Love!

A visit to our wonderful friend Ms Cynthia's house!

How special would you feel with a welcome like this?

We had such a wonderful afternoon visiting and playing! Thanks for such a warm and welcoming afternoon. We love you!

Christmas 2013

Ahhh to look back in review of such a lovely Christmas! The activities started the night before with Church and a wonderful dinner at Tessa and Doh's house. The house was all quiet when Santa appeared at the door. There bells in the background and the children ran to the door. Sanat had arrived a tad bit early! He delivered a Mickey and a Minnie Mouse! We had some SUPER ecstatic children!

Tessa with all of her darlings!

We had a very late start to our list to Santa.... yes this could be very dangerous at the 10th hour of what she would like. I was able to steer her in the direction of items she wanted and I knew about. The only item she was insistent about was a "Big Allacorn!" I tried to explain to her that I was not even sure if Santa knew what an allacorn is (She claims it is a unicorn with wings... hmmm not sure on that one). She was so thankful that Santa was making another stop at our house and left him a big kiss with the letter.

We picked out some collards and an orange from Doh's garden along with an apple for the reindeer. We also left him a poppyseed roll made by Tessa because she was sure that a poppyseed roll would be at the top of Santa's list!

Two minutes after crawling into bed....

Assured the next morning that Santa indeed did love the poppyseed roll. He was so kind and even let her know that it was such a nice change from all the cookies that he receives.

Checking out the fire place the next morning for some signs of Santa...

Her excitement over her new Minnie scarf and hat and what she really wanted - her new RAINBOW LOOM! The loom takes me back to the friendship bracelets we used to make with embroidery floss. I sat with her and worked with her. 

Ul'Nanny and Trippy

Ul'Nanny and his Niece and Nephew

I mean is this guy a ham?? I promise I will keep this picture and pull it out at his rehearsal dinner someday!

Silly boy ready to wrap himself right up!

Daddy's very special present from my parents. A replica of a bone fish that he caught this fall int he Turks.

Yup... his first gun! It had to come from his Grandfather, Doh! It would only be fitting. This was a huge hit with the kids! I have head more pops over the last two days than you can imagine. 

And the girl is working some bracelets... that's what's up for Christmas day

So Ul'Nanny is the third generation owner now of the famous robe! Each year it gets passed down as a gag gift. Yup Ul'Nanny you're the lucky contestant! What began with Dad as the receiver has not been passed onto Don and now you!

A boy and his pop gun!

Yes Mommy it's time to relax with some warm hot chocolate, my fancy coat and my new pink boots in Tripp's new Mickey chair! She is a character!

And now look who is interested in the loom... yup, I told you it was addicting!

AND yes I was so exhausted Christmas night this was how I put my dear daughter to sleep - you got it   - in Tripp's 12-18 month jammies! Seriously! I never even noticed.... When she woke up the next morning she commented that something felt tight around her...

Wow! And that my friends spells an exhausted Mommy who has enjoyed with her family the Merriest of Christmases!

A night at Annie

My Mom, Dad and I took Juliette to see Annie tonight. It was SO wonderful and just a great production at Dock Street. Juliette was so into the production but exhaustion took over...

So off we go at intermission with a dead weight little girl in our arms!

A day for the Mommies to play at school

We had a play day in kindergarten today. The Mommies got to come and make gingerbread houses with the babies and listen to them sing. It was So much fun and and so nice to be part of a very special day.

Juliette and Maya making their houses

Juliette and her little friend Byars

Juliette and her class with a special prayer

A crown fit for a Princess, Queen and King

The art project of the evening tonight was handmade crowns for Juliette, Mommy and Daddy... in this picture below Juliette has included her crown, her castle which she is holding and her three dogs that belong to the palace which are stuck onto her ballet tutu...

Cheers to the King, The Queen and the Princess

"The Makers and the Takers"

In this world some are the "Makers" and some are the "Takers"...

We got a little taste of it today making cookies... Juliette worked diligently making the balls that needed to be chilled. Tripp helped himself to a ball just as fast as she could even make them. Now don't get me wrong she ate a ball or two... but there was no "taker" quite like Tripp.

Oh how she worked and rolled each ball out... you can see the little fuzz head making his way to the bowl...

and here he comes.... "But Tripp you can't eat this..."

"And Tripp Stodda is watching you!..."

But yet the taker was not worried in the least and was ready to dip his hand right back into the bowl!

Here I caught the "taker" right in the act - he pulled the stool over and piece by piece tried to rob the gingerbread of its beautiful decorations...

A hilarious afternoon ice skating

Juliette and I went to the Ice Palace for a birthday party today. I laughed SO hard with her that I was sure I was going to go flying on the ice. Okay let me just say that I by no means am some great skater... I am one of those that walk onto the ice and flop all over the place in the beginning. Juliette walks out there with me and insists that the walkers are for babies. She is grabbing onto me for dear life and we are both all over the ice! Finally I convinced her that a few laps with the walker would not be such a bad idea after all...

I am SHOCKED we made it out of there without any bumps or bruises... I have a feeling the two of us will be back! We had so many laughs and giggles!

The tree trimmings are complete...

We have been so busy having fun that we still as of this morning had not finished the final decorations of the tree. Since the tree was the largest ever, it took ALOT of lights and need I mention to you that I plugged too many of the lights in together and twice I was half way through lighting the tree and all the lights went out! I guarantee there was a minute or two when I thought the tree was going to be bare all season. Don said he liked the natural look... liking the natural look means make it easy and we won't have to do any work. All worked out though and with my assistants we completed the tree!

My one small assistant lives in his own world! He pulls out the swifter at any given moment and says "help"... why yes Trippy you are always helping Momma!

He then insists on climbing the step ladder to show me what an "ornament" looks like... kids can teach you oh so much!

Juliette showing one of her most special ornaments, a piece of pink candy. When Juliette was three and four years old, all she wanted from Santa was pink candy! 

After a lot of hard work and a lot of giggles we had success... well we had a tree done as done as it was going to get...

A super cute video of the kiddies working on the tree... Juliette in the video is sure that it is Christmas Eve... you may ask why? Because she is describing to you that "Stodda" her elf  FINALLY arrived! She knew she must finally have been good enough that the Elf was able to enter the house! I'm afraid too that she is not sure how long she can remain perfect so she is hoping that Christmas is just one day away...

And as if she did not have enough of decorating trees, we stopped by Tessa and Doh's house and Juliette helped Tessa finish her tree up...

The best Santa visit yet!

Leave it to wait until Don's office visit for the best Santa experience yet. Don's partner Dr. Cox is always Santa and let me tell you he makes the most amazing Santa. The beard and the mustache that you see in the picture is real! We were sure that Tripp was going to cry once again but he sat down and actually smiled immediately and did not want to leave Santa's lap!

Santa brought Tripp some matchbox cars and he brought Juliette a necklace making kit. They were most excited! 

Juliette paid a visit to her Daddy's office... I assured her she had a lot more studying to do and that she better forget this idea that kindergarten is SO hard... ha!

I assured Santa that we have all been good.... 

Juliette was thrilled to once again be talking to the jolly old man himself! As for Tripp, he was just happy to be sitting on this silly comfy old man...

Does this face look like someone has been naughty or nice?... well it changes each and every day...

The first multiple words came today...

It happened! Today Tripp looked at Tessa and said, "I see you..." As if I did not believe her he looked at me when I walked in the door to pick him up and said it once again to me!

Bouche de Noel

My Mom, and our dear friend Cynthia took a class through the French chocolate shop downtown and we made the Bouche de Noel which is the French Christmas log. We had so much fun and SO many laughs the whole evening.

Don and I ate our log and Mom's is in the freezer for Christmas dinner. It was such a wonderful evening of memories and learning something totally new!