Christmas!

Stuart and I live in a small home that Stuart remodeled in the first couple years of our marriage. We moved into it when Blaire was 9 months old. When I say small, I mean small. The house is about 950 square feet with 2 bedrooms. The house is adorable and Stuart worked so hard to bring it back from a very dilapidated state.

While my house is small, I do love it. However, I was wishing for a couple of hundred extra square feet over the holidays. But, we made due and enjoyed every minute of it. The kids all crashed in Blaire and Presleigh's room which was interesting at times and Jenna and Pobzeb slept on an air mattress in our living room. The kids wen to bed and the "adults" stayed up way to late playing games and watching movies. It really was a great time of fellowship.

As is tradition we let the kids open up a gift on Christmas Eve. Sheryl, my mother-in-law took care of this. All the kids got a gift to open and inside each present were the most adorable Christmas PJs for the kids to wear, with Santa socks and Santa hats. The kids loved them and you couldn't ask for cuter pictures. We dressed them in their pj's and sent them off to dream land so we could play Santa for the kids.

Of course, the kids woke us up the next morning. Well, I needed a shower and wanted to get semi ready for the day before we opened up gifts. So the kids were "locked" into the girls bedroom until we were ready for them to come out. It was fun really "torturing" them as we had been "tortured" as children eagerly anticipating the gifts that Santa had brought. Jenna and I reminisced briefly about sitting at the top of our stairs in our childhood home waiting for our parents to give us the OK to FINALLY go down to see what wonderful gifts Santa had brought us.

When we were ready, we let the kids out of the room, all of them clad in their matching pj's. They ran into the living room and were thrilled with their stocking stuffers and their Santa gifts. Blaire had been asking for a Jewelry box and of course Santa had come through.

I look forward to many more Christmas' such as this. It was wonderful to watch the kids experience the magic of Christmas and continue to learn about the reason for the season which is the birth of Christ!

"Nutcracker"

Better late than never, but, as I mentioned before Blaire started taking ballet. It took her a bit to adjust to the whole idea of going to a class and following directions. She has had to learn to pay attention. While it seems that she isn't learning anything during the class, she comes home and shows us all of her new moves. The first part of the year her class was preparing for the Nutcracker Ballet. Her class was to be the "Teeny Tiny Fairies".

So we went each week and they learned their dance. Of course the average age of the girls in this class is 4 so you can imagine some of the interpretation taken by each girl. But, by the night of the performance the girls new most of the steps. So all that was left was hair, makeup, a teeny tiny fairy costume and wait to see what they do onstage.

Well, my little Blaire has a bit of a shy side(not a trait she gets from me) and so as I expected she stood onstage with her fingers in her mouth. But, there were no tears and she even thought about doing some of the steps to her dance. Her dad and I were so proud and made sure to present her with flowers as is tradition. We are looking forward to the spring recital!

Note: We are going through a bit of a "I don't want my picture taken stage" so this is the best I could get!

Missing Papa and Grandma Jill!

I promised to get a picture for Papa Tom and Grandm Jill in the sweet outfits they got for the kids. They were so cute. Hopefully next year we will get a chance to open gifts together! We missed you Dad and Jill!

Presleigh is 10 months old!

Presleigh is now 10 months old. It is hard to believe that in 2 short months we will be celebrating a year with this little girl. Stuart and I speak often of how blessed we feel with our girls. God created each of them so uniquely and it has been fun to watch them both grow through the stages.

Presleigh is beginning to communicate with words and sign. She says "mama", "dada", "bye bye" and "more" in sign language. She babbles all the time and has so much to say. She looks at me and tells me whole stories in baby talk. It is too cute!

She isn't crawling traditionally but she army crawls quite proficiently. She makes her way around the house in nothing flat and keeps both Stuart and I on our toes. I catch her often crawling into her and Blaire's bedroom and try to play with Blaire. Blaire tries to let her play but gets frustrated with her when she gets into her stuff.

Presleigh at her 9 month appt was 17lbs 8oz, and 27 inches long which landed her on the small side of the growth scale. While the doctor did mention that she is small he wasn't concerned in the least. She looks good and is as happy as it gets. She has let me keep her a baby a little bit longer and I am enjoying that.

Decorating Cookies!

As is tradition in our house we decorated Christmas cookies, or well we put frosting on cookies. As I have mention in previous posts my sister and brother-in-law moved to Colorado Springs and so they were able to come to our house for Christmas. So all the cousins were together this year to docorate cookies. We had so much fun!

When setting out to decorate cookies with two preschoolers, a toddler and a 10 month old you must be prepared for the licking of spoons, sprinkles sprinkled directly into the mouth, frosting on the table, bellies, hair and face and you get the idea. The kids had a great time and we did manage to get a few cute cookies out of the whole ordeal and of course we had to top it off with a bathtub full of cousins!