Home School Pre-school

We are still going strong with Pre-school at home. Last week was "B" week for birth (of Christ), bee, bear, baker, butterfly . . . 

It's a lot of fun. My MIL gave me lots of tips and I found a fabulous website with lots of print outs and lesson plans. She especially loves the letter books - she colors the pictures and then matches up the words and glues the pictures on. She also really likes the "find-a-word." She is responding well. Some weeks we have more time to spend on the letter than others. And, some weeks she is more attentive than others. But, she seems to be picking it up. She runs up to me all of the time telling me what letter a certain word starts with. Like today: "Mom, did you know that tiara starts with the letter T?"

well visit

Emmalee had her six month check up on Friday, even though she is almost 8 months old. Somehow, we got behind, her doctor was out for 6 weeks and we were gone to Idaho for half of October. So, it just got pushed back later and later. 

 These were taken pre-shots. Happy as can be waiting to see the doctor.

75% Weight 77% Height. She's my big girl!

She took the shots like a trooper. She cries at the immediate pain but as soon as I pick her up she stops crying. (much better than my experiences with Annagrace!) I still cry or at least tear up at the fact my child is in pain. But, it's not as bad since she handles it so well.

She developed a fever on Friday night that I am blaming on the shots. But, it hasn't broken yet, 2 days later. She has been on Tylenol consistently every 4 hours. I think we might be making a trip back to the doctor tomorrow if this doesn't stop. Or at least give them a call to see if I should be alarmed.

Tristan's Birthday

Tristan is my cousin's, Alex, son. He turned 8 and he had is party at Chuck-E-Cheese.

 Then we headed out to the Pine Mountain Branch for his baptism.

 Alex and Tristan

 My Aunt, Uncle, 3 cousins, and Tristan

 Such a sweet little moment with Tristan's little brother. He had his hand on his back through all of the talks.

My Mom gave the talk on baptism.

Ma-Ma

Emmalee said her first word today: 

"Ma Ma"

I couldn't have been any happier!

She is totally a Mama's girl, so it was fitting that it would be her first word.

Annagrace's first word, on the other hand, was "Hey." She's my little socialite, so that too was very fitting. 

It's amazing how their personalities are evident at such a young age.

a box . . .

is never JUST a box!

This time - a minivan!

Gifts

 Tyler needed gifts to give to his team since he is a supervisor now, he needed to get something for everyone.

AND, we had to do this on a budget.

So, I suggested monogrammed letter ornaments. We headed to Hobby Lobby (where all of the Christmas stuff is 50% off) and bought boxes of frosted ornaments and little drawstring bags. Angie is my go-to vinyl person and she cut the letters for me. I had to do a little surgery on a few of the letters to make them fit onto the rounded surface of the ornament. But, it wasn't too bad!

I placed just their last name initial on each ornament, tied a small white ribbon bow on the top and placed them into the little drawstring bags.

I printed To/From tags and tied onto the bag.

Viola! And as Tyler said "they are so fancy!"

Christmas Tour

I thought I would take you on a little tour of our house all decorated for Christmas.

 The master bedroom - kept it simple with a Santa and some garland.

 The girl's bedroom (the tree still needs a skirt)

 I love these little trees. I found them at a thrift store a long time ago and they look perfect in their room.

 The toy room.

 Dinning Room

 centerpiece

 I love the simplicity and elegance of these dishes! 

I'm slowly collecting all of the dishes and serving pieces of this collection.

 breakfast nook

 The fun family tree - where we hang all of the handmade, colorful, yearly Hallmark, and anything else. It's my "no theme" themed tree. I take Annagrace to Hallmark every year and let her pick out an ornament. So far she has a Minnie Mouse, Bolt, and Cinderella joined us this year. Underneath - are the Christmas books and the girls felt nativity set. It's also where we put all of the gifts sent or given to us. I'm really crazy and picky and will only allow matching presents under the big tree. So anything that is different goes under this one.

I KNOW!!! I'm crazy!!!!

My big tree - silver, gold, white, and crystal. This is where we hang our annual Swarovski crystal ornaments:

 my antique ornaments (They belonged to my Dad's mom. I rescued them from my Mom's house where they were being put into one big box with everything and they kept getting broken. I wrap them individually in tissue paper and pack them in their own slot in an ornament box every year. I don't want ANY of them to break!):

  and our baby's first Christmas ornaments. It has an overall snowflake theme. Actually, the whole house has a snowflake theme. 

This year, the wrapping paper consists of two different rolls. One silver with fun print birds and the second is a coordinating green and white.

the "fireplace"

We've never had a fireplace in any of our homes in GA. So, Tyler built this mantle for me a few years ago so we would have a place to hang our stockings. I love it! It moves around the house and usually lives in our bedroom and then makes it's way to the living room for the holidays.

 nativity

This was the first "nice" Christmas decoration that I invested in. I bought it our first Christmas and look forward to pulling it out every year.

hall bath 

(no room is left undecorated!)

Well, there you have it. Christmas is my absolute favorite time of year. I look forward to the decorating, the traditions, and family fun every year.

Letter continued

We finally deposited Annagrace's Santa letter into the big red "Believe" mailbox at Macy's. I've heard Santa pays special attention to those and makes sure he sends a letter back.

Progressive Dinner

For our Christmas Relief Society meeting, we had a progressive dinner. My new calling is Relief Society Meeting Coordinator so I had A LOT to do tonight. My main thing was the food and I cooked 8 pot roasts!! And I had to decorate the main course house where the pot roast would be served.

 (I am in love with that HUGE fork and spoon!)

 The sister's started out at one house and had appetizers and at the second house they had the main course. Then at the third home we had dessert, a cookie exchange, and had a couple of sisters talk about their family Christmas traditions.

Me and Amy 

(She's the Presidency member in charge of the activities)

Each sister was given our gift - the tile as they left.

We had a lot of fun and everything went smoothly. (Except for the disappearing dessert plates!)

Fantasy in Lights

 We really had to bundle up - it was SOOO cold. 

Annagrace used my Mom's hat for her steering wheel. She held it up the ENTIRE time to "drive" the trolley.  Emmalee fell asleep 5 minutes into the ride. (Annagrace did the same thing when she was a baby.)

#5 Write a letter to Santa

We are dropping off the letter in the "Believe" box at Macy's tomorrow. They say Santa responds to all of the letters from that mailbox!

Seriously???

 This is Annagrace in 2007:

This is Emmalee:

Did I have twins 3 years apart?

Christmas Crafts

I've been in a crafting mood lately and what better time than Christmas??

1. Photo Ornaments - unfortunately I didn't take a picture of them before I wrapped them up. But, I plan on making two more for myself and my mom. I got the idea from a catalog, but at $78 a piece . . . I don't think so! I printed out this cute photo of the girls on regular paper and then decoupaged it to a cream color porcelain ornaments that I found at Michael's. I then outlined the photos with a gold paint pen. 

2. Advent calendar - I have grand plans to make this elf one! My sewing skills are lacking and time was running out so I looked around at some different blogs, combined a few different ideas and a free template and came up with this:

A square for each day and on the back is an activity to do for the day. The activities include playing with red and green play dough, color a Christmas picture, watch a Christmas movie, make a Christmas treat, do something kind for someone, etc. Just simple fun things. I didn't include "read a Christmas book" to the cards because we plan on reading one everyday anyway.

3. For our Relief Society Christmas meeting we doing a progressive dinner and giving each sister a gift. The gift this year is a tile. Amy and Jessica (RS councilors) did the vinyl words on a Cricut and transfered to the tiles. Then they dropped them off at my house so I could add the ribbon hangers to the back. I'm going to display them in a basket (still trying to decide which one) so the sisters can pick them up on their way out from the progressive dinner.