Christmas festivities

We have had a lot of fun so far this December. The girls have had a lot of fun at their school. Ava and Allie both had their Christmas parties on the Thursday before break. Then on Friday, they had a big cultural diversity day where parents came in and shared different things about their heritage. The girls were able to taste food from different countries and learn about different customs.

 

We had a Christmas party and cookie exchange with our mom's group. We started off at a nursing home where we had the kids sing to the residents, then pass out Christmas cards. Then we went back to my house for a potluck lunch and cookie exchange. The house was packed full!

This past Sunday, we continued our tradition of making cookies houses at Grandma Epley's house. The kids had a great time!

Joseph and Mike made their own version of a cookie mansion.

Chris did too!

 

 

It's been a busy month! The girls are singing at Church this afternoon for Christmas Eve. Then tomorrow we will spend the day with the Epleys for Christmas!

 

Merry Christmas everyone!



Christmas Decor

As is my custom every year, I have to blog about our Christmas decor. I love Christmas decorations. I think it's because two of my favorite colors are red and green, so how could I not?

 

 

This year, the girls and I had a fun time decorating the tree while watching the movie Elf, which might have to be a new tradition for us. We love that movie.

 

Merry Christmas Season everyone!

 

The exterior of our house is still being renovated so we had to make shift some Christmas lights on the window! I love the way it looks through the curtains.

 

The girls put our old Christmas tree in their room and decorated it all by themselves.

 

Excuse the construction! We took out the double doors in our living room and put this window in. So it's still being worked on.

 

Our family calendar even got a little festive flair!

 

Ava drew this greeting on our snowman! I forgot to tell her to correct "Merry."



Thanksgiving

 Happy Thanksgiving! It's the holiday season! I can officially start listening to Christmas music. Thanksgiving is over and it's on to Christmas. We put up all our decorations today!

 

We had a great couple days for Thanksgiving. Yes we broke it up this year, which was awesome. Thursday, we spent the day with the Ross side of the family at my house. And Friday we went to the Epleys and stuffed ourselves with another Thanksgiving dinner. It actually was very nice not having to go to two different places on the same day.

 

My mom cooked the turkey for the Ross dinner and Tara and I helped out with the sides. It was a fun day. I think the Lions won. Wahoo. Yeah, I don't really care. The kids played all day. We ate a delicious meal, the played a lively game of poker. Mike took first and I took third. I love taking money from my family:)

 

During dinner, everyone told two things that they were grateful for. No one could repeat something that another person had already said! Our responses were pretty clever!

 

After dinner, I forced everyone to gather for a group picture. And not only that, but I forced them twice, because the first few, Brian was missing!

 

I'm very blessed to have a family that gets along!

 

Friday we went over to Joe and Kathy's and had another great meal! This was the only picture I got, on my phone, so it's not that great. And once again, I FORCED everyone to get into a group shot. People really do appreciate it after the fact though...at least that's what I'm telling myself.

 

It was a great couple of days! I really do have so much to be thankful for. God is amazing and continues to allow me to see how he works in and through our family. Even in trials, there is much to be grateful for.



November so far

Something happens in the Fall, with the position of the sun coming up just in the right spot over the water. We get a sun rise like this almost every morning, just in the fall. I LOVE IT!

 

Ava is a reader! I love to read so it warms my heart when I see this!



 

Mike has been diligently plugging away at the exterior of our house! It's looking so good. But he has so much more to do. He is SO Busy right now too, which is a huge blessing, but it also means less work here. But that's ok! We'll be here a while so it doesn't matter how long it takes.

 

Allie is the best little helper. Mike loves that she likes to sit out with him. Sometimes she helps, other times she sits by him and plays on the ipad. Either way, he loves having her out there with him!

 

More to come soon!



Halloween

I love Halloween! I love how excited the girls get about getting dressed up and getting free candy! We had a few different options this year for trick-or-treating, but we decided to head out to our friends' house in Davisburg. But first, we had some fun activities in the morning!

 

Hannah and I went with Jackie and her boys to a nursing home in Waterford. The residents lined up in the hallways and let the kids walk through and get candy! It rained all day on Halloween so for Hannah to be able to stay dry, and trick-or-treat, was super cool.

 

 

Hannah filled up her pumpkin bucket with candy. She was very excited.

 

 In the afternoon, we drove over to the girls' school to watch their Halloween parade, and I was able to help out at Allie's party.

 

Principal Carlin dress up as a penguin:

 

 

I saw a couple costumes like this. They cracked me up!

 

 

Ava didn't really know what she wanted to be this year, so we sort of dug through our dress up clothes and she came up with this cat outfit!

 

 

With the mask, that she painted all by herself!

 

 

Parent fail moment for Allie: The kindergartners do a nursery rhyme unit in the beginning of the year, which ends with a nursery rhyme party on Halloween. So everyone in Kindergarten is asked to dress up as a nursery rhyme character. We went to Marshall's and found this adorable Little Red Riding Hood costume and I thought "this is perfect!" Only to realize later that LRRH wasn't a nursery rhyme, it was a fairy tale. Oh well, she looked super cute!

 

 

Papa and grandma came to watch the parade, then lovingly took their tired granddaughter home with them so I could help with Allie's class!

 

I was able to run to the opposite end of the school, where Ava's class is, and snap some pictures of her party going on!

Despite the rain, the weather was actually decent. It was nice that it was warm out. So at about 6, we took off trick-or-treating! The kids had a great time, and even Hannah did well. The second half of the neighborhood, she rode in the wagon between houses.

 

Hannah filled up her bucket again! And Ava and Allie both got a ton of candy as well. What a fun time of year! We're looking forward to the rest of the holidays too!