In a Mid December

. . . it finally dawned on me that I hadn't posted since the first of November and it's now mid-December.  It was obviously a quiet and non-eventful month.  We had a quiet Thanksgiving - just the four of us.  Amelia kept waiting for the "holiday" to happen . . . apparently we didn't celebrate Thanksgiving enough to meet her expectations.  I am thankful for 2 beautiful, healthy daughters.

Ken was in charge of the turkey and this year he tried a recipe he had heard on NPR - a turkey porchetta - basically a seasoned turkey breast rolled up and baked.  It looked a lot like a giant caterpillar, but thankfully was much tastier.  I was thankful that Ken did half of the cooking.

I am thankful for a warm, dry house - it was unseasonably cold here in November.  It was dry the day after Thanksgiving and we did our annual "hunt for a Christmas tree" adventure.  The older the girls get, the harder it is for all 4 of us to agree on a Christmas tree.  I am thankful for a patient husband.

The Relief Society was in charge of our ward's Christmas party - "How the Grinch Found Jesus" and I was very happy when it was over.  We were supposed to come dressed as a Who.  Amelia told me, "I don't do silly", so I let each girl and Ken do their own costumes and Amelia ended up winning "best costume" for her age group - go figure!

Here is Amelia the next day proudly displaying her award wreath.  I am thankful for independent thinkers . . . most of the time.

Sophia standing next to our decorated Christmas tree.  I am thankful that we haven't broken any ornaments this year . . . yet.

We have much to be thankful for and are trying to get ready for Christmas.  Despite already mailing out Christmas cards, I am so unprepared for the holiday.  And yesterday, Amelia lost her 2nd front tooth . . . so now all she wants for Christmas is her 2 front teeth ;)

Happy Halloween

We finally got around to carving pumpkins on the afternoon of Halloween.  The girls are contributing more to the actual carving process, but Sophia still refused to touch the stuff inside.  She helped me carve hers though and modeled so perfectly with it afterwards.

Amelia didn't want her picture taken with her pumpkin.  So here are the 3 final products - Ken's, Amelia's and Sophia's.

I didn't have any brilliant ideas for costumes or motivation to make them this year, so after asking the girls what they wanted to be, we headed to the thrift stores to see what we could find.  Sophia wanted to be a princess - which was easy - and it turned out we found a Princess Sofia costume.  Perfect!  Amelia didn't know what she wanted to be - which actually made it easier than trying to find something specific.  She loved the bee costume we found and the thrift store had a packaged wing/antenna accessory to go with it.  Perfect!  And I was happy that they were happy and I didn't have to stress about making costumes.

After a day of torrential downpour rain, it actually stopped raining long enough for trick-or-treating.  We started out at the ward Trunk or Treat, then headed home to visit a few of our favorite neighbors.  We called it a night and warmed up with hot cocoa and a bath.

October Happenings

Some months nothing happens, and other months, everything happens . . . and I don't have time to blog about it.  October is one of those months - too much going on, not enough time or energy to document it.  On Oct. 12, we took the girls to a pumpkin patch to pick out a pumpkin and have a bit of fun.  It was a tad cold and rainy, but we all had fun.

Then on the 22nd, Sophia went to a different pumpkin patch with her Joy School group.  The kids in that group are a great bunch of kids and everyone gets along so well.  (Sorry about the blurry picture - the wagon was moving and my camera is slow.)

My friend Jennie brought her "big girl camera" and got this fantastic shot of Sophia.

Sophia is loving Joy School - here is a cool picture of the group of kids playing with "moon sand".

And that day, the teacher (Ann) made a little treat and sang Happy Birthday to Sophia for her upcoming birthday.  She was thrilled!

We threw a birthday party for Sophia and a few of her friends.  Ken told me to keep it simple.  So I planned a simple craft (sorry no pictures), a few easy snacks, and the cake - then I put Ken in charge of games.  He totally rocked it with the games. . . . fishing for a prize . . . pin the crown on the princess . . . and the cotton-ball/ spoon race.

Ken moved a potted plant out of the way for the race and immediately the girls crowded around to see the bugs and worms that had been hiding underneath . . . that took a good 5 minutes.

And here they are at the start of the race.  The race was hilarious to watch, but I didn't include a video here because it's probably not as funny on video as it was in person.  But you can imagine with five 3-5 year olds running confidently with a cotton-ball on their spoon, only to realize it fell off back at the starting line ;)

And then it was time for cake - a gluten free, decadent chocolate cake, with chocolate whipped cream frosting.  The kids loved it and are showing us their chocolate tongues ;)

A close-up of Sophia's chocolate grin.

And finally, time for presents.  I love watching little kids at present opening time.  They're all so excited to give Sophia their gift.  One little girl was so excited, she just opened her present and handed it unwrapped to Sophia ;)

Happy Birthday to my easy-going, loves to cuddle, super, smiley 4-yr old.  We love you Sophia!

First Lost Tooth

A while back, I saw a cute idea for tooth-fairy pillows . . . the idea being that the tooth goes in a pocket in the pillow instead of tucked under a pillow where the tooth fairy has to find it in the middle of the night.  I thought it was brilliant . . . but the ones I saw advertised were around $20 each!  Crazy, right!  I knew I could make something similar, for much less money and saved the idea for when it was needed.

A few days ago, Amelia told me she thought one of her teeth was loose.  And so I made a tooth-fairy pillow . . . out of scraps I had on hand . . . to be ready for that first lost tooth.  And all it cost me was about an hour of my time . . . mostly spent unpicking and re-trimming, since I was doing it without a pattern and in a hurry to finish it before I lost momentum and energy.  Don't look too closely at the stitching (it's definitely not perfect) and Amelia helped decorate it this morning with the "A". . . but it will definitely serve its purpose and Amelia was excited about it.  (And of course I made one for Sophia too - even though it is a few years off before she will need to use hers.)

And this afternoon, Amelia said "oh, my tooth just came out" and she proudly showed it to me.  I can't tell you how excited I was that Amelia pulled it out herself, instead of me having to do it for her.  And that we somehow escaped the drama that is usually a part of everything in our house.

Family Pictures

I realized the other day, that I had posted about how awesome our new family pictures are, but that I hadn't really posted any of the pictures - other than the crazy looking one of our family for our header.  I love getting new family pictures.  But what I hate is trying to figure out what everyone should wear, and then worrying that my strong willed daughters won't actually wear what I've so painstakingly picked out. The day we got our pictures taken, the weather was off and on rainy, with the forecast being more rain and wind.  We kept changing the time of our photo shoot, and I think we timed it perfectly.  The rain and wind held off, everything was bright because of the previous rain and the overcast skies kept us from squinting in the sun.  Plus, my daughters both wore what they had agreed to wear!  And without further ramblings, here are a few of my favorites.  Thanks again Pam for a job well done.

Off to School

First off - don't you just love our new family pictures?  My friend Pam, of PJ Kirkwood Photography, took them, and we all love them . . . and it doesn't hurt that my girls love Pam so they were more than willing to cooperate.

Amelia has been anxiously awaiting going to school for at least a year and the time has finally come.  She was supposed to start school on Sept. 9, but with the change to all-day Kindergarten for everyone, they changed the start date to Sept. 14, with a meet-and-greet with the teacher on the 9th.  Here are the girls with Amelia's teacher, Mrs. McKinney.

Amelia was so excited on the first day.  She refused to comb her hair or brush her teeth, but she literally ran/skipped all the way to the bus stop.

Ken and I were at odds whether or not Amelia would actually ride the bus to school on the first day or have to be driven to school.  But I won the bet - Amelia was very excited to ride the bus and jumped right on board when it got to our stop.  She only hesitated slightly, before continuing down the aisle to find a seat.  Mommy only cried a bit - after the bus had pulled away - I am so proud of Amelia.  She has made so much progress this year and was super ready to start school.

It's different at home during the day, with Amelia in school all day.  Sophia hasn't had a playmate, so she has become my little helper instead, and I love it.  Sophia started Joy School (a co-op preschool) today.  She was so excited and loved her first day.

I have a feeling that this is going to be a great year.  Both girls learning and growing (without me by their side) and a little time for me - to volunteer at Amelia's school, work on long overdue projects, and have a little down time.

August's Adventures

Ken took the girls to the Thurston County Fair, where they petted goats . . .

. . . watched the 4-H girls on their horses, ate an elephant ear . . . 

and left Mom at home to have a few hours of "me" time.  Everyone got just what they wanted.

The next day, we headed out to the beach, where it was so foggy, you couldn't even see the water.  And of course, we forgot jackets, but thank goodness for the baby blankets I keep in the car.  They came in handy as super-hero capes/protection from the wind.

The fog eventually cleared up . . . about 45 min. before we headed for home, and the water was too cold to do more than dip toes in, but we all enjoyed our day at the beach.

Ken took Monday, Aug. 3, off of work and we spent the day at Remlinger Farms - it was our 2nd year there and the girls love it.  They wish we had diggers like this in our yard . . . or at least in a nearby park.

 We rode the train . . . 

 paddled our canoe . . .

 pretended we were farmers after we petted the goats and rabbits . . .

and rode the ponies.

 We laughed and screamed on the roller coaster, the flying pumpkin, and the barrel spinners . . . and just had fun being silly and spending the day together as a family.

Two weeks later, we made our annual camping trip to Mt. Rainier.  The weather was perfect (never got colder than sweatshirt weather), didn't rain, our campsite was close to a bathroom (perfect for the middle-of-the-night potty needs), and no one got hurt or lost!

Our campsite had a lot of big rocks and fallen trees around it, and the girls loved climbing and playing on them.

We did some hiking around Mt. Rainier.  It's definitely a lot browner around the mountain than last year, but still amazing and beautiful.

 I love that Sophia always wants to hold my hand.

After a not-so-restful night (ie. air mattress deflating in the middle of the night), I took a nap, while Ken helped the girls build and decorate paper airplanes.  When mommy is rested, everyone is happy :)

 We hiked some more . . . 

 played baseball in our campsite . . .

 and explored the old-growth forest near the park's entrance.  I'm always amazed by how big trees can get. 

After a successful camping trip, with kudos to Ken for doing the cooking and cleaning up (my 2 least favorite parts of camping), we headed home, where I did 3 loads of laundry, gave the girls a bath, fixed dinner, and helped Ken put away the camping gear.  That was fun - let's do it again next year!