Time at the park and playing in the snow

This winter has been so mild and that has been great! Early January we headed to the park on one of the more mild days. When I say mild, I still am talking about the 40's so we had to bundle up a bit.  Addison and Caroline loved that we were able to spend some time outside.

Addison swinging with daddy

Caroline

Addison

Addison

Addison again.  Love her eyes.  Caroline's eyes too :)

We finally got a significant amount of snow mid-January.  I was eager to get them outside to see if they would enjoy it.  They LOVED their pockets on their snow pants.  Here they are being silly :)  They can be such goofballs.  Addison is in the lighter snow pants and Caroline is in the darker pink.

Addison was not so sure

Caroline liked it a bit more right away

Scott taking Addison for a sled ride

She liked the snow much more from under the overhang where it was not blowing in her face.  Can't blame her for that!

Caroline

Addison watching the snow

Afterwards they loved running in the hallway for a bit once all their snow gear was off.  This is actually an activity that they do often.  Normally they bring out balls with them and play "hallway soccer."  Here they are giving each other a high five!

 

They actually did not really enjoy their time out in the snow too much but it was understandable since it was windy and still snowing.  I was a bit too anxious to get them out there.  The next day we went back out once it had stopped snowing and they had a much better time.  Scott and I were even able to have fun sledding down this little hill next to our parking lot.  Playing in snow was a big success.

Chrismas Eve/Day

ok, moving on to Christmas. I am only a couple months behind now :)

This year our Christmas tradition had a big change.  Since my grandparents moved to the village we had to figure out what all of our families wanted to do for Christmas this year and begin new traditions.  We started with Christmas Eve dinner at Julie and Roger's with everyone.  It was wonderful that we could all still be together for some portion of Christmas.

At first I was sad to let go of a tradition that was so dear to me and something I always anticipated and looked forward to.  However, as our evening continued on, there emerged many examples that made this new tradition great for its own reasons.

First was that we did not have to rush from dinner to get started with opening our presents so that we could finish by the time we had to go to the Christmas service at church.  We had no presents and could spend more time with each other in conversation...

and a new activity....dancing!

and just enjoying being together as a family.

and of course, more dancing!  Sonja LOVED it and was pretty good.

Sonja had many dance partners and it was so fun to watch her.

After Christmas Eve dinner we headed over to my parents house.  We put the kids to bed and once my parents returned from the service at church (the rest of us had gone to the earlier one before dinner with our kids) we opened up our presents.  This is a funny thing to me because I remember when my parents were the ones staying up late with my aunts/uncles opening their gifts to each other.  Now we are the adults doing this and this is the start of a new Christmas tradition that I hope my kids cherish just as much as I do.  Of course we had to continue the family sleepover so we all stayed at my parents.

When Addison and Caroline woke up Christmas morning they were greeted by filled stockings and presents from Santa!  I didn't get a picture of either....whoops.

Enjoying some snack pack pringles that they got in their stocking.  That Santa sure does know what they like!

No visit to Mor Mor and Grandpa's is complete until they have been able to pet and kiss the cats.  That usually goes for me too since the black cat, Bjorn, is actually mine from when I lived in CA.

Getting ready to go to my Aunt and Uncle's house on my mom's side for Christmas dinner.  Notice how high Addison's tight go.

Elsa is clearly really excited!

Sonja is so sweet.  Also, note the Darth Vader key chain she put on the purse.  She cracks me up!

Naomi and Linnea

December Happenings

Here is what was going on with us in the middle of December...

I went into their room when they were supposed to be sleeping and this is what I found!  They love each other so much already :)

Caroline giving Addison a ride in their new sled they both got for their birthday.

Another birthday present was a bubble machine for the bathtub.  They LOVE bubbles!  Here is Addison all smiles.

A new favorite activity of theirs is painting.  A nice bonus for me is that they stay very clean because they don't like to get any paint on themselves so there is not much of a mess when we do this activity.

Caroline

Addison

There was a shower for Elsa and Matt at their friends place.  It was a lot of fun!

Singing happy zero birthday to the baby

Predictions of the gender on the left and possible names on the right.  Some of those were pretty funny.

Sisters

For the Christmas program I managed to get 2 little pigtails in both their hair!  The first time!!!  That only took more than 2 years!!

Gwen front and center at the Christmas program

Addison and Caroline were old enough to participate this year by just a couple weeks.  Addison did not even attempt it but Caroline went up there with the teacher.  You can kind of see her behind the other kid at the bottom left corner.  After they finished singing "Away in the Manger" she yelled "again!"  Of course, she did not sing herself but she wanted everyone else to sing it again.

This year's Christmas dresses.  I was way busier with caramel orders and other stuff this year so I did not have a chance to start them until the Monday before Christmas.  I was so happy to be able to finish them and I am really happy with the way they turned out.

Dress 1

Dress 2

The pattern called for a zipper and in the past I have always skipped putting the zippers in but this time, since the neckline was so high, I could not just skip it.  The zipper and I had lots of issues and I did not have the time to figure it out so I put in this lace up back instead.  I actually prefer it over the zipper and will keep this in mind for the future!

Caroline

Addison