Wednesday, March 7, 2012

christmas-jo's side

Wow! It is March-we are wearing rain boots, have put the sleds away (which didn't get there cost per use down this winter), are dreaming of summer and I am just now adding Johnson side Christmas. Yikes. Talk about time flying by! We forgot our cameras and so many of these pictures are not the most quality from our old phones:
korpi clan:

papa, nana, and the kids:

opening presents:

yum, coffee:

h opening his puzzle from the korpis. loving it, but then quickly told us that "an eagle is not a zoo animal."



lots of play and quality time:




playing rook and having a good ole time:


pete's gift from dan, the antlers of his fall deer, mounted by dan himself:

i love my family:

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

christmas-pete's side

Christmas-Part 1-Pete's Side

Gma taking it all in. The other Jolene really concentrating. For those of you who don't know, people that are really cool have the name Jolene-take me and my sister in law, for example.

sporting maternity wear a wee bit sooner this go around. due end of June/early July.

h digging his new book from uncle joel and aunt jolene
sweet new ride from gma and papa john

pete doing some wrestling

and cutting the cheese (i had to).

reading time with papa john

a wonderful lunch with great grandpa

before christmas was over we realized we didn't take any family shots. here is our half tired and worn out attempt.


So much to be thankful for this Christmas. Merry Christmas to you!

Sunday, December 18, 2011

christmas is a lot of fun with a 2 year old

it is so fun to have a 2 year old around for Christmas this year. i love seeing things through his eyes. a few of my favorite tid bits:

*h,almost asleep in the car, so i am hustling home and "Holly Jolly Christmas" comes on the radio. He perks up and says, "i love this song!"
*when h asked what Christmas stockings were and I showed him ours, he said, "no, lions stalking. lions." at that point i went with it-unable to grasp how to explain a homophone/homonym or whatever that is to him.
*went to see a drive through light display. the last one was a snowman waving. not sure if this scared him or intrigued him cause he just kept saying, "snowman waving bye bye." and was the first thing he said to me when i got him up the next morning. "snow man waving bye bye."

so much to be thankful for this Christmas. Merry Christmas to you from us! :)

Wednesday, December 14, 2011

heidi's birthday-27 years young

Dear Heidi,
It's your birthday today. I've got to admit that most of my missing you feelings seem as though they lie a little dormant and then moments like this -thinking of your birthday-getting choked up, makes me realize that those feelings haven't changed. We miss you an incredible amount and quite honestly, it still hasn't sunk in yet that you are not here living life with us.

Today we celebrate you, Heidi Marie. We remember what a special sister, aunt, and friend you were. You were an incredible listener, had amazing integrity, could be quite silly and probably one of the most loving and faithful people I will ever know. You touched more people's life in your 25 years than many of us will in our whole lifetime.

There are some hard truths that I know and hurt to think of. I long for you to see what Henry is up to. You were always faithful at checking in on him. I long to have very import debriefing sessions post bachelor episodes-new season coming up -and most of all I really miss how intentional you were about knowing us on a deep and personal level.

But I do know that today you are celebrating your second birthday in heaven. For that I am hopeful. Happy 27th Birthday and can't wait til we can celebrate together again.
Love, Jolene

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

fall fun and trick or treating!

We are pretty bad at emptying our memory card on our camera. So, here are a few pictures from the fall:

at this particular park, henry calls this horse a "zebra." -definitely has a favoring towards wild animals.

the whale is a whale.

little puppy.


to my surprise, h loved every aspect of trick or treating (once he got beyond that people weren't inviting us in to play). we did have to tell him to let people shut their own doors. he had the system down to a science. and shutting their doors was part of his system.

yep, those are really cool pumpkin earrings. (can't take the teacher out of a girl...)


i had to put this picture in cause he pretty much cracks me up. pete brought home a bunch of balloons for my birthday which h has taken a liking too. enough that it came to lunch with him. in this picture he is saying, "i have a balloon ear." ha. :)

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

what a fun and funny day:)

hooray for days when you can't wait to write stuff down so you don't forget. :) today was one of those days. It started off this morning with a bunch of one liners from Henry who is very careful before he talks cause he wants it to sound just right, but these things were just to precious to not write down:
"A male polar bear is called a polar bear."
"These raspberries are really juicy."

then, we went to the underwater world (sealife) at mall of america with two of my college roomates-one who currently lives in germany-so a real treat to see her! What a fun time. :) i had never been there before, but recommend, especially if you have a toddler who digs animals.of.any.kind.but.prefers.wild.over.farm.

we then visited dad at work-which we have never done and henry loved hamming for his coworkers and loved the "special room" which really was a video shooting (there is probably a way more techy name for this..) room that had a jar of suckers.

following, henry and i took pretty momentous naps.

after that, i had a chill and like a grandma, put on a cardagin. i told henry that i was feeling cold. he told me:
"i feel kinda hot, like a campfire." bahaha.

the evening felt long-in a good way-playing in the living room with puzzles and wrestling and then henry working at his play kitchen (wearing my old starbucks apron) and i working in my kitchen. why i write this? because long attention spans are something to write down cause they don't come too often. :)

i tucked h in bed and he said, "had a good time at sealife."
and thus my day. written down, so i don't forget. :)

Monday, September 26, 2011

mr. caleb

What a fun weekend with our friend Caleb (from Texas). This is our friend's second MN debut -the last being Janurary- and we are lucky to have him as a friend-always so much fun. He even put up with our colds and coughs. There's something about a friend who loves your kid too. He always is so kind to Henry and Henry thinks he is pretty cool too.

A little bean bag game:

Pete saying he has "bags under his eyes." pretty tough guys: the guys:
buds:
caleb brought this toy for henry. what a hit: