Hans is an extremely healthy, happy 6 year old (if he were here he would ask that I say that he's 7...it's only 4 months away!). Merry Christmas to us!! :)

Connecting up with Good Friends!

After visiting with my brother John and his wife Debby, we headed over to Edina to meet up with my friend Lisa and her family, up visiting from Chicago. We met up at Lisa's sister Ann's house. Katie was also able to pop over and visit with us too. What fun it was to spend the afternoon getting caught up with friends from way, way back. Our two were playing in the basement while Lisa and Dan's three girls were off doing their own thing. It's nice when that leaves the adults to visit. We had a great time and finally hit the road back to St. Cloud just before 6pm. Thankfully the roads were fine on the way home...much quicker trip for the drive home!

The Meldahl Kids Christmas Party

Yesterday was the Meldahl Kids Christmas Party, held at my brother John's house in south Minneapolis. The party was set to start at 5pm, but seeing as we were in the midst of a winter storm warning, we packed up and set off for the cities just after 3pm. It was a bit dicey driving down to Minneapolis, so I was thrilled when we pulled up to the house just before 6pm. The boys were sick of the drive at that point, so they were also very happy to arrive!!

The party was in full swing when we arrived. Debby had commissioned her daughter-in-law Terri's brother to provide the food (he has a restaurant in St. Paul) so we had an unbelievable feast of Cambodian food. It was absolutely delicious. Of course, Hans kept asking me, "when is the kids food going to arrive?" I finally just directed him to the corner of the kitchen where there were loads of fresh Christmas cookies of all sorts. You would have thought that I had just said Santa was there, waiting to take their order! What was really funny was the number of adults who asked both boys if their mom was aware that they were eating cookies for dinner...they gleefully replied that their MOM was the one who had told them to have at the cookies!

After our meal, we did the traditional gift war (woops, I mean gift exchange). This years theme was "going green." As has also become tradition, someone managed to include a 6 pack of beer into a gift as part of the theme (it was Heineken - green beer...get it?) so of course that gift became the sought after gift. Debby had planned ahead and had John marking the gifts with a Sharpe pen for the number of times that the gift had been 'stolen.' That alleviated some of the typical fighting and debate over the rules that typically occur. Fa la la la la and all that. The gifts were all very creative and really a lot of fun this year. Orn came home with a compost keeper and I managed to snag a bag filled with tea towels and dish clothes and air freshener stuff. All very fun.

After the gift exchange we played a game with lottery tickets. You can't get that many Meldahl's involved in a competition and walk away unscathed. However, nobody ended up worse for the wear and it was truly a ton of fun! My nephew Travis was sitting to my left and Hans and Gunnar were on my right, so we Bodvarssons were desperately trying to win out over the Meldahl on my left. We did not. Travis won the whole deal! He was very gracious though and tossed some tickets to the boys who very much enjoyed scratching off the tickets...until they lost again. The school of hard knocks arrives early when around the Meldahls.

The other Travis of the evening is a soon to be new member of the family, Chloe's fiance, Travis Hanson from Mankato. Chloe and Travis drove up from Mankato in the wee hours of the morning as Chloe was bound and determined that they would not miss this party.

Jim and Kathleen came to the rescue and wrote the poem for Steve and Claudia who could not be at the party this year. That was a lot of fun and well written considering the short notice. All in all, it was a wonderful evening filled with a lot of good fun and cheer on a very cold evening!

Classic Minnesota Winter Scene

This afternoon both boys have friends over to play after school. See the photo's for the view of the typical Minnesota winter play from our cats favorite position to view the outside from upstairs! Both cats were enjoying watching the boys slide and snowboard down the driveway...that is until they heard the telltale sound of the camera clicking behind them!