Back in December, Molly tested to get a purple stripe on her green belt. Here she is doing a kata.
She did some sparring against opponents of various sizes. You’ve got to get in close when your opponent has a lot more reach than you.
Congratulations on earning your purple strip, Molly!
Molly’s gotten to be quite tough. This kid is serious.
But also silly.
Jen was invited to an Ugly Sweater Brunch with some of the neighborhood ladies. Instead of buying a pre-made sweater, Jen got crafty and decorated one she found at a local thrift store. Molly said it was more cute than ugly!
As happens every year, the Fire Department brought Santa’s sleigh to our neighborhood.
I believe Molly told him that for Christmas she wanted a chicken that said “pataca” (inside family joke).
Here’s a wider shot of the sleigh and the front of the line waiting for their turn.
Molly participated in the Young Author’s Contest at her school. Here she is writing her short story, Magic Maya, involving a girl rescuing her brother who has gone through a portal and been possessed by an evil magician. Here she is hard at work creating her story.
In December, both the girls sang with their choirs in church.
Great singing, girls.
The day after getting the tree, it was time to decorate the tree.
The ladder got a lot of use, which was good as it meant we didn’t have a concentrated ring of ornaments around the bottom of the tree.
There was also an alternate ladder the girls could use to reach up high.
Leah was happy to use the Daddy ladder as well.
This year, Molly decided she was big enough to put the angel on top. It was a bit of a reach, so I gave her a little support.
Our new ornament from Disney World was a highlight of the tree.
Here’s the decorated tree.
So, sorry for not posting anything for the past couple of months. But never fear, I’ve been taking pictures along the way and will now catch you up over the next few days. So, think back to December, and pretend the holiday season is just getting started.
This year, we returned to our favorite place to find and cut down a Christmas tree, Greenway Farms. Sadly, they no longer have any White Pines (our go-to tree), so we had to choose something else. We browsed around for a lot longer than the girls wanted to, checking out the Douglas Fir, Norway Spruce, Blue Spruce, White Spruce, and Canaan Fir. We ultimately found a Canaan Fir we liked (as you can see here) and I cut it down.
Cutting down a tree is enough work to warm you up, so I ended up taking off my jacket. The girls were complaining about being cold, and each wanted to wear my discarded jacket. They found a fun solution.
Charlie is now one! We gathered together to celebrate, and I got a picture of how big he’s gotten.
You may want to take a picture with him, but he cannot be contained. Escape!
He’s on the move.
Charlie needed a bit of help with the presents.
He seems happy with the shark towel we gave him.
Aunt EA made a big cake for us, and of course a smash cake for Charlie.
The most fun of the party was Charlie eating his birthday cake. Here’s the play-by-play so you can experience the fun.
Like many kids, Charlie started out a bit unsure of the cake.
Hmmm, Mom, maybe this is OK.
He likes it, he really likes it.
Charlie, you’ve got a little something on your face.
Charlie, I don’t think you’re supposed to put it in your ear.
Now you’re just a mess, Charlie. Thanks to Aunt EA for going with green icing for the full effect.
Charlie, there’s something green coming out of your nose. Need a tissue?
I think we can be sure Charlie liked the cake.
Charlie’s lost it. He’s moved from eating the cake to eating his shirt.
Happy birthday Charlie! Glad you enjoyed your cake.
Molly loved HowGirlsCode last year, and signed up to participate in their WeDo Lego robotics after-school activity this year. On the last day, they showed off their robots to us.
Molly called her robot The Dog Beak. She did a great job designing and building it and programming it to chow down. Over the weeks, it went through several different designs and forms, and I think it ended up awesome.
On the last day, parents and siblings were invited to tour their workshop. Molly demoed The Dog Beak for us.
Here are all the robots built by Molly and her fellow coders.
Saturday was the big day. It may have only been 2 days since Thanksgiving, but it was time for the big family Christmas celebration. But since we were all staying together (mostly), we have some time to hang out together before the official festivities began. I even managed to get in a couple of the pictures myself.
The game of the gathering was Spoons. Our girls had never played, but they quickly grew to love it.
These girls didn’t actually make it to the finals, but they were asked to stand in for those who did.
There was also a lot of foosball played.
Nutter Butters and Oreos are great, but they’re even better when decorated.
There was also some hula hooping. Note that Molly’s cream soda bottle is empty. She just likes to show that she could drink something while hula hooping.
There were several important activities during the official gathering. Chief among these was eating (sorry, no pictures of people shoveling food into their mouths). There was also the gift exchange (more on that later). There was watching the Iron Bowl (sadly, not a fun year for this). And possibly most importantly, there was a corn hole competition. We’re not really corn hole playing people in our family, but we picked up the intricacies of the game throughout the day. In particular, Leah got really good at it.
We took a short break from corn hole to exchange gifts.
Molly was a huge fan of the mermaid blanket her cousin got her.
And we had to take a group picture.
Then it was back to the corn hole competition. It lasted well past dusk. Despite being the only all-kid team, Leah and Emmie defeated their dads to make it to the finals.
Leah and Emmie defeated Maddie and John to win the whole tournament.
We had a great time gathering with everyone.
