The Outcome Of My 2012 Predictions

Here's the predictions I made a year ago, and how they turned out:

1. Audra will be in kindergarten and will LOVE it. (True)
2. Claire will minimize her tantrums- only one a week instead of about 5 a day like it is now. (True- in many ways thanks to pre-school)

3. No visits to the ER. Hey, it worked last year- I'll try for another miracle this year. (True)

4. Healthy pregnancy with a perfectly healthy baby born in late May. Though we are scheduling a C-section, I am willing to bet I will go into labor before the C-section date and we will end up with an emergency c-section just like with Claire. (All true, except the baby came in mid-May, not late May)

5. We will have a baby girl. (we will know the answer to this pretty soon!). She will be VERY happy and an EASY baby- we deserve an easy baby the third time around. (TRUE- Thankfully!)

6. No big trips, because, well- we'll have a baby. (Not quite true because we did go to Utah- sans Ben- and I did take Camille to Utah for our roommate reunion. So while neither was a super big trip, but they were big enough!)

7. We will all be completely sick of political ads. (True)

8. I think the economy will pretty much stay the same. People keep talking doom and gloom (including myself), but the status quo keeps going, so I think it will continue to. Of course, it would be really nice if  more jobs were created and the unemployment rate went down, but I think things will pretty much be the same. (True)
9. I will can lots and lots of fruit this summer (I was just given over a hundred jars, a steam fruit canner, and several other supplies that I need to put to good use!) (Mostly True. I canned quite a bit, but certainly did not can over 100 jars)

10. I will be released from my current calling (assignment) at church and be put in the primary (kids classes) as one of two primary choristers. This is more of a hope- I got to lead music for senior primary before, and it is by far my favorite calling! (Though, Brittney, you are pretty awesome right now so they might not be willing to only let you do just junior or just senior primary. I can hope, though!) (True)
11. Ben will continue to be awesome at his work. (True- he was actually nominated for a couple of very prestigious trainings- we'll see if he gets it in a few months)

12. Life will continue to be good. Nothing extreme, just nice and simple.(True)

Happy New Year's!

We really don't do much for New Year's Eve. I'm sure we'll go to bed around 9:30 or 10 and get annoyed when fireworks wake us up at midnight.

But, tonight we decided to have a little celebration with the kids. The girls were excited, even though they don't really understand what "New Year's" is. Audra asked us if she gets presents.

We started off by playing 20 Questions. It is awesome playing 20 Questions with a 5-year-old. Audra's first question for Ben was, "Is it a type of Mermaid?"

 We got some poppers for the girls They LOVED them.

 Some Sparkling Cider

 Even Camille wanted some:

 Then the girls "decorated" with the confetti and poppers. They took it all very seriously:

Happy New Year's!

Top 12 of 2012

Wait, the year is over already?!? How did that happen?

Here's our top 12 Happenings of 2012:

12. We visited the Ice Castles in Silverthorne
11. We signed Claire up for a music class- she LOVED it and still sings some of the songs from the class
10. Audra started piano lessons- and she is doing well. She really seems to be catching on and enjoys learning how to play.
9. Ben and I went and saw Wicked
8. Audra started kindergarten
7. We decided to put Claire in pre-school (this turned out to be the best decision! It is night and day how her behavior has changed! I am so glad we did this!)
6. Ben and I went on an overnight anniversary trip to Estes Park
5.Without Ben, Audra, Claire, Ben's parents and I ventured to Utah so the girls could meet their great-grandpa and we could visit with family
4. We had lots of out of town guests come to visit!
3. We got a new roof- what a PAIN! I am glad it is over, but our new roof looks beautiful!
2. Audra and Claire having a camp out in the backyard with Dad

And, no surprise here, the absolute #1 BEST happening of 2012:

1. Welcoming Baby Camille into our family! 

Happy New Year's Eve!!!

(We told Audra today was a holiday and she asked us if she got presents. HA!)

Merry Christmas!

Christmas went off without a hitch this year. We had a great time. Mostly, I wanted to forget about the news and the pain and suffering in the world and concentrate on our family and the Savior. Mission accomplished!

 Here is Audra with the Pixie Spray that Santa got she and Claire:

 Both girls asked for Pixie Dust so they could fly. Santa tried to come through and provide the requested gift, but I guess he can't give Pixie Dust out. He left a note for the girls:

Dear Audra and Claire,

I know you wanted magic pixie dust so you could fly. Unfortunately, only fairies and reindeer can use pixie dust- that is a rule.

Instead of pixie dust, I hope you will like the pixie spray I am giving to you. Spray the pixie spray on and it will help you to run super fast.


Merry Christmas!

Love,
Santa

The girls excitedly tested the pixie spray out- and it worked! They do run super fast when they use the spray! Santa really did come through.

Here's some more pictures of our day:

 To see the happiness as evidenced on this face is the reason Santa works so hard:

 Claire helped Camille open her presents:

 Camille slept until 9, so we opened all the other gifts before she woke up. She made quite a haul for such a little baby!

 Here's Audra putting up her new glow in the dark stars (they were a HUGE hit, Dani-thank you!):

 Camille and I sporting our new Broncos gear (thank you Matt and Ilea!):

 Merry Christmas!

Audra's Class Party

On Thursday Audra had her holiday party. Her teacher allows Claire to come and participate, which is awesome. Claire LOVES being with the big kids, and they are all so nice to her. Camille now insists on only sleeping in her crib, so even though it was her naptime she was awake the whole time. Nevertheless, she was a perfect Christmas Angel for the party.

Can you tell they are excited?

 Claire takes her coloring VERY seriously. It can become a problem if you need to go somewhere while she is in the middle of a picture. For hours she will sit and color.

 No party is complete without goodies- and there were plenty!

 Audra with two of her besties- Isaac and Hannah.

 And here are some of Claire's masterpieces. She does pretty well considering she's only 3:

 And, with cold weather finally coming in, here's Camille bundled up.

Claire's Party

Claire's pre-school did a little Christmas performance today. It was very cute, though I'll let you watch Claire's reaction to being in front of a crowd in the below video:

(Claire is third from the left in the picture- the one with, you guessed it, the pink rain boots)

If nothing else, Claire is her own person- and we LOVE it (most days)!

The class (well, really just one boy in the class) sang 3 more songs. Sans Claire.

Teacher Gifts

I have seen a lot of teacher gift ideas on Pinterest. I eventually came up with this:

A Notepad

A Pack of pencils

Chocolate covered pretzel rods

A picture from either Audra or Claire

A note that says:

You're the WRITE teacher for me!

I tried not to do sweets, because I know teachers get a lot of them. I also know they get lots of candles. I wanted to give them something they would actually use, so school supplies seemed like a good idea.

Ben thought I was crazy. Apparently he had never heard of giving teacher gifts. That's no big deal, of course, every school has their own culture in regards to gifts.

But I have to ask. A poll of sorts. Do you remember giving gifts to your elementary school teachers growing up? Are you giving gifts now? What gift ideas did you come up with this year, or are you not doing gifts? I remember giving gifts as a kid and I remember the teacher opening the gifts in front of the class each year. Ben has no such memory.

There's no right or wrong answers, I just want to know if Ben is right and if I am, indeed, a little crazy.

Claire's Tree

Camille was not nearly as amused as Claire was at being turned into Claire's "tree." Claire didn't like it when I told her we had to turn Camille back into a baby.

Happy Holidays!

Seven Months

We might as well talk about something positive after the horrible day yesterday.

So I'll talk about this little pumpkin:

 I mean, really, how can you not smile when you see this happy face?

Or this, "Mom, I REALLY don't want to be doing this" face that she has here:

 Here she is showing off her almost crawling moves:

 Her " I MUST put this into my mouth" look:

 And another one of her just being as cute as can be:

I truly cannot describe how much JOY this girl brings into our lives. I love her so incredibly much!

This past month has definitely been one of achievements for Camille. Here are a few of her accomplishments:

• Eating solid foods. Oh, my does this girl LOVE solid foods! So far she has eaten yams, avocado, squash, bananas, and homemade rice cereal. She LOVES all of it, and has been known to cry when I try to nurse her because she wants to eat real food instead.
• Scooting all over the place. She can't crawl just yet (though I think that will come soon as evidenced by the photo above), but she is getting around. A favorite phrase for all of us is, "Where's Camille going?"
• Sitting up- for a minute or two at a time. If you remember, this is a concern. I have to be right next to her while she sits up because she will just suddenly fall over, but I think she is doing OK.
• I gave her a ball the other day and she didn't want to pick it up- she just wanted to kick it. Perhaps we have a future soccer player.
• Being unswaddled at night. This is very new, but a couple days ago she started rolling over at night and then crying for me to come turn her back over. With her arms swaddled, she couldn't roll back over on her own. So we have started not having her arms tucked in, and so far it seems to be OK.
• When music is playing she dances. Seriously. She moves her head really fast in a jerking motion. At first it really scared me, but then I realized she only does it when music is playing and I realized that she is dancing.
• Putting the binkie in her mouth by herself
• Rolling around while I try to change her diaper. She now has to have a toy in her hands or diaper-changing is difficult.
• She's still sleeping pretty well at night. She wakes up around 1:30 or 2, then wakes up around 7 for the day. I can handle that.
• She's about the happiest baby on the planet. In the last few days I have been a couple places where Camille was left on the floor to play. She played perfectly for a pretty long time and all the other moms just marveled at how well behaved she was.

It's hard to believe 7 months have passed and that there was ever a world without her. She is such a great addition to our family- we are very, very blessed.

Festivities!

Last night we decorated gingerbread houses. Not surprisingly, the kids were SO excited!

Once again we used a gingerbread village kit from Bed Bath and Beyond, and once again they were a great success. I know some of you have had problems with those kits, but I wonder if the problems come from the bigger houses, because the smaller ones work great? Just a thought.

You'll notice in these pictures that Audra was MUCH more willing to let me take pictures of her.

Then I need to tell a story of what happened on Friday at our church Christmas party.

The teenagers put on a little nativity story. Mary, Joseph, and Baby Jesus went up on stage. We were sitting in the back, and Claire said: "I want to go see Baby Jesus."

Audra and Claire went up to the stage while Ben and I stayed back. Soon we saw Claire's head pop up high above the stage. Audra was picking her up to get a better view. We see Claire's head pop up again. And again. Then, all the kids who were sitting nice watching the play got up so they could have a better view. It sounds bad, but it was really cute.

Then on the way home Claire started whimpering and said, "Mommy, I miss the Baby Jesus that wasn't real!" (it was a doll). Ben and I started chuckling and I told her she could name her doll at home Baby Jesus. It's not sacrilegious if it's a three year old who calls her doll Baby Jesus, right?

Young Rembrandt

Last week Audra's class had some guest teachers from a group called "Young Rembrandt." They are an after school program that helps kids learn art skills. Like so many other worthy programs, art was dropped from the school curriculum. In this picture, Audra drew a penguin (left) and a bear (right). I think she did quite well!

At some point I want to enroll her in this program. I really do think art is very important. I want to wait until Claire can also join, however. I feel bad always having Audra in programs and not Claire because Claire is too little. I don't think Audra will be too far behind in art if I wait a couple of years- even though she did LOVE drawing this picture and does love drawing. Ah, the decisions that must be made as parents!

Random Pictures

Here are a couple of random pictures from Ben's phone:

 Why do they smile for Ben but not for me???

 This isn't such a great picture, but I still like it because it reminds me of how much the kids are wanting to hear about Jesus and see Baby Jesus. They keep asking to see Baby Jesus. And when Easter is. They seem to want to skip over Christmas and go straight to Easter. Weird, I know.

Star Of the Week

Last week Audra was the "Star of the Week." That means she got to be the line leader all week, bring an item each day for show and tell, and make a poster telling about herself.

Audra took this very seriously. For weeks she talked about the poster. It was a BIG deal- for her. I'm not much of a poster person, so we did what we could.

 She chose all the pictures herself. She wanted one of her as a baby, her kindy picture, and a family picture. Then she had to have things that she liked: First on the list was a mermaid- she had to have that. Then princesses, butterflies, and kittens. She wanted a picture of her brushing Camille's hair, then she finished it off with a sign that said, "I like drawing" and a picture she drew.

Let the Holidays Begin!

The holidays are in full swing over here- minus the snow. Or cold weather in general. It has been incredibly warm, which probably is not such a good thing and may lead to a tough summer. But for now we will enjoy the beautiful December!

We found out the local high school was putting on a Christmas Kidfest so we loaded up the kids and headed to the school. It was fantastic! I believe this is something they do every year, and I hope it is because I want to make it a fun family tradition.

After teaching high school for so many years I learned something: There are a lot of kids with a lot of problems who do a lot of really bad things. But there are also amazing teenagers out there doing fantastic things and trying to make a positive difference in the world. Yesterday we got to see some of these positive and giving teenagers and it was great to see.

 Please notice Claire's rain boots. They are super cute, and Claire wears them everywhere.

 They had dozens of different crafts- making ornaments, coloring, or decorating cookies. Then they had games as well. We just jumped from one place to the next- it was great.

 That's a little frosting on Audra's cheek:

 Then, last night we decided to head downtown for the Parade of Lights. We had some great friends come with us. The weather was perfect, but we bundled up just in case.

Before we left Audra said: "I don't think I'm going to have fun at the parade. I think it's going to be boring."
I told her we needed to have a positive attitude.

For the record, the girls had a GREAT time! They also started getting ready to go to the parade two hours before we needed to leave.

 Here is Camille bundled up on the train:

 We brought Subway with us for dinner and we ate while we waited for the parade to start.

 Claire was entranced the ENTIRE time. It was great! All the girls were so well behaved- thank goodness!

 I brought some avocado to feed Camille, and I am so glad I did. We didn't get home until 9:50 PM, and were gone for a total of 6 hours with nowhere for me to nurse her the whole time. It's so nice that she can have "real" food for occasions  like this. Camille was great, and she really enjoyed the parade as well. She was giggling and cooing quite a bit during the parade. But, she was definitely tired by the time we got home! Like everyone else, she fell asleep the second her head hit the pillow!

In the end, I am glad we went. It got really crazy after the parade as we had to catch the train to go home- the lines were LONG coming home, and the girls were getting restless. We almost lost Claire once in the crowd which was pretty scary. But, the weather was perfect and I do think it was worth it. However, I agree with Ben that we probably won't go again- at least not while we still need a stroller.