My First Quilt

I've been learning to quilt, and I just finished my first quilt.

 It's a small girl's baby quilt, but I couldn't be more excited.  I can't believe how easy sewing is and how beautiful the results are.

Of course, I've probably just ensured that all of my friends' future children will be boys.

Tree Climbing

Here are my little monkeys.

Chalk Drawings

It was a beautiful 70 degree day here and we spent most of it cleaning the house.  But we also got outside too and enjoyed some chalk.

Clare's working on a little girl friend.

Thomas is advising Gregory on his art.

 Thomas is very good at making Gregory's work look like it's his own.

Somehow he ended up with chalk all over him.

Holding hands and drawing together.

"I need a bigger vision or a bigger driveway."

Clare's drawing of an angel watching over the baby Jesus in Bethlehem

 It's a person!  Is it me?



Heavy Weighs the Crown

Thomas and the Christmas Tree

The biggest problem with most Christmas trees is that they are not huggable.

 Then you get faces like this when you try to hug them.

 Luckily for me, my parents got me this nice soft tree, with buttons instead of glass ornaments, and fabric instead of needles - see?

 It makes me smile just to think about it.

 And then I hug away!

 It's even more fun to do it with your eyes closed.



Thomas and the Gun

Cute and dangerous!

Sometimes carpool line makes me a little crazy!

 It would make me very sad to have to shoot someone.

 In the meantime I'll just work on some target practice - where's Gregory?

Dance Tap and Ballet

Making a Nativity Set

Clare's school loves projects.

For December she had to make a shoebox nativity set, making as much of it as she could.

She was very proud of the results, and after the project is returned to us, it will become a part of our Christmas traditions each year to use this nativity set.

We made clothespin dolls standing on wooden stars for balance.  My glue gun got the most use it has ever had.  Over all, we think it turned out pretty well.

As you can tell, by the time we were at the animals, I was tired of make it yourself projects.

 Here's a close up of the angels which are Clare's favorite part.

Gregory's Best Birthday Ever

I can't believe that Gregory turned 4 today.

 It would be hard to imagine a better birthday then he had.

This is his requested rat and turtle cake.

 Here we are at Chuck E. Cheese with the mouse himself!

 Gregory's crowned a birthday king.

 The king with his cake.

 Ready to get tickets in the ticket blaster.

After the party (which was at 9:30am - the best time to have a party at that place, it's empty), we had an ice cream party with Clare's soccer team, and the kids and I went to see Tangled (a great kid's movie)

Tangled was at the mall, and so was Santa.  I think Gregory was more excited about Santa than the movie.

 When you saw Santa they gave you a free ticket to ride the Mall Carousel.

Here's Gregory's dragon.

 Clare picked a reindeer.

Finally it was time to come home and head to bed.  I'm not sure what else we could have added.

Bouncing

On Firday night we went to a birthday party for a class mate of Clare's at Pump it Up.

I knew the big kids would love it, but I wasn't sure about Thomas.  He loved it, but wasn't big enough to do anything by himself.

This meant that I felt free to climb on all of the bouncers and slides and do them with Thomas.

It was tons of fun and quite a work out.  We went down huge slides and jumped up and down.