Christmas... Happy Birthday Jesus!!

Happy Birthday Jesus!! We woke up to a beautiful Christmas morning. Allie was excited to check out her "sock"... we opened stockings and a couple presents early, then enjoyed a breakfast that we began with singing Happy Birthday to Jesus.




After Church, we came home and opened more presents and tried to get a nice Christmas picture. ;) Again, our girls do not really like to smile at the same time!! But.. they smiled a lot with their gifts!! They were all very blessed to get wonderful treasures from friends and family (thank you all!!).



Allie got a new big bike from Papa and Nana for Christmas (and birthday)... It is a super cute and she is excited to have big girl breaks. It is a little big for her, but by summer she should be speedy on it.
Then after a nap, we all headed to Woodburn to visit the grandparents and cousin Brett (Aunt Kim and Uncle Mark were there too!!).


Our Christmas was full of blessings... the greatest, of course, was celebrating His birth together!!!

Christmas Eve Children's Program

This year, Allie participated in the St. John Christmas Eve Children's Service. The children all sang songs and decorated a tree. It was the first time Allie has ever participated in a "program" and she was entertaining. I am sad to admit that I forgot my camera, so I don't have any pictures... but perhaps that is a good thing?? :)

Either way, here are pictures of the girls in their Christmas Eve Skirts I made.

After church, the girls got to open a couple presents... new Christmas Jammies that I made (which they had already worn once on the Polar Express, but I wrapped anyway), new towel and a new Christmas book.



Then it was off to bed...

Gingerbread boys and girls

Christmas Eve found us decorating cookies... specifically, gingerbread boys and girls. Allie loves to decorate cookies.




I think the candy pieces we got were a bit big, and then Allie placed some in interesting locations... :)



But all in all, they were cute and once you removed a bit of candy, they tasted good too!!

Movie Time

Allie and Shannon decided they needed a little popcorn and movie time.... but why is it that both girls cannot look at the camera and smile at the same time?? I guess I could use photoshop.... :) Either way, they sure look cute!!

Monkey time.

Gotta love monkey girls.

A big girl now...

Ok, so for months many of my friends have been telling me all about how their daughter was insisting on picking out her own clothes, and I always laughed at the antics thinking... what is the big deal?

Fast forward to now. This past couple weeks, Allie has decided she can and should pick out her own clothes and dress herself.

Today, was red day she said. Me: Why? "Because red is my favorite color!". Me: But that skirt is not red, it is pink and does not match (not even mentioning the tights). Allie "We are pretending it is red". End.

And this is what she wore all day today.... out in public and at home.

Story time with Ms. Santa

We went to Al's nursery for story time this week, and Allie enjoyed sitting with all the kids listening to the first story...


...though she got restless after a couple, so we decided to go exploring around Al's.





Allie liked the trains best!


We love this place.

Great Wolf Lodge

After our ride on Polar Express, we headed up to meet with some good friends at the Great Wolf Lodge. It is an amazing water park just outside of Olympia Washington.

We didnt take any pictures inside the water park.. it didnt seem to be a good idea to bring your camera into a room where water was shooting out everywhere.. but it was great and the four girls had an amazing time. At night they had story time, too.. where it snowed inside!! (quite the bubble/foam machine).


They had this Magic quest thing, where you used wands to go on this quest.. well, we didnt do the whole quest, but the girls enjoyed making magic!

It was a great place and we look forward to going back!!

The Polor Express

Last year, we were supposed to go to Hood River to ride the Polar Express train, but due to weather (anyone remember a fairly large snow storm in the PNW??), we were unable to go. So, this year, we tried again. The morning of the ride, we actually feared a repeat, as I84 was closed....but luckily, it opened just in time.

On the drive there, we were amazed at the look of Multnomah Falls.. Breathtaking!!

Once in Hood River, we met up with Stacie's folks and Kyle's Folks, and Stacie's step sister and family. So, there were 12 of us going on the train. The children were excited to hear "all aboard".

Once on the train, we were served cocoa and cookies. Obviously, this went over very well.....



Then the conductor came by to punch the tickets.... Allie got a "B" for believe.
Then it was time for the elves to read the book...

and time for visiting...

All in all it was a good trip. The kids (and adults) seemed to enjoy the train ride, visits by the elves and santa (ok, so not Allie.. she DID NOT like santa)...

It was just special to be with family this time of the year!

Gingerbread Houses

We started a new family tradition.. making a gingerbread house. This year, we bought a nice little kit so that things would be a bit easier.


This is the before...
Then the fun begins..


Allie is very particular in her decorating.. she likes to follow the picture given on the box. That is, until she doesn't like a certain design, then she uses her own creativity. Shannon was pretty content to sit back and watch...


The moment is here...


a masterpiece!!