Theme Night: Book Club

It feels like it has been way too long since we've had theme night.  With all the holiday craziness, who has time for anything else?  But now that Richard is back in school and we see him less and less, hopefully we can start putting more of these together to spend some good time with him. Kenna has recently flip-flopped and overnight it seemed like she went from not wanting to look at a book for more than 10 seconds, to wanting to read all day, every day.  It's super fun for me and I love this new stage! So we decided to do a theme that she would love- books!  We all put on our pajamas and built a fort in the living room. 

Then we told the girls about our favorite books and brought all of their favorite books to read by flashlight in our fort. 

It was a little snug, but we all fit in! As Kaylee would say, "one big happily family!"

After hearing about Richard's favorite book, Don Quijote, Richard and Kaylee decided they would act it out and took their "swords" to defeat the "mighty beast" who had overtaken our living room (aka our fort).  I got a great video, but Richard might kill me if I actually show it...so here is the only picture I took.

If you're thinking right now that Richard is a huge nerd, don't worry. That's exactly what I thought too :) But at least he and Kaylee had fun vanquishing their pretend foes.  Nothing better than a night together as a family!

First Snowman

After being super spoiled last year with a fantastic winter, we actually had some snow this year!  Which I actually love... the first time it happens.  Then I am ok with it not happening again until next year. But it was fun to watch Kaylee play in it this year.  As long as it's not TOO cold and windy (I think she is even more wimpy than I am) she loves to be out in it.  And she was finally able to build her very first snowman with Daddy.  

See?  There are a few good things about winter.

Jinxed?

(Please excuse my sentimentalism in the following post) 

I am not a very superstitious person, but I swear I am jinxed.  Because whenever I tell someone that my kids are doing really good (or sometimes really bad) at something, all of the sudden they flip and do the complete opposite. So I am sure that I will really be regretting this post because it will make my children become monsters tomorrow....but I just had to do it anyway.  You know those moms who talk about how they wish they could freeze time for every new stage their kid is in?  I've never really been one of those because I love seeing what's coming next, the new things they are learning and saying and how happy they make me.  But right now, I wish I could spend my eternity just the way it is.  My kids are both in the best stage ever right now- they are listening so good, they're both super polite, they play good together (and are starting to actually play together without me!), they both are on really good sleep schedules, Kaylee is potty trained, McKenna is no longer nursing, and both of them can make me laugh like nobody else can.  We just have SO MUCH FUN together!!!!  Tonight I watched them play and just smiled.  Don't you love those moments?  I hope by the time my kids are grown, someone invents the time machine because if I have the choice, I will come back to these last two weeks over and over and over again.  I am so lucky.

Christmas in Indiana

Ok, I now have to eat my words a little bit. Remember my last post about Indiana where I talked about how ghetto it was and how much I didn't like the children's museum?  Well, I have to take that all back now (or maybe just some of it...) because this trip we actually saw a really nice area of Indianapolis (so I know some good parts exist) and we went back to the children's museum and had a BLAST.  Apparently last time we went to the two most boring parts :)  Needless, to say, our Christmas in Indiana was SO MUCH FUN!  We were even planning on leaving the day after Christmas but because there was a gigantic storm that day, we ended up staying for two more days of crazy fun.  (Although I think the kids had had enough of each other by that point!) .  How can you not have fun when you are surrounded by these four crazy kiddos??

Most of the festivities I did not get a picture of....but the few that I did include a nativity where Kaylee got to be Mary and was SO sweet and cute with the baby. She got very solemn when it started and seemed to take her role very seriously.  What a sweetheart!

Richard stepped in to be Joseph when the original decided at the last minute he wanted no part in the nativity.

Opening LOTS of presents, of course

Playing dress up (we need to work a little bit on her fashion sense I suppose...)

And, as I mentioned, going to the Children's Museum.   

I wish I had taken pictures of all the other fun stuff we did, like all the Christmas crafts we did, the nativity scavenger hunt we set up for the kids, or the kids decorating the Christmas tree by shoving ALL the ornaments into one tiny spot...but all I can say is that we had a great time! Thanks for letting us raid your house and eat all your food Holly and Chase!

Clothes-A-Holic

I think we are in big trouble with this little one- she already adores clothes!  Whenever she sees me getting her shoes she giggles and immediately sits down and puts her foot in the air for me to put her shoe on.  And if she sees clothes laying around, she hands them to me and sits down, then looks at me expectantly as if to say, "Well?  Aren't you going to put them on?"  And if I don't, you better believe she protests very LOUDLY until I do it!  After getting her in her jammies the other night, she got into one of Kaylee's drawers and handed me pair after pair of pants. I actually managed to get FIVE bottoms on her before I had to tell her I couldn't do anymore.  Here she is with her pajama bottoms, tights, two pairs of pants and a skirt.

 She was super happy and wandered around for a long time with all of those layers on, but I had to draw the line at actually letting her go to bed with all of them on.  I'm a little nervous for her teenage years...

Sibling Fun

We were SO lucky to not only have one, but TWO of my siblings come visit me last week.  At the same time!  For the first (and possibly last) time there were more siblings here than in Utah.  It was a good feeling :)  And this was probably the most fun week I have had in a LONG time. Nothing beats quality time with my brother and sister! Too bad it has to end.  Scott flew in on Thursday and that night we went to German Village. 

  Can I just say that I LOVE watching Scott talk to new people?!  He is the most friendly person you will ever meet and he will talk to anyone and everyone.  Not only does he put a smile on the face of everyone he meets but they leave with a great impression of Utah and hopefully they will remember that for the future. I could go on and on about how awesome my brother is...but that's not the point of this post.  We did take him to our awesome bookstore but mostly just tried lots of German goodies, including, but not limited to, the pig's ear (these are just the English nicknames. I can't remember any of the German names...), 

 the elephant's ear

and the mountaintop, which was the most disgusting thing I've ever tasted (why didn't I take a picture of it?? I need to go back just to get evidence of this disgusting treat to make sure no one ever tries it again).  You know that smell that hits you when you walk past a nail salon in the mall?  It tasted like that.  I'm not sure if it was supposed to...maybe someone was doing their nails while baking the goodies that day?  Anyway, don't ever try it.

The next day we took Scott to the zoo.  Poor Scott had Kaylee attached to him at the hip all day and ended up carrying her everywhere. Another reason he is the best uncle ever!  

That night Holly got in and we went out to eat and then all went to Jeni's Ice Cream.  This place has all kinds of crazy ingredients in their ice cream like sweet potatoes, corn, and goat cheese. We made sure to sample all the gross sounding ones but then ordered more normal flavors to enjoy :)

The next day we saw Santa at Home Depot 

and went to an Aquarium store for a little bit.  Then while I stayed home for Madeline's nap, everyone else went to the Central Ohio Fire Museum.  The kids had a BLAST and it sounded pretty awesome but apparently it was extremely small for the price you pay.  So the adults weren't quite as happy as the kids. Kaylee got to dress up like a mini-fireman, 

slide down a pole, 

and play in the front of a real firetruck.

Kenna wasn't quite as thrilled with her fireman gear but looked just as adorable!

Scott and I walked across the street to get us some delicious Indian food for dinner and we had a surprise visit from Holly's husband, who was just passing through on his way back home from Philadelphia.  A very full and fun house!  We were very sad to see Scott go the next morning but Holly stuck around for a few more days.  Unfortunately, McKenna got pretty sick so we didn't do anything on Monday except decorate my house for Christmas and Tuesday we went back to the zoo but I forgot my camera so I have no proof of that.  Oh and we also blackmailed my nephew by getting him in one of our princess dresses.  Sad to say, he made a very beautiful princess!  I can't even tell you how much I am looking forward to showing him this picture when he's older....

It was seriously the best week and I was so sad to see all our visitors leave.  We need to make sure this happens more often!  Thanks for an amazing trip Scott and Holly!

Baby Girl Turns One!

I think it's great when people put so much work into their kid's birthday parties.  And it makes me pretty envious...but at the same time I've never felt the need to do that for a kid who doesn't understand what's going on.  So that combined with my laziness kept McKenna's birthday very very simple this year :)  Apart from opening her presents,

and helping Daddy put them together, 

all we did was get a GIGANTIC chocolate cake. It reminded me a little of the cake scene from Matilda.  (not that my child reminds me of that boy at all, just the enormity of the cake, ha ha). So, ok, the cake was mostly for us...but at least she enjoyed it too!  This little girl loves food so much that I thought she would be going to town on her cake.  Instead she was very careful and very deliberate in making sure that every single little tiny piece ended up in her mouth.  

We finally had to take her piece away because I didn't actually think she would eat the whole thing.  Even though it was very simple and short, we were very happy to celebrate having this amazing little girl in our lives!  She has definitely changed us for the better.