New Christmas Tradition

 Grandma and Papa came into town to stay with us for the few days before Christmas and through Christmas Eve and Christmas day. One day we went to the Grand America in Salt Lake and looked at the Christmas windows and the GIANT gingerbread house! The kids went on a letter scavenger hunt in each window to earn a cookie at the end. It was so pretty inside the Grand America and it was a fun way to pass a little bit of time. I'm thinking I'd love for this to be a new tradition at Christmastime!

December Fun

 Daddy was home from work and built a giant awesome fort in the living room

After school on the last day before vacation, the kids had friends over to make frosted Christmas trees. Claire had two friends from her first grade class over. Makena and Logan.

Luke had Ashton, Tate and Henry over to make Christmas trees!

Luke's class had a Star Party on the last day of school before break. They chose face painting so I volunteered with other parents to come to the class and paint their faces. I love being in Luke's classroom.

Lily and I shopped for a whole day at Station Park! She was such a good girl. We had lunch and just had to try a cupcake!

Angie, Sherice and I went to the Hale Theater to see Kim in the Christmas Carol. It was fun! Earlier in the month Kiel and I took Luke and Claire to see "Scrooge" at the Centerpoint Theater and that was fun too.

This was my favorite Christmas decoration this year...I hung our pretty glass ornaments with fishing line. Kiel and I got these ornaments when we moved into our house in Bountiful and they always kinda got lost on the tree and didn't stand out. They looked so pretty hanging above our table.

I love this picture of the kids writing their letters to Santa.

Santa Claus in Farmington

The real Santa is at Station Park. Lily has stopped to say hi to him a couple times this month! So it was fun when all three kids could visit him together. He told them to go to bed on time and listen to your parents and then he was sure there'd be something special for them when they wake up on Christmas morning!

 Without hesitation Claire asked Santa for a Barbie cruise ship. Santa told her that Mrs. Claus wants to go on a cruise after Christmas!

Lily asked Santa for a horse. A purple horse.

 

Santa liked Luke's shirt. And Luke asked Santa for some legos. 

I know I have 3 kids on the nice list! 

Friends at Christmas!

We decided to make it a tradition and go to Station Park with the Hibberts to see Santa and ice skate, just like we did last year. Our goal was to go earlier in the day and not stand in a long line for Santa. Last year we waited in line for Santa for an hour and a half and it was Freeeeeezing!!! This year was much better! No line and nice mild weather! Success!

Lily and Wilson have so much fun together. They're just pals and are in their own world playing together. They were sitting so cute and cozy for the picture that I said, "Wilson, give Lily a kiss on the cheek!" and then they both turned and kissed each other! Char and I were laughing because it was so cute and funny! We have lots of good material for a future wedding video. :)

 Claire and Abby are cute friends too. They like to be together. Abby was very concerned for Claire when she cut her hands and was sweet to try to make her feel better.

Luke and Lincoln gel so well together. They are each other's first friend! They get along, like similar things, and just have fun together. Luke always asks when he can play with Lincoln again. I hope and expect they'll be lifelong friends.

Skating at Station Park

 Claire couldn't wait to go ice skating at Station Park! She was worried that our plans wouldn't work out to go and was so happy when it did. She went right out there, fell down a lot, but got right back up every time with a smile.

The night ended a bit traumatic unfortunately. Char was tying Claire's shoes at the end and noticed that Claire was looking at her hands. All of a sudden they were bleeding, and she was crying. It was dark and we couldn't really see how bad it was. We got some band aids and went home as fast as we could. After we cleaned her up and calmed her down we saw it was just three little cuts across her fingers. We put on princess band aids and she bounced back. Now we need to go ice skating again to shake that off. (Because now she's saying she doesn't like ice skates.)

 Luke was excited to go ice skating too. At the very beginning he was a little frustrated and said, "I don't know how to ice skate!" I told him that no one really does, and you just have to stick with it to get your balance, and that he could stop whenever he wanted. After a few more minutes though, he got the hang of it, and by the end of the hour he was daring to skate across the middle of the ice. That made me so proud!

The lights at the fountain were so pretty! It was a festive atmosphere!

Our Busy Day

It goes without saying that December is one of our busiest months. There's activities for the kids, shopping, errands, and Christmasy traditions to do. Of course even though it's December 11 and I'm already tired, I absolutely love it!

Today was no exception. A little different though because Lily had a big appointment with the pediatric dentist. We went to Kaysville Pediatric with Dr. Swan. She had so much work to be done they wanted to sedate her so that she wouldn't be traumatized and so everything could go more smoothly.

I've been feeling just horrible that she has to go through all that. I'm supposed to be the one in the family with all the dental problems. So unfortunately all I can think is that she must have inherited my teeth. I didn't even know you could do that much work on a three year old. But the thing with teeth problems is that they don't get away, they get worse. So there was no way around not fixing them. She had many fillings, some baby teeth root canals (ugh!!) and two silver crowns on those. She had a pretty big brown spot on her front tooth and he did a great job filling it and making it look perfect. Now her baby teeth are all taken care of, our budget drained, and we're going to do our best to protect them here on out.

She did fine with the sedation. We haven't had experience with sedation with the kids, so it was a little disconcerting. But it went well. She was disoriented and dizzy when she woke up but she was ok. We were asking her a few questions to see how awake she was. Kiel asked her if she liked Elsa or Anna, and she said, "Elsa..because she's so pretty." She did great the rest of the day, didn't seem too sore or upset. We've kept up on Tylenol and Ibuprofen all day. Her appt was at 7am so we had an early start. Luke and Claire went to Ashton's house. It was so nice of Jake and Kelley to make them breakfast and get them to school. All in all it was a good experience at the office despite the awfulness of it.

After she was feeling better we stopped at preschool for the last 5 minutes of her party because that was the end of preschool until January. Then we ran into Target for some Tylenol and a few groceries. When we got home Lily watched Frozen and just took it easy.

When the kids were out of school we went straight to ballet for Claire's ballet Christmas recital. Kiel met us there from work so we were all there to watch. I love watching Claire dance.

Then, straight home from ballet, about an hour to do homework, and then Luke had a pack meeting. I picked up a few of his friends and went with him. He earned his bobcat award and he was just so happy about it. So fun!

After scouts, Luke finished up his spelling homework, I painted the girls names because I promised them I would. Finally then bedtime! What a day!!! So glad tomorrow is Friday!

Ballet at Christmas

 In December Claire has a ballet recital in the studio. They do warm up at the barre in front of the parents and then a short Christmas dance. It's fun to see what she's learning. And really, there's nothing cuter than little girls in ballet. Claire concentrates really well and does her best, and that's what I love to see. At the end of class she passed out candy canes to the girls in her class. It's her little tradition and it makes her so happy. Now she has a break from ballet until January.

Bobcat

 Luke earned his bobcat at pack meeting tonight. He was so excited! I had to go up with him and paint his face for the bobcat ceremony. He and Tate just giggled the whole time. I love it when I see Luke so happy and having fun with his friends. At the pack meeting they talked about helping others and made care kits to give to someone in need. Luke gets so excited about scouts!

Visiting Santa

 Lily and Parker had fun enjoying the perks of being the youngest! While the big kids were at school they got to go to Station Park for lunch and seeing Santa. They had a lot of fun running around - and do you notice the sunshine and lack of coats? This has been such a mild December.

 This is Lily asking Santa for a horse. "A real horse or a toy horse?" Santa asked. "A toy," Lily said. "Oh good because real horses get a little cold on the sleigh," said Santa. "What kind of toy horse?" he asked. "Purple," Lily said.

Then he showed Lily a picture book and talked to her a little more. There wasn't any one else in line, so we got some cute pictures and Parker and Lily got to hang out with Santa a bit longer. It was so much fun!

My Helper

What would I do without my helper? She loves to help me carry in the groceries. She'll say, "I can do it!" or "This is heavy!" But even if she thinks it's heavy, she still wants to carry them in. Then sometimes she'll even help me put the groceries away!

After preschool

One of my favorite parts of the day is hearing Lily talk about what they did in preschool. 

Today she had cookies for snack,  they have a fake pet mouse named Cheddar ("He's a puppet! Not real! ") and a gingerbread man named George. For some reason she has marker on both of her cheeks today and she said,  "It's just for fun."

I love watching her come out of preschool because she's always happy! On Tuesday she came out running and singing jingle bells and saying, "You can't catch me I'm the gingerbread man!"

Tomorrow were going on a preschool field trip to the movie theater for a tour. I appreciate that I can go on her field trips with her since I stay home with the kids. I think we're both excited for this one! We love jumpstart preschool.

Sweet Luke

Luke is so sweet. He's been saying the nicest prayers lately. He'll say things like, "Please help my friends in school tomorrow. " Or "Please help (school friend) to not be sick anymore." He said the prayer for Thanksgiving and said, "Please help everyone around the world to have a good Thanksgiving." The other night before bedtime he said, "Please help the girls to stay in bed all night."

He's just as good as gold and I'm so glad he's mine.

School Days

This story might need Claire's voice and inflection but I thought I would jot it down because it's so 1st grade. Claire got in the car after school and said that her friend Makena talked her into buying her lunch (even though she brought her lunch) and then Makena ended up getting checked out for lunch. I asked Claire if that meant she had to sit alone and she said, "I had to sit at a table with all boys!!!"

Later Luke was asking her who she played with at recess and was naming different kids and after he named a boy she said, "No way! He's a dude!!!"

Now she's missing her two front teeth - just in time for Christmas! How fitting is that? She lost two teeth in the last two weeks. One on our way out the door for the airport - so the tooth fairy had to come to California... And then another one in St. George so the tooth fairy had to come to St. George!

Look how gorgeous she is! And she has the most sparkling personality to match!

Funny kids

Tonight Claire was talking about what she wanted to be when she grows up.

She said,  "I'm going to be a dolphin trainer."

And Lily piped up and said,  "When I grow up I'm getting a cat."

Tonight Lily gave Claire the paint with water page with a dolphin on it and then gave me a play by play of how she found the page and what she said to Claire. It was very detailed!

Lily has a pretend horse that goes shopping with us. Sometimes she decides not to ride in the cart so she can ride her horse. And then she gallops next to me throughout the store.

She also has 3 or 4 pretend cats and they're yellow and blue,  from what I hear. At the zoo on Friday we were getting off the train and she wouldn't let me out until I picked up the pretend kitties off the seat and carried them!

Luke is a funny 8 year old. He thinks he's pretty funny anyway! Today he's been telling me that he thinks it would be great to have Mac n cheese for all three meals on holidays. Christmas,  mothers day,  Easter,  you get the picture. Don't even bother asking Luke what he wants for dinner because he'll always say Mac N cheese!

A few weeks ago Kiel and I went to a party at our neighbor's house in the evening. We couldn't find a babysitter so we put a movie on,  popped popcorn and told Luke he was in charge!

We left Kiel's cell phone and Luke called once and said,  "Are you coming home soon?"  And I said,  "We'll be home in about 15 minutes, is everything ok?"

And he said, "Yeah we're just having a really good time."

It was so cute. And it was a successful night. :)

I love our kids!

Cinderella's Pumpkin

 Claire was excited about this idea to make her pumpkin into Cinderella's coach. She put on lots and lots of glitter glue, which dried really sparkly! For this picture she made sure Cinderella was looking at the camera. :) It's so fun having girls so we can do this kind of silly sparkly stuff! We still have two more pumpkins we need to carve!

Typical Day

 This pile of shoes by our front door is a common sight around here. Because they're not just my kids shoes, they belong to all our neighbor kids! Our house seems to be the hang out house of choice lately so we usually have anywhere between 4 - 8 kids here anytime in the afternoon!

Luke usually plays Minecraft with his friends - until time is up - and then they play Legos or go outside and do something. The other day there were 4 of them and together they played Star Wars lego sets for almost 2 hours!

Then Lily is always playing with the two little boys across our cul de sac, Drew and Austin. They pal around together outside in backyards, or they play here with toys.

And Claire loves to play with her friends in the cul de sac, Kylee and Ayla. They mostly play outside - on Kylee's tramp or making crafts at Ayla's or some type of elaborating pretending - last week they were in a circus!

Watching a show isn't too common, but they all seemed to need some downtime! Sometimes it gets very loud and crazy, other times and most of the time, having friends over keeps every one entertained and out of my hair. Although sometimes I wonder if the aftermath of messes and toys are worth it! But overall, I'm so glad they have friends and I'm happy they're at our house. Then I can know just what they're doing, can know their friends better, and keep an eye on things. It's nice having a big enough house now that they can all spread out!

As happy as I am that they have good friends - one of the #1 reasons we moved here - it becomes more apparent to me that I want to make sure that first of all they're friends with each other. So I've been wanting to work on that a little bit more. Sometimes we'll just go somewhere - park or zoo or something - so there's no friends around and they're forced to be together and have fun together. Which they do really well too. We're going to be off track in 2 weeks and then they'll have lots and lots of time to play together! ;)

Nature Walk

 On Saturday morning we went for a nature walk with our cousin Heidi who was in town visiting. The kids found lots of cool leaves so when we got home they did some great leaf rubbings. I love getting away from home and enjoying the fall. It's been unbelievably beautiful this year.

After our hike we picked up some lunch, I introduced Heidi to 'dirty' drinks at Fiiz and then headed home.

Saturday night we got together at the Zaugg's house, then Sunday evening the Hibberts came to our house for dinner. On Friday night we went to a block party at our neighbor's house. So it was my favorite kind of weekend with plans with lots of friends.

Pinewood Derby

 Luke had his first pinewood derby last night. He and Kiel have worked on his car, which he named "Red Lightning," for the last week. All his friends were there and he had a blast. He came in 10th overall and got the award for "Little Engine." But he won 1st place in a race so that was awesome! I love his big smile!

Preschool Field Trip

 Lily absolutely loved her field trip to the pumpkin patch at Black Island Farms. They got to ride a tractor wagon to the pumpkin patch and pick a pumpkin off the vine. And they were the cutest pumpkins too.

Then Lily had fun playing on the slides and rolling around and doing "Corn angels" in the sandbox full of corn kernels! She was so excited and happy the whole time and it was a beautiful day.