Christmas Eve

The kids had a GREAT Christmas Eve. Brunch with Maus, Granny Tanny, Smiths and Cassie/Ellah. Gifts and Pictionary then back home to open more gifts. WHEW!

Kendall got several dresses for Christmas and she tried them ALL on as she got them. I think she is in dress number 7 for the day so far.

Parker helped create a coffee mug for Maus.

Parker made Kendall a butterfly shirt (iron on) for his Christmas present. He was pretty proud of himself!

and Kendall LOVED it! Thanks Parker!

Parker was pretty excited about his new DS. Earlier in the morning, Maus had given Parker a DS game. He was a little confused and just thought Maus was trying give a Wii game. Silly Maus! The light bulb goes off in the video...

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Kendall

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Woodard's Christmas

We had a blast at the Woodard Christmas. Dana fixed some yummy Italian food and the cousins had a great time playing together!

The kiddos were looking good before we headed to church the weekend before Christmas.

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Photo Shoot

My little princess (literally!)...Kendall Rae. Kendall can talk up a storm and is speaking so clearly and in sentences for the most part. She is still doing the grunting thing when she wants something, but I feel the end is coming soon on that. She ALWAYS has to be in a dress; ALWAYS! Whatever she gets dressed in the morning she slips on a tutu over the top of it. Thanks goodness we have some older cousins that have grown out of theirs. I think right now we have about 5. She is always in a tutu, sparkley shoes and a bow in her hair (no boring clippies allowed!). A couple of weeks ago we discovered that after we put her to bed, she was getting up to put on her tutu and shoes. She was sleeping all night in her dress up clothes...silly girl! So we went and bought her some nightGOWNS so she can be a princess even when she goes to bed. She likes to wear jewelry and carry around her babies. Her new love is kitties. Maus has bought her a stuffed kitty and she won't go anywhere with out it. Kendall also likes to color and watch Peppa Pig. Peppa Pig a silly TV show about a little girl pig and her family. It doesn't come on TV often so we had to record a couple so we have some on reserve. She thinks a lot of her big brother and follows him around a lot too. We are attempting the potty training again and I feel like we are getting close even though we haven't had any success yet. She can take off her pants and panties (she was SUPER excited about her princess panties we bought her "do get potty on princess" she says). She tells me she has to go potty, but when we get to the toilet she doesn't sit still long enough to do anything. She is a wiggly worm! After a couple minutes of attempting we put everything back on and then as soon as we get to the living room she pees. GRRR...but I know one of these times she is going to get it and everything is going to click.

 

Parker, Parker, Parker...he grows so much, but he is still my cuddle bug! I hope he never grows out of that. Parker has done a great job in Kindergarten so far this year. At conferences, his test scores were all above average. His teacher, Mrs Fieser, has said Parker does a great job. She said there was even a time when one of his classmates, Ruven, was getting picked by some older kids and Parker stood up to them and told them to "stop and be nice." What a good friend...those are stories that make me (and Kevin) so proud! He is already reading! I know that I didn't read in Kindergarten, but the expectations are very high. We practice sight words all the time; his favorite sight words are color words. At school they play a game that someone starts a word (MAP) and then another kid gets to take a letter out and put a new letter in (take out M and put in a H). They work to sound out the word and talk about if it is a real word or a nonsense word. Parker thinks that game is a lot of fun, so we play it a lot at home too! Since we live in the Goddard district, but he is attending Maize, Parker has to get up early and go to school with me. So he gets up at 6, we are out the door by 6:30, then he usually plays with the iPad or colors while he waits on the bus to pick him up at 7:30. He attends half-day kindergarten and during the winter months (so right now) he comes back over to my school. One of my students Colton Helm has been a big help about waiting for him to get off the bus and bringing him to my classroom. He is with me in class for an hour before we head over for lunch. Then it is my planning period where he races cars, watches a movie, colors, does ABCmouse on a computer or the iPad. Last week he got invited down to the PE class to play mat-ball with the high school kids. I hear he got a homerun (wink, wink)! Parker is definitely Mr. Social and isn't afraid of anything.



Basketball

Parker did basketball last year at the Y, but he is such a competitive kid that he didn't much enjoy it there last year. Their age group didn't practice and he is always wanting to get better. It amazes me how persistent he is at his age about getting better at things. I hope that drive never wears off.
So this year we decided to take it up a notch and play FunBall. 5 of the 9 boys play baseball together, so they are really having a fun time together learning a new sport. They practice once a week and have a game weekly as well. Usually practice is not enough for Parker; he about wears Kevin and I out begging us to practice with him. Parker is a thinker; he really wants to understand the game and what he is supposed to do. It has been fun to see him excel at a "new" sport to him. The first game the team was not very successful (neither team was), but the second game Parker did awesome. Bragging alert!...he scored 12 of the team's 24 points. He is so much taller that the other kids so we told him to camp out under the goal and get open. One of his friends, Tanner, who is awesome at stealing and dribbling does a great job bringing the ball down and then passing it to Parker under the goal. He just throws it over the rest of the kids' heads. So fun to watch! The last game we this week Parker scored 10 points. He is really excited about basketball.

Halloween

Of course Kendall had a to something BEAUTIFUL for Halloween, so she was a fairy princess. She loved putting on pretty shoes and having her magic wand. She wasn't real sure about the wings, but we convinced her they were beautiful. Parker has been very curious about when Dad goes hunting so naturally he wanted to be a Hunter for Halloween. Very manly!
We have our tradition of heading over to Tom and Chris's house for chili before we hit the neighborhood. It is a lot of cousin fun!