From our family to yours

Greetings from Claire

My Mom said people liked my Christmas letter better than hers, so I'm writing it again. I'm 4 this year and can still do almost anything. I can write my name. I learned that in pre-school. I go there Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Friday is show and tell day. Next year I'll be big enough to go to Natey's school. I'm so excited about that!

Natey's my biggest brother. He's 7 and loves 2nd grade. He's good at drawing and reading. He doesn't like math much. He really likes sports - all sports. This summer he was in Coach Pitch baseball. I tried to watch him, but it was funner to play at the park. Natey went to football camp, too. He loves football. He really does. He lost teeth over the year and also grew some. I try to pull on mine to see if they'll come out. If they come out then the tooth fairy comes. I think I've seen her before. Natey's a good big brother and he's nice to me most of the time.
My littest brother is Jack-a-Roo. He just turned 3 years old. We had a birthday party for him and Mom made animal cupcakes. He loves animals. He doesn't have therapy friends anymore. He's all better. I'm glad that Roos is my littest brother because Momma says that if he was my biggest brother then he'd be an only child. I'm glad he's the littlest. Did you know that he jumps a lot? He does. He smiles a lot too - even when he's in trouble. the other day he was getting in trouble and Momma was telling him NO!. He just reached up and honked her nose. He did that. I love him and miss him when I'm at school.

This summer we did some fn things. We got to spend a day at the Omaha Zoo again. My Daddy got a new truck in Omaha, so we went to the zoo. Daddy also took Natey to his first Angel's game at The Cities. Mom, Roo and I went swimming at the motel and then ordered Chinese in the room while Daddy and Natey were at the game. Jack poured out his pop on the carpet. Mommy was not happy. We also went to The Mall of America. Aunt Shannon sent us tickets to ride as many rides as we wanted. It was super fun.

We went to Aunt Shannon's house for a weekend, too. Daddy went fishing with Uncle Jim and caught a big fish. It was fun to see Evie and Izzie. I miss them.

My Aunt Lynn had a baby in October. She's Baby Kyra. I love her. She's my other girl. When I went to see her, I made sure to take my baby doll to show her. We'll play with it when she's bigger. Baby Kyra has two brothers just like me; Spencer and Zachary. We're the same.

This spring we had some bad news. My Papa Gary got his angel wings and had to go live in Heaven. We are so sad about it. Sometimes I play games and have Papa as one of the players. Mostly I let him win. I also send orange pop to him in Heaven. I think he likes it. We sure do miss our Papa.

My Dad is a bigger cop this year. He's a Detective Sergeant cop. It's a big deal. My Mom still works at the salon. She colored my hair pink for Halloween. I was Strawberry Shortcake.

As for me, I like to color and play with my brothers. I'm really good at taking care of them. I got a bike for my birthday this year. I'm good at riding it with my training wheels. When I get in trouble I have dramatic melt downs and I tell my Mom and Dad that I WANT MY GRANDMA! That's what I do.

I've got to go. Roo said he's get me a juice box and I just heard a crash in the kitchen. Merry Christmas!

Love,
Claire

Oh Christmas Tree

We finally got our tree up last night. I had to run to the store - twice - before the project was complete, but it's up. Justin and I put the lights, tensile and beads on, and then it was time for the kids to finish it off. They had a blast - well, Nathan and Claire had a good time, but Jack Had! A! Blast!

Here he is adding a bit more to what looks to be an already overpopulated spot.

And then you get "I DID IT!"
Beautiful!
That cracks me up. I actually took a picture of it with my cell phone and now it's my wallpaper. Love it!

Then Claire and Nathan wanted to point out their favorite ornaments.
Then we had to take a gazillion with each child "in the middle".
You can't tell that Jack loved every. single. second. of it. Can you?

Claire's Preschool program

Claire had her preschool program Sunday. It was - adorable. The kids were so cute. Mrs. Poncelette led them out to the stage and before long all of the kids are waving at their parents. It makes me smile just thinking of it. I didn't take any video to show you, but it was cute.

She was very proud of her dress. It came with a matching one for her doll. Cute, cute, cute!

She and I were alone this weekend. Justin and the boys went to Aberdeen for our nieces baptism. Claire and I had a good time. We started a project that isn't quite done. I promise to blog about it before it's old news - like 10 years old.

This girl says some of the funniest things. Her imagination is more than wild. She pretends more than any other child I know. For instance, we'll go to the grocery store and she'll say, "I've never been here before". Then she'll look at me with her big brown eyes and say, "pretend". Then I'm expected to say something like, "You'll really like it. They have almost anything you want inside." A remark like that will make her smile from ear to ear.

Yesterday she was playing with a doll and it seemed if maybe the doll was on the phone with someone? I'm not sure. Anyway, she said "Well it's in Madison, South Dakota (although she says it more like Southa Koda). You go to Koda - and go south." Priceless!

....because when you *think* you can do it better, you should

mostly because I think she's cute.....

Pictures taken - check

Monday afternoon I took the kids to Black's to get their pictures taken. Jack had his birthday photo shoot and then they took the kids Christmas card picture.

I spent the afternoon wrapping 3 boxes in Christmas wrapping paper and packing things to take. I took a little tree as well. I also made some snacks for the kids to eat while I was picking out the pictures. I made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and packed some cheese balls. I packed a juice box for each of them too.

I can! not! wait for you guys to see the pictures. Jack had a blast! They got some adorable pictures. I hate waiting for them to come in. It's the worst part.

The picture above is from Black's blog. He's a bit of a Peachy Pie fan and called her Princess the whole time. The boys walked in and he said "Where is my Princess". You should have seen his princess bat her eyes and twirl around. Lordy.

Halloween 2009

Halloween 2009 was a success! The day before, it snowed. Not just snow, but it snowed snow balls. Snow chunks. It was crazy. It was cold and wet.

Not today though. Nope. It was perfect. I don't think we reached 60, but we had sunshine and that's almost as good.

I've been waiting for Halloween for weeks. We decided that Claire would be Strawberry Shortcake and my mind went crazy. I decided that I wanted to color her hair pink. Anyone can put on a wig or spray that crap on their hair. Pink hair it would be!

Here she is getting ready for her transformation.
One of my co-workers, Natae, helped me apply the pink. I needed it put on quickly and Natae was willing to help, so I took her up on it.After the color was done I put her hair in rollers. Such a happy camper.As if life could get any better.....
She got to sit under the dryer which made her SUPER happy. She loved it!Then it was time to get her costume on. She was so excited! We got the dress on, the tights. I put on her hat and she wasn't all too excited anymore. I took it off to air-brush some cheeks on her. She wasn't overly fond of that either. I think she'd had her fill of mommy/daughter time. She even mentioned missing her brothers.

Finally, it was time to put on her fake lashes and her look would be complete. She asked me not to, but being the Halloween Mommy Dearest that I am, I just....kinda....did it. And got this fab pic.
And then down came the tears. Not only did she not want the hat, or make-up, she REALLY didn't want the lashes. At all. She cried and cried. Did I mention that I air-brushed her make-up? Yeah. Well she finally quit crying and decided that the hat would work out just fine. (I kinda told her that she'd have to wear her stocking hat if she didn't choose this one and then NOBODY would know what she was supposed to be. See? Halloween Mommy Dearest. I'm not proud of it. Well, not super proud of it, at least.)

The end result.

Strawberry Shortcake!

Here are all the kids. Nathan was a baseball player. I tried to explain to him that Halloween wasn't career day, but he didn't care. He wanted to be a baseball player anyway. And really, he took one for the team last year. He was the Tin Man. His friends would walk by with super cool costumes as Nathan tried to hide behind the nearest tree - because he was the Tin Man. So baseball player it was.

If you asked Jack what he was he'd tell you a bat. After all, he had wings. :) A devil wasn't a stretch for him, that's for sure. He had a b*l*a*s*t trick-or-treating. He loved every second of it. He asked almost everyone if we could come in their house. It was pretty funny. One guy said, "Maybe you can come in, I don't know, maybe next week". I'm almost positive Jack penciled him in.
Here is the gang: Dawson, Caymen, Claire, Nathan and Jack.Here are the kids with their loot. For reals - nobody needs that much candy. But! We'll take it. ;)

Pumpkin painting

Monday we picked out our pumpkins. Each of the kids picked one out (and loved every second of it...) and then I chose one. I don't think I'll be able to carve the one that Jack picked, so I thought I better get a 'stand-by'.

We also got mini pumpkins for them to paint. They had a blast!!

You know what?

You're Cranky!

(Do you love how he says it with a big, fat, smile?)

Do you love it?

I got my hair cut and colored Sunday night. Do you love it as much as I do? The red is HD again and again Justin doesn't like it. But I sure do. Oh! And do you love the self portrait? It drives me crazy when I see a self portrait, but I had to. HAD TO! :)
Oh yeah! Here are my blue nails. Speaking of blue, Jack told me yesterday that he liked my byou (blue) hair. Um, close sweetie. :)

You know you're tired when....

You fall asleep giving yourself a neb.

Butterflies

This has been such a fun project at our house. I hope the kids want to do it again next year. The only draw back is that the caterpillars and chrysalis' don't smell all that great. Other than that, the life of a Monarch is unbelievable.

We started with these little guys....Jack couldn't get enough of them.

When they are ready to make a chrysalis, they make a J, like this.

Then they shed their skin and made a chrysalis. Remember?Before they get ready to hatch, it would appear that they turn black. However, the chrysalis isn't black at all, it's just the black of the Monarch's wings that you see.She the wings?The chrysalis is actually clear.Here are a couple of them after they hatched.You have to make sure their wings are fully dried before you try to set them free. Here is one that we took out too soon.I ended up bringing it back in so the wings could dry more.

Did you know they migrate to Mexico? If you have a 2nd grader you sure do.

Did you know that you can tell the difference between boys and girls? Here is a picture of a boy. I didn't make the caption big enough, but it says "This is how you can tell it's a boy. There is a swelling in the line." I had no idea!

And would you believe that I got video of one hatching? You'll be able to hear that I'm a little excited about it. Ok, so I was a lot excited about it. I couldn't believe that I got video of one making the chrysalis and coming out.

What a wonderful, beautiful and simply amazing process!

DSU Homecoming Parade

On Friday I was super nervous what kind of weather we'd be having on Saturday for the parade. I told the kids that I'd take them rain or shine. Thank you Jesus for giving us shine. :)

I called Grandma Sandy and Papa Ken that morning to see if they'd want to sit with us. The kids thought it was a great idea. Tracy and her kids were in the parade, so we were happy to save them a spot.

It was cute - Natey woke up Saturday morning and was in a panic because "WHAT IF DAWSON HAS TO WALK IN FRONT OF A FIRE TRUCK????". Dawson isn't a fan of loud noises and Natey was so worried that his buddy's parade experience would be ruined due to a fire truck. Luckily, Dawson wasn't near a fire truck.

How about some visual aids. Here the kids are waiting for the parade to start.I'm telling you, Jack is a total gamer. He's playing Chuzzle on my phone.Here is the Madison High School Marching Band. They sounded great! I really love the bands.The Rost girls made appearances at different times in the parade. Amber stood with us until Shayla went by. I love me some Amber.Check out this cool truck. I don't know who owns it, but it's awesome!The Dueul High School band was there too, and not that I have interest in them, but I loved their outfits the most. :)The families of the 211th walked in the parade. I think we got a half a bag of candy from them. The kids L*O*V*E*D it! Here are Tracy and Caymen.

And Katie and Braelyn.

Remember when the Shriners had those itty bitty motorcycles? Well they are movin' on up. I wonder how many hours they spent practicing this?

Natey's right, totally cool!

Later that day, Tracy and I went to Sioux Falls. I had a blast. I even got my nails done. Other than doing them myself, I've never had them done 'professionally'. It was fun - and now I have blue tips. :) Check out Tracy's blog to find out about her parade experience.