Merry Christmas!

 We wish you a Merry Christmas!

Emily's Dance Concert

 Emily also had her Christmas dance concert last week!  I got her class's dance on video and just got a couple of pictures afterwards.  Such a cutie pie!

Visiting Santa 2013

Another year, another visit to Santa!  This year, Cubby's parents came with (they were in town for a day on their way out to Utah to spend Christmas out there)!  We went on Tuesday afternoon, after school, thinking that it wouldn't be too crowded.  Well, thankfully we arrived while Santa was "on break" and was able to get our name written down.  Had we come even 20 min later, we would've had to wait over an hour to see him.  As it was, we only had to wait 10 min...which was 10 min too long for Miss Juliana.

See, we love going to see this particular Santa b/c he is sooo the quintessential perfect Santa.  Not only does he look exactly like what I'd always pictured Santa to look like, he is incredibly patient and really listens to the children.  He has the kindest eyes and last year, even though he was supposed to go on break, he allowed Christian and Kari to come talk to him b/c we had waited for soooo long (twice; b/c the first time it took too long and we had to go back).

This year, it was a much shorter wait (thankfully b/c Christian had soccer practice that night).  As always, Emily wanted nothing to do with talking to Santa.  However, she was a good sport for a picture...mostly b/c I told her that if I'm paying $18 for one picture then she was going to smile!  Christian could hardly wait to talk to him and had a huge list...of which he picked his 4 favorite things (of the day).  Kari was excited to see Santa, but pretty shy about talking to him so I helped her say what she wanted (a "Hello Kitty" clock).  Juliana was happy to wave to Santa from a distance, but once she got up there she got scared and our group shot turned into one of those classic crying pictures.

So, was it worth it?  Yes!  Afterwards (and for the next two days) both Christian and Kari kept telling me how happy they were that they got to see Santa and tell him what they wanted for Christmas.  It was so sweet and made it all worth it in the end.  

Kari's 1st Christmas Concert

Kari had her first Christmas concert at dancing last week!  It was so cute and she was very excited.  The room was PACKED with family and friends of these little princesses.  Accordingly, they danced to some sort of Cinderella-esque Christmas song.  The cuteness was in over-drive.

Kari does a (very) grande plie'!

Singing and clapping to the song

Twirling!

Both classes singing, "We Wish You a Merry Christmas!"

We just loved watching this little girl perform her dance!

Art Party

My artist pallet cake!

We had an Art Party for Emily's 9th birthday party!  Emily was very excited as she is quite the artsy girl and loves to create!  We needed a larger amount of space than what our home offers and so we held it up at our church and it couldn't have worked out better!  We had one section for food, one for crafts, and one area for eating!

We had an easel set up in one corner.  The first attempt we made at a "group painting" turned out, well, like a huge brown canvas.  Hmmm.  On our second attempt we used markers (not paint) and had the kids all sign their names.  It turned out much less messy.

 Here are some of the treats (bc treats are very important to 9 yr-old girls).  Funny enough, Emily wouldn't try the Rice Crispy "paint brushes" (b/c Rice Crispys are cereal and even at 9 yrs old she won't eat cereal).  Nor does she fancy popcorn.  However, she loved the cake and the Gatorade so all was well.

 We had some "Handy Helpers," of course!  Grandma and Harvey's assistance was invaluable!

 For the main craft I had each of the kids' initials for them to paint and decorate with embellishments.  They all loved doing this!

 All of the kids' old sports t-shirts really came in handy as painting smocks!

Kari was sooo excited to be included in her big sister's party!  (We did the party during Juliana's naptime and had Maggie come over and babysit!)

Christian's finished product!

 As the kids finished up, they were ready for something else to craft and so I got a piece of long paper and brought out the markers!  They all loved drawing on it and writing notes to Emily.

Emily and her good friend, Louisa

Crazy Christian!

Such sweet sisters, Ella and Brooklynn

Paige and Abby

The "drop the crayon in the paint jar" game.

Classic "Duck, Duck, Goose!"

Everyone loved helping Emily open her presents!

Singing "Happy Birthday"...no candles though since we can't light candles in the church :-)

Time to eat!

Mom enjoyed the Rice Crispy paint brush :-)

Harvey says, "Happy Birthday, Em!"

Can you tell which picture was supposed to be the "nice" picture and which one was supposed to be the "goofy" one??  Me either.

This party was a lot of fun to put together!  It's so fun to see kids get creative!

Sisters

"Sisters, sisters!"  (I'm humming the song from the movie, "White Christmas.")  As crazy as these girls can be, there's no denying that they love one another!

Potty Training, Really??

Little Miss Juliana has become extremely interested in trying to use the potty!  Now, she's only "preformed" once (and kind of by accident), but she's had plenty of fun practicing all the same.  Normally, I don't attempt potty training until the child is much closer to 3 yrs old (mostly bc I'm too scatter-brained to try and remember to remind the child to try going potty every 15 minutes).  But, she's been so persistent we may just have to give it the old College Try!

Good reading material is a must-have!

Wish me luck!

Emily's NINE!

Happy 9th Birthday, Emily!!!  Yes, her birthday was 20 days ago, but 'tis the season to be busy and with Thanksgiving so late in November, it threw everything off, including my blogging.

Still, Emily's birthday was great!  Her actual birthday was on a Sunday, so that morning we opened up a couple of gifts before church and then after dinner we had the family over for an ice cream sundae bar!  (Such a hit, I will definitely do one again--a nice change from cake!)

Christian and Auntie Erin set up camp underneath the table

We loved watching her smile as she opened up her gifts!

Big smiles for Legos!

Bryce, Chelsie, and Uncle Kyle, kickin' it on the couch

 One of the sweetest moments was when Christian sat down at the piano and played "Happy Birthday" for Emily.  Now, Christian will be starting piano lessons in January, but he had worked very hard (and it took him a couple of minutes) to play the song for her.  He was so patient and brave for playing in front of everyone!  Brought a tear to my eye!

 We love our big girl!  (Still can't believe that it's been NINE years since she came into our lives!)  Happy birthday, Emily!