Happy Christmas Day!

 

That is what Claire was saying all day. She insisted on us saying Christmas Day and not just Christmas.

We had a wonderful Christmas. Meema and Boopa came to visit, which is always fun. Both kids were really into Christmas this year and we had such a fun time leading up to the big day. First the kids helped me decorate some sugar cookies. They actually did pretty well and only licked their knives once or twice (those cookies stayed with us).

 

Christmas Eve was filled with decorating more cookies and building gingerbread houses. We learned that it is quite difficult to build gingerbread houses without the right amount of icing to reinforce the walls.

   

The final products. Claire’s fell about halfway through. I didn’t do the best job with reinforcing the walls. Both kids then spent the next few days picking apart the candy.

 

Christmas morning was nice and long. The kids took awhile to open their presents. Thankfully, both kids slept and didn’t wake us up super early.

        

Claire was very excited to get roller skates and spent the day practicing outside while Henry enjoyed brushing the mane on Claire’s horse. Silly guy.

Paul and I escaped to Asheville for a couple of days and went to the Biltmore Estate. It was stunning and a wonderful, recharging trip.

We hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and has a happy New Year. 2013 has been a great year for us and we are looking forward to a busy 2014!

Sing(or dance) your heart out!

 

This week Claire and Henry had their Christmas programs at school. It was so cute. In all the past years Claire did not sing at all. This year she sang and was so happy. Henry didn’t really sing, but he danced away. This kid loves to dance!

 

 

The Happenings

 

Paul’s been really bothering me to do an update on the kids so here it goes! (I really think he should do one…)

Claire:

• Such an imagination. Every day we have a new pretend dog or cat as our pet. The names change daily. The pets get in trouble with the Christmas tree, barking, and jumping. It’s pretty cute. Henry gets in on the pretend play as well.
• Calendars. She loves playing with her calendar and figuring out the date, how many days until an event, and looking at all the birthdays. She is a big helper with the Christmas countdown. Surprise, surprise.
• A little writer. Making lists and practicing her letters. Claire is always asking how to spell something or what do certain letters make. She has written out her Christmas list, mine, and Henry’s.
• We went to the annual Christmas in Davidson last weekend. There is a horse drawn carriage ride we went on. Claire’s face was lit up the whole time. I don’t think she stopped smiling. It was so fun to see. Henry thought it was his personal parade and said, “HI!!” and waved to every person we passed.
• She loves drawing pictures for all her friends and doing her “homework” for school. She is becoming such a big kid.

Henry:

• Big news: he’s in a big boy bed! Yay! But also pretty sad for Mommy and Daddy. He’s done pretty well so far and is so proud. We decided to switch because 1) he is approaching 40lbs and 2) last weekend he and Claire decided to push his crib to a chair to climb in and play. Once a child can move a crib around a room I think it’s time to move to a bed.
• His name for Claire is hilarious. It sounds like, “Ha” but imagine it kind of nasally and almost like a honk. We love it. Claire answers like it’s no big deal although she does ask why he doesn’t just say Claire.
• He loves playing with his friend, Grady. Whenever I pick him up from school or after swim lessons(his friend is in both), he says, “I play Grady”.  So cute. I call them double trouble at swim lessons because they are the only ones in the class.
• He is our sensitive little guy. When Claire gets in trouble she pushes her limits when you are disciplining her; Henry just breaks down and cries. He then asks to sit on the couch with you and cuddle. I feel bad that he gets sad but man, can that kid throw a ball hard and far. I’m surprised he hasn’t broken more things in our house.
• Speaking of ball, that is both of the kids’ favorite game when Paul is home. They sit on the top of the stairs and throw balls back and forth for at least an hour sometimes. Thankfully my picture frames have withstood a few hits.
• Such a dancer. He will dance to any music, anytime, anywhere.

 

Christmas has been such a fun experience with them this year. We caved in and did Elf on the Shelf. Mixed feelings on that one, but the kids enjoy it. Her name is Sparkle Heart and Claire informed me when she arrived that she is pretend. Oh well. It’s the game of it that I enjoy. So far she has hung from our blinds, chandelier, and Claire’s stocking. We are beginning to run out of ideas…

Claire is star of the week and last weekend we had Toby the Tiger as our visitor. Here a few cute pictures of them.

 

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope everyone had a nice, relaxing day. We had planned on heading up to Maryland to visit family, but decided to stay home after the weather seemed questionable. It was a good thing we did because poor Claire finally came down with the cold Henry has been trying to recover from. She was up all night Wednesday/Thursday coughing. It was a quiet day with lots of TV yesterday and today. The kids this year enjoyed watching the Macy’s parade and seeing some of their favorite characters. I decided to make some food and Claire helped me bake Wednesday before I knew she was getting sick.

 

Since I thought we would be gone this weekend, I told Claire we could decorate for Christmas in the house. Most of the house was decorated last weekend except our tree, which goes against me believing no Christmas until after Thanksgiving. But, the kids were excited to decorate. Today Paul took down the tree from the attic. I still can’t get over having a fake one, the Oregon girl in me weeps. The kids were helpful for about 10 minutes until they decided to do something more fun.

Since it’s been a few weeks, here are a few more photos of what we’ve been up to.

Leaves, leaves, and more leaves:

I finally went to a local farm near us that sells amazing food (bacon, cheddar biscuits…yummy!). Claire helped me make breakfast one morning:

 

We hope you all have a relaxing weekend before the craziness of Christmas comes! Also, GO DUCKS!

Little Bakers

Both kids are sick right now. Henry has croup and Claire just a nagging cough. We spent the day at home and after about four hours the kids get restless. So do I. After Henry woke up I decided to bake with them. Normally, all Claire wants to do is eat the sugar and Henry follows her lead. Today, with my encouragement they just mixed similar ingredients to what I was making. It was a lot of fun.

The final product:

I’ll let you figure out who made what one! (Final product is a chocolate chip pumpkin bread)