december jam

this past week has been jam-packed with things going on. On top of everything, Kiersten has had croup and Evie has an upper respiratory infection. So that has not been the greatest, but they both have managed to stay mostly happy through the sick times. I think Kiersten is starting to be better. Today there was no vomiting or fever. Kara has been fine so far, and hopefully wont get sick at all.

Kara made Christmas suckers to share with her classmates. Kiersten got to help for the first time ever. She did better than I expected. Here they are enjoying some of them.
Evie is such a big girl. I have started her on fruits and veggies now. Here she is trying to use the spoon on her own, unsuccesfully. She has really started loving food, and tries to eat anything we eat while holding her. If we aren't holding her, and she sees us eating, she just lunges forward with her mouth open and a frantic look in her eyes.
this is how she looks when the food is gone and she's upset that I've stopped shoveling it in.

now that she's such a good sitter-upper, she doesn't have to take lay down baths anymore. She loves looking at herself in the mirror, and also splashing with her hands.

I like this one of her looking in the mirror.

she is getting around so well. I'd call it more of a wriggle than a crawl, though.

sometimes she likes sitting in the splits. She is so proud to be able to get into a sitting position all by herself. She beams with pride every time she does it. (which is like, 30 times a day)

you'd hardly know she was sick, if not for the running nose, horrible coughing and raspy breathing. she is still so happy.

Kiersten was no longer contagious as of friday, so she is happy to play with Evie again. I was trying to keep them away from each other as much as possible so Evie wouldn't get croup and end up even sicker than she is.

Kara's class Christmas party was friday. They did a singing and dancing performance for us. Kara is in the pink dress if you can't spot her.

They held up their books in front of their faces the whole time they were singing, but the words weren't even in the books. it was just pictures to remind them which song came next. I wish Kara hadn't held hers up the whole time. I took video, but only got a few glimpses of her face.

Mrs. Wright is always dressing up for holidays and the kids love it. She's a fun teacher.

Kiersten refused to wear her shoes because it was raining, so she insisted on her rain boots.

After the party, we drove up to meet Ben at Black Angus for his birthday dinner. We had several people come over to tell us they thought Evie was cute, and a few to tell us all the girls were cute.

When we got home, we let Ben open his birthday gift early. He went right upstairs to start playing it.

Today is Ben's 29th birthday. Every year after my birthday, I have a month of teasing to endure. He calls me an old lady and teases me about having robbed the cradle. Now he is 29 too, and the teasing will stop for another 11 months, until I turn 30. I'm sure that one will be extra fun for him. He dislikes cake, so I made him a birthday rice krispie treat. I could only find those 2 candles, so we decided each candle represents 14.5 years.

blowing out the candles. I hope his wish comes true!

It was taking too long to load the videos from Kara's christmas recital on here, but I did post them to facebook if you want to see.

Christmas stuff

Here are some pictures from Ben's Fidelity Christmas party. It was at a bowling alley.

Kara took most of the pictures. We ended up with a lot of candid ones, because I don't think everyone realized she was taking pictures. We also ended up with a lot of pictures of the other little kids, especially Nathan's little boys.

Kara bowled one time without the ramp, and dropped the ball. Then she sat on it as she tried to roll it forward.

this was right before Kiersten dropped the ball very near her toes.

Evie got held by lots of different people. It was nice to have my arms to myself for a change.

another wierd sleeping picture. This was on friday. She fell asleep in the car again on the way home from Kara's school. I sent her inside, and went back out for Evie. she didn't even make it to the couch. I did pick her up and put her on the couch after I took the picture.

the girls love hot chocolate with whipped cream and marshmallows.

Kara had a Christmas concert yesterday at the South park community center. Here she is with some of her friends from school before the performance.

Kiersten was more than a little jealous.

Kara and her friend, Gregorio. He was at her school last year too, so they are pretty good friends.

Once the show started, Kiersten cheered up. She was singing and dancing along with the kids.

Evie got all dressed up for the concert.

Kara's group during their ballet performance. We got better video than pictures during the dances, so I'll post that on here later.

Can you pick out Kara, the little cheeser?

It's been a pretty busy December so far. I am glad that I am completely done with shopping, wrapping, and shipping. So I am looking forward to the next few weeks of hanging out with the girls and doing more fun stuff. Kara has one more week of school, and then a Christmas party on Friday. I am looking forward to 2 weeks of not having to get all the girls ready and out the door in the mornings. It will be a nice break.

trimming the tree

First, I have to share this picture of the girls. They fell asleep on the way home from school friday. I always wake them up and send them into the house, but they decided to go right back to napping. I think Kara has outgrown her little pink couch... what do you think? little holiday crawler. I don't think I can call her an official crawler yet, but she can get around pretty well now.

Ben wanted it noted that he was singing black sabbath to Evie to get her smiling like that.

Ben took Kiersten on some errands saturday morning, so Kara and I decided to get started with the decorating. I had to run to walmart for some wall hooks, and forgot i had been christmas shopping early that morning. When I opened the back of the car to get Kara in, Kiersten's christmas present fell out and knocked her to the ground. I quickly explained that our neighbor left some presents in our car for her daughter's birthday, and sent Kara in the house to sit down and recover while I hid the gifts in the garage. when we went back out, she asked if she is gonna be invited to the fictitious birthday party. I told her I think it's just a family birthday party... I've asked her about it a few times since, and am convinced she sort of saw kiersten's gift, but didn't really know exactly what it is. She saw other boxes still in the car, but didn't see what they were. phew.

When Ben and Kiersten got home, we decorated the Christmas tree. I whined a lot about having to put those beads on. (just ask Ben) but it really didn't take too long.

Evie took a break for some baby food!

we went with our black and white decorations this year.

they did a pretty good job. Kara is tall enough this year, that I didn't have to rearrange the ornaments too much.

hanging the stockings!

for some reason, they always like hanging out under the tree.

Kiersten came home with suckers for her and Karalee.

Kara was excited to decorate this little tree. She remembered it from last year.

we found an unopened christmas cd that we must have bought on clearance after christmas last year. We put it on for the girls to dance to. They love having dance parties.

santa baby.

Ben, Kiersten, and Evie went to bed early, so Kara and I wrapped up a bunch of my jewelry boxes with left over wrapping paper scraps. We filled up this sleigh for a cute decoration. I knew there was a reason to keep every little box that I've ever gotten jewelry in. We did about half of them.

Kiersten already opened one, and was disappointed to find it empty. But better that, than opening the actual presents, I guess. Kara made that little Santa in the front at school last week.

Daisy's favorite hiding spot is back this year.