Here's some pictures from Chantel's 7th Birthday at Chuck E. Cheese. 

All the kids definitely loved it and our "hostess" at Chuck E. Cheese made sure the adults had little to do but enjoy pizza and sandwiches.

After the party, Chantel and Toma hung out around the Christmas tree and opened up Chantel's birthday presents....

Chicken Limbo.  Limbo underneath the chicken and if you hit his tail, he taunts you.

Toma and Chantel got Moxie Girlz dolls.  The blonde doll for the blonde girl and the brunette doll for Chantel.

First we went bike riding.  Chantel was willing to go 5 miles.

She's a good swimmer too.  If we can work on her running, she can become a regular Triathlete!

In the evening we went to the park where Chantel took advantage of some inflatable obstacle courses and when the sun went down, the fireworks show began.

I think she's dancing.  Hard to tell with her.

Chantel's pictures used to be hosted on Tripod at http://chantelamber.tripod.com.  I know that dealing with implanted banner ads and random pop up ads comes with the territory when using a free service to host your photos, but when I recently visited Chantel's site on Tripod, I was apalled to find that there were so many banner ads across the top of the site that any pictures of Chantel on the page were pushed mostly below the fold.  There used to only be one above and one below, but not anymore.

No more.

Everything is now here at http://www.jongerow.com/ChantelAmber/  Of course, these are only pictures from birth to two years of age as everything after early 2005 is buried in the Blog somewhere (something I'm sure Grandma would rather I not do).

...And we managed to get the tree up!

Chantel just built a mini gingerbread house with mom too.

No, I'm not going to do this every morning before Chantel leaves for school.  I promise this is it.  But yesterday I left my camera at work and we only had Lois's Blackberry to take pictures and she had to go to work before the bus came.

She's VERY excited when the bus comes.

And she was completely oblivious to my being at the bus stop (of course, maybe she just wanted everyone to think she was "too cool" to say bye to daddy).

More pictures!

Abive is a picture of the girls all dressed up for church this morning.  From right to left you have Kayla, Chantel and Rachel and I forgot the other two girls' names.  I'M SORRY!  I'm horrible at remembering names.  :(

We also had an Easter egg hunt out front.  The kids are now all hyped up on sugar. 

A rare picture of Lois and Marie together...

We decided to fly to Pittsburgh this Easter to visit Lois's sister Marie and her husband Rich and their three kids, Kayla, Rachel and Logan.

Last time we fly, that's for sure.  Sure, the drive is about 8 hours and gas costs a lot, but tickets for three people cost a lot and when you consider the time spent driving to the airport, going through security, waiting at the airport, flying, landing, walking to the baggage claim and waiting for your bags, loading up the bags in your ride from the airport and then, finally, driving to your final destination... and then of course, doing that all twice because you have to fly back AND pay for parking at the airport when you get back.... What's the point?

Anyways... I'm ranting again.  Here's some pictures from our first morning there....

Chantel has always lived in Florida. Even when we visited family up north, it occured during Spring and Summer months. This was Chantel's first snow.

Later that evening, the snow really started to accumulate on the deck.  Chantel changed into her pajamas and returned to watch the snow accumulate.

My mom and brother flew up from Florida to visit.  We decided to take the Metra into the city and do a little sight seeing.

You can't visit Florida without a trip to Disney World... well... maybe you can. But if you have small children (5 and under) one day is certainly enough!

Here's pictures from when Lois's sister, her husband and their three kids came down to Florida and we all went to Disney.