Christmas 2014

Christmas 2014 is almost in the books now. It seemed like an eventful month, but in retrospect they all seem that way. The girls got to pick their own dresses this year. They've been wearing this and last year's dress every week since Thanksgiving, they really enjoy them.

Both girls had Christmas concerts this year. Abby got to play the maracas in hers and Nora was about the only kid in pre-school who had all the words and motions down. Nora made sure to practice her songs to and from school every day.

They also had a great time at the church's Christmas pajama party this year.

After Nora's birthday we made our annual trip to visit Santa. I think Nora is still a little unsure about the whole Santa thing, at least she didn't hide this year.

(Yes, Mrs. Claus is texting)

Christmas Eve we took the girls to their first Christmas Eve service. It was a little long for them, but they were duly impressed with holding candles and singing silent night. Christmas morning was a blur. This year they spent some of their allowance money on presents for each other, it was fun to see them really experience the giving side of Christmas.

Nora's Birthday

Nora J turned 5 this year, this was probably the first year she really had a hard time waiting for her birthday. I've lost track of how many times she asked if her birthday was tomorrow.

On the eventful day Abby woke Nora up at 6:00, the earliest they're allowed to be up, to be the first to say, 'Happy Birthday!'.  Nora brought Hello Kitty cupcakes to preschool, the kind with a ring on top, and she received several rousing renditions of Happy Birthday!

After dinner we opened a few presents. Nora's favorite was a large stuffed Elsa doll from Abby. Nora has barely let it out of her sight since, Abby knows her sister.

On Saturday we had Nora's party, she requested a rainbow themed party. There were rainbow necklaces, pin-the-cloud on the rainbow, a musical rainbow walk, rainbow favors, and one awesome rainbow cake.

Nora had an awesome day, best birthday yet she said.

Thanksgiving 2014

It seems like we haven't posted much recently for Thanksgiving. I don't have a lot to add this year, but there were a few things I'd like to remember. For the second or third year running we made a thankfulness tree at home. Each night we wrote something we're thankful for on a leaf and added it to the tree. Personally, I'm very thankful for the time and effort Kristin puts into cultivating grateful hearts in our girls.

It's always interesting to see what sort of things the girls are thankful for. We get a few high-brow leaves like: laughter, being 4, my sister, etc. Several more funny ones like: having a lot of tickets, tv, and puns. The majority of our thankfulness involves food though: chocolate, chocolate frosting, candy corn, chocolate frosted candy corn ... I suppose it's obvious we did this after dessert.

We also visited Dr. Howard at lunch for the first grade lunch feast. The girls loved it.

After the feast we drove to Grandpa and Grandma VanDuyne's and had Thanksgiving with Great-Grandpa and Great-Grandma Oxenrider. I don't have any pictures of that but I know others do.

Per tradition when we got home we all put up the tree. Saturday was unseasonably warm so we all worked together on the outside decorations. The Christmas season is officially on us now.