Pre-Christmas Happenings

 

Here are the kiddos posing by one of the trees at Disneyland.

We have been having a lot of fun getting ready for Christmas.  Kara and Eddie kicked off the month of December with their first Daddy-Daughter dance.  Kara was really excited for it, and I had fun doing her hair. 

I think Eddie was a little disappointed that Kara ditched him to go dance with her friends.  She's only 7 and already Daddy is not cool enough. 

Kara is part of the Kids Choir at our church.  For Christmas, they put on a production called, "Dude, You Hear What I Hear?"  It was a cute story about the real meaning of Christmas.  Kara sang with the choir, and also go to portray Mary in the Nativity Scene.

The story takes place in a store where a little girl gets left behind overnight, the mannequins come to life, and she teaches them the real meaning of Christmas.  Then they make a Nativity Scene.  Here they are dressing Kara up as Mary.

There's Mary and Joseph. 

Take a bow!

Not far from our house is a cul-de-sac they call "Candy Cane Lane" around here.  All the houses are decked out with displays covering their yard.  I only had my phone so my pictures didn't come out very well but I had to post this one of Blake.  He almost looks like he is glowing.  He's covered in fake snow.  Some of the houses had snow machines atop their displays...it smelled like soap. 

Thanksgiving

This year was my first time to make the complete Thanksgiving meal.  I really enjoyed it.  Everything turned out delicious, just how I like it!

 I was so happy with how the table looked, I had to take a picture.  Kara and Blake made napkin holders.

The girls put on aprons and helped me in the kitchen.  I wish I had a picture of that!  I did manage to get a picture of my little man next to our bird, and the nice towel he made for us at school.

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We really missed our annual trip to Kansas City to see extended family and friends, so to soften the blow, we went to the beach.  When in California....

This time we went to a hotspot for surfers, it was a sight to see for this Kansas girl.  The kids went right to the sand and had a blast.

 

We also got our tree up and had our annual tree decorating and egg nog.  We even convinced Blake to drink some.

Roller Skating

Lately, the Saturday morning ritual around here includes roller skating lessons for the kids.  We found this place in Fountain Valley, and it is seriously like walking back in time when you walk inside.  I got some skates and gave it a whirl the first time we went, and let me tell you, it's not as easy as it used to be.  I was working pretty hard to not make a fool of myself.  Of course Eddie was perched on the sidelines with the camera, waiting to catch me.  I think the kids have had 4 lessons now, and they can both skate better than me for sure. 

Blake's 6th Birthday

 Blake's Birthday sure was a blast.  Kids should always have their birthdays on Saturdays, it was a day of non-stop fun.  We started our day with some shopping at Downtown Disney and a trip to Ridemakerz.  I've decided this is like the American Girl store, but for boys.

Blake and his grin.  He won't smile because he doesn't want to show how many teeth he is missing.

It's kind of like Build-A-Bear with cars.  You pick a basic car, and then there are thousands of different accessories you can get with it, and you can make it a remote control car if you wish.

Once you pick everything out, then you actually have to put the car together.  Here he is working on it.  

And there it is, the finished product.  He chose a Camaro.  I don't know why.  Maybe it's because there are two guys on our street with black Camaros he thinks are pretty cool.  This is on cool car.  It has lights, makes noise, and goes way to fast....

Camaro complete we headed to the ESPN Zone for some games.  

Leah made sure to get in on the fun.

Here he is trying out his new Rockboard scooter.  This kid is a rocking machine.  He figured it out in a flash and is really enjoying racing it up and down the streeet.  He also got a good dose of Legos and some Beyblades to keep him busy until Christmas.

 

 

 
Blake discovered he loves Almond Joy bars at Halloween, so I made him Almond Joy cupcakes complete with Almond Joy footballs for decorations.  I tried to get him to put on a shirt for the picture, but he refused.  These days he thinks shirts are optional clothing...we are working on it.  

Halloween 2011

We celebrated Halloween at "Blocktober" a huge block party at Saddleback Church.  It was like trick or treating and going to the biggest carnival all in one.  The kids got loads of candy.  So much they complained their bags were too heavy.  They had fun getting their faces painted, playing carnival games and doing the inflatables.  I didn't get many pictures because I was too busy keeping up with everybody.  But here's a few!

Eddie got in on the fun for the pie eating contest.  Blake won :)

The Santa Monica Pier

On a sunny southern California day, we visited the Santa Monica Pier!  Here are the kids and the view looking out towards the end of the pier.

Here are my girls in their shades strutting their stuff on the pier.  Notice Leah has her purse. 

The kids got in on the action with this performer in the middle of the pier.  I say PARTY you say TIME....PARTY TIME!  It was too funny!

Here we are at the end of the pier looking back at the beach. 

There is an arcade and an amusement park on the pier.  Of course we couldn't pass up the arcade.  Does this look like the machine from BIG?  We thought so, so we tried it.  Turns out Eddie and Blake did not switch places.

Kara hit the 1000 ticket jackpot.  She was so excited.  It took a long time for the machine to spit out 1000 tickets.  And then she did something very surprising...she used the tickets to get a prize for Blake!

Also at the pier was a little aquarium.  The kids had fun seeing some of the sea creatures up close.

And they got to touch some too.

We finished up the trip with a ride on a really old carousel and ice cream drinks from the old time soda fountain.  It was a fun day, we are enjoying discovering California!

Happy Halloween!

I made cookies!

It's been awhile, let's catch up!

So I see it's been over a month since my last post.  Sorry!  We have been crazy busy with school and just still getting used to things out here.  Today's post will include some of the random goings-on of the past month or so. 

Kara has loads and loads of homework.  Last year, she loved homework.  She couldn't wait to get home and get it all done.  This year, she just wants to be done so she can go out and play.  There's something about the beautiful weather here...the kids never want to be inside...they are always outside playing as long as they are allowed.  But this is Kara for two hours Monday-Thursday:

Leah is getting so big.  She does a pretty good scrunch face, just like Kara did.  I had to take a picture of her playing with these two toy phones.  The big Care Bear phone was Kara's when she was this age, and the little iphone look alike came with one of Leah's toys.  It just cracks me up how even the toy phones have gotten smaller.

Blake is playing flag football.  He likes it.  We toss the ball around a lot at home too.  Leah says TOUCHDOWN!

Kara's favorite thing to do outside is roller skate.  She and a friend have also invented their own sport "Scooter Skating"

Back to flag football.  Here's a few pics of the little man doing his thing: