Cha-Cha-Cha

Each Tuesday night we have a mad scramble in our house, especially now that basketball is in full swing.  This past fall, Emma Jo started taking ballroom dance lessons at 7pm each Tuesday. It has become a tradition at our school for the 7th and 8th graders to participate in Nordquist dance in Santa Rosa.
This is the first year that Emma is old enough and I was eager for her to participate.  I think it is important to try as many new experiences as you can.  You never know what you will love until you try it. At first she wasn't sure if she wanted to participate but soon it became "when can we go shopping for Nordquist dresses?". Thankfully Grammies was more than happy to help out with that request.

I love that not only are the kids learning dances like the swing, Cha Cha, and waltz but they are also learning etiquette and manners. We are part of a car pool so I only get to go to watch every five weeks but the times I have gone there were lessons on walking a girl onto and off of the dance floor, standing when a woman approaches the dinner table, tying a necktie, helping a girl put on her coat and dressing in a way appropriate for the occasion.

This week I was amazed to see how much the kids have learned in such a short amount of time. They were doing the night club two step and knew many moves and actually looked like they were dancing!

Long weekends

Long weekends are a mixed blessing. This past weekend was Presidents Day so we got Monday off. It was a very productive weekend. Saturday we cleaned the family room from floor to ceiling including moving all of the furniture, shaking out the rug and mopping all of the wood floor. We also got Lucy groomed, went to ballet and sold almost 150 boxes of Girl Scout Cookies (well Gracie did). We even squeezed in a trip to Starbucks and the park!

Sunday was church, a trip to the nursery for potatoes, and about ten loads of laundry before heading to Grammie's and Grampa's for dinner.

Monday we woke up and weren't quite sure what to do. I washed all the sheets and the towels. Went to Walmart and Safeway.  Finished folding and putting away stragglers and watched Smash (my new favorite show!). Then I realized it was still only 3:00. I decided it was s perfect time to take the kids to the park. Emma want interested but the littles were game.

We had gone to Keiser park in Saturday so Monday they opted for "Connie's" park. It wasn't quite as much fun as our trip on Saturday since we didn't run into any friends to chat with. But it is always fun to send time playing with the kids.

By 6pm we were all beat. Three day weekends are nice for getting to spend time together and getting projects done. But by the end of the weekend we are all worn out and ready to get back to normal. I told Jason that next time we have a three day weekend we are getting pizza for dinner on the last night so that we can just relax.

Long, lean & smart!!!

I took Henry to his 18 month appointment last week. He was 23lb 12oz and 32.5" long. This is the 25th percent in weight and 50th percent in height. I didn't get the head circumference but it was in the 70th percentile. My conclusion was that he is long, lean and smart!

He is growing and changing so quickly! He eats more food than any of his siblings. He is stubborn and opinionated. He demands his own way and is a bit if a bully. Henry has the cutest curls and an adorable smile. He is a love and a cutie. He has recently been learning an explosion of words and there is nothing more adorable than hearing him say "peas" or "dank u".

It's Beginning to Look a lot like Christmas!

I am so happy that I found my Christmas spirit this year! The last few years Christmas has felt like more of a chore than a choice and I grudgingly put up (some) decorations and tried to get into the spirit. Thankfully this year is different! I was ready for the tree Thanksgiving weekend! We put up lights on the outside of the house, decorated the inside of the house and we're even hosting our first Christmas party in years!


Before we headed out to the Silver Oak Christmas Party I snapped these pictures of the kids. They were going to be for our Christmas cards but I ended up choosing something else


I love this picture of Henry! Look at those curls! Can you believe that Jason wants to cut them off?


She is getting so grown up!

Last weekend we finally(!) got our tree.


I sure love this man. Especially how he puts up with all of my wild ideas.

Catch Up

I've fallen behind on the BlogWagon again. Last weekend (or was it the weekend before?), I took pictures of the kids dressed in their Holiday best as we got ready to head out to the Silver Oak Christmas party. The next day I downloaded the pictures to the computer. That was when I discovered that I still had pictures from carving pumpkins on the camera! I guess life as been a little crazy!


Always a ham
Look at those curls!
She did not want to touch the "guts"
But did want to pose for a picture
He did not want to be outdone
Daddy helped Henry

Sitting on the pumpkins from Grampa

In November Cooper sang at church with the preschool.


Thanksgiving at Grammie's
There were 18 of us this year!

Having fun at the park on a sunny day in the beginning of December.
It was a little chilly
He loves the swings
Always reading

End of Summer

It is getting colder and colder here and I think I have to admit that summer is over. In fact, I'm probably going to have to put my flip-flops away and find some real shoes. (Maybe it is a good excuse to buy the new boots I've been eyeing.)

Looking back through pictures, I discovered these that I never posted. As the summer was drawing to a close, we tried to get out into the fresh air in the evenings before the time change. We rediscovered the rope swing in the middle of our neighborhood.







Everyone enjoyed it and like so many other things, it made me wonder why don't we do this more often? Of course, now with the cold weather, coming rain, and time change we will need to wait until spring before we can visit it again...

A Knight, An Angel, a Masquerade Ball & a Monkey?

We had quite an assortment of Halloween costumes this year. Each child (except Henry) got to pick their own and we ended up with Sir Cooper the Noble Knight. He was wearing the Armour of God.

He picked it out himself months ago and has been talking about it ever since.

Miss Grace picked an Angel costume out of our dress-up clothes.

I made this for Emma when she was in 1st grade in the Christmas pageant.

Emma and her friends decided to be guests as a masquerade ball.

She borrowed the dress from Grammie and made her own mask.

Henry was adorable as a Monkey, complete with banana in his back pocket.

Jason did a great job picking this one out!