Friday, December 24, 2010

Merry Christmas :)

my pretty girl admiring our pretty tree :)



Micah posing with the ornament that Rowan's sweet music teacher made for all the kids at the ELC.


Our tree topper, which adorned the top of our Christmas tree throughout my whole childhood. My mom picked it out. When my sister visited for the holidays, she said, "How come you get that?!" I replied, "Because I am the oldest. Duh."


Merry Christmas!!! :)




Sunday, December 19, 2010

Friday, December 17, 2010

micah's class party was yesterday, and it was a huge success!! i am the only room mom for her class (three other people signed up, including josh. one of the other moms' daughter switched to another kindergarten class soon after the school year started, and the other mom has never responded to any of my phone calls or emails.) one of the moms in the class who did not sign up to be a room mom because she works a retail job and never knows when she'll be available, requested the day of the party off from work so she could help out. she was a lifesaver. i love volunteering at micah's school, but i'm not the leader type. i do much better when i'm working with someone else. katina and i went to walmart together to shop for food, drinks, treats, and party goods. we had turkey rolls, cheese cubes, pretzels, cheese crackers, baby carrots and ranch. the kids ate HARDLY ANY of the food. i think for the next class party, we'll get much less food! but the party was still fun. after the food and dessert, we had the kids do a quick little craft: they got to decorate a foam snowflake with some glittery snowman stickers. it wasn't perfect; the stickers didn't adhere too well to the snowflake, but the kids didn't seem to mind. they had fun drawing little smiley faces on the snowmen's faces. i was kind of bummed to see how few parents came to the party. obviously, parents have to work and some can't take time off for class parties... but it made me sad to see one little girl crying because her mom wasn't there. i'm so thankful that i work from home and am able to volunteer and be involved at micah's school.

Friday, December 10, 2010

Santa's Village

Rowan loved the goats!

Micah wanted to take one home with us. I think the goat was on board...



Micah and Rowan in the Dr. Suess house. Thing One and Thing Two put on a show for us as we waited in line.


Posing with Frosty!



Waiting for Santa to arrive on the fire truck...








"Is Santa coming or what?!"









Monday, December 6, 2010

we had a lovely thanksgiving last month. for the first time, on actual thanksgiving day, josh and i cooked at home for just us and the kids! it was really nice. my dad's side of the family usually does our thing on black friday, and mama, wesley, and maya were in brownsville visiting wesley's mom. sooo, that freed us up to have our own little family feast on thanksgiving day. we got a pre-roasted chicken, and made mashed potatoes and green bean cassarole from scratch. i used a mix for the stuffing, and bought a pumpkin pie. it was delish!



on friday we went to my dad's parents' house and had my grandmother's amazing lasagna, salad, apricot and pecan jello salad (a family tradition), along with some really yummy raspberry lambic my sister's boyfriend brought. we had a choice of pumpkin pie or homemade pumpkin cheesecake, courtesy of my stepmom and sister, for dessert. it was a nutritionally and emotionally nourishing couple of days. :)



this past weekend josh and i took the kids to santa's village. in years past, micah, especially, has not been much for going inside the little cottages. she gets anxious in crowds and feels shy. she also gets SUPER out of sorts when she's cold. last year i solved the cold problem by putting five layers on her, and she was as happy as a clam but didn't want to go in any of the houses. this year, she surprised me by being totally excited about all of it! first, we arrived in time to join in the countdown for them to turn on all the beautiful lights. the kids squealed with glee as the enormous tree over our heads lit up. then we got to see santa and mrs. claus arrive on the fire truck with the lights blazing, which the kids LOVED. we went into mrs. claus' bakery first, then a few more, ending with the petting zoo. the petting zoo made josh and i so sad. there were two ducklings huddling in a corner surrounded by shrieking kids, and a poor chicken running back and forth, back and forth, trying to get away from a group of toddlers. a big black and white goat climbed into my lap when i sat down next to him, and i could practically hear him begging me to get him outta there. the kids petted the goats and the rabbit, then our turn was up. i think we left after that.