Snow Days

Arianna, Maya, Zuleikha, Alex, and Shalini

Let's see where to start. Last weekend was a fun weekend. We ended up not having to watch both of our neighbors kids on Thursday as the little boy got sick the night before so we just had Zuleikha. Then Friday we had a good time at Michael's holiday party. It was at the Musuem of Flight. It was really nice. The food was soso, but they had a casino there and that was fun. Michael was a top winner. They were given $1000 (play money of course) he got to $11,700 playing craps. The next morning was Arianna's birthday party. It was a great success. All of the girls had a wonderful, fun time. It was nice having such a small group. There were 5 of them total. They got their makeovers at Club Libby Lu and then afterwards we took them to lunch at Ruby's Diner. Ruby's was great. They let us bring in our own cake and the kept it in the fridge for us and then they lit the candles and came and sang to Arianna. She loved it. Of course she loves being the center of attention.

That evening we drove an hour north to Warm Beach (http://www.warmbeach.com/). This is a Christian conference center and camp. They hold different kinds of christian camps throughout the year there. Well anyways at christmas time they have the Lights of Christmas. They use about 1 million lights to make all kinds of displays. It is beautiful. They have mountains with rivers, christmas scenes, etc. They offer train rides, horse drawn wagon rides, visits with Santa, and hot homemade donuts. I think the donuts are the main draw :). The line was probably about 45 minutes long and you are limited to 3 bags - each contain 6 donut holes. It was fun, but very cold. It had started snowing that night so it was fun, but Ethan refused to wear his gloves so he was getting cold.

This week has been a little crazy. They cancelled school on Wednesday even though there was so snow. They cancelled it because of the threat of snow - crazy!!!! We ended up not getting snow until Wednesday evening. Then we got about 4-5 inches or so. Thus they cancelled school on Thursday. Arianna had a great time playing in the snow with her friends, but she gets bored hanging out at home. She decided she doesn't like snow days - she would rather to go to school so she can play with friends all day instead of having to hang out at home and dealing with brother :). There was lots of ice so they also decided to close schools today. She she doesn't go back until Jan 5th. Because of these snow days they have taken away some vacation days. They were supposed to have the 5th off, but now they go that day. Then in april they were to have the friday before easter off, but now they go and then there were also supposed to have the tuesday after memorial day off, but they will go that day now too.

Tonight is supposed to be a Parent's night out at Ethan's school. His school is open today so we will see if they keep that. We hope so because both kids were set to go and we need to finish christmas shopping!!! Michael worked from home yesterday, but went into work today.

Another nasty storm is coming Saturday night with snow and freezing rain and winds. It is supposed to hit hard on Sunday into monday.

Well, the kids want to play so here are some pictures of them in the snow and Arianna's party

Feliz Navidad!

Well, the holidays are here! We finally have our home all decorated for the season. I had most of our decorations up before we left for Thanksgiving since we were going to be gone. Then this last weekend Michael was able to get the lights up outside. Pretty much every house on our street has lights so it looks really pretty. I think there is only like 3 houses that don't have lights on, so it always looks very festive in our neighborhood.

This is a busy week for us. Tomorrow we watch our neighbor's kids while they go to their holiday party. It is great because Zuleikha and Arianna are good friends - they are just 1 year apart and then Ethan and Zane are the same age - just a few months apart. So it will be a fun, but crazy time. Then on Friday it is Michael's holiday party. This year his party is that the Museum of Flight. Then on Saturday is Arianna's B-day party in the morning. It shall be interesting because there is a chance of snow on friday night and early saturday morning so hopefully it won't deter some of her friends from coming. She is just having a small party. There will be 5 girls going to Club Libby Lu to get makeovers and then to lunch.

This week it was funny because I had christmas music playing and the song Feliz Navidad came on and Ethan just went crazy. He had pretty much ignored the other music, but once this song came on he started dancing, jumping around, etc. It was so cute. So when Arianna came home I put the music on again and they both danced around. Arianna found some bells and Ethan found a toy and so they were making all kinds of noise. Then once the song was over that was it. So cute.

Arianna is having a little bit of trouble at school. She has a talking problem :) (surprise, surpise). The girl loves to talk. I even found a shirt for her for christmas that says My Best Subject is Talking!!! So she has to work on not talking, so when the teacher reminds her to be quiet Arianna makes a quiet sign to remind herself not to talk. Her quiet sign is to cover her mouth with her hand. We will see how it goes.

Ethan is starting Tumblebus at his school. This is a bus that comes and inside is all kinds of tumbling/gymnastic activities. He got to try it for free and he loved it!!!! He is doing better with talking all of the time, but he still has a lot of babble. More sentences are coming and questions as well. It is cute at night while he is going to sleep he will sometimes sing. He knows most of the words to twinkle twinkle and it is cute. He also learned up and down so he will rub my arm and say up and then down.

Well, I need to run. I am getting a manicure and pedicure for the party this weekend. A special treat for myself :)

I will try and post some pictures of Arianna's party this weekend.

What a weekend

We had a great Thanksgiving weekend. On Tuesday we headed out to Michael's parents house and spent several days there. Michael's mom made us a wonderful dinner. Arianna even got to help. She helped grandma make the apple pie and she helped Michael make the sweet potatoes. It was enjoyable time for me as well - it was nice not to be doing all of the cooking this year. For about 10 years we have always done our own dinner.

Friday morning Michael and I headed out to spend the weekend in Portland. We were able to get a good amount of shopping done for the kids and also visit friends. We had dinner with Jenny, Bryan, and Gabe on Friday. We had not been able to get together with them since April so it was nice. We need to try and make sure to visit them more often. Then on Saturday we visited Michele, Jeff, and David. They had flown up from Yuma, AZ to visit Jeff's family. We haven't seen each other in about 1 1/2 years so it was sooo nice to visit. Although the time always goes to fast. Michele and I would need a couple of days to fully catch up. Hopefully it won't be as long for us to see each other again.

Saturday night we went over to Dennis's house to watch the Civil War game. It was a sad game to watch. If OSU would have won, we would have gone to the Rose Bowl, but ohh well. What can you do.

Sunday we headed back to pick up the kids and had a nice surprise. Arianna was riding her bike without training wheels. Grandpa helped her! We had been working on it with her, but living on a hill makes it a little harder. They have a nice flat driveway to ride on. She was very proud of herself. She was a little slower at learning, but I think that was more because of the hill we live on and the fact that we always had to go to a specific park to ride so she just could not practice at home all of the time.

It feels good to have a good portion of the shopping done and I have our christmas cards ready to be addressed and mailed out. We also put up most of our decorations before we left, so that is nice. just a few things to add and put up the outside lights and we are good. If feels good to have that in order. Just need to get the house picked up a little bit more. It seems as if I can never get all the cleaning done with a toddler around. We did get Ethan's crib out of his room, so now we are rearranging that and going to move some of his toys up to his room.

Well, time to run.