Catching up . . . on January

Can you tell that work has been very busy? It seems that I am now months behind on the blog. Here's my attampt to catch up on a few highlights. . .

January was cold and one thing that occupied our time was Girl Scout Cookies. I am the "cookie mom" for Katie's Daisy Scout troop and she was eager to get out (or get on the phone to sell cookies). She boldly announced to her troop that she was going to sell the 2000 boxes necessary to earn a "free" iPod Touch. Thank goodness we didn't get there! The troop sold about 900 boxes total and that was plenty for us to deal with!


The red note here marks another "first" in Katie's life- first forgery. Hmm . . . there doesn't seem to be a slot in the baby book for this one. A red card represents a "challenging" day at school and must be returned the next day signed by the parent. This photo shows Katie's attempt at "signing" my name. Not surprisingly, her teacher detected that this was fraudulent. I must say Jamie was quite proud of her "cleverness."

As January dragged on, we were looking more and more forward to our trip to Florida. Here the girls are trying on some new beachy gear.

Caroline got to attend her first Indian Princesses event and joined Jamie and Katie for a roller skating party. No one was happier than me, who had a quiet afternoon at home! Both girls loved it and I think it used up a lot of energy.

The girls do a pretty nice job of getting up and entertaining each other on weekend mornings. Here they gathered all available pillows and made a big nest for themselves.

Our Super Bowl party was a big hit. We decided to play a game and have prizes with it, so shortly before the kickoff, we ran to Target and split up to find prizes for each other. Working in pairs we managed to find some fun little treats, many of which were perfect for the trip to Florida. If the score didn't work out to give everyone a prize Jamie was very good and making the girls think it had.

Here's Lily enjoying her view of the snow.

Just before we left for Florida, Caroline celebrated her 1/2 birthday (with cupcakes) and was so pleased to tell us how big she is now. She said to me "Mommy, where did your little girl go?"

More January

We continue to slog along through this gray part of the year, which makes us really look forward to our upcoming trip to Florida!

There haven't been a lot of photo opps as we hibernate in our house. Caroline keeps quite busy in the "baby doll room." Here she is rocking both of her babies after finishing her pretend sweeping. The babies keep her quite busy for long periods of time, which is delightful and we love listening in on the pretend conversations that occur between her and whoever she is calling on her toy cell phone.

Our neighbors got a new dog, so Lily is pleased to have a friend next door again.

Katie and Caroline continue to enjoy playing gymnastics and no one's been injured yet!

This week at school Katie is the "star of the week" which means that she got to make a poster about herself and she takes a special show and tell item each day. This photo was one we had to take to add to her poster in the "interests" section. We know that Katie will enjoy being the star!

New Posts Below

Please note that I have finally caught up with our Christmas and Christmas break photos, so scroll back to see some new posts!

January Blahs

We are trying to beat the January "blahs" by keeping busy with fun activities. We had some snow last week, which meant one day there was no bussing, another there was a 2-hour delay and another day there was no school. It was a lot for us to keep up with and juggle schedules around, but Katie loved it. She spent one morning with Jamie at the office. She got picked up at school another day, which gives her more time at home and She had Friday off entirely, so she got to play in the snow and do some sledding.

Katie officially started her gymnastics classes last week and seemed to like her class and made a few friends. I think it will be a good way to channel her energy!

As soon as she got home from her class, she asked Caroline if she would like to learn gymnastics and went and found one of her old leotards (or onesie, as she called it!) to give her. Caroline was delighted to put on the "ballerina costume" and Katie helped her with some tumbling while Jamie and I made dinner. Thankfully, no one was injured!

On Saturday, Jamie and Katie had an Indian Princesses activity at the Air Force Museum. They had a scavenger hunt throughout the space and it sounded like fun.


On Sunday afternoon we went ice skating with our friends Ricia, Scott and Griffin. The whole way there Caroline kept asking "But how do you ice skate?" Here she is ready to go, but quite disturbed that she can't walk normally.

Jamie got the kids "walkers" which helped him manage all three on the ice. Katie quickly decided to take off and skate around the full rink, while Griffin and Caroline stayed closer to Jamie in the center. Ricia braved the ice, but Scott and I stayed on land to man the off-ice area.

After about 20 minutes Griffin and Caroline decided that it was break time and wanted their skates off. Jamie continued to work with Katie a little bit and then we retired to the lounge that overlooks the rink and had some hot chocolate while the kids ran around and played some video games.

Wasn't this a great attempt at a cute photo of the three of them?

Katie's 6th Birthday Party

We're a bit behind on getting the many Christmas photos and pre-Christmas photos up, but I thought I would jump in with our most recent event- Katie's 6th birthday party which was a fake sleepover (the girls came in PJs and brought sleeping bags, but went home at 9 pm). Since Katie and I were off all week, we spent lots of time picking out decorations and favors. Here's Katie assembling the favors- breakfast items for the next morning in a cereal bowl with a straw and a little personalized travel case. Katie loved these polka dot napkins, so we made that our theme and she was very enthusiastic about picking out the decor. Katie thought of a way that everything we saw on our errands that day could be incorporated into her party- including a ugly chef's hat with a pizza on top that she thought I should wear to serve dinner (I did not agree to that one)!

Jamie took Caroline to dinner and a movie, so once they were gone, Katie and I set and decorated the table and got to work on the crazy string game (more on that later). We were racing to get everything done before the guests arrived!

Once the girls showed up, it was super silly time and Katie had them running all over the house, giggling and telling secrets. Here they are claiming their slots for the toenail painting game.

Thankfully, I thought to snap a photo of the group before the fun (and messes) began. These are all kindergarten friends and most are in Katie's Daisty Scout troop.

First we had pizza, and once the first girl asked for pepperoni, they all had to have pepperoni. There were many funny stories told at the table and Katie seems to relish being the "class clown" and was full of crazy antics.

When it was cake time, Katie had all the girls stand up on their chairs to sing to her and then later proceeded to paint her chin with chocolate frosting to make a funny beard, which delighted her friends.

After dinner and cake, we proceeded to the string maze game where the girls had to follow a piece of yarn all over our house to find a prize. It took Katie and me about 30 minutes to get all the yarn strung around (which became more and more difficult as we got more and more string up). It was fun, but we ended up cutting a lot of the strings to make it a little easier for the girls.

Once the girls found their prize of a flashlight, we got to work decorating them with paint pens.

Then we proceeded to the toenail polish game, where I spun different colored bottles of nailpolish to determine who got what color. The game started out this way and quickly became a free for all so that each girl could have a full rainbow painted on her toes.

While the polish was drying, Katie opened her gifts and then we moved on to some karaoke.

The karaoke mainly consisted of Taylor Swift songs and was pretty funny. I will add some video of that later.

Following the singing, the girls got some popcorn and candy and settled in for a movie (Hannah Montana). Except for a few spilled drinks, this was the best part of the party for me!

As the parents began to arrive to pick up the girls, Jamie and Caroline returned home, and Caroline quickly saw an opportunity to help herself to some candy while no one was paying attention!

By the time we got Katie settled and to bed, it was 10 o'clock, so while it was a "fake sleepover" we still had a really tired 6-year old today.

The girls enjoyed their junky party favor breakfast and new cereal bowls this morning and then Katie kept busy for the rest of the day with her new gifts (many of which were of a crafty nature) and making pom poms from all the extra yarn we have from the string game!

It was a fun party and Katie had a blast, but it was very loud and messy . . . of course what did I expect combining 5/6-year olds with frosting, ice cream, nail polish, paint pens and popcorn! Here's the video of thr karaoke:

Christmas Vacation

All of the family departed Saturday morning, so we began the process of getting things back in order and finding a home for all of the new toys.

That afternoon after rest time, we finally got to work decorating the gingerbread village, and since there were five little houses, we each got to work on a house.



I was smart to by extra candy because what they provide in the kit is barely enough to decorate- let alone snack, and I will admit that there was a lot of chewing happening around the table. Unfortunately you can't see it in this photo, but one of my favorite parts of our village was the fish pond that came about because Caroline was eating Goldfish crackers. We made some blue icing and released some fish!

That evening, we debuted our new popcorn popper (thank you Johnny and Suzie!) and the girls new sleeping bags and settled in to watch Dog Hotel. It was fun, but Caroline has a hard time not talking!

Katie spent a lot of time working on her new crafts, particularly making potholders. Here she is showing off her first complete one.

Here's Caroline wearing her cute new outfit from Great Grammy and Great Poppy in Canada and eating some Necco wafers from her stocking.

Katie models her new had and scarf from Aunt Suzie. It looks great with her coat!

Katie and I were both off between Christmas and New Year's, but Jamie worked and Caroline had preschool. Katie and I spent a lot of our time shopping and preparing for her birthday party.

We finally got the snow that we had been waiting for on Monday and Jamie came home from work early and we went sledding with the new sleds.

For the most part we stayed in our front yard, so Lily could be out with us, but then we went down to a slightly bigger hill at the park.

Finally, it was time for hot cocoa!

Katie's favorite part about the break was staying in her pajamas until as late as possible. And, here she is with another potholder!

Here is Katie following her haircut- we chopped off 5+ inches!

We spent New Year's Eve with some friends at their house. Here the girls wear their paper crowns from the "firecrackers."

Caroline, as always, was very interested in their baby sister, Josie.

We celebrated "midnight" at about 9:27 and then got the kids home to bed.

We had a quiet New Year's Day, but went out to lunch and then had a nice dinner capped off with the first products from Katie's Easy Bake Oven for dessert. She had been dying to bake with it, but we had a surplus of baked goods in our house, so I suggested a special New Year's dessert.

Look at tha lightbulb shining! Here's Katie ready to put the cake in.

I love this photo. It really sums up the plight of the little sister who has to stand by and watch as Katie frosts her cake.

But, alas, she gets her moment! She gets to lick the crumbs from the pan.

Here is Katie posing with her two beautiful cakes. One came out hard like a hockey puck and the other was have raw and we had to send it back for some more wattage exposure!

Since the pieces were teeny tiny, we served them on our tea party "china" to make it feel more special and important.

Here is Caroline enjoying her "tea." Jamie told her to drink with her pinky out to be fancy and this was her interpretation of that. A classic moment!