Day 4

Day four was pretty good for potty training. He is definetly getting it and will go all day for a marshmallow. We are just hitting one bump in the road... Going poop in the potty. Today I'm thankful I don't have kids that eat food off the floor. I had to have a conversation with Casen that what was on the ground was not a chocolate chip. Ughhh....Hopefully your not eating as your reading this. Looks like I'll have to read up on how to get him to sit on the potty a little longer to take care of other business. 

We survived day 3

After 2 long days of potty training and endless sibling battles I was wanting to throw in the flag on potty training. He woke up eager to sit on his potty and go pee pee - I should clarify he was eager to get a marshmallow. It appears that marshmallows work wonders for Jackson. He did such a great job today. He even went and sat by himself twice and went. So proud of him and who knows maybe we will be done with diapers before the new year!

slightly annoyed

I was so proud of myself. I was thinking I was doing a pretty good job of keeping up the blog during the busy holiday season and then I looked and 4 posts didn't go through. If you are an avid follower there are a few posts that I had to republish tonight. I guess I should check my ipad before I close the app to see if it in fact published.

Besides myself being annoyed with Blogger, Jackson, is highly annoyed with his mommy, the timer that keeps going off, and THE POTTY.
Potty training has started and I am thinking we will take a little break if he doesn't buy into it by Tuesday. Day one was great and now the newness and fun has died off.
But I do have to say he looks rather cute in his saggy underwear.

Merry Christmas Eve

Merry Christmas Eve to all our family and friends! 

Today we started out our day hunting for Lovee the Elf. He surprised the kids with some Christmas Magic in the shower. We now have a rainbow water in the shower. The kids were so excited! 

Next we finished off our Lego advent calendars and are down to one bag left of our special advent calendar. The kids are beyond excited to open the last one and add Baby Jesus to the manger in our nativity sets. 

Next, we had my favorite breakfast, potato pancakes. Emmeline even had some and decided they aren't that bad. Yes! I'm slowly converting them. 

After naps we headed to Nama's and Grandpa's for dinner and then Christmas Eve service. I love that it is all done in cndelight and I love that we all light and hold a candle at the close. 

After church we headed back for dessert, family time, and presents. Jackson definetly has it down this year and was so patient waiting his turn. 

After they crashed from their sugar rush we loaded up and headed to find our Santa Jammies. 

The kids heard the story The Night Before Christmas, set out their cookies and carrots, and off to bed. 

We are taking bets on what time they wake up? I'm hoping there are hours and hours of sugar plums dancing in their heads. 

Merry Christmas Eve! 

My little performers

Today we went to watch Caden and Emmeline's last preschool Christmas performance. Crazy to think next year they will be in kindergarten and Jackson will be in preschool.

Caden and Emmeline did outstanding. It is the sweetest thing to see them march in and sing with their class.

The program would be complete with out them waving and saying hi to each of their family members from up on stage. They have done this every year and seem to not be shy at all! 

After the performance they took a class photo and yes, I have the child who is making the funny face with his fingers in his mouth. Oh Caden!

To wrap up the show they went and saw Santa and we took our picture with their wish list. Every year I cringe. Funny how that list is different from the letter they mailed to Santa. It always puts me into a frenzy to try and help Santa find some toys. Thankfully Santa gets a little help from Amazon Prime. 

Our little performer

All of the play practice paid off. Today we had the perfect little horse that sat next to the manger and admired baby Jesus. 

She wasn't thrilled that she wasn't on stage for only one song. And she really wasn't thrilled when she couldn't hold baby Jesus and didn't have a solo. She is already counting down the days until the auditions for next. Looks like we will be adding singing lessons to her dance class as well. 

Sticky Fingers

Tonight we made our annual gingerbread houses and I can't stop smiling while writing this post. This year Caden decided to help decorate. I'm not going to lie it was a rough start with several melt downs over frosting getting on his fingers. A small tab of frosting on fingers would put a smile on most kids faces' as they realize they could lick it off put my little buddy into poor panic mode. We worked through it and by the end of it he was licking it off his fingers. A small win and a enough to put a smile on this mama's face. The kids did a great job and worked so hard. We will have to see how long the house will last!

Family Dinner

Tonight we had everyone over for a special family dinner. We celebrated Papa's birthday with a little sauce and meatball, red wine, and the most delicious apple pie. It was so nice to visit with everyone and I was thrilled that Dr. Chris and Emily were able join us. Wish I could say it was a quiet, low key family dinner, but with 3 little ones it is never quiet. After dinner the kids calmed down and Jackson serenaded us with Jingle Bells.  It is one of the cutest things I've ever heard. It was a great night, celebrating someone very special to us.

Happy Birthday to our fabulous Papa!!!

Growing and growing

It is the busy time of the year. I have a to do list that is about a mile long. Every time I feel like I cross something off I ads two more things. I have been putting off the family blog to tackle things at teaspoons and twine. It is pretty exciting to see that little blog grow. We went from a few clicks and follower to posts that are in the thousands and a few recent ones that are almost to 10,000. It is funny to see how some if our printable are floating around all over on Pinterest. And this week we got approved for ads on the blog. While I'm sure we are no where near retiring, it may be a little extra money to help with the craft projects. 

Feels like Christmas Morning

I felt like a little kid on Christmas morning when they brought this in. 

I'm so excited to have produce in my refrigerator that isn't going to freeze. I can't count how many heads of lettuce I have had to throw away because they were frozen solid. I'm thinking salad will be on the menu everyday next week! 

Pizza Party

After a hard and emotional week it was nice that a lot of us were able to get together for family dinner. We were lucky enough to have Uncle Tommy and his beautiful, sweet wife here. Emmeline loves her Aunt Erina and would love for them to live here. In 5 minutes she had Emmeline using a Spanish word correctly in context. Think what she could learn if they lived here!  The kiddos had so much fun using Uncle Tommy as a jungle gym and Caden was in love with his huge phone. And while there was so much bad news the past few weeks, it was nice to give Aunt Sherry a hug and be thankful for the little bit of good news that came and to see most of the family together.