Fun and Games at the Cabin

Holidays at the cabin are always fun.

We played Hearts . . .

. . . and Minute to Win It.

Heather and her boyfriend Jacob joined the recent coloring book craze . . .

. . . and made some thumbprint art, too.

The little kids built a big marble track with Aunt Heather . . .

. . . and Joy played Boggle with Papa.  I'd have loved to join in, but I've been banned from family Boggle games because I know too darn many words and nobody enjoyed being clobbered.  I suspect, though, that Joy and I will be a good match for each other in about ten years.

Christmas Day 2015

We had a happy Christmas today.

Daniel is wild about his squeaky jumper toy . . .

. . . Joy loves her scripture hero book (she says the Teancum chapter is her favorite) . . .

. . . and after we opened Todd's fire truck toys he didn't care what was in the other packages.

After opening presents and eating pancakes for breakfast (a rarity in our family--we usually eat them for dinner), we headed to Papa and Red Grandma's home to enjoy Christmas dinner and play "I Spy an Ornament" with Aunt Heather.

Christmas Gumdrops and Croquet

We celebrated Christmas Eve with Pink Grandma today.

We built gumdrop trees . . .

. . . of various shapes and sizes . . .

. . . then played croquet . . .

. . . and jammed with Grandma's guitar.

After dinner we dressed up to act out the Nativity story (good thing those child-size outfits are made of stretchy material), . . . 

. . . then sang Christmas carols.  I always love spending Christmas with family, sharing favorite holiday traditions.

Merry Christmas!

Robots, Bugs, and Trains

Anna, Joy, and I went to Kidspace with Riley and his mom today while the boys hung out at home with Daddy.

Joy and Riley started out at the BYOB (build your own bug) table . . .

. . . then moved on to the Lego robotics assembly room.

While Joy and Riley built robots . . .

. . . Anna and I climbed up some of the structures.

View from the top.

Back at home, Wheel Toy Boy decided that what our Nativity set really needed was a few trains.

A Very Merry Minecraft Birthday

Joy requested a Minecraft birthday party again this year.

The sign on our door says, "Creep on in!!!" :)

Joy drew Creepers on the favor bags . . .

. . . and as soon as Joy's friend Riley arrived . . .

. . . we played Pin-the-Block-on-the-Enderman, . . .

. . . Don't Eat Pete (or Steve, in this case), . . .
  

. . . and I posed as a villager again, asking for four "emeralds" in exchange for the "pickaxe" . . .

. . . to break the "gold block" pinata outside.

After the kids "mined" the gold block, we all came inside for cake and ice cream blocks.  I put three candles on them because Joy is nine, and three is the square root of nine, and we're geeky like that.

Joy's friend Riley gave her a stuffed Creeper as a birthday gift, which rode in our electric train this evening delivering treats (i.e. some of Joy's Halloween candy) to her younger sibs and me.

Books and Jammies

It always warms my bookworm mommy heart . . .

. . . to see my kids reading.  Joy is the most voracious reader in our family (when I bring home a book for my book group, she often reads it before I do), . . .

. . . but even Daniel felt inspired to pick up the first book in the Boxcar Children series after hearing his teacher read it to his class this month.

On an unrelated note, it also warms my heart to see my toddler wearing Christmas jammies with reindeer on the feet.  Awww.

Anna's Christmas Preschool Program

Anna's preschool class performed their Christmas program this morning.

Here's Sunnyside Preschool, Class of 2016. :)

The kids performed lots of songs, including Jingle Bells (complete with jingle bell bracelets) . . .

. . . two carols played with hand bells (each bell plays a different note) . . .

. . . and The Reindeer Pokey (you put your hoof in, you put your hoof out).

My favorite number was Away in a Manger, with the kids dressed up in Nativity costumes.

Todd would have happily watched ten more songs as long as he had a couple wheel toys to hold in his hands.

Great job, Anna!  It was fun to watch you and your class perform.

Assessing Joy

When I picked Joy up from school today she said they'd had a writing assessment, and she lamented that she tried for an hour and couldn't come up with anything to write.  I was sympathetic until I saw what she had drawn on the back of her assessment paper.

She had spent most of the hour drawing a map of Queen of Everything Super Awesome Underwater World (QESAUW, for short).  No wonder she hadn't managed to compose even a topic sentence.

The substitute teacher let Joy take her assessment sheet home to work on it some more (technically, I don't think she was supposed to do that), and Joy put her time to good use . . . adding more buildings to her map with alliterative names like Zaney Zipporium and Cool Company.  I think we can deduce a few things about Joy from this little assessment, and they have nothing to do with her ability to compose a correctly structured paragraph.

The Birthday Baker

It's Joy's birthday today . . .

. . . and she decided to celebrate by making her own cupcakes, using a recipe that we found on the Internet and she tweaked a bit.

I'd say they turned out pretty well.  Joy opted to leave them unfrosted, cuz that's how she prefers her cupcakes.  Daddy heartily seconded that motion.  Her sibs humored her because she's the birthday girl.

It probably won't shock you to learn that Joy's favorite present was a cookbook (which she picked out from the school book fair a few days ago).  It contains 321 recipes, and after looking through every page she says she wants to try cooking 101 of them.

Stair Steps

Each of our children (except Joy) is just over two years younger than their next sibling up.  For five weeks between Todd's and Joy's birthdays, their ages are stair steps two years apart.

Tonight, on the eve of Joy's ninth birthday, I printed off their ages and we snapped a fun picture.

2, 4, 6, 8--who do you appreciate?

Angels, Shepherds, and Cleaner Uppers

We had a fun time at the Christmas party at church last night.

All the kids dressed up as angels and shepherds, and sang "Away In a Manger."

Here's Anna the angel, getting ready to go on stage.

Afterward, Daddy helped take the decorations down . . .

. . . and the big kids followed his example by helping clean up chairs.

Then they hitched a ride on the push broom.

"In every job that must be done, there is an element of fun."