Juliet Goes to Ballet

A great (cheap is more like it) opportunity came about through my home school group to have the girls sign up for ballet.  Since our schedule is already quite full, except for poor Juliet, we decided to sign her up. She LOVES to dance around the house and has been asking to "do gymnastics" or "do dance" so this came at the perfect time.  The girl teaching it does ballet herself and is trying to raise money to go on a mission as well as go to Bible college this spring.

Showing off some moves before we go to class.

This is how she dances around the house on a regular basis.

Sweet little girls holding hands.

Stretching HIGH!

 I know these all look very similar, but they are all similarly cute!

Some adults have difficulty doing this move too...the tree in Yoga.

No one else was dancing at this time, but Juliet kept on moving.

Nama was in town and did this super cute braid.  I've copied this "ballet hair" every week and it is perfect for practice.

Story time, because, well, its hard to keep kids focused.  The teacher does well with mixing things up.

Mommy, come join me!

Mt. Charleston

Earlier this month we went sledding on Mt. Charleston with some friends.  

 What a great daddy.  He got lots of praise from strangers on this trek up the hill.

 

Juliet quickly figured out how to slide down the mountain on her belly.  She had a blast and giggled constantly.

 Mr. Kid and some of his crew ready to head down.

 Its like a circus act.

 And that would be Jonathan and Juliet crashed nicely in that tree.  Juliet was less than thrilled.

 Kylie and M went down the mountain together over and over.

Juliet quickly smiling then screaming "I DON'T WANT TO RUN INTO A TREE".  We didn't, but it was close.

 K & M going again.

 The just about got smoked going down this part of the hill.  You can see the Olympic moguls that bumped them pretty bad, but they held on.  It was awesome!

 Ava liked staying stationary more than sledding.

 Eating snow.

 A couple of the W kids with Juliet.

Who doesn't love family fun?

Brrrr

Where do we live again?  Somewhere that requires this get-up to go out and play?  Give us a few months and add 90 degrees to the current temp and we'll be back to normal weather.

Christmas

Here I am a month later blogging about Christmas!  I thought about skipping the post but I decided to keep it short and sweet.

We went to California for Christmas and enjoyed the long holiday weekend.  The girls love going home (my aunt always corrects me that home is where Jonathan, the kids and I live, but we can't stop calling going to CA going "home") and are always sad when we leave.  Having family all in the same town is nice because we get to see everyone in one trip, but on the flip side, then we have to see everyone in one trip.  We were at 3 different houses on Christmas day and even though we love seeing family, there just aren't enough hours in the day to see everyone as long as we/they want to.

 Granka put the kids to work!

But it didn't last long.

Christmas Eve at Nama and Bopa's house.

One of my best gifts on Christmas morning.

Waiting patiently...but as long as she's got her blanket, she'd wait all day!

Thanking each other for their gifts.

Oh momma.  We hit the motherload!  Every single Disney Princess in one box!

Another one of my best gifts.

This gift of mine loved all her dress up stuff.

An Alby replacement.

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 The girls making their 2nd annual train cake.

Look at the precision.

GG giving Kylie some tips.

All done!

The girls and I in our matching aprons.

Other Christmas Fun

We attended the Ops Group Christmas party a few weekends ago on base.  This is a great way for the girls to get out their craft bug, and the mess that comes with it is far away from my house.

Santa flew in on a helicopter.  I'm surprised Santa didn't puke at this moment when the helicopter did some crazy stunt.

We don't celebrate Santa and the girls know he's not real (and keep quiet about it around their friends), but they still love all things Santa....cartoons, wrapping paper, decorations, watching him at the mall, etc.  Kylie did say when this guy got off the helicopter "that doesn't look like Santa!".  She told me the other day she kinda believes in Santa, but she believes in Jesus more.

Let me rephrase....they like all things Santa, but any man dressed like him, they like from a distance. They had no interest in getting close and we didn't have to wait in the long line to get traumatic pictures with him.

Kylie and Micaela.

Juliet painting her ornament.

Daddy helping the girls make candy cane reindeer.

Finished products.

I finally ordered some new personalized stockings for us.  It was my first time ordering anything from Pottery Barn and when my first package arrived, I was so mad!  Both mine and Jonathan's embroidery was severely off center and they decided to leave the T off of Juliet's name, so it read Julie...yeah, not my kid.  I was shocked for as expensive as their stuff is and everyone just raves about their stuff.  I'm not fully convinced after my purchase.  But I called and kindly expressed my disappointment with my order and they quickly fixed it and sent new ones.

I think our names could have been a little bit bigger, but overall I'm pleased.  Ava said "hey, its a pattern"!

Our Christmas village and the wonderful cards from you all.

I get the Little People Nativity out only at Christmas time, and Juliet has played with nothing else, and I mean nothing else.  She totes this thing all around the house and plays with it non stop.  She even likes to bring some of the characters in the car when we go out.  Her favorites are of course baby Jesus, Mary and "Jofes".

Who wants to help decorate the gingerbread house?  "ME!!!"

Squeezing the foundation.

This is serious work.  Don't mind Ava's lunch on her shirt.  Its tomato soup....her shirt is festive!

Holding it up as the frosting/glue hardens.

The reindeer giving Santa a kiss.

They did well not fighting and taking turns decorating.  Its one of our best creations yet!

Giving Rudolph his red nose.

The best part-getting to eat the leftover candy.