It’s buddy week at karate again! Bring a buddy, break a board.
Hehehe… it looks like I used the exact same title last time too!
Ninja girl breaks a board
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Christmas 2015
Merry Christmas 2015! Another one on the books.
We went over to Grandpa’s house for Christmas Eve dinner. The sunset was amazing!
I love how the sky in front is blue and pink, but the sky in back is on fire! I also love the reflection along the car and window. I took a lot of mirror pictures on the way to Grandpa’s house. :)
So pretty!
As usual we did our secret stocking stuffing Christmas Eve. Everyone taking turns sneaking into the back room to do a little Santa magic.
I think this would be a good Duluth photo. :) A stocking full of Duluth shirts, held by a guy rocking his Duluth shirts. :)
Grandpa Tom knows how to keep the kids in line! Actually, I missed the better picture when she was completely under the ottoman and he was staring at his phone. By the time my camera was ready she was rolling away. :)
Back at the house the kids went to bed with minimal fuss and Santa came at last!
All Eve wanted for Christmas was a puppy in her stocking. She’s been reading one too many Little Golden Books, I think! I was hoping this big eyed cutie would suffice.
Before I went to bed I realized that we had completely forgotten the cookies and milk this year. Oops! The kids didn’t say a word about it (still haven’t!), but I’m not going to point out the oversight! Santa was good to us all anyway.
Shaking the presents on Christmas morning. A tradition in every home, I’m sure.
Opening stockings. She looks wide awake and raring to go, doesn’t she?! :)
Lots of sweets to get them going.
Her bedroom gift was Chinese Checkers, a game I loved as a kid. We played a few rounds while waiting for everyone to arrive.
The breakfast spread. We had a tater tot casserole, fruit platter, cherry almond scones, blueberry muffins, oranges, grapes, coffee, and mimosas. Something for everyone!
Let the unwrapping begin!
Eve got several doggies for Christmas. :)
A typical Christmas morning.
A candy dish for me, that I painted years ago, and Popcube admiring his new calendar.
Eve painted a squirrel mug for Mema.
Lex got a few new pets for Christmas too! Aquabots. Two jelly fish and a hammer head shark! Luckily they all get along well. :)
This girl wore down fast. Luckily she has a great Grandpa to cuddle and read to her.
The gift we’ve all been waiting for! Thanks, Rosy, for another awesome calendar!
Dr. Alan and Dr. Eve, hard at work operating on a poor man with a big red nose.
She almost made it! As we were getting dinner on the table she was passing out on the couch. I tried to rouse her to eat, but no luck. I brought her up to her bed later and she slept right through until morning. Tired girl!
Merry Christmas!
Let’s eat! Awesome veggie lasagna, salad, bread, and endless cookies and ice cream. Yum!
The next day, as we were tidying up the living room and trying to bring some semblance of order back into the house, another box arrived in the mail and Christmas just kept on going! Thanks West Coast Santas!
A very cool balancing Gyrobot. Lex loves anything he can build.
And a dart board! Lex also loves anything he can throw. :)
A grainy picture of my Christmas kitty enjoying a good long snooze behind the Christmas tree.
We are now finishing off leftovers, exploring new toys, building puzzles, eating sweets, and thoroughly enjoying our Christmas vacation. I hope yours was merry and bright as well. Much love for a peaceful start to the new year. Life is good.
HEXBUG Racing
While on vacation Lex found Hexbugs at my parents house. Hexbugs are cool little “bug” toys that move on little rubber legs. Lex decided to take the accompanying track setup and make a Hexbug racing movie using iMovie on the iPad. He worked hard on it for days and here is the result!
The trailer to the movie:
The official Hexbug race movie:
This is his first production, complete from start to finish. He did the job of three people and sometimes it shows, but I love hearing his voice and knowing how much work he put in to this! :)
Skateboarding!
The sun is shining and the kids were out! Look what else came out for the first time!
Easter weekend
We had a busy weekend! Easter fell just after Eve’s birthday so we did a little celebrating of both. Friday afternoon we had friends over to play (and my bestie over for tea!), Rosy came to visit, and Alan and I went to a late-night dinner party. We were all tired by the end of Friday, but that was just the beginning.
First tree climb of the season, I think.
Saturday included a trip to GemStar, cake baking, egg decorating, painting, and more. Then Alan brought home a movie and is grownups were up until midnight! That made two nights in a row!
Rosy was in need of a few original pieces of artwork so she commissioned two little painters.
Boring mommy made them move to the table because painting on the floor was just too messy!
While they painted I did a little creative work of my own.
Oh yes, and Easter basket filling, of course!
Pretty table, all ready for Easter morning..
I like my own decorations. :-) I was excited to find these sugar eggs on Etsy. I have find memories of them in my own Easter basket as a child, and the eternal question as to whether or not to eat them.
Sunday was Easter, so we started the day with candy for breakfast. Of course. The egg hunts, a trip to the playground, a little birthday party, and early bedtimes!
There was no question for Eve. Sugar? Eat it!
We had the usual Easter egg hunts. The kids still love looking for eggs!
My masterpiece! Eve's final cake for this birthday. As usual it was an ever evolving project. I love how it came out.
We did a few outdoor egg hunts as well, but it was chilly out there!
There is still a fair amount of snow on the ground too! We were hiding eggs in snow banks.
Daisy ran from window to window trying to keep track of everybody outside.
Daddy attack! :-)
Mad dash for an egg Alan hid up high. :-)
Good thing Rosy was here. She took us on a walk to the playground to shoot some hoops.
Aunt Katie and Popcube came over for awhile to hang out and eat cake. Eve was pretty wound up by this point!
This giant slab of cake didn't help matters much.
It's not perfect, but I'm pretty proud of how the cake turned out. I love the vivid colors! Rainbow parties are great!
Alan sliced it in an odd way. This looks like a cake tunnel. Yum!
/div>
After cake the kids proceeded to flail around on the floor, wrestling and laughing like sugared up wild ones! The crash came about 15 minutes later, but some alone time and iPad time helped settle everyone down.
That about (almost) wraps up Eve’s 8th birthday and Easter 2015. Now for a few weeks of sugar detox!
Flying high and diving deep
Waffles for breakfast, again.
This weather is just not cooperating with our plans this trip. Or with our visitors’ plans, I suppose. We headed to SkyZone today for some high-flying fun.
The plan was for Julie and her girls to come up and spend the day with us, but the weather did not cooperate and she didn’t make it, so we were on our own. Turns out that was maybe for the best. Things are SkyZone were crazy!! We didn’t pre-buy tickets, despite the website strongly encouraging us to do so, and so when we got there they were pretty full up. We were hoping to stay for a few hours, but there were only a few time slots available. We got the kids tickets to jump from 10:30-11:00am while Alan and I watched. The place was a bit overwhelming at first and the ticket lady said grownups had to jump on the other side of the room from kids and I wasn’t sure what that exactly looked like, so I decided to let the kids jump first. Turns out “the other side of the room” was really just not that far away.
Trampolines everywhere! Do you see the kids way in the back?
At 11am we left SkyZone and went to the Olive Garden for lunch. YUMMY!!! Before leaving SkyZone we purchased tickets for all four of us to jump from 12:30-1:00pm. I wanted to do longer, but again, there was limited time available. So we had lunch then came back. This second time was soooo much better… because I jumped too! As a grownup watching the place is boring, loud, and chaotic. But as a jumper jumping, OMG it is so much fun!!! You can go so high and do all sorts of fun tricks. I wasn’t brave enough for flips and somersaults, but other people were. Lex mastered the “jumping off the wall” trick and Alan worked on getting as high in the air as possible. So much fun!!!
After half an hour we were all hot and sweaty. I could have stayed longer, but our time was up and everyone was exhausted so it was a good time to head back to the hotel… for swimming! What better way to cool down. I didn’t get any pictures in the pool because I was swimming too, but I really wished I had an underwater camera. There are skylights in the pool area and the sunshine coming in made everything really beautiful. It would have been a great day for swimming pictures. Oh well. By 3:00 we were all worn out and hungry, so we headed back upstairs. It’s a good vacation when everyone is showered and in PJs by 4pm, right?! :)
Vacation leftovers! Pizza from the hotel, various options from Cheesecake Factory, pasta from the OG, and carrots so we can pretend we’re eating healthy on vacation. I know what’s for dinner tonight!
A day at the mall
The day finally arrived! Our big trip to Destiny USA! We had a little time to kill in the morning so Eve took a swim.
A pre-mall swim.
At the mall. First things first, the ropes course! The moment Lex has been eagerly awaiting for the last five months!
Harnesses on!
Here they go!
Turns out it was a little scary! Look at that serious face!
While Lex and Alan did the ropes course, Eve and I went to Build-A-Bear, the thing Eve has been eagerly awaiting. She saved up all her money to buy this bear and some clothes.
Stuffing the new bear.
They had a whole rack of Girl Scout clothes you could buy for your bear, including GS undies! I was amused, but we didn’t buy any.
Eve and Chocolate, her new teddy bear.
Rosy joined us at this point and we headed back to the ropes course to check on Alan and Lex. They were having a blast!!
Having fun.
Such concentration! This one had no railings, just the tether to hang on to.
So high!!
This one made Alan say “whee!” The beams swayed as he walked over them!
These boys survived the ropes course!! And LOVED it!
We had lunch at the food court, then headed for the carousel.
Fun on the ponies.
Then right back upstairs for the Mirror Maze. We went through a bunch of times and loved every time. The place makes me laugh and smile the whole time. It was crowded this time, which introduces a new kind of fun to the experience.
Selfie in the Mirror Maze.
Eve
Lex
This is what Alan has been eagerly awaiting! Pole Position! He raced hard and was #1 in best lap time! They gave him a little award certificate and all. He LOVED it! :)
Alan is in car #18.
Coming around the corner.
After Pole Position we headed downstairs for glow in the dark mini-golf. It was an interesting experience and a tough course!
Lex putting. It was pretty dark in there!
Eve putting. She had the best shirt for black light fun! :)
By this time we were all really tired, so we headed to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory. Dinner was delicious, of course, and we were sure to save room for dessert!
I think this is the first time the kids have had cheesecake. Lex was slightly hesitant, but that piece was full of candy so he overcame his fear and dug in. If only everything new came coated in candy! :)
After dinner and dessert we did a little of this. Well, they did. There rest of us steeled ourselves for the cold air and drive home.
Goodbye Aunt Rosy! Thanks for spending the day at the mall with us! :)
Back at the hotel this was about all we could manage.
Now it is late and the morning will come early. It always does in a hotel. I am off to bed! Tomorrow is another busy day.
Ninja girl breaks a board
Today they had a “bring a buddy” event at karate. If you brought a buddy, you got to break a board at the end of class. Eve was pretty excited. She asked one of her friends to go and he was happy to give karate a try. At the end of class, she punched through a board! Afterwards one of the girls in the changing room commented on how Eve did a good job breaking the board. Eve told her it was easy, then the girl said it was easy if you have fists like Eve! She told Eve her fist went so fast it looked like a blur. I think that made Eve pretty proud. :)
Lex missed the event because he has volunteered to be on the stage crew for the 4th/5th play this week. He has two hours of practice every day after school. He’s pretty excited.
Happy Thanksgiving!
When I was taking the pictures off the camera for the holiday concert post, I realized I hadn’t taken the Thanksgiving pictures off yet either. Opps! So, here is a slightly belated Happy Thanksgiving post. :)
We had a great Thanksgiving this year. The weather forecasted a Nor’easter for Wednesday, so we decided at the last minute to drive Tuesday night. We packed up and headed out around 7pm, which ended up being great. The kids had some fun car time, then they fell asleep and Alan and I enjoyed some grown up time too.
At my parents house this year things were so calm. The kids and the dogs have all matured and gotten more comfortable with one another, so everyone enjoyed a calm, happy visit.
We enjoyed the first real snowfall of the season.
Eve in the snow. I love how the flash reflects off the snow flakes!
I do not love how I have no ability to remove redeye from my pictures. I need to figure out a new photo… process, I guess. The boy is kind of cute anyway. :)
Snowy devils
What’s vacation without a little iPad time, snuggly on the couch.
Eve was in charge of appetizers this year and did a phenomenal job of getting me and Rosy to do all the work. She’s tricky like that!
I realize I don’t have many pictures on my camera. I take fewer and fewer with my camera these days because the quality isn’t as good. Pictures on my phone come out better, usually, but I can’t save/store them like I can with my camera pictures. Alan promised to help me come up with a solution to this first world problem. In the meantime, lots of my phone pictures end up on Instagram… also down the side of this page. :)
Holiday Concert
The kids had their holiday concert this evening. I always enjoy seeing all the kids. I miss being at school every day. :) Eve was over the moon excited about this event. She has been singing and dancing and talking about it non-stop. She even asked for a new outfit, which I bought for her, and it’s been hanging in her room all week, tempting her. Tonight she finally got to put it on!! :)
Lex, on the other hand, was doing great until last night when he suddenly decided he was too nervous and wouldn’t participate. We had a nice chat last night and he came up with a plan to talk to his music teacher at the dress rehearsal. I reminded him that she is a professional performer and might have some advice about stage fright. He asked me to email her too, so I sent her a heads up that he would be asking for advice. He came home today feeling good and ready… almost. The solution they came up with was reserved front row seats (ended up being second row, but I’m not complaining!) for us and if Lex got too nervous he could leave the risers and join us in the audience. He liked the plan, but ended up too nervous to even get on the risers. I feel so bad for him and his fears. His classmates were encouraging (he had trouble in the dress rehearsal and at last year’s concert, so they know about fears) and the teachers were encouraging, but he couldn’t do it. He ended up sitting with us and enjoying the show from the audience. We all enjoyed Eve’s enthusiasm!
Can you find Eve?
Dancing girl!
Just a little wound up after the concert.
Pure silliness.
Who’s that girl with the curly curls?!
Probably no one is interested, but here are the three songs Eve sang. I love watching her and her classmates.
Happy Holidays!