Friday, December 14, 2012

Visions of Sugar Plums...

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas around our house.  We have been enjoying Christmas music and the old Christmas cartoons at our house.  Tuesday night, we went to my dad's house for dinner and to make ginger bread houses.   The girls enjoyed decorating the houses with Grandpa...

... while Oliver enjoyed torturing the Christmas tree.
 On Wednesday, Melanie's preschool had their Christmas program.  Melanie was an Angel.


Melanie did an amazing job.  She had two lines:
"C is for Christ Child, born Christmas Day.  Asleep in a manger, a bed made of hay."
"O is for offerings from Wise Men, so divine, Myrrh from the forest and gold from the mine."
They also sang several beautiful songs to celebrate.  It was wonderful, and she did a great job.  I'm so proud of Melanie.

Thursday, December 6, 2012

The Things...

The things I catch the kids doing sometimes just makes me smile.  Monday morning, the girls decided to start wrapping presents for each other.  The girls got into my wrapping paper and tape, and went to town.  I didn't realize they took pictures as well until I uploaded pictures onto my computer today.  This was a fun reminder of their silly and fun personalities (here is one of many pictures that I found).

 You didn't know we lived underwater?  Neither did I... but I was wrong.  It's a good thing Melanie was prepared with goggles and swimming arms!
 Sunday morning was a good day for Santa Pancakes...
 And watching Noelle eat them was hilarious!  I'm not even sure how she got the strawberry jam *in* her nose.  In fact, I'm not sure I want to know! ha!
After being sick literally all week (Monday through Thursday) it was fun to see them at their goofy selves again this afternoon.  Noelle was having fun building tall tall towers out of dad's old QT cups.  And Melanie was excited for the photo opportunity.  We sent this one to dad at work!
 Melanie asked if she could go out back to play (also a good sign that she was feeling better).  I told her yes, but to get dressed.  She came back like this:
 It may be hard to see what the problem is...  look closely at her pants.  Yep!  Those are Oliver's pants.  They fit her just fine too, except the length was just not right.  Too long for shorts, too short for knicker bockers.
If you are wondering where Oliver is in all these pictures... well, he was in my arms.  My little man is extra snuggly when he is sick and has had a hard time letting me put him down.  So, when I do put him down, I see this:
In fact, he got that horrible scratch/bruise on his eye chasing after me when I put him down to clean up Melanie (while she was sick) this week. 
Let's just say, it has been an adventure. :)  Good thing we still have a lot of reasons to smile!  Happy Thursday!

Sunday, December 2, 2012

Oliver is 1

Oliver is one!  It's official!  Here is some fun facts about him:
He is 17 lbs, 4 ozs.
He can walk, run, climb, and giggle and do all these faster if he isn't suppose to be doing them.
Oliver loves sloppy joes, corn, beans, and fruit (lots and lots of fruit).
It seems his first word may be banana. 
He has 2 teeth with a bunch on the way.
Oliver refuses to wear shoes.  If I put some on his feet, he shakes his feet, one at a time, while screaming at his foot. 
Oliver is a huge mama's boy. 
I love my little man.  Happy birthday to him!

Sea World Anniversary Celebration

To celebrate 9 years since our family started, we decided to take a trip!  We surprised our kids with a little Sea World adventure.  We even left Oliver sit forward facing.  This was my view looking back at them.  What a fun group of kids I have.
 We did Sea World for 2 days.  The first of which was actually Oliver's birthday.  He LOVED it!  When we got there, this gentleman with a lizard came up to us and showed the kids his "pet".  He told us all about the animal and let the kids pet him.  It was really neat.
 The park was all decorated for the holidays.  They had an area where they made their own snow.  There was ice skating and snow ball fighting in this area (which we actually never visited).  They also had Christmas trees everywhere.  They were beautiful.
 You can't go to Sea World and not see the animals.  We LOVED watching the aquatic animals. 

 
 The sting rays were HUGE!  I think they were use to people feeding them because they would come right up to you.  Personally, I like looking at them more than touching them. Especially when they are so big.  The girls did pet them though.  Oliver preferred to watch.  He is his mom's son!
 See how big that sting ray is that they are standing next to...  That's how big some of them where in the pool.  Crazy, right?
 


The trip was a total success!  We all enjoyed so many things, it's hard to name them.  But, I think Melanie's favorite thing was the dolphins.  Noelle liked the whales.  Oliver seemed to like the fish.  Brandon and I loved the smiles!
Happy Anniversary to us!  (Our actual anniversary was on Thanksgiving this year, which was spent at the house.  It was nice to do something to celebrate though.)

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Mantenance MalFunction

So... apparently I have some how hit the limit of "picture space" I am allowed.  I need to move them all about, do the hokey pokey and turn it all about... then I can update everyone on our fun San Diego trip that we just took, and also about my little man, who just had his 12 month wellness visit.  I'd like to include photos of all that, but Google isn't playing nice...

...  So just stay tuned...

Thursday, November 22, 2012

We are Thankful...

For New Adventures...
More information to follow later.  Happy Thanksgiving.

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Oliver is a Little Man

My little Man had a birthday party.  There was fun food and decorations.


 A photo booth with silly people.

 

 


 

Some of the people did even need props... just the chocolate from their cupcakes.

Speaking of cake, Oliver got one too...


 
And he liked it!  Happy Birthday, Oliver.