Belle's Christmas Program

Yesterday, Belle performed at her first Christmas program.  She was such a cutie!  (Although I know every parent says that of their child.)  She really didn't do much singing and looked around a lot.  She would sing a few words in each song, but I don't think she sang a whole complete song though. Chris and I took the boys to the dress rehearsal in the afternoon since the actual program was at 7 p.m., which is bedtime for all the kiddos.  We met Chris' mom and grandparents there and we got really great seating.  There was probably about 30 people there for the rehearsal.  The program was great because it was only 40 minutes long for the whole school.  I hope they continue doing it that way from now on!  The younger grades (4k/5k through 2nd) definitely stole the stage and were up there for a good 15 minutes.  The other grades got fewer songs and less verses.  I'm sure a lot of the older kids were glad to not have to be up there singing for a long time.  Chris and I, along with his dad, went to the evening show.  And wow, was it packed!  I was planning on taking pictures during that show, but unfortunately we didn't have as good of seats as earlier in the day, so some of the later pictures are grainy.  (The first two pictures are from the dress rehearsal.)  Anyways, enough with my rambling and on with the pictures!

 

I think I actually caught her singing!

Losing interest fast...and I think this is only the first or second song.

Looking for her dad and Grampi

...and spotting them to give them a wave during a song.

Can you tell it's past her bedtime?  (We were actually sitting right next to them while they were waiting for the other groups to finish singing.)

My favorite picture, so I had to enlarge it.  *grin*  I don't know why it's my favorite, but I just really like it.

Yikes!

So, it was just brought to my attention that Christmas Eve is only 10 days away.  Wow, that really snuck up on me!  I knew in my head that Christmas is next week, but when you put it in days, it seems a whole lot sooner.  It kind of makes me sad though because that means that there is only 10 more days of Christmas music.  (I'm sorry, but I just cannot listen to Christmas music after Christmas is over.  It kind of loses it's zip for me.)

I am most excited for Belle's Christmas concert next week.  She is going to be singing with the rest of her 4k/5k class.  She has been practicing at home (by singing the songs over and over again) for the past week or so now.  She is quite excited!  I love all her mispronunciations of words, like corn-cop instead of corncob, and trying to remember all the words.  She does quite well if you sing along with her though.

********************************

Belle attended her second classmate birthday party on Saturday, and she had an absolute blast!  The family actually happens to live a few houses down from us, so we were able to walk there.  The parents are both extremely nice and I felt comfortable having Belle there.  I stayed anyway to help out a little bit because I know how hectic birthday parties can be.  You always feel like you're running around with your head cut off because there are a zillion things to do.  But anyway...it was a princess party, and Belle was in Heaven! They played tea party and had lunch on blankets on the floor and sipped juice out of real tea cups.  They all got to make a crown and a wand to go with the princess outfits the girls wore, as well as get their nails painted.

Belle had a lot of fun, and I even got complimented from the parents about how polite she is.  She sure is a sweetheart, but she's growing up too fast.

Snow Day!

Tuesday night into Wednesday morning, we received so much snow that they canceled school yesterday.  I suppose being in a "blizzard warning" might have had something to do with the cancellation of school as well.  Chris was lucky too and his workplace cancelled the rest of the day, and he was home about 10:45.  So, while Casey was taking his morning nap (and before the cold started to get worse), I took the two kiddos outside to enjoy the snow.  I stayed on the front porch most of the time, except for a few times when Grahm couldn't get out of the snow and I had to help get him unstuck.  After about 30 minutes, my legs were starting to go numb, and I headed inside and watched from the front door.  When Chris came home, Belle and Grahm reluctantly came inside so he could snowblow the driveway.  That afternoon, we made some sugar cookies.  I finally found a recipe that actually makes soft sugar cookies and that doesn't need sour cream.  They turned out surprisingly good!  Everything was back to normal today though as we took Belle to school this morning and have spent most of the day playing downstairs.

We Are Family

Alright, cheesy blog title, I know.  But I am just so happy that we finally have a nice family picture!  Well, even though Grahm isn't smiling in the photo, it's still pretty nice.  Thanks a bunch Lauren for all the pictures!

************************************************

I took a few pictures of our Thanksgiving, but they are still sitting on my camera waiting to be uploaded.  I've been too busy relaxing to want to take the time to upload them.  But I will this week!  I got My Life in Ruins from Netflix yesterday and watched that last night, which was a total waste of my time.  Dumb, dumb, dumb movie that dragged on forever.  And tonight I've been reading about what some people have gotten as white elephant gifts, and I'm getting some good ideas for our gift exchange this year at my husband's grandparent's house.  I'm getting so excited!  :)

************************************************

On another note, we got our Christmas tree and put it up!  Well, Chris cut it down, put it up, and put all the lights on.  And Isabelle and I put the ornaments on, with Belle doing about 99% of them.  Sure, there are a couple bare spots, but that's fine if that means less work for me!  Besides, she was so excited getting to help put the ornaments on, that it made me happy to see the smile on her face.