Holiday Ramp Up

December is always busy - fun busy.  Here are some of our adventures.

 

Annual trek to the mall to see Santa with Sam and Eli.

So much easier now that no one is pooping their pants or nursing!

 The visit to Santa is always followed by a trip to Old Chicago.

The kids got their own table this year - big time.

 Crazy day at Roosevelt.  Christmas parties galore.  Quinn got to tag along.

Merediths class made some crazy snow storms in a jar.

 We're just going to skip kindergarten and go straight to 1st grade I think.

 I'm saving this gem.  Meredith has a pen pal at another school who just happens to be her good friend.  It's hilarious to see what they write to each other.  Love the PS on this one.

Ahhhh, it's so cool when Santa visits you at home!

Sadly the girls are totally on to Santa Gene.  Still fun to pretend.

 Super excited about the Frozen microphone which she thought was an actual phone.  Sorry Quinn.

 Cousin London came too!

Fun trip to see the Nutcracker!  We had lots of friends that performed this year and Merediths ballet teacher was the Sugar Plum Fairy.

Holiday Programs

Always a favorite this time of year - the Roosevelt Holiday Program.

It's a huge production with costumes, props etc...not sure how they wrangle all the kids but it's always hilarious and sweet.

It was certainly fun to see both Meredith and Delaney in the show this year!

 

Kindergartners

 Third Graders

 Smiling peppermint gal

 Singing about latkes I think?

Meredith was a peppermint dancer.

 Last year for Meredith in this program, next year it's on to band or choir. 

Oh boy.

Last but not least - Wesleyan Christmas program. 

Our last one...sniff sniff. 

December

December - the month I love and hate all at the same time.  It's already gone by in a one huge blur.  It's been especially busy this year for some reason. Always fun of course - but busy!

 

Meredith and her friend Sienna decided to make yo-yo headbands and hairclips to sell at the Roosevelt kids craft fair.  They did a great job!

 Aunt Kortney came to visit and got to experience a typical Wed/Thu/Fri at our house.  She may never come back ;)

We managed to hit Winter Garden Aglow on a super warm, rain free night.

 Cousin George came with us too.  Lots of shoulders to ride on this year.

 We hustled up to McCall to get a Christmas tree cut and up in the cabin for our extended stay in December.  Quinn and I spent a little time in the truck.  A little wet in the woods!

 Tree hunters

 Meredith had a little performance with her ballet class to wrap up the semester.  Not a big production but cute nonetheless.

 Little ballerinas.  She did so great, we were so proud of her.  And she is sticking with it (no pressure for me, I promise!).

 How we all go to the dentist at the same time.

Thanksgiving

I almost forgot about Thanksgiving!  We had another fantastic meal at the Arid Club.  No cooking, no dishes, just fun.  Quinn wanted to wear a tiara.  Pretty standard these days, never without accessories.

 Still flaunting the lost tooth hole

 Working on our selfie poses

 Grammie and Papa joined us too

Winter has arrived....

I wish I had taken pictures of the snow we had last week - it was crazy for mid-November.  We even had a snow day.  Thankfully we live in the flats, near downtown so I don't have far to drive so we managed to get out and about.  Quinn needed to have her hair cut, a nice trim I thought but she had other plans.  This kid was determined to cut her hair 'like Delaneys'. 

Most things don't get to me, for some reason cutting off her pretty long hair had me in tears.  Poor Felicity had to put up with me and my tears.

 Luckily Delaney is okay with having a twin. 

Same size, same hair.  One is naughty, one is nice.

 We managed to get to McCall the weekend before Thanksgiving with Gene and Dana.  We needed some help tearing out our old oak framed fluorescent lighting in the kitchen.  WOW - what a difference.  Thank you Gene for all the help!  Dana and I kept the kids busy why the boys worked. 

 

Then KK and Papa Jim came down for a quick visit.  It snowed a ton while we were in McCall.  We hit up the normally packed hill downtown McCall on Monday.  No one there!  The kids FLEW down the hill.

 Papa Jim had to keep them from going into the lake.

 Our typically scared of everything Quinn had a great time!

 Peaceful, quiet day in McCall

 First Thanksgiving!

 About 6 more inches fell on Monday night

 Sadly it started to rain on Tuesday so we opted for the ice rink instead of the sledding hill.  Quinn wanted no part of it...

 Love ice skating when we can have wine and hot chocolate and watch the big girls skate

 This trooper skated for 2.5 hours.  Had to drag her off the ice

 We headed home to visit with cousin Zolie!

We always have the best time with Zolie and her parents.

 

ALSO DELANEY LOST HER FIRST TOOTH