Christmas dresses

I have a bunch of pictures to go through and put up for Christmas but I wanted to share with you the pictures we took today.  These are our Christmas dresses.  If you want to hear more about how I made them you can look at my other blog Crafts Redesigned for more information.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas

Hope you are enjoying your Christmas.  We are having a laid back kind of Christmas.  Yesterday when I finished the Christmas dresses and started feeling anxious about Christmas Eve Dinner and all that needed to be done.  I said to myself - "SIMPLIFY".  We are still having a nice dinner but I am not going all out.  The sweet rolls we had for Breakfast will also be for dessert.  The kids pealed the potatoes and will help me cut up fruit for our fruit salad.  I just wish I had thought of this before I went a bit overboard on Christmas presents.  Maybe next year.

We wish you the best Christmas ever and Hope the New Year brings fun and adventures for your family and mine.

What the back of the card said:

This year has been full of many FIRSTS

   Kirsten started FIRST grade *  Esther had her FIRST birthday * Dave started his FIRST commute on the bus and train to his new job in Chicago * Peter started going to his FIRST preschool * We took Esther (and her siblings) on her FIRST airplane ride and trip to Utah * We lived through our FIRST blizzard in Chicago * Kirsten had her FIRST toothless school picture (missing both top teeth.) * Esther took her FIRST steps around Halloween * Kirsten passed her FIRST spelling test with flying colors * Peter had his FIRST ride on the Metra Train (along with the rest of the family) *

Hopefully we can be the FIRST to wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

A quick review of the last couple of months

I will try and make this as painless as possible. I have been crazy doing other things and avoiding putting my pictures up. Not because I don't think they are good enough but because I didn't feel like I had time to pretty them up and put them on pages. I realized that I am just getting further behind and you don't get to see all the fun we have been having. So here they are. I will try and describe them as I put them on. Sorry it will be a bit of a picture overload for most of you.

Thanks for putting up with my lateness.

Making Halloween cookies for the Trunk or Treat party.

Here are pictures of Peter and Kirsten's school parties and Trunk or Treat party and Halloween. They are so cute.

A close up of the costumes I made them. You have Tinkerbell and her sister and a pig from Angry Birds.

Esther is now 1 years old.

Here is the pictures from her birthday party. I think she enjoyed the box almost better then the presents. The picture in the left corner is her after cake face. She isn't so messy. She kind of picked at the cake and didn't make a mess but she sure love it. You could hear her saying, "Mmm, Mmm. . . Mmm." The whole time she ate it. Peter, Kirsten and I made the cupcakes. I was trying some techniques I had learned at a Relief Society Meeting.

The month of November is pretty slim pickings for pictures. I have this one as the kids helped me decorate the tree the days following Thanksgiving. I guess I forgot my camera when we went to the Parker's for Thanksgiving.

This is a new party trick Esther can do. She can sit in her drum. She squishes down in and sits there. Then she pops up. She is a funny little girl.

We visited Mr and Mrs Claus a couple weeks ago. I'm not sure what Peter or Kirsten told them but I think it was pretty intense conversation based on their facial expressions. Esther was kind of indifferent about the whole thing. She didn't seem to care if she saw Santa or not. 

Our Ward did it's annual Live Nativity.  This year the format was a little different.  I joined the choir that sang in the concert.  Dave, Kirsten and Peter were able to be shepherds this year.  Thanks to lots of prayers the evening was beautiful and warm enough the kids were not frozen.  It was neat to watch as my family walked up to see the baby Jesus.  This event always brings the spirit of Christmas (and the true meaning of Christmas) to my heart.  I love it.

I served along side Liberty Cameron and many others that helped as we set up the beautiful Creche display.  This part is a lot of work but worth every minute as we open box after box and see the many ways the Savior is honored in this beautiful display.

We visited Kirsten's School for the sing-a-long.  Each grade sang a different song and Kirsten's class sang.  Must Be Santa.  It was fun to listen to the many types of Holiday songs.  They had some for all of the different holidays celebrated at this time of year.

In Honor of Peter finally having 10 plus dry nights in a row, we got to go to Odyssey Fun World.  The kids had a blast.  They ran and played for a couple of hours.  It was well worth it.  Peter was pretty excited.  Dave kept taking pictures of him on the toys and then he would be on top of the toys.  He is a crazy fun little boy.  Esther was in Heaven as she walked all around the place.  She thought that this was a cool place to run and play in too.  For the first 1/2 hour or more we didn't see Peter or Kirsten.  They were running and playing in the tubes, the balls and the slides.