Mrs. Claus and Riley the Elf go caroling

One of the things we decided to do this year as part of our goal to restore meaning to Christmas was to go caroling at Cagui's assisted living community. So the kids dressed up...

Violet wore her Mrs. Claus costume that Mamalali made her last year, and Riley wore the elf costume I slapped together this afternoon. Yay for felt! I can sew felt. Just add a couple fun Christmas socks and you have yourself a regular costume!

We had our friends the Gomez family join us... Eli played guitar while the girls joined my two kids in the singing and merriment. I made their costumes too. Seriously felt makes me incredibly happy! I can't screw it up!

We walked through the halls, tying bows to everyone's doorknobs and singing our hearts out. The kids were adorable and everyone loved them, of course!
We stopped by Cagui's apartment and entertained him with a rousing rendition of "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer", which he enjoyed immensely. :)
Afterward we enjoyed hot cocoa at Starbucks...


and Violet and Riley conked out in the car on the way home. ;)

Hopefully we can make this an annual tradition. It was so much fun to bring joy to the residents and see their happy faces. We got lots of hugs and thank yous, some joined us in song, and everyone was left with a smile on their faces. It was a great night. ♥

My Children in November, 2009: The Violet Edition.

Violet, ever the performer, learned about the school's Lip Sync competition and she set about perfecting her performance of Avril Lavigne's song "Girlfriend" (Kids Bop Edition, so it was clean... LOL). She tried out and made it to the finals! When it came time for performance night, I helped outfit her in full ROCKSTAR clothes, complete with rad makeup.

She decided that ROCKSTARS are tough and don't smile for the camera.

They also pose like this:

Then I made her practice singing to get some "action shots" ;)


SING IT SISTAH!

Fortunately for me, I can always get my girl to smile ;)

The competition was great! Violet did a fantastic job and really worked the stage... up until the very end, I thought she would definitely have a chance at winning - and then, the last entrant performed. She sang Miley Cyrus's song "Party in the USA" and it was like we were actually watching Miley performing. Props! Choreography! And Impeccable lip-synching! This girl was in a league all her own. Violet loved watching her and getting some cool ideas for how to improve her next stage performance, and I was pretty proud of her for thinking that way. I love my girl :)

My Children in November, 2009: The Riley Edition.

My First Grader has been dying to lose a tooth! He is one of the last in his class that still have all their baby teeth, and he was getting pretty antsy... especially because for the past several weeks his bottom two teeth have started loosening. Well, a couple weeks ago he came home from school pretty excited because his loose tooth was REALLY SUPER LOOSE! I told him that if he worked at it, he could probably get it out today!

First, he had to see how far it would bend forward and back, side to side -

It was even starting to bleed, which I told him was a GOOD sign! That meant it was breaking free!
The other good sign was when he pushed it he could hear the distinctive popping sounds when it started pulling away from the gums. The more pops, the closer it was to coming out!
It popped some more, and he could almost get his tongue all the way under it! I told him it was almost no time now...
Grab it with the tissue, and PULL!
The look on his face when he realized that the tooth that was in his mouth was now in his hand was excellent. :)
And all of a sudden, my boy's smile would never ever be the same!
The neighborhood kids (all younger than Riley) came over to check out the tooth!
and Riley was super excited to have something to put under his pillow!
And the Tooth Fairy did visit him! He got TWO golden dollars! Lucky kid!

Halloween 2009!

I know, I know, I am a little late to the game, but I still wanted to share my cute kiddos from Halloween!

Violet wanted to be a "Cute Witch" - we looked around some stores for costumes, and although we found some, I wasn't about to spend $25 for a silly witch costume. I would make it myself! (all this two days before leaving for India... tell me again, WHAT WAS I THINKING??)

We found a cute hat, top, socks to turn into fingerless gloves, broom, and material to make a funky skirt/wrap. By the time it was all said and done, I LOVED the costume. And it cost me $45. SIGH. :)

The Boy was easy. He wanted to be Snake Eyes from GI Joe. $10 in the costume section at Target, and I was done.

We also decorated the front of the house with lots of creepy cobwebs and pumpkin decor!

And Violet practiced flying on her broom... first the takeoff...
balance....
and she was off!
I think she got the hang of it! :)

Going the DISTANCE!

So as some of you know, Liane and I are training to run a marathon! We are running this January in Walt Disney World, and we are about halfway done with our training!

Many of you may ask what in the HECK am I doing... and sometimes, when Liane and I are doing our long runs, I ask myself that same question! I have never been much of an athlete (well, actually, according to my dad I am a natural athlete, but I never have had the motivation to do anything sports-wise... ha!), so why not start with something small, like a 5K or 10K, or even a half-marathon? And my answer is simply this:


It had to be something completely foreign, completely unattainable. If I thought the goal was in any way reachable, then it wasn't a challenge for me. I had to take myself COMPLETELY out of my comfort zone so I could watch myself achieve something I had always thought impossible.


I am learning, through training and through some of the things I have experienced in this last month (such as going to India), that "with God, all things are possible!"


I know that there is no way I will be able to achieve this goal on my own. I also know that I will not be finishing this race anywhere near the front. I am training with Liane, which is the best choice I could have ever made. She motivates me and challenges me, she encourages me and believes in me. The two of us are consistently the last ones to cross the finish line on our Saturday runs... but we FINISH. And we will do the same in January.


We are running in honor of those fighing blood cancers and in memory of those who have lost their battles. We are raising money for this cause (see the widget on the right hand column on my blog!), and are very very thankful for anyone willing to donate to our race!


Right now, until November 25th, we are also offering a special incentive - for every $5 that is donated to our team, your name will be entered into a drawing to win a FREE PHOTO SESSION with Speckled Bird Art Photography! Can't beat that!


TELL YOUR FRIENDS! Take a second and check out our fundraising page! Pray for us!! We appreciate all your support! :)

The Baby Girls

Violet has been BEGGING me for a pet hamster for months. I told her she had to research it, tell me all about it, and then save up all the money to do it. She went to the library and checked out every hamster book there. She learned about their lifespan (3-5 years), that they don't like sharing their cage with another hamster (except in the case of dwarf ones), and that they needed their food and water changed daily. After more research, because she really thought it would be cool to have two of them, she was leaning toward a dwarf hamster (although the recommended age for caring for them is 14 and up). Then we thought about gerbils, which are smaller than hamsters (but not as small as dwarf ones) and they like to share their cage with siblings. That way both Violet and Riley could get one. She was liking that more and more! It took her 3 months to save the money to get the cage, bedding, tubes, food, and running balls, but she did it and now she is the proud mama (with Riley as the proud dad!) of two "baby girls" named Hermione and Juliet.

Here is Hermione (Riley's gerbil):

She is a light gray color and her eyes are light too - they almost look red (but not in a creepy way! LOL!)

And this is Juliet (Violet's getbil):
She is more brown than Hermione and she has black eyes.
Juliet is very curious.
And here are the two "baby girls", as Violet calls them.
We've had them for a couple months now and they really are cute. Violet puts them in their little rolling balls and lets them run around in my office while she cleans their cage. They love to burrow and run and climb and play and they have only escaped once (LOL - on *MY* watch!).

I am really proud at how responsible she is in taking care of them, too! She is definitely proving that she would make a great veterinarian. :)

Violet's Birthday Carnival - more summertime

Violet decided that she wanted a Carnival birthday party this year... and I have always wanted to do a carnival party, so I was ALL ABOUT IT! We painted signs and hung colorful flag banners...

Put up tents (Thank you Ted Wiens Tire & Auto for your canopies) and made some rad games...
And designed plenty of fun photo ops! All the signs were painted and colored by Violet and Riley.
Of course, it was a hundred and eleventy that day, so it was also a Pool Party! We called the pool our big Dunk Tank :)
This is one of the Carnies. She's in the Witness Protection Program, so we will just call her "Erin".
Everyone participating in the games...
Another Carnie, this one in charge of the Tic Tac Toe game...
Watch out for this guy. He was in charge of the Ring Toss, and let's just say we are pretty sure he wasn't playing it fair. He had shifty eyes.
This Carnie handled the Duck Shot game, one of the hardest of the day... you had to use the little Nerf gun to shoot a ducky off the sawhorse. Seems pretty easy, but nothing is as easy as it looks...
What's a carnival without Plinko? I'll tell you! It's no carnival at all!
There was even a golf game for the kiddos to play...
The kids loved "Spilled Milk", where they had to knock down plastic milk jugs...
and thanks to Oriental Trading Company and the $1 section of Target, there were plenty of prizes for all!
And look! I was there too!!
Riley showed us how to master the Skee-Ball game...
and here I am again with "Erin"
Of course we had grilled hot dogs!
and everyone took a turn taking pics in our silly photobooth.
The carnival really was a great time. All the adults who came were "put to work" at various stations, and all the kids loved going from game to game throughout the afternoon and evening. By making most of the games ourselves and shopping sales for the prizes, we really kept the budget down... and the kids happy!

Of course, now everyone's asking how I'm going to top THIS party! Hopefully I can come up with something in the next year... haha :)