Xmas Decor...

I love Christmas and often can hardly wait til the middle of November to get the decorations out.  It usually takes me a week to get everything put up.  Thankfully the boys and Jarrett are a good help.  Here are a few photos of our home at Xmas. 

This year we also received a beautiful memorial ornament in the mail and I wasn't sure who it was from.  It made me think of my grandpa and of  others who we miss up in Heaven.  We later found out Jarrett's mom and dad shared it with us and it became one of my favorite ornaments of the year.  I love walking up to the trees and just admiring the ornaments and the story behind where each of them came from.  It was such a touching gift to have this added this year.

As quickly as the season comes, it goes just as fast.  I sit now in a house that feels empty but also clean and fresh, ready for a new start that January brings.  I will look forward to next Christmas and the feel the house brings when its decorated.

Until next time,

Angie

Zoo Lights!

Another fun thing we did at the end of the year was go to Zoo Lights!  Zoo Lights have become one of our holiday traditions thanks to Debi our friend and some of our other friends Tom and Gloria who have shared tickets with us in the past.  We all look forward to it!  Here are a few pictures of the girls, dad and I.  The night we went the boys happened to have a baseball game and they weren't able to come.  So we just had to have extra fun for them!

the girls were posing for us!

Such a fun night!

And made us excited about the holiday season. 

Until next time,

Angie

2018 Recap... San Francisco trip.

 For the first time in 8 years, I decided to take a break from blogging.  The month of December was so hectic with getting ready for the holidays and wrapping up the year, I decided to give myself permission to take one thing off my to do list, and that was blogging. I"m not going to lie, I felt guilty.  Almost everyday I thought, I should just blog, but then I got distracted by something else and soon enough it was another day gone.

As we begin 2019 today, I think back to all that 2018 brought.  Many great moments, a few hard months but overall more blessings than I can even count.  We continue to have our health, we are blessed with four kiddos who challenge us, push us and make us strive to do everything we can to help them, as we build our lives together.

In my attempt to cover all that was missed in the last month or so of blogging, I share now highlights from the end of  2018...

In early November, Jarrett and I took a quick trip to San Francisco. It was so much fun to see the city, except that the largest fire in California history started the morning after we arrived and it affected the air quality in a big way.  We still had fun visiting the Ghiradelli Chocolate factory, Alcatraz, the trolley cars and even the piers.  We also ran into a few friends, Renee and Stan which made it extra fun.

The curviest street in the world.

The smoke was terrible

Some of the buildings on Alcatraz Island

The prison was amazing and I remember as a little girl watching stories about the people who tried to escape and to be there in person it was even more surreal.  

That's the city in the background.  And it was cold too!

Jarrett riding the trolley car.  It was a lot of fun!

More to come in the next posts.

Until next time,

Angie

Gymnastics

This past summer Isabelle took an initial gymnastic course at a local gym and she loved it. 

As a result we signed her up for on-going classes which she seems to be thoroughly enjoying!

Here are a few photos of her learning some initial skills.

 

Here she was trying to take the ball in her feet and  place them into the circle above their head.

Getting it down... practice makes perfect!

We look forward to seeing how Isabelle continues to grow and develop her skills. I am excited for her to be able to get into an activity of her own, as she has become a pro at supporting her big brothers in their activities.  

Until next time,

Angie

Preschool Halloween Celebration & a Rainbow pumpkin

Well since it's after Thanksgiving, it is probably time that I post our Halloween recap. 

This year was a fun one for Halloween.  The festivities stared a few weeks prior to Halloween with a festival at Madelyn's school.  Here are the kids with our favorite preschool teacher.  Hard to believe she was the teacher for all the kids and now two of them tower over her. 

At Madelyn's school festival there were all sorts of activities for the kids to participate in.  Here it was a game of "Stick the Eyes on the Spider"  

Other fun activities the girls liked was getting Halloween tattoos. 

Isabelle and Madelyn both decided to dress like Elsa.  

Isabelle proudly showing off her tattoo.

Madelyn decided to put her tattoo on her hand.

After the festival we found out the kids won a Halloween Movie gift basket which had the movie Hotel Transylvania which now plays in our car on loop as we drive around.  The kids h ave the entire script memorized.

Another fun thing that happened on Halloween was that we got booed!  Some fun friends brought over a basket full of goodies which the  kids were super excited for!  And on top of that they kindly remembered our little boy who isn't here by making us a really cool rainbow pumpkin!!!  Isn't it super cute? 

On Halloween day Madelyn got to dress up for school and while she was only supposed to wear the costume for the morning hour, she was insistent she got to wear it all day.

Our little Rainbow Dash

Here she is with her classmates waiting for the costume parade to start.

I think she's the cutest thing in her costume.

She loves to get all dressed up.  I was thankful I got to stop by to snag a few pictures.  And Madelyn who usually isn't too keen on staying at school any longer than she has to, actually told me to leave.  She said, "Bye Mom, see you later."  It was clear she was having fun.

And after that I got to go volunteer in Isabelle's school for her Halloween party.  I volunteered to coordinate ghost bowling and grand prize game (like the Bozo Clown show).

Belle dressed up as a police woman.  

The kids seem to have a lot of fun.  

I was so excited to get to spend some time with Isabelle's class.  It isn't too often I get to do those things so I cherish when I get to see her in her classroom.

And then for the big kids.... or the terrors that they were that night.  Gabriel wanted to be the clown from IT and Michael a werewolf.  They were super scary and got a thrill out of scaring the girls.  After several threat and telling them I was going to take away the costumes, they finally got the message I wasn't joking.  Both girls were crying, Madelyn wouldn't let me put her down and Isabelle was insistent she wouldn't be able to sleep at all. 

Yep see how much fun they had scaring the girls?  Seriously boys.  

Dad and I decided to get into the fun and dressed up too.  

Overall Halloween was a really fun night.  The kids got a TON of candy so they were thrilled!

Onto the next holiday!

Until next time,

Angie