The Big 4!

There is no doubt that Isabelle is proud to be 4! In the past two weeks, no matter where we go, she is certain to find someone who she can tell that she 4 years old. This then leads into a deep conversation about how she is in preschool and her brother is Mark. He is going to be 2, and on and on. Luckily, everyone she chooses to talk with is a good sport and continues to converse with her until I finally stop her so we can move on. This girl loves to talk and is definitely proud of being 4!

Four Years Old!

We celebrated her birthday with a few friends and our family. She wanted to have a pizza party, so that's exactly what we did.  It was so much fun and very cute!! Here are some photos of the special day. 

On the actual day of her birthday, Jamie and I had to work, so Nana asked what she would like to do. It was to no surprise that "swimming" was the answer. Then, when Jamie and I got home we took her out to dinner for one of her favorite meals: hamburger and fries. She also got a birthday surprise from the waitress: sundae and balloons!
 
Then, the next day she celebrated at preschool with all her friends. Jamie took the day off to be the parent helper. They brought cupcake cones for all the kids to have (Jamie made them special for her! I wish I had a picture, they were adorable) By this point she was completely worn out!

          

Our little girl is growing up fast! She is the love of our life and a day doesn't go buy without her doing something that either amazes us or makes us laugh and smile (and only occasionally a day of frustration). Belle, we love:

• Your curiosity of life and the gazillion questions you ask each day
• Your beyond amazing memory that shocks us!
• Your kindness and sweet demeanor to everyone around
• Your outrageous imagination and how you LOVE to play dog, horse, unicorn, princess, mermaid..... forget about the toys. It's your imagination that makes life fun.
• Your love for Cat in the Hat. One of our favorite shows too!
• Your joy for reading and storytelling.
• Your intelligence: recognizing and writing all the letters in the alphabet, counting to 30+ (with a few missed numbers), and writing your name with no help at all.
• Your patience and love for your brother who takes anything and everything you are playing with, holding, or touching. 
• The hugs, kisses, and laughs we receive ALL DAY LONG!
• You might be 4 and growing up fast, but you still love to be carried, cuddled, kissed, and hugged. You want nothing to do with your bed because cuddling with mom and dad at night is your favorite thing ever. 
• You absolutely love to lollygag when we are trying to get out of the house. Although we reeeally need to get places, we still love how easily distracted you are with that imagination of yours!

Happy Birthday to our favorite 4 year old ever!!

Christmas Part Two

Christmas Day at our house.....

"WAHOOO, Santa came!"

 "And look, he ate his cookies and the reindeer ate some of the carrot AND he left us a NEW fish!" (we had to part ways with our last fish. Poor Tranny, who must have been elderly when we bought him. So nice thinking Santa, Bronco will hopefully be young and vibrant!)

 Merry Christmas Isabelle! We love you!

 

 Merry Christmas Mark! We love you!

 

 Merry Christmas Sierra! We love you and promise we'll let you go play in the snow!

 Mark helping dad shovel before our guests arrive.

 Our first family Christmas at our new house. We had 14 adults and 7 kids and it couldn't have been more fun!

Kids table.....

 Start of the adult table.....

 Dance party, dress up, karaoke, fireman saves the princesses, and whole lot more. The kids completely entertained themselves while the adults enjoyed food, drinks, and conversation!! We loved it and snuck a few laughs while peeking in on the kids.

 Mark spent his entire day and evening at his train table. No joking here. He is madly in love with trains and anything that involves a train. Good job on the train table present Santa!

We hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and enjoyed all the smiles and happiness that appear at this time of year. We feel so fortunate to have such wonderful family to spend it with!

Christmas- Part One

A great Christmas in a great house! We enjoyed every minute of being home as a family for 2 1/2 weeks straight in our new home. We got to do some fun activities with the kids, visit with family, complete some housing projects, and just relax (as much as you can with kids). It was torture having to go back to work!

We spent Christmas Eve at my parents house in Evergreen. The cousins had more fun than you can imagine. We enjoyed a feast before opening presents.

 Belle patiently waiting to open presents.

 

They did manage to open one present the second we walked in the door.  Noah and Will couldn't wait a second longer to show Isabelle and Mark what they got them. The kids rode their new scooters around the house all night and because they were so smart and got 4 of them, there was no arguing on who gets to the ride the scooter. All of them. Around and around and around. Hilarious.

 Mark's favorite time of the night. Dessert. He has a major sweet tooth!

 

 Noah and Belle playing so sweetly, as usual, with their new cupcake decorating set.

 

 We knew Belle and Mark would fall asleep on the way home, so Belle wrote her letter to Santa before leaving. Mark was too distracted to contribute. I wrote word for word what she said and she signed it and added a quick picture of Santa.

 

We had a great evening and the best part was watching the kids interact, laugh, and show every ounce of excitement they could that it was Christmas and Santa was coming. I absolutely love Christmas with kids!

Thanksgiving

Well, it's fair to say there is no way I can keep up with this blog like I used to. Times are clearly busy these days!! So, going back to Thanksgiving.

We had a great week off spending time with family and friends. After doing a few things around the house, we headed up to the cabin for Thanksgiving with Grammy, Pepe, Auntie Robin, Uncle Guy, Phoebe, and Vander.

The cousins had a lot of fun together! We did lots of hiking, cruising through the forest on The Mule, eating, and playing.

On our way home we stopped to cut our Christmas tree with the O'Reilly's and gang.  It's a good thing Belle and Mark like hiking because we did a lot of walking before finding the perfect tree and much of it was straight downhill.  Although I didn't get a decent photo of them smiling, they had a blast looking for the tree.

Watching dad cut the tree.

Ta da! Our tree!

They even picked out their own small tree, which both managed to carry most of the way back up the steep hill. Well, Mark's tree was basically dragged up the hill, which if you look carefully you'll see here. Luckily it was nice and fresh and few needles got lost in the dragging.

Then a trip to visit Santa on the way out. Belle asked for a wand, a table, and a pink car. Mark didn't say much of anything. He wasn't quite sure what was going on, but he managed to pull through without crying.

We had a great Thanksgiving week! Coming soon (hopefully) will be our fun and eventful Christmas post.....