ice skating

This time of year at Ella's school is Ice skating time.  The kids all get to walk up to the ice skating rink and show off their skills.  Ella is still in the learning phase of it all.  She tries very hard.  She only fell one time while I was watching her skate.  I love the gusto Ella has for life and her willingness to keep trying things that are difficult for her.

The Minivan Express

I saw on pinterest how this mom printed off these tickets for her kids and took the kids outside and watched The Polar Express inside their van for a FHE activity.  I thought that it looked fun but I edited the activity a little bit.  Instead of watching the movie we went to look at Christmas lights. 

I had all of the kids dress in their pajamas and meet me upstairs.  When they came up I gave them a ticket, a cup of Hot Chocolate, and a popcorn ball.  We all loaded up into the van and went for a drive.  We drove around the Chugiak area and found several fun yard displays.  It was a nice way to start the week off.

Tyler's first band concert

Tyler had his first band concert this month.  He plays the percussion instruments.  He is one of only about 6 kids that have taken and graduated from the bells to other percussion instruments.  During the concert he played the bells, the xylophone, the base drum, the snare drum, and the sleigh bells.

He sure looked sharp in his concert attire. 

At the beginning of the concert the kids went over all of the stuff that they had learned in class and by the end they were playing the songs that they had learned.  I am quite impressed with how far Tyler has come in band and all of the things that he is able to play now.

Modge Podge of things

I have been lucky enough to babysit little Ryker and Ruby a few times lately.  The kids love when these two come over and fight over who is going to get to hold Ryker and help Ruby.  I must say these two are awfully spoiled when they come over.

Natalie had her Christmas concert for band.  I really enjoy going and hearing her perform.

My two "puppies" are patiently waiting to have treats.  Ella is going to eat her cookie while Pretzel get to have a dog bone.

It is extremely cold outside in the mornings while we await the bus.  It snowed the day before so Ella was entertaining herself by jumping off of the rock that is in the front yard.

Ruby was hiding behind my curtain in the living room.  Because it is so dry outside her hair because extra staticy.

My buddy Ryker and I.  I have him in the front carrier so that I can get some things done around the house.  He fell asleep like 5 minutes after I took this picture.

I threw a cookie exchange party at my house on the 15th of December this year.  I had a huge turnout.  There were 18 ladies that came.  There was a raffle and everything.  Below is a picture of the goodies I gave as the ladies left the house.  A good time was had by all.  Plates and plates of cookies were distributed.  And tons of laughs were had.

My mantel decorated for Christmas.  

It's gingerbread house decorating time

It has become quite the tradition in my house to make gingerbread houses.  For the last several years we have done this.  Last year The Fisher's came over to decorate and this the The Fisher's (for the last time here in Alaska anyway) and The Murphy's did.  I was really excited because I bought a mold for the houses this year.  It made it a lot easier to put together but it was a lot more time consuming.  

Nate would shave off the corners to make them more even.  Then he would glue them.  I piped the edging on all of them.

The kids really enjoy decorating the houses and spending time with their friends while doing this.

Paige was so cute.  The first thing she did was walk over to the table, climb onto a chair, and take a huge handful of the candy which she immediately shoved into her mouth.

Matt and Emma working on Emma's house.  For the most part the kids can do all of it themselves because I have already assembled the houses.

Katie and Ella took the most time to decorate their houses.  The also put the most candy on their houses.

Enoche was just happy that there was another boy to play with.

Ruby helped David and Marissa decorate the house.  By help I mean would try to eat all of the candy before they could put it on the house.

Nichole kept to herself in the corner of the room.  Natalie didn't want to participate so she had to stay downstairs.

Marissa and JulieAnne brought all of the candy.  There was so much candy. 

It wouldn't be gingerbread house decorating without Matt putting his finger up his nose!

These two girls are the funniest little things.  They sat on my stairs and ate their candy and talked to each other for like 20 minutes.  Which is a long time for them to stay still.

Ruby liked to wear this bowl as her hat and brought down Ella's chair which her and Ruby fought over the whole time.

Marissa and Dave with their white trash Gingerbread house.  Notice it is missing some tiles on the roof.  That is also a cage with fighting dogs in it.  The grass inside the cage is yellow because the dog pee killed it.

The kids with all of their gingerbread house creations!  They all did such a great job.  A lot of fun was had that day!

Nichole with her tree.  I think she picked the best candy to put on hers.

Oh Christmas Tree Oh Christmas Tree

Usually the day after Thanksgiving we put up our tree.  This year on that day I was at the Nutcracker so we didn't get to put it up then.  We didn't get to put it up the day after that either.  We finally got around to putting it up the Sunday after Thanksgiving.  We bought this tree on the Day after Christmas 3 years ago.  We are not so impressed with it.  It is very slender.  We like big fat trees.  But we are settling for this one this year until we can find a better one.  It is really easy to put together though so that is a bonus.

Natalie and Ella spreading out all of the branches.

Tyler pitching in to help.  That is the first step to a nice looking tree.  Make sure that the branches are spread out.

Then as usual we went decoration wild.  We like hanging as many ornaments on it as humanly possible.  We like it to look very full.

When it was all done I had to get a photo of the kids around it.  Yes Natalie pushing it upward.  It liked to lean a little.

All of my kids liked to lay under the tree and look up at the lights.  They girls I guess are getting to big for that.  Thankfully Ella and Tyler aren't.