55 degrees?!

55 degrees in Iowa on December 30? And there's snow on the ground? Why sure, we'll go outside to play in the soggy mess for an hour even though the girls just got out of the bathtub!

What did we do for an hour, you ask? Why, we...

...played on the snowpile by our house

...threw snowballs by the bank (Note: Laura threw it. It's headed away from her, not toward her.) 

...made little snowpiles on the sidewalk "so there's enough for everybody" 

...looked ornery 

...threw snowballs at Daddy's office (and marvelled at how green the grass is)

...played on the snowpile across from our house 

...enjoyed the sunshine 

...each did our own thing 

...made footprints 

...threw more snowballs (Note: Laura threw this one also. She's not trying to catch it.) 

...smiled a lot 

...undid the face part of those baths that had just happened 

...tobogganned on our tummies, face first

...tobogganned on our tummies, feet first 

...played so very happily while Mommy played with her new camera for an hour 

...thanked God for the blessing of such a wonderfully warm day to play outside.

Merry KissMoose

On our ride to Chad's parents' house for Christmas, things were going awry with sleepiness and (lack of) contentedness with being in the van so long. So we pulled off at a rest area so I could talk to Laura and give her a hug and kiss. Kendra said she wanted a hug and kiss also. She then remembered that if she puckers her lips as soon as I give her a kiss, then I can't resist giving her another one. This went on for probably 2 minutes with her re-puckering every time I gave her a kiss. I told her that we'd never get there if she kept making kiss faces at me. Somehow, the kiss face turned into a reindeer kiss face. And, thus, the face in the first picture came into being -- for several, several miles. But that face didn't end once we reached our destination. Instead, it became contagious, and therefore the second picture. I couldn't help but smile, laugh, and of course kiss my reindeers every time they did this. I even still got a reindeer kiss at bedtime tonight, 3 days later.

Merry KissMoose (or, rather, Reindeer)!

Licensed character everything

While shopping for Christmas presents, I noticed that nearly everything out there has a licensed character on it. And most of them are Disney.

But, really, Disney Breathe Right strips? This seems to be taking things way too far.

No, wait. Those aren't Breathe Right strips.

Those are sock stickers and goofy kids.

Phew. At least it's just their socks (and toys and books and jammies and underwear and plates and vitamins) that are licensed by Disney now.

Baby (chair) feet

When we had our floors finished, we tried felt feet on the bottom of our dining room chairs. Those didn't seem to be like a good option for our floor, so we tried the plastic gliders. They work pretty well, but they were starting to scratch some as they got crumbs stuck underneath them.

A few months ago, I saw that my aunt had chair socks for their dining room chairs. They were like little old men socks, dark brown socks for their chair feet. Fun idea, but rather spendy in my opinion.

Then a couple of weeks ago, I decided that chair socks were looking like a good option for our chairs. I looked online at chair socks and still thought they were expensive. I looked at crochet patterns for making my own, but I figured they'd just join the ever-growing pile of unfinished projects. So I looked for a less expensive, less time-consuming option. And ... voila!

Baby socks!
$3.14 for three pair, not $1 per sock.

5 minutes to decide which packs to get, not 20 minutes per sock to make them.

And they're cute.

And colorful. 

And did I mention cute? 

Christmas'd out

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas

from our family to yours!

Winter wonderland

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas outside.

Or it started to last night while we were
dreaming of a winter wonderland.

So today, on this snowy day before celebrating our Savior's birth,

I'll leave you with a picture of the snowmen

that were in our house earlier this week. 

Merry Christmas Eve!

One down, one to go

I made a hat.

It was a little big on Laura.

But it was a great size for an adult. 

And super cozy warm. 

Now I'll just have to make one for me since I gave this one away.

Hip hip hooray!

When Mommy and Daddy announce that we're

going to have our Christmas early -- like, right now

instead of on Christmas.

Update: Since Laura keeps looking at this picture and saying, "It's me crying", I thought I should clarify that she is not crying. She is cheering and "hooray"ing in this picture.

Christmas carol conundrum

Tonight was the first night that Laura has asked for Silent Night for her bedtime song. It's not the first night she's wanted that song; she wants it nearly every night lately. But it's the first time she's asked for it by name. Prior to tonight, she was asking for it as "the rags song". I'm stumped as to why. Do you know why?

It's a start in the right direction at least

Evan's prayer at bedtime tonight:
"Help us remember that Christmas isn't about presents. And it isn't about Santa. But that it's about you sending us your son Jesus. And help us get really good presents. And help us have time to play on a snow pile. The one at preschool would be best. It's ginormous. Amen."

Tis the season

Tis the season!

The season for...

...wrapping presents

...mailing cards

...wondering if I'll ever be a Christmas cookie maker

...feeling behind on everyday life

...watching snowflakes fall

...reading and rereading the story of Jesus' birth

...making lists for what to take where on which day

...reminding the kids (and ourselves) that it isn't all about presents

...Christmas programs

...pretty clothes for the program performer

...and everyday crazy outfits for the non-performer 

Enjoy the season!

Their church Christmas program

To the grandpa and grandma who can't make it to

Evan and Kendra's church Christmas program this year,

Here is a home performance,

complete with hot chocolate mustaches.

P.S. Hopefully for the real program

Kendra's performance will be of equal caliber to this one,

and Evan will have a more acceptable stage presence.

Merry Christmas!

While I'm bragging anyway

While I'm already bragging about Kendra from supper last night and her declaration that she'll try vegetables, I thought I might as well go ahead and brag about her from this morning also.

I went to town with the girls to get groceries. Kendra asked if she could do "Evan's job", which is to hold the grocery list, read to me what's next, and sometimes have the pen and cross of what we've already put in the cart (he likes adding things to the list so he doesn't always get to have control of the pen). I reminded her that Evan's job was reading the list to me, and I asked her if she can read. "Yep."

So to town we went. Kendra got to do "Evan's job", and lo and behold, the kid can read! I had figured she could read more than she was letting us know, but I wasn't sure how much. In order to not be misleading, she wasn't whipping right through the list like she's been reading her whole life. But she was sounding out the words letter by letter and figuring out most of them. I was so excited and so proud!

Good job, Kendra!

Later, when I was telling Chad about Kendra's grocery store reading success, Laura piped up with, "I'm learning my letters too!" Then she told me the letters that she can recognize.

I love that our kids are excited about learning!

We're making this public

No no no, it's not some big announcement.
Well, it kind of is. But not in the way some of you were probably thinking.
The announcement I'm making public tonight is that Kendra said the following:
"I'll try a bite of any vegetable except green beans. I won't try a bite of that. But any other vegetables I will. But not green beans."
I questioned this to make sure. "If I made carrots, you'd try a little bite?" "Yep." "And if I made mashed potatoes, you'd try a bite?" "Yep." "And corn too?" "Yep." "But not green beans?" "No, not green beans. I won't try them."
I proceeded to tell her again the story of the baby Kendra who I couldn't ever find a bedtime snack for, and who would eat a can of green beans for her bedtime snack. After the retelling of that story, she said that she would try green beans also, but she's the only one who knows what size the bite needs to be so she gets to cut it herself. I'm ok with that.
So, there. It's blogally (which I'm sure is a word) official. Kendra's going to try vegetables. WOO HOO!!!!

And in related news:
--I made teriyaki chicken the other night, which is newsworthy all on its own since I'm historically scared of undercooking chicken so I avoid making it. But, the actual newsworthy part is that Kendra ate it! Her bites were dinky, but she had 5 or 6 bites. That's HUGE! And, she said that she wanted a little bite of chicken everyday so she would learn to like it. No way! That's great! So, Chad cut up the little piece of chicken that was left into little tiny bites, and I give her one every day. And she eats it happily. This is HUGE, folks! HUGE!
--While we're on Kendra'as food successes, I'll go on to tell about supper tonight. On a whim, the supper plan changed to Hamburger Pie as I was walking into the kitchen. I'd never made it. None of us had every tried it. Normally a meal like this would end in Evan trying a bite and most likely saying it wasn't good (it did look a little odd), Kendra refusing to try it, and Laura following Kendra's lead. But, instead, everyone tried it, and everyone ate it. Again, HUGE, folks! Enormously huge news!

Can you tell I'm excited? I'm nearly swooning with how proud of Kendra I am...

Appeasing the masses*

This photo is to appease the masses* who said they were disappointed that there wasn't a new blog post up this morning.

*In reality, I have very few blog readers, so "the masses" really just means "Chad". I love you, Sweetie! Thank you for reading my blog!

Laura's 3rd birthday (day 2)

My birthday (day 2)

by Laura

The part of my birthday that happened after I was in bed

was that my grandpa and grandma came to our house

for the weekend.

So, the next morning when I got up,

I put on another "Laura outfit"

and started day 2 of my 3rd birthday.

We had my baby cake since I fell asleep

at cake-time on my real birthday.

I got to lick the frosting off the pacifier. 

Then I opened presents.

This one was cool (it's a Lego Advent calendar). 

But Evan kind of took it over.

So I opened this huge present. 

It's a trampoline! 

I tried it out right away. 

Then I let Daddy and Grandpa put it together. 

It took them a loooong time, 

so Grandma read to us,

and I practiced my contortioning.

(Mommy says it's fun to make up words.) 

Then I got my first turn on the trampoline!

It was a great day with great presents!

Catch ya on the flip side!

Laura's 3rd birthday (a few days ago)

My 3rd birthday

by Laura

I started my day with a snuggle from Mommy,

and then Daddy,

and then Kendra.

I was very excited about my birthday! 

And I wore what Mommy calls "a typical Laura outfit". 

I chose cinnamon rolls for breakfast.

And I got presents too! 

This is my "I'm 3" smile.

Mommy says I should point out that I'm still a goofball

even though I'm 3 now.

I got glue sticks! I was very excited! 

I also got to have my very first bubble bath.

I thought it was pretty cool.

After my chosen lunch of meatballs, we went to Pella.

I got to ride in Evan's seat.

And Kendra and I decided to hold each other's ears on the way.

We only made it half a block though. 

But we did make it the whole way playing our new favorite game.

It's called "hills",

and how you play is that everytime you go down a hill,

you yell "aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa" the whole way down.

Sometimes there was flat land for a tenth of a mile,

so we'd change to playing "trees".

Mommy said you should be able to guess how that game goes. 

I wanted a "baby cake" again this year.

Mommy's happy she kept her note of how to make

flesh-colored frosting. 

Later, Mommy read to us. 

I don't know how the story ended. 

But Mommy says she enjoyed the snuggle. 

A lot. 

She said she reminisced about 3 years ago today. 

And how we snuggled for 24 hours straight. 

Then she passed me off to Daddy so he could have a turn. 

I didn't notice. 

But after a while, everyone woke me up so we could have

living room supper.

Pizza and  Dora movie. My choice again. 

That was the end of my great day.

Happy birthday to me!