It's Christmas Time...Already?

As you can see from my lack of posting, things have been busy around here. Also I have some sort of stigma about needing enough time to blog rather than just doing it. That is why it never gets done. So here's a quick visual review...The first week of Dec. we took the girls to Breakfast with Santa at our credit union. They do it every year and it is the best and easiest way to get photos with Santa. The credit union is very small (they know everyone by name!) and you never have to wait in line, plus you get a delicious pancake breakfast after seeing Santa. Allison didn't cry, and Emily actually smiled. Good job, girls! Aren't their little matching outfits cute?!

Kevin took advantage of Black Friday by purchasing a 40" flat screen HDTV at Best Buy. Luckily they have no-interest financing for two years! We are trying to sell our old one if anyone is in the market...it's a Sony HD and measures 30 inches.

Allison started crawling on all fours about the first week of December, and she (and Emily) had a great time playing in the giant TV box. Allison has also had a great time exploring the whole house with her new-found mobility. When Emily was a baby she never was interested in too much that wasn't hers...Allison is the complete opposite. Just the other day I put her down to play in the family room while I washed dishes in the kitchen right next door. Well five minutes later when I went to check on her, she was nowhere to be found! I didn't think she could crawl that fast, I guess. I finally found her all the way down the hall in the bathroom with the door closed! She also likes to follow us around from room to room and get into anything and everything she possibly can. If any of you ever visit my house in the next (uh, years?), don't expect it to be pristine.

We spent the week of Thanksgiving at my parent's house in Pleasanton. Kevin gets to go up there at least twice a month for work, but the kids and I usually stay home, so it was a nice trip. We scrapped our plans to go to San Francisco for a day and just stayed in and relaxed instead. The kids had fun with their grandparents and aunt Marianne (above) and uncle Devin. Emily was especially impressed that her uncle Devin could launch her up about 12 feet in the air.

We spent a few hours at the park on one of the days. Pleasanton has a park in every neighborhood, and Emily has been to a lot of them thanks to my mom. We had fun swinging, playing hide-and-seek, and bouncing on the teeter-totter.

KEVIN RECEIVED HIS DEGREE!! I put "received" because technically he earned it in August, but it came in the mail mid-November. WAHOOOO! After about 10 years, only, thanks to Fresno State's ridiculous transfer protocols. Anyway, Kevin now officially has his bachelor's degree (Business Administration - Finance Option of you can't read it) and I am so proud of him. So was the TV a graduation gift to himself??? Yeah, let's go with that. Plus he survived a major round of layoffs at AT&T in the past week, so we are also very happy that he still has a job.

Allison actually fell asleep like this. I always put her in bed before she is asleep and leave the room and close the door. So who knows what she is doing in there between me leaving and her falling asleep. This particular day she was apparently exploring the bumpers and trying to peek out of her crib. Maybe the serene view of the changing table on the other side of the room put her to sleep.

Emily's Halloween gingerbread house. Parents - here's a tip: in early November when all the Christmas gingerbread houses go on sale in stores and your kids want to make one but you dread the idea of a messy frosting- and candy-gobbed structure taking up space somewhere in your house for two months...buy the Halloween house kit on clearance for $1.99 and let your child go to town. Then discreetly get rid of it after a week or two. What? Did I do that? No, we bought ours for full price a few weeks before Halloween and ... okay, yes that's what happened. Great idea, though, right? I also got a Christmas kit and we made it last week (so it is now taking up half of my table), but the Halloween one was there at the right time and was just as much fun.

We made Jell-o jigglers for family home evening sometime in October. Notice Emily's name spelled out at the bottom. And the nice Halloween shapes. She did a good job cutting them out and eating almost all of them.

We actually carved pumpkins this year! Emily picked out the witch design and I painstakingly tried to cut out the intricate pattern. It turned out okay but not exactly as it looked on the stencil. We carved the other two after the witch. I was worn out after that. Princess Emily and froggy Allison got to trick-or treat at ZooBoo (see post below) and our ward's trunk-or-treat party. Truthfully, this was the only time Allison actually wore her costume because both event nights were too warm. So I just dressed them back up and took their photo so we could remember their costumes!

We also went to the pumpkin patch with our playgroup in early October. It was a very hot day, and all the kids were running around with red faces. But it was fun. I guess October was unusually warm this year, because it stayed in the 80's most of the month. But I'd much rather have that than cold! It's great to live in the central valley.