More Christmas fun!

The past couple of years, our friend, Cliff, has participated in a Christmas tradition with us. He came over again this year for our annual cookie baking and decorating night. We had a great time making Christmas trees, candy canes and snowflakes. Mostly, they had the most fun icing the cookies. Joshua seemed to think the cookie dough was a lot like playdough and ended up covered in flour and dough. It was a lot of fun...and a lot of clean up afterwards!

I'm so glad I had JUST given this little guy a bath. He needed a complete change of clothes afterwards!

Christmas traditions

We have been so busy the past couple of weeks, mostly doing fun stuff! I thought I'd do one post of several things instead of a million others. Christmas is my favorite time of year, mostly because of all the extra little things we do to create little family traditions. I want the kids to be able to look back and think about how we "always did..." or "every year..." So, here are some of the fun things we've done this year!

Going to see the Christmas lights at Sharon Woods in our PJ's

Singing in the Christmas program at our church. This was Haleigh's first year to sing in the musical with the "big kids". She loved it, especially being on the dance team. 

Our yearly family photo in front of the tree at the church. Next year, there will be one more added in the picture!

This was the first year of us all sleeping by the Christmas tree in our family room. The kids loved it...I'm sure it'll be one of those things we do again!

More to come...! Merry Christmas!

Pregnancy Update-30 weeks!

Well, here I am at in the middle of my 30th week of pregnancy. All is going well for me and our little girl. I am trying to keep busy getting ready for Christmas and keeping up with the other little ones, so I don't think about how impatient I really want to be. So far, the pregnancy has gone well, apart from a lot of indigestion and a recently failed glucose tolerance test. I go back Monday for the three hour glucose test to determine if I have gestational diabetes. My levels were only slightly elevated, I was told, so I am optimistic! This baby is always active, which fits well in our family! Just a couple of nights ago, she kept me up with her case of the hiccups.THe kids have felt her moving and love to talk to my belly...as does daddy.  I am very blessed that things have gone well thus far. Please continue to pray for us as February draws closer! 

Music class

This is the second week in the new trimester at our home school co-op. Haleigh and I were both really excited about her choice of classes this year. Today during music class, there were two special guests.  A father and daughter brought their harps and played for the children and taught them about their instruments. The really cool thing is that the gentleman made the two smaller harps from cherry wood. I was pretty impressed. Haleigh said the music was peaceful and she liked it alot. Hmm...maybe we should play some harp music to help the little Peoples' settle down! 

Haleigh in music class. She's the cute one in the middle with the blue sweater!

Thanksgiving '08

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. I love the family, friends, food and the great traditions that we've had the past few years. Like the past few years, Shawn's family has come up to Ohio to visit with us. This year, not only did Mom, Dad and Leiana come, but also Aunt Margaret from Hawaii and Shawn's brother, Dan and his wife Misty. We had a house full from Wednesday to Sunday, but it was so much fun. Thanksgiving day, a family from our church came over to celebrate and eat with us, then later that evening, we headed to their house for dessert. The day after Thanksgiving, the ladies of the house ventured out at 5 am to do some serious Christmas bargain shopping. We came back exhausted at about 2:00, but had a vehicle full of treasures! I had such a great time with my family, and I am truly thankful for the amazing people God has placed in our lives.

Mapping out the game plan for Friday...my favorite part!