Pictures from the holiday

Here are some more pictures from Christmas morning and also from the Roper Mountain Lights in Greenville. We went there a couple of days or should I say nights before Christmas and in all the chaos I forgot to post anything about our experience. The kids loved the lights and wanted to be outside in the 30 degree weather!

Our Christmas 2008

We started our Christmas festivities on Christmas eve at my mother in law's house. We ate supper and opened presents. The children were so excited and happy to finally be able to open some presents. We stayed and visited until Laurie informed me through her behavior that it was time to go home so she could get in the bed. Since 'Santa' still had some wrapping to do, I was happy to go on back to our house!
Christmas morning the children actually slept until 8 am! They were so excited once they were up because they knew it was Christmas morning (they have been doing an advent calendar). The boys tore into their presents and Laurie watched in amazement. This is only her second Christmas and I think she is still trying to figure things out. Jonathan was only too happy to help Laurie unwrap her presents! The kids got the items that were on their lists..which included items like Club penguin for the DS, an Idog and a mickey race track for Jonathan, Nintendogs, Go Diego Go for the DS, and a v smile for Nicholas, a baby doll and stroller and a sit and play piano for Laurie!!
It was on to breakfast after our santa gifts. Then we were able to talk to my parents on Skype. Two of my brothers came to my house to spend the holiday with us so my parents were able to see everyone except for my brother and his family who live in San Diego. I was so happy to get to see and talk to my parents..it made the holiday complete. I wish they could have been here in person with us but they will be in 2010. I guess that gives me something to look forward to. After that conversation with them, we opened our family gifts and headed to Columbia to see the rest of my side of the family (my aunt, uncle and their family and my grandmother).
All in all, everyone really enjoyed Christmas. And if you ask Jonathan or Nicholas why we celebrate Christmas...they will tell you that it is Jesus' birthday and that we get presents to celebrate HIS birthday! MERRY CHRISTMAS from our family to yours!

Laurie loved this singing bear!

Jingle all the way!

The kids favorite Christmas song this year 2008

It usually goes something like this...

Jingle bells, jingle bells

Jingle all his way

Oh much fun it is to ride on a sleigh HEY (repeat)

We are still working on all the right words especially with Laurie and Nicholas!!

Stockings

I like to have an uniformity to the stockings that belong to my kids. I can not sew well or cross stitch or anything like that so I just bought them some pretty ones. We have tried out several stockings but have settled with the ones we presently use. I bought enough for all the children that we had at that time and Chris and myself about three years ago. After I bought these particular stockings and was set on using them for many years, we found out we were pregnant with Laurie. Now I was one stocking short!
I went back to the store where I bought the first four and found out that the style had changed slightly. The ones I bought at first were velvet stockings with silver embroidered initials on them. The new line were also velvet and had an initial on them but they were done with rhinestones. We bought one for Laurie anyway. How appropriate that her stocking has bling on it..after all she is our shining star!

Christmas Parties

Nicholas had his party at the ELC this past Wednesday and Jonathan had his at school today. They seemed to enjoy themselves and were so proud of the things they made and the treats they received from the parties. It does not take much to make my kids excited! Jonathan's new phrase is 'it's perfect'. That is exactly what he said about his goody bag (it was actually a stocking).
The boys both had pizza at their parties (a staple with children). Nicholas' teacher put alot of work into the ornaments that they made for the parents. Nicholas was so proud of his creations..One in particular. It was a breakable snowflake! He gave it to me in a gift bag and he was so excited that he tried to open it up so he could show it to me and it fell on the floor and broke. He was so upset he just about started to cry. I comforted him and told him we would try to fix it. But my heart was broken too. It was such a cute ornament!
Jonathan also made an ornament at school that I got today. His teacher let them paint elbow macaroni and they shaped into a wreath with a picture of him in the middle of the wreath. It is so cute and now I have a picture to remember his kindergarten year.
Here are some of my favorite Christmas items they hav brought home from their parties.

One of Jonathan's projects

A thank you note from Jon's teacher!

Jonathan's ornament

Nicholas' creations

Brotherly Love

On Sunday, our pastor spoke of Jesus as our big brother. He was speaking from the book of Hebrews. He compared some of the aspects of our relationship with Jesus to the relationships of brothers. I started thinking of my two boys and how much they love each other. Nicholas loves to play with Jonathan and he follows him around and loves to make him happy. Nicholas repeats Jonathan's expressions about things or events. He evens usually wants to play what J9nathan suggests that they play.
Lately though, I have noticed that their own interests are developing and they are not always the same as their brother. Now when Jonathan wants to play something and suggests it to Nicholas it may not always be answered in the affirmative. The boys deeply love each other though and would stand up for each other any day of the week. They are also very possessive of their sister and do not let any one other than themselves mess with her.
I kind of feel bad that Laurie does not have a sister. I never had one either so I am not sure how those relationships work. I guess she will just have to have lots of friends!

Laurie's first sentence

Laurie Grace does not make much of a fuss unless she wants or needs something. However, when she does need or want something she lets you know about it. Last night on the way home, Laurie dropped her paci. After about 30 seconds she calls out to her daddy. She said something to him about the paci but neither of us fully understood it. We asked her to repeat it and she said the exact same thing again. I understood her the second time. She had said "Daddy, I dropped my paci". I quickly picked up the paci and sure enough that was what she wanted.
Then it ht me that she had just put her first sentence together and we actually understood it. I was amazed! I feel sure she has been putting them together for some time, but this was the first one that we understood. She has started talking so much faster than either of the boys did. I am so proud of her! She will probably be able to be understood by others soon too..so watch out!

Singing on the stage

This past weekend, we attended two special services. First, Nicholas and the preschool choir at our church sang in the morning service. They all did an awesome job! Nicholas was so animated and he knew all the words to the songs. I was so proud of him! He called it his time to go and sing on the stage. He was so proud of himself too.

We also went to see my brother, Nathan, who sang in his choir's production of 'Once upon a Holy Night'. He is not a normal choir member but he wanted to sing with them for this musical. The entire choir did an awesome job and the music was beautiful! Nathan sure knows how to make a joyful sound! Since my parents are out of the country, I was glad that my family and I could go and support him. I am so proud of him and the Christian man that he has become.

The Trees are Barefooted!

Jonathan is my oldest child and he has just about outgrown the cute little misprounciations and odd terminology for everyday things. However, this morning we were coming home from the Santa breakfast at his school and he said, "Look Mom that tree is barefooted!" He continued and explained to me that the tree was barefooted because it had no more leaves on it because it was winter.
I believe that he was trying to say that the tree was bare. It was so cute that I did not have the heart to correct him.

Will you marry me?

Nicholas is my 3 year old and he must know how to put on the charm. I have heard now from two mothers who tell me that Nicholas is going to be their son in law one day. I was not worried when the first mother told me of her daughter's feelings, because they are friends of ours and the children are 3 for goodness sake. However, when the second mother told me a similar story about her daughter last Wednesday night, I started getting worried. None of my other children have gotten proposals at 3!
I believe Nicholas is just a loveable boy who must get along well with others. I guess if all continues to go well, he will have his pick of girls when that time comes. And I hate to disappoint all those girls out there, but his time is not coming any time soon...Nicholas will not be dating for many years to come nor will he be getting married soon. Sorry girls!!

Club Penguin

I don't know if anybody else's children are into the whole club penguin scene or not, but Jonathan sure is. Club penguin is a website sponsored by Disney that lets you create a penguin for yourself, play games to gain coins, spend those coins on different items from an igloo to home accessories to a puffle (a pet).
Jonathan found out about this website from his cousin, Corie. He loved it and now has his own penguins and igloo etc. In October, we found out that Disney was releasing a club penguin game for the DS and it immediately went on his Christmas list. I also purchased a book from Scholastic about club penguin that I thought would go nicely with the game.
I did not let his teacher know of my plans for the book fast enough and one day Jonathan came home from school all excited about a book that he had gotten from school. Once he said that I knew one of my Christmas surprises was gone. He loved it and has even pulled out the poster from the back of the book and it is now on my refrigerator. Yeah me!

License to Fly!

Nicholas came home from school the other day with the cutest piece of Christmas art. His class had made hats with reindeer antlers on them. They took pictures of the kids next to the big Christmas tree in the lobby of the church, then made a certificate with an official seal from the north pole on it that gave him the license to fly! It was very simple but I loved it!

Jesus Loves Me

Sunday night we were coming home from a Christmas event at my in laws church and the kids were very tired (have you ever noticed that all the Christmas parties and other events are scheduled for the weekends??). Laurie Grace is a very scheduled child. She enjoys and needs a scheduled bed time, nap time, and meal time etc. You would think with her being the third child she would go with the flow, and she does until it interrupts her schedule. That night it was about an hour or two past her bed time and she was not happy. She started crying out of sheer exhaustion.
When she was a tiny baby, I used to sing Jesus loves me to her when she was crying and she used to stop and listen to me. I thought that it couldn't hurt now so I started singing and she not only stopped crying but started singing the song with me. I was so excited that I asked Chris if he was hearing her sing too. He said that he believed that she was singing the song with me. I continued singing most of the way home and she did too!

I tried to recapture it on this video..we had to go outside and so her attention was distracted some but she is singing the song. At the end she gets tired of singing and takes her paci back from me.

Snow Hands

One night we were coming home from one of our Christmas events, when Nicholas asked me a strange question. He said 'Mom what are you doing with those snow hands?' I had on a pair 0f gloves and he did not know what they were called so he made up his own name for them. I thought the name he had given them was quite appropriate!

I had bought the kids all a pair of gloves and a hat this year so we took a picture of Nicholas and his 'snow hands'.

Christmas cookies

Jonathan loves to help me cook. It does not matter if it is supper or cookies or a cake, he simply loves to help out in the kitchen. Nicholas has started developing an interest too.

We made our first batch of Christmas cookies for this year on November 29. Jonathan got his uncle to get in on the act and we made ginger bread cookies. My job was the supervision of the project, the cutting out of the cookies, and the icing of the cookies. We did make some pretty and great tasting cookies. I love having Jonathan take an interest in cooking and more importantly I love the time we are able to spend together through cooking. I am sure we will make many more batches together before Christmas!

Picture Taking

Any family that has more than one child will fully understand the topic I am about to write about in this post.
Last night my husband and I took our three children to the Picture People to have their Christmas pictures taken. Our appointment was scheduled for 4:40pm and of course we did not arrive until 4:50pm (potty emergency!). The picture taking session that was probably suppossed to take 15 or 20 minutes took about 45 minutes to an hour. You see, the photographer would get the boys posed and then ask them to stay put and smile (fat chance) while she or I or Chris would run after Laurie and attempt to get her in the picture. The boys would try to 'help' us keep Laurie in the picture and then they would not be in the right spot for the picture. Laurie would sit or stand still only long enough for the photographer to take one shot and then she would run into another part of the store.
After 20 or 30 minutes of running after Laurie and having the boys use up all their goodness, it was time to stop and either cry or laugh. The photographer, Chris, and I decided to laugh. The whole experience was funny and the photographer had a great sense of humor, thank goodness. I even video taped all the ins and outs of getting the kids ready for one shot (it literally took about 10 minutes).
We got a great work out and a lesson in patience as well as some good pictures all for one price.

All the ins and outs of getting a pose ready

What a week!

Have you ever had one of those weeks where you don't seem to have the time to even sit down?? Well our week has been that way so far. Hopefully the weekend will prove to be somewhat more relaxing.
Monday is a blur..
Tuesday (yesterday): I watched a friend's baby, took Chris his lunch at work (yes with all three children), and fixed supper.
Wednesday (today): I went to the dermatologist and had 8 moles removed, bought groceries, went to church, bathed the kids, and wrote on the blog.
There is still more to do tommorrow and Friday we are taking the kids for their Christmas pictures. I tried to get a good picture myself and was unsuccessful so off we go to the professionals.

Jonathan and Spot

Jonathan has a dog named Spot. Spot is a 12 lb. Jack Russell terrier who is white with brown spots (hence the name). Jonathan got Spot for Christmas last year when Spot was only 6 weeks old. We had to keep her in the house at first and get her used to eating puppy food. Eventually, we fixed her a place outside where Jonathan could play with her and she would be comfortable.

Jonathan loves to go outside and play with her. During the summer and early fall, he went out about every day. Since the weather has turned colder, he goes out less. Spot is extremely excited to see him when he does go out though. Jonathan worries about Spot, especially on the nights when it is so cold. We have put a heat lamp out near her dog house so that she will be warm on those cold nights. Jonathan can now sleep better knowing his dog is protected.

Our neighbour that lives behind us has complained about Spot's barking. He has very ugly and rude in the way he approached the matter. Jonathan understood enough to know what was going on and he asked me if 'that man' was going to hurt Spot and then started to cry. I reassured him..but that is how much my son loves his dog.