Happy New Year!!!!

The kids decided they wanted to stay up until midnight and see the ball drop. Well it's 10:50 now. Molly is laying against me asleep. Caleigh is in the floor in a sleeping bag. She's still awake, but she looks really tired. I'm not sure if she'll make it. Chad asked her if she wanted him to wake her and she said no. Colin shouldn't have a problem. I sometimes find him reading or playing in his bed when I check on him before I go to bed sometimes later than midnight.

What will I do with Molly?

I guess everyone has one child who does it. I should have known it would be Molly. She found some scissors today and cut her hair. It's not terribly noticeable so it could have been worse. She cut a good chunk out of one side though. Molly said she thought it was okay because it's her own hair. Here's what Caleigh brought me when she came to tell on Molly.



Caleigh actually came to tell me because Molly was chasing Caleigh trying to cut her hair too.

While I was trying to comb it and see how bad it was, Caleigh said she knew how to fix it. She said just put Molly in the bathtub because her hair always gets longer when you wash it.   I guess I'll be taking her for a haircut tomorrow or Friday to fix it. It was only in May that I was able to let her get her first real haircut. I hope they'll be able to do something to blend it in without having to cut it all as short as that section. 

Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas.

The Polar Express

Yesterday, we had a Polar Express party. I gave the kids new pajamas and invited some of their friends over in their pjs and watch the movie with us. I printed boarding tickets for each of them. Before starting the movie, I punched their first initial on the ticket. They had hot chocolate and snacks while watching the movie. I punched the letter for their last name on the ticket when the kids in the movie were boarding the train to go home. At the end of the movie, I gave them each their own bell.

Here's a pic of the kids waiting for their friends to arrive. I don't know what this face is that Molly is making, but she was proud of it. As soon as I took the pic, she turned and showed it to Colin and Caleigh and laughed about it.

Gingerbread House

The kids had a great time making their gingerbread house. Molly was more interested in eating candy. Colin and Caleigh actually worked on the house a lot though.



After finishing it, they were very excited to eat it. Now it's looks like this.

Gingerbread

Today, we read Gingerbread Baby, The Gingerbread Boy, and The Gingerbread Girl. Then we compared the stories. Then we made our own gingerbread men. Actually, they were snowman shaped because I couldn't find the other cookie cutter. Aren't my helpers cute?



Here are the cookies they decorated. Molly had already taken a bite of hers. She told me he didn't want to wear a hat so she bit it off for him.



Then we made some gingerbread ornaments. We started out using glitter glue, but the girls were having a hard time with it. They ended up finishing with markers.



Molly has been running around the house with her ornament trying to get everyone to chase her. She comes up to us and says, "Run, run. You can't catch me. I'm the gingerbread man." Then she takes off running.

An update, finally

Well, we've been busy with Christmas activities and preparations. For school, we've been doing math, handwriting, spelling, phonics, and grammar daily. We've read quite a few Christmas books. Some of them are: Cranberry Christmas, The Tale of Three Trees, Mortimer's Christmas Manger, If you Take a Mouse to the Movies, The Story of the Three Wise Kings, The Little Drummer Boy, Madeline's Christmas, and Silver Packages.

The kids made these trees from ice cream cones and frosting.







We've been out looking at Christmas lights. We went to one house that had their lights synchronized with music you could listen to on the radio. One night we went to a park about an hour away that you can drive through to see the displays.

Wednesday, Chad took the day off work and went with us to a play at the Charlotte Children's Theatre. It was called The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. We all really enjoyed it. The kids thought it was very funny.

Yesterday, I finally got a picture of the kids for our Christmas cards. I thought it would get easier now that they're older. I guess I was wrong. Getting three kids to all look the same direction without silly faces and everyone's eyes open is still difficult. Molly, who I can usually count on to pose anytime, didn't want to have her picture taken. This isn't one I'm using for our cards, but it makes me smile so I thought I'd post it.  A big smile from Caleigh when I'm taking pictures is rare.

Another visit with Santa

Yesterday, we went to a little party at Chad's work. The kids got to visit with Santa, pick a stuffed animal, have cookies and milk, and get coloring books. Once again, we only got pictures with Molly and Colin. Caleigh decided not to see Santa.





After that, we went to the parade. Here they are waiting for it to start.

December school

We got started back to school after our week break for Thanksgiving. Sometimes we don't end up getting to do all the fun things I find for holidays because of our other work so I've decided to actually schedule it in this month. It's a good thing I did because I ended up being sick all week and we didn't get to everything I planned. Normally, I would have seen holiday stuff as extra and it would have been cut out first. Colin will do spelling, math, grammar, and some history. Caleigh will do reading, math, and handwriting. The rest of our time will be spent on Christmas stuff. Most days we'll focus on one book. We'll read other books and do activities that go along with that book. We'll watch lots of Christmas shows, do crafts, and cooking.

One day, we read The Wild Christmas Reindeer. We also read Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and watched the cartoon. Then we made reindeer ornaments (in the picture below).

Another day, we read Santa's Favortie Story and This is the Star. We made a foam Santa craft.



 We read a lot of other books last week, but these are the ones we liked the most are The Legend of the Candy Cane and The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey.