Christmas Projects

So many of you have seen posts on Facebook about the projects I was working on for Christmas.  I finished the last one about 4:30pm yesterday, Christmas Eve.  Obviously since they were Christmas presents, I couldn't post pictures until after the recipients opened them.  So here are the pictures.  I included pictures of the back because that's where you can really see the quilting on it.

Tiffany's quilt - the first one I did.  This is the one I broke my sewing machine on, which my parents then bought me a new machine as a Christmas present.

Marcey's quilt

Margie's quilt

Teresa's quilt

Mom Gallahan's quilt

Christmas!

This is such a wonderful time of year.  We celebrate the birth of our Savior and we come together as family and friends to enjoy each others company.

Sunday night, we all went to celebrate with Grandma and Grandpa Dixon and Aunt Pam.  The kids had fun getting presents and playing.  I think Bryce finally started to understand that he would be getting presents. I got my present from my parents early (a new sewing machine).  Ken got a quilt my Mom made that was all snakes, which he has thoroughly been enjoying. 

Then on Christmas Eve, we talked about the Nativity Story with the kids and then they got to open one present, which were of course, new pajamas.

 

Christmas morning was pretty fun.  The kids didn't wake up until after 8:00!!  Then my hours of work were destroyed in about 20 minutes.  Go figure.  The kids have had lots of fun playing with their toys.  Later today we are off to spend Christmas with Ken's family.

 

Santa Claus is coming to town

We had our Ward Christmas Party this past weekend at church.  It was awesome.  They did a breakfast this year and I loved that.  It allowed us to be able to take Ken's parents to see the Christmas Lights up at the Washington DC Temple Visitor's Center.  That was a lot of fun.  Anyways, while at the party, a friend in the Ward is a professional photographer and she took pictures of the kids with Santa.  Bryce had absolutely no problem going up to sit with Santa.  Isabella was a little more wary, but she went up there.  Here are the pics of the kids with Santa.

Pumpkin Patch Field Trip

I had the opportunity to chaperone a field trip with Isabella's class to the Pumpkin Patch.  While I was not all that impressed with this particular pumpkin patch, the kids had a lot of fun.  Here's a few pictures from the day.

The three I had to keep track of - Isabella, Julia, and Kailyn

Isabella on the big slide - it needed a little help and a lot of air!

Some of the kids with their pumpkins

The whole class

Ken became a warrior

Ken got talked into doing the Warrior Dash in Richmond, VA, this year.  It was a few weeks ago.  For those who don't know what it is, its basically a 5k race with a bunch of muddy obstacles along the course.  Ken said he enjoyed it but he's not sure he would do it again.

Ken all geared up for the race

With the group that he was kinda with - the woman in the white shirt is someone Ken used to work with and she convinced him to do this.

Isabella with her Warrior t-shirt and Ken's warrior helmet

 Bryce with his shirt and Ken's helmet - he wouldn't look at me

Ken after the race

 Ken and the kids after the race.  Isabella wanted nothing to do with muddy Daddy, she looked at him and said, "Don't touch me."

This was as close to Ken as Isabella would get until he cleaned up.

Sick Days

Unfortunately, Isabella's has had a bunch of sick days since school started.  She just isn't used to all the germs.  So in a month of school, she had 4 sick days.  Hopefully we're good for a while.  Here's my little sicky one of the times she was home.

Bryce is 3!

Yup, sure enough Bryce is 3 years old.  We had his birthday party a few weeks ago at Aunt Pam's house.  We had pizza and cake and ice cream and lots of fun.  He was very excited to be the birthday boy.  He asked about his birthday for a couple weeks afterwards.  He's finally not asking about it.  I'll post a few pictures from him party a little further down.  

I think Bryce is enjoying Isabella being in school.  He finally gets a little Mommy-Bryce one-on-one time.  He is excited though when we go get her from school.  The first week or so of school, he was convinced we were going to get her every time we got in the car.  He still thinks that every so often.  

Bryce continues to crack us up.  He loves to sing the alphabet song...at the top of his lungs.  He also counts to 12 or 13 on his own...most of the time.  He loves Dora.  I mean, he really loves Dora!!!  He wants to watch Dora all the time.  

Bryce is huge!  He went in for his well child check-up and he was off the charts for height and weight.  The nurse said it red-flagged when she put in his height and weight.  Otherwise, he is a healthy and happy three year old.

Bryce and Paige cheesing it up

Bryce and his birthday hat

 And noisemaker

He wanted a Dora cake, so I made the "picks" for the cupcakes.

I got lazy (or just too busy) to make his cupcakes, so these were store bought.

 Ken insisted that there be something other than just Dora, so we got some Cars cupcakes too.

Bryce was super excited to blow out his candles shaped like crayons.

We have a Kindergartner - Holy Cow!

I can't believe it, we actually have a Kindergartner.  It became a reality when she received her class assignment in the mail.  Her teacher's name is Mrs. Sirag.  She was very excited because then it meant school would be starting soon. 

On August 30, we were able to go to the school to meet her teacher.  She had to get all dressed up to go.  She even let me curl her hair.  We did not expect them to separate us that night.  We dropped her off in her classroom where they got to do an art project and ride the bus around the bus circle while we went to the cafeteria to get information for us parents.  At the end of the night, the kids were walked through the "lunch line" to get a snack and then we picked them up.  She was very excited and kept saying that she didn't know the classroom would look like that.  Here's Bella all done up, Bryce had to pose too and its just such a cute picture of the two of them.

Then came the first day of school (today), on September 4.  Ken had a hard time getting to sleep last night because he was so anxious about the first day of school.  Isabella on the other hand was so excited that she woke up at 6:15am.  Ken tried to get her to go back to sleep for a while, but when I went to get her up at 7:00am, she was wide awake.  So she got up and ate her breakfast and was just itching to get into her First Day of School outfit that she picked out.  Finally she finished eating and with some coaxing we got her hair done and then she was able to get dressed.  When we did a test run of the walk to school, it took us about 20 minutes.  Not this morning.  I think it only took 15 minutes this morning because Bryce was walking super slow and kept stopping to try to pick the number of people's mailboxes.  It was a little chaotic inside the school.  For some reason, Isabella's teacher had all the kids line up against the wall outside the classroom instead of having them go straight in.  This also meant that all the parents were in the hallway too.  She started making friends in that line.  It was funny to hear one girl ask Isabella how old she was, to which Isabella responded that she was 5 and to hear them all say, Hey I'm 5 too.  Ah the minds of 5 year olds.  At last it was time to give hugs and kisses and head into the classroom.  Bryce was not too sure about leaving Isabella at the school.  We left to go to the store and we got in the car and Bryce says, "Go to Bella's school now."  Now Ken is just sitting here waiting for 3:30 to come so he can find out how Isabella's first day of school was.

All ready to go

Borrowing the pretty flowers in someone's yard as a backdrop on the way to school

All of us in front of the school (thanks to some friends who took the pic)

 Chatting up a classmate in line

 Still waiting in line

We told her that if she needed the teacher she had to raise her hand and wait until they asked her what she needed.  She just wanted to ask where her lunch went since they hadn't told them yet.  Good to know she listened to us about raising her hand and waiting her turn.

Bryce made Ken carry him for a little bit after leaving the school, 

he really wasn't sure about leaving his sister there.

Ken and Bryce walking backwards on the way home

(Don't ask me)