Holiday Time part 1

I had this vision of an enormous blog with a million pictures, alas I'll be splitting it in 2 parts (possibly more). There are so many pics I want to share with you but it seems I can only do so many at a time.

As the kids get older, Christmas becomes more and more fun. It reminds me of when my mom and I took them to Disneyland a couple summers ago. I don't remember the last time I went before that, but taking the kids made me see Dland in a way that I had forgotten. We didn't do any fast rides nor go at the speed of light in order to get in as much as possible. Instead we took our time and did things that I don't know if I ever did or even noticed before, and seeing it through my children's eyes made the experience so precious. Having our kids had made me look at Christmas in a way that I haven't in a long time.

Our holiday season started with a visit from my brother and his wife for Thanksgiving. It was such a treat as we had not seen them in a couple of years. They had served in Japan for around 4 yrs and are now in FL. Hopefully we can see more of each other while we are on the same side of the country. The bad news is I hardly took any pictures :( But the kids love their aunt and uncle and seeing them at christmas was great too.


The kids were in the Christmas program at church. J a shepherd boy that held a cross and E and angel who held a Bible and a heart. They were both so cute. E really surprised me with her amazing stage presence as well as her effort to enunciate the words to the songs, and to keep mouthing the words even when she didn't know them.

The Saturday before we left for CA we had Christmas with Dennis' family. The cousins love playing together. That was an important part of growing up for both D & I and we are grateful that our kids can have that as well.


Dennis has a friend who's dad is really into trains. He has a mini train that goes around his property. This year they held a train ride that took you through a (small) lights display. It was freezing, and a super long line, so out of sensitivity to the people behind us (we waited for almost an hour) we four crammed into a roughly 2 1/2 by 3 ft. box car. It was a moment I had to capture.

The Thursday night before Christmas we headed out to CA to be with my family. The kids were fairly good on the plane. It definitely gets easier as they get older. While we were there took the time to relax and catch up on a variety of things, such as...........

Reading,

baking,

lounging in front of a TV with more than 2 clear channels,

and some arts and crafts (gingerbread house).

Christmas eve was filled with the traditions of ......

going to the candle light Christmas Eve service.

singing happy birthday to Jesus (actually this was new, but someone always gives my dad the christmas tree cake)

and Christmas pj's!!

more to come..........

"Cinderella is nice"

The title of this entry is something that E says randomly as if to spark a conversation about the varied personalities of the well known princesses. E turned three this month. I know I took forever to post the pics, but you should be used to this by now. The party was a success. My mom was in for a quick trip to help and enjoy in the festivities. The Cinderella princess party was well received by all that attended.

Everyone had their picture taken in front of the castle. She didn't want to wear the sleeves on the dress because they "tickled".


This was the princess cake. I envisioned it a little different, perhaps if the frosting wasn't white....anyway, it still tasted yummy!


The knights made shields and the princesses made necklaces (shown on E below).


My mom bought necklaces for the girls that turned out to be lockets with purple lip gloss inside. I suppose a princess must look her best. I was told later that a cousin was found with a completely purple face.


The next morning there was a tea party to recooperate from the previous evenings affairs.

overdue..........

At J's school they did not have a halloween party, they had a storybook character day. J chose to be templeton the rat from Charlotte's Web. I read this to him this summer. It was so fun to see how he got into the story and really feel for the characters. When we finished the book there wasn't much reaction at first. Later, however, he came to me with teary eyes and said, "Mommy, I don't want Charlotte to die." I was of course touched with his compassion for the eight legged heroine, and I was also realizing that the future only holds more tough questions from the mouths of my babes. I pray that I will pray when they do so I can pass on God's wisdom, and not my own. Here's a pic of J as the rat. It was also a "Donuts for Dads" day, so D was able to go down and see J in action. He got there and J did not want to wear his costume. Even though he was excited about it when we made it, I knew this would happen. So I had prewarned D and told him to make him wear it for at least one picture. As you can see I have a husband who loved me enough to take a picture of a grumpy boy.

E's bday party is on Friday so i will try to post pics soon after that.

Field Trip

Earlier this month J had his first kindergarten field trip. It was to a apple orchard, and it involved a tour guided hay ride (big bummer for my allergies).

Everyone was allowed to pick an apple off of a tree, play in a straw bale maze and sample some excellent apple cider.


It was so much fun to see him in his school mode as well as talk to his teacher a bit (who is a believer :).

first ballet class.....

The kids have borrowed a couple of Angelina Ballerina (a mouse who dances) videos from the library recently. Contrary to what you might be thinking, E picked it out all ber herself. There was no ballet pushing from me. While I was making lunch I had the soundtrack to Amelie' on and they were doing their ballet (as they say) in the living room. After lunch it was decided that we should have a ballet class. So showed them a few basics such as a plie', first position, and chasse' (which done ungracelfully would be considered a gallop), and some turns. I got them to do some chasse's across the floor on a mini video for you all to enjoy. You can hear them saying "chasse' chasse'!" Unfortunately I am unsuccesful at loading it!! Sorry!!!! Anyway, I promise if E never takes a class and hates it I won't be too sad. It's fun to watch them have fun with it now. She can say the word ballernia perfectly by the way. And I of course want J to be a guy who can dance and be confident in it.

America's First Fair

On Saturday we went to the York Fair. I think it's comparable to the Orange County Fair in size. As you can see the kids enjoyed the merry-go-round. J really wanted to ride on one of the benches, but we made him ride a horse, thus the look of disappointment. We are awful parents. We also tackled the house of mirrors and one of my personal favorites the FUN SLIDE. However my bag was wet so E and I would nearly stop on the humps. It was a little disappointing.

Then we had lunch; cheese steaks for us, cheeseburger for the kids and we split some fried zucchini. We wandered the rest of the afternoon, checking out the tractors, seeing the animals, cheering at the pig races and letting E get her face painted. She wanted a princess one but settled for a flower. It was a good day. I love the Saturdays when D gets to be home with us.

a new day.....

Towards the end of August, the kids and I flew out to CA for a visit. We had a great time. J had a list of things he wanted to do; throw rocks in the canal (pictured below), go swimming (also pictured below), go to Foster's Freeze, and play games. We were able to check everything off of that list, as well as pick up where we left of last summer with swimming. Even E, who is more cautious around the water did a great job and enjoyed herself.


And now it is a new day. Last week J started kindergarten, and he is loving every minute of it. He is all smiles and proclaiming that he "had fun!" whenever I pick him up from school. This new phase in life means lots of different thing, such as no more traveling whenever we want, which is probably the biggest bummer since they only have 1 week of school of here for Christmas, and they don't take a week off for Easter/Spring break. Darn snow days I suppose. But there are many good things to come of this too. E and I will ahve more one on one time together that she didn't get as much of being the 2nd child. I have hope of having more things done in the morning while J is away so i am more available when he's home. Also it's a joy to watch J learn to read, and to see E blossom when she has some space from big brother. So here we are.

a day at my happy place

If you read this you know me, and if you know me you know that my happy place is the beach. I love the magnificence and mystery of the ocean. It represents so much about our God. He is beautiful, creative, bigger than us, and there is still so much to learn about Him (to name a few). So yesterday I went with my favorite people to my favorite place. It was wonderful. E took a little while to get her courage up and play in the water (which was a little cold at first, or a warm day at the pacific, but as the day went on it got warmer), while J ran and literally hurled is body into the water all day long. We had blast.

The Big Five

Yesterday my son turned 5!!!!!!! It's true what they say about time flying by soooo fast. Not only did we celebrate his 5th this year, but in August he starts kindergarten. As excited as I am it still blows my mind. Sunday we had a party with his cousin Will who turned 6 on Saturday. It was a overall ocean theme, slightly focusing on pirates as the boys weren't crazy about leis and grass skirts. There was a slip 'n' slide, you could get your picture taken with a ferocious shark and the surf board he bit into, as well as receive a complimentary eye patch or lei. The kids seem to have a blast and there was only one injury, J's lip colided with Will's little brother's forehead. Rowen walked away with a tooth imprint on his forehead, J a fat lower lip. It's not the first time, I'm sure it won't be the last.



There is a ship wrecked on the rocks near a deserted island. (in case you couldn't tell:)


Monday we sang to him and E helped blow out candles on the actual birthday. Then we went and bought his present, a bike (with helmet and training wheels). He was ecstatic.

Raystown '06

I've been trying to share these pics for a while but well, here they are now. Soon after J was born we started a tradition with D's fam of going to the mountains where there is a lake nearby. We've kept it up as an annual event since then. The kids LOVE it and ask about it literally all year long. We were there the last week of June.

On the trip up we made our pit stop and Daddy came out with 4 large ice cream cones, and as if to scoff at my doubts in her ice ceram eating capablitites, E ate every last bite, while J couldn't finish his.



It was the first day, before dinner and the boys had already found a muddy hill which they thought was perfect for sliding down.


"I'm a cowgirl" (her words, by the way)


Even though it rained every day, we still made it to the lake almost everyday.


Smore's


J, in front of rainbow falls



E, stopping to take a sniff


good times........