"Rotten Bikinis"

We had this pile of zucchinis from our garden that I had picked right before it froze this fall. They have been sitting on our counter, waiting for me to make into zucchini bread. This morning I told the kids we were going to give them to Pa's chickens because they were getting rotten. Lucy looked at them and said, "Wow, look at all those rotten bikinis!"

Let the Madness Begin!

December is always a busy month and as much as I love it, sometimes I feel pretty overwhelmed by all there is to do. We started off the month by setting up the Christmas tree. We broke down and bought an artificial tree last year and I never thought I would say it but I love it. It is so nice to just be able to pull it out set it up. It needs no water, it is pre-lit, always straight, and there are no pine needles to vacuum every day (just the usual dirt, crumbs, and pieces of playdough that I have to vacuum now). Now that the kids are a little older, I love watching them pull out ornaments that they recognize from previous years. Every year, they each get a new ornament and they are remembering which ones are theirs and sometimes even when they got them. I always get a little sentimental when we get out their "First Christmas" ornaments. They wanted me to take their pictures with their ornaments this year. Of course, seeing them holding the ornaments with their baby pictures choked me up a bit. It is hard to believe how tiny they all were.





My sewing machine as been busy lately, too. Here are some of my recent projects:

Christmas jammies for the girls.


Pillowcase dress for Lucy. She calls it her "Baby Jesus dress".



Christmas outfits for the girls. I don't even know what I was thinking here. It all started when I saw these little fur coats at Gap Kids, but I am way to cheap(or thrifty, as I like to think of it) to pay $58 a piece. They were so cute though, and the more I looked at them, the more I thought, "I bet I could make these". So, I found a free pattern for a similar jacket and waited until Black Friday so I could use my 40% off coupon for the fabric at Craft Wharehouse. $25 later (plus more hours with my sewing machine and trusty seam ripper than I want to mention), we had two little fur coats. I even learned how to use my button-holer. Of course, they needed something to wear their coats with, so I had to make some fancy skirts. They turned out pretty decent, but I think next year we will stick with buying Christmas dresses from Costco ;)

Honors Reader!

Lily came home from school a couple weeks ago and was so excited to tell me she had been selected to be in the Honors Reading Program at school. Honors Reading is for the kids who are at the highest reading levels in their grade and are selected by their teachers. They have a list of books they can choose from to bring home and read. Then, they take a test on the book they read. If they read 100 books or more and pass the tests on them, they get to have lunch with Mr. Campbell (the Principal) at the end of the school year. How awesome is that? Micah has been in the Honors Program for the last few years also, so it is great to see Lily following in his footsteps. I am so proud of miss Lily for all her hard work. It has really been a challenge keeping that girl on task this year. She is such a daydreamer and sooooo easily distracted, but so loveable too.

Here she is with the very first Honors Reading book she brought home, "Hop on Pop". You can't go wrong with Dr. Suess. Great job, Lily!

Thanksgiving Feast

Even though it is almost Christmas, I am realizing I haven't posted since Halloween. The last couple of months have flown by and I have been a major blog slacker. Lucy got to have her very own Thanksgiving Feast at preschool. I love this. The week before Thanksgiving, Miss Jan reads the kids the book, "Stone Soup". Then, she assigns each child something to bring to the feast so they can make their own "Stone Soup". It is usually something easy like one carrot, two stalks of celery, one can of tomatoes...you get the picture. There are a few lucky parents, though, that get to bring things like barley or a pound of cooked hamburger. The funny thing is, the day before we got our "assignments", Mel was telling me that she was hoping for something easy this year, since last year she had to bring a pound of cooked hamburger. When I opened up Lucy's backpack, I just had to laugh because Lucy was assigned a pound of cooked hamburger. Thanks a lot for jinxing me, Mel.

Anyway, after the kids help Miss Jan make Stone Soup, all the parents are invited for a feast. First, the kids came out in the costumes they made and sing some Thanksgiving songs. They also made little drums and rainmakers. Lucy got really into some of the songs and was really rocking out on her "drum".





After the performance, we all got to feast on "Stone Soup", cheese, crackers, cookies, grapes, jello, and even pumpkin pie. Yum! Here is Lucy with her friend, Talon from her class. Apparently, this little boy loooves Lucy. His mom says that he talks about her all the time and even told her, "Mom, Lucy is the perfect girl". So sweet.

Happy Halloween!

Halloween was pretty low-key this year. In fact, we didn't even get to carving pumpkins until the night before. For the first time ever, Micah and Lily both carved their very own pumpkins. The only thing Isaiah and I helped them with was making sure all the "guts" were completely scraped out. They were pretty proud of their creations.


Lucy was a different story, though. She was pretty tired that night and wanted so bad to "do it myself!" but still needed plenty of help. This eventually led to lots of tears. It is rough being three. Here they are with their finished products.


On Halloween day, Lucy and I went Trick-or-Treating with Beckie, Logan, and Kaden at their Grandpa's work. Here she is with Spiderman (aka Logan). These kids raked it in!



We just walked to a few houses around the neighborhood, but the kids still got plenty of candy. Micah decided to just wear his costume from last year (Ash from Pokemon)and Lily was a leopard. I broke down and bought her this leopard print tutu from Costco. It was totally justified, too because she can wear it again. Doesn't this girl know how to work it?



I just realized I didn't get a single picture of Micah in his costume. Poor Micah. Oh well, he pretty much looked the same as last year.

Pumpkin Patch

Lucy was so excited to go to the Pumpkin Patch this year with her Preschool class. This was the first time I have gone to the Pumpkin Patch with just one child - weird. It was kind of nice, though, because I was able to focus on Lucy and on helping her pick out the "perfect pumpkin".

Here she is with her class in front of the Nursery where they got their pumpkins.


...and with her friend, Lola. These girls are getting to be the best of friends.


The perfect pumpkin!


Say cheese!


After all the kids found their "perfect pumpkins", they got to line up and sing some of the Fall songs they have been learning. Lucy was such a crack-up. She really got into the songs and motions and I could definitely hear her little voice above all the others.












Preschool has been so much fun this year. Lucy is loving it and I am trying to enjoy it as much as I can, since next year will be the last time I have one in pre-school(sob, sob). Love you, my little "Perfect Pumpkin"!

Happy 9th Birthday, Micah!

Wow, can it really have been 9 years already? I can hardly believe this will be Micah's last year in the single-digits. It seems like Micah has grown up a lot this year. He is no longer infatuated with Thomas the Train or even Hot Wheels. Now, it is nothing but sports and video games.

As a 9-year-old, Micah:
-loves sports. His favorites are baseball and soccer.
-loves to read. He has really taken off as a reader this year and will sit with his nose in a book for hours.
-is into anything that has to do with Pokemon.
-loves video games. We seriously have to limit his time on the Wii and ds or he would play all day.
-does NOT like to take showers or change his socks.(what is it with boys this age?)
-has still been known to watch Barbie movies with his sisters.
-is still the slightest bit of a mama's boy at times(not as much any more, though, so I take those moments when I can get them now).
-still has to have about 20 stuffed animals on his bed to sleep with him at night.
-can be very stubborn and strong-willed. This is nothing new. I think he was pretty much born that way. Too bad I can't blame it on anyone either because I am pretty sure he gets it from me.
-likes to be in control. He is definitely a first-born child. We are working on turning this into an asset. He has some great leadership qualities that just need a little work.
-can also be very sweet and kind-hearted. Even his teacher this year sent a note home and described him as a "very smart and kind boy".
Overall, Micah, we love you for who you are, including all your little quirks and "boyness".

For the first time ever, I convinced Micah to have his birthday party somewhere other than our house. This was a relief to me, especially with all the projects we have going on right now. One of the hotels here rents out their pool area for parties, so we decided to have a pool party in October! We also got a whole banquet room set up for us where we had snacks for the kiddos, cake, and presents. It was definitely a hit with the kids and with me, since I hardly had to do anything.

They even put Micah's name on the reader board by the front desk. I think he was pretty impressed.


Snacks, anyone?


Time for cake!




The kids mostly swam the whole time, which was great!




And, check out these little hot-tubbers. This is where we found Lily, Lucy, and the Boneck girls most of the night.