School Christmas Party

Addy's school Christmas party was the Friday before Christmas. Here are a few pictures that I took with my phone during the party.

The kids kicked off the party by singing Jingle Bell Rock.

 

 

 Then Addy & her classmates enjoyed a few fun Christmas activities.

They made Rudolph ornaments from popsicle sticks.

They decorated ice cream cones like Christmas trees.

(Same thing we did at our GS Christmas party.)

And they played Christmas bingo.

Oh & Santa stopped by too!

Addy & her teacher, Mrs. Jalifi

 Addy had a lot of fun at the party & it was a great way to end the first semester of the school year! I'm excited to see what the next semester has in store for my baby girl!



Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas from our home to yours!



The 5 Days of Christmas for Addy's teacher

Last year, I went all out for Addy's teachers' Christmas gifts & spent way too much money! This year I toned it down a bit. I still did the 5 days of Christmas, but only for her Kindergarten teacher. I looked at Mrs. Jalifi's teacher wishlist (it's on the PTO website & there's one for every teacher. It shows all their favorite restaurants, stores, snacks & etc...) for ideas & and here's what I came up with...

 

On the first day of Christmas

Addy gave to me

An ornament for my tree.

 

On the 2nd day of Christmas

Addy gave to me

Diet coke & candy

And an ornament for my tree.

(Diet coke & peanut m&ms, Mrs. Jalifi's favorites)

 

On the 3rd day of Christmas

Addy gave to me

Lunch from Subway

And an ornament for my tree.

(I asked her to email me what she wanted & brought it to her at the school.)

On the 4th day of Christmas

Addy gave to me

A pan of yummy brownies

And an ornament for my tree.

(The brownies were made by my friend Carrie who makes cakes. She makes the best brownies EVER!)

 

On the 5th day of Christmas

Addy gave to me

A pair of new converse

And an ornament for my tree.

(I made this converse ornament. Didn't it turn out cute! I almost kept it for myself!)

  

I had to bring all this to the school on Friday for Addy's Christmas party. The gift bags are presents for Mrs. Jalifi (converse), Mrs. Cardenas, Mrs. Berry & Ms. North (gifts from their teacher wishlist) & 20 bags of Oreo truffles for all the staff at SOE.

 

I think I will always go all out for Addy's teachers. They just love her so much & take great care of her while she's at school! (I may have to rethink things though when I have 2 in school, lol!)

 

 

 

 

Weekly Update

Here's what we've been doing the past couple of weeks..

Alex riding on an 'airplane' with his 'friends.' Boy does he have an imagination!

Reading books together before bedtime. Aren't they so sweet!

A game of Candyland with my favorite boy!

Addy went to a Girl Scout PJ Party.

Addy & Alex both had a dental check up. No cavaties for either of them! But Addy is going to have to have 2, maybe 4, teeth pulled in January to make room for her permanent teeth.

Addy had her Girl Scout Christmas party.
They decorated ice cream cones to look like Christmas trees.

 

Here is her finished tree. Isn't it cute! Another Pinterest success!

 

They also made candy cane ornaments & Christmas snow globes.

 

Oops, maybe inside the light was not the best place for our elf to land after his nightly trip to the North Pole. Someone turned on the light & Tiny got burned!

 

 Nick went to the Rockets/Celtics game.

 

And I went dark again. Highlights are just too much upkeep for this mom!

 

We've also been doing all our activities from our advent calendar, but check out my other post for that. I got all our Christmas presents wrapped on Friday & now we're just anxiously awaiting Christmas!

Advent Activities

The kids have really enjoyed doing their advent calendar activities.

 

They made hot chocolate.

 

They made flat gingerbread houses from graham crackers.

 

Can you guess whose is whose?

 

They also decoarated a gingerbread Christmas tree.

 

It didn't turn out quite like the picture on the box! (But it's still beautiful!)

 

They made smores.

 

 And Christmas cookies.

 

Alex was a little more interested in eating the cookies than decorating them.

 

Again, can you guess whose is whose?

 

Daddy doing a taste test of the finished product!

  

There's still a couple of days left before Christmas which means more fun activities to come!

Pinterest Party

Last Saturday, I had my mom & sisters over for a Pinterest Party. We all picked a Christmas craft project & brought enough supplies for everyone to make it. Each craft was very different & they all turned out great!

And it was a lot of fun!

Kelci's project... a modern Nativity scene

(Mine is the one on the left with the headless Mary.)

My project... a Merry Christmas sign

(Mine is the one on the bottom.)

 

Mom's project... a Christmas tree plant stake

(Mine is the bottom left. There are 6 because Hannah made one too.)

 

Molly's project... Joy

(This is mine.)

 

Brooke's project.. Beach Christmas ornaments

(This is mine hanging on my Christmas tree. It has sand from the beach from our family vacation this summer at Santa Rosa Beach.)

 

 

I also had a 2nd project which was Santa ornaments. You can see them in the bottom right hand corner of the picture above. I got busy cooking & forgot to make one though. I have all my supplies so maybe I'll make mine before Christmas.

 

After making all our crafts, Mom, Brooke, Kelci & I went on the CASA Christmas Home Tour in Sienna & Sugar Land. We toured some beautiful homes, one of them was over 11,000 sq feet!

 

I always have such a great time when I get together with my family! And this time was no exception! It was so much fun & we ended up with some great Christmas crafts! We will definitley have to do this again next year! 

 

 

 

The Reindeer Run & The Jingle Jam

On December 1st, the kids & I attended the Reindeer Run & Jingle Jam at Addy's elementary school. (Nick didn't go because he was in Georgia at the SEC championship game.) The Reindeer Run included a 5K which I ran & 1/4 mile run that both Addy & Alex participated in. And the Jingle Jam part was the school carnival.

 

I ran the 5K in 23:02 & placed 3rd in my age range. Another great run!

 

Addy & some of her girl scout troop ran the 1/4 mile & earned their red petal for being courageous & strong.

 

Friday night Addy had been up for several hours in the middle of the night, like she often does. I debated on whether or not to wake her up to go to the Reindeer Run. But in the end, I decided to go ahead & get her up. She was cranky & exhausted & laid down on the sidewalk right before the run started. I had to go get her up & make her run & so we were the very last ones to start. She actually did run though, unlike Alex. He wanted me to carry him. And when I put him down & tried to get him to run, he started yelling "Stop. That's enough. I said... That's enough!" And then he started crying. So I picked him up again & we finished the run. We were the last ones to finish, but we finished nonetheless!

 

 Here they are with their medals.

Alex & his playgroup buddy Carson.

 

Making reindeer food

 

Playing in the bouncy house

 

Cake walk... Alex won a cupcake. We sat down & he ate his cupcake & then he got up & told me "Mommy, you stay here, I'll be right back." I asked him where he was going & he told me he was going home to get his juice. Umm yeah, we live a 1/4 mile from the school. That boy is crazy if he thinks I would let him walk home alone!

 

 There were lots of fun games at the Jingle Jam including the football throw 

 

fishing

 

 and basketball.

 

We didn't stay at the carnival for too long, maybe an hour. I kept trying to get Addy to play the games & she really wanted to, but she was just so tired. And so when we got home, she took a nap. And she woke up with fever. Poor thing. I felt so bad that she had been sick when I just thought that she was tired from not sleeping. Luckily, it was a short lived illnes. Her fever broke on Sunday evening & by Monday afternoon she was back to feeling 100%!

 

Hopefully next year, the kids will actually want to run in the Reindeer Run!

 

 

O Christmas Tree O Christmas Tree

The Sunday after Thanksgiving, we put up our Christmas tree. Addy was all into decorating the tree & was singing O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree the whole time!

Alex just wanted to put the star on top. That's all he really cared about!

 

And then the very next day, I bought a new tree! A much taller tree than our old one. So we had to undecorate the old one & then decorate the new one. But we didn't have enough lights! And the star wouldn't fit on top.

 

So after 4 trips to Hobby Lobby (to get lights, return lights that didn't work, get more lights, & to get mesh ribbon to make a bow for the top of the tree) we got it decorated. And I just love it!

 

And I love this picture of it too!

 

On December 1st, our Elf on the Shelf made his arrival.

 

Alex named him Tiny (his first suggestion was Alex, lol, but I told him that might be a little confusing if both he & the elf were named Alex) and Addy agreed, so Tiny it is.

 

We also started 2 new traditions on December 1st (both ideas from Pinterest.) I wrapped up 25 Christmas books & we've been opening & reading one every night. We're also opening one bag from our Advent calendar each night.

 

 Each bag has either a Christmas craft or activity for the kids to do.

 

One night it was Make Popcorn & Watch a Christmas Movie. The kids snuggled up in Nick's lap while they wathced Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer for the very first time. It was a big hit!

 

One night the bag had snowflake ornaments in it for the kids to paint & glitter.

 

And one night it had snowmen sticker sets in it.

 

So the Christmas tree is up, the house is all decorated & the shopping is almost done. And now we're just enjoying the Christmas season, one day at a time.