On Hold.....

Ugh. I got the dreaded msg from Blogger.....the one that says I've used up all my "free" space, and now I have to purchase space in order to upload more pictures.
The rest of the Christmas/New Year's story in pictures will continue shortly......

December in Review Continues....

One night in December, our friends invited us to the Baton Rouge Zoo for "Zoo Lights". I'm ashamed to admit this, but this was Anna Claire's first trip to the zoo. I know. I know. No 'Parent of the Year' award recipient here. *grin* She and her friend, MM, had a grand 'ol time.

 On the way out, MM's dad bought the girls glow necklaces. I requested a picture with the girls and their necklaces, and here are the results:

AC before church on the 19th, all ready for the Christmas service.

Then, Anna Claire had her Christmas program at school. It was in the gym this year, and for the life of me, I could not get the settings right on my camera to take a decent picture during the performance. Fortunately, Brad was video-taping, so we're good. Just know that AC takes things like this performance very seriously so she was concentrating on her music teacher until the last 5 minutes. Then, it was time for the silly faces to come out. I gave her the 'mother look' which only made her make more faces. Lovely.

 

 Here's another look at the Christmas "dress that I cut too short so it became a swing top" that I made for AC and referenced in an earlier post. Apparently, Anna Claire and I have different interpretations of the request, "Please stand in front of the tree and show me a sweet smile" request.

My mom, dad, and sister came to Baton Rouge for Christmas this year. After the Christmas Eve service, my mom requested a family picture. She makes this request every year and we have yet to get a decent picture. There is one from 2005, but that's the only one. From 2006-2009, we have out-takes and lots of them. So, this year, I had the great idea to set the camera on our mantle and use the self-timer. There are more out-takes than you care to see, but everyone was cooperative and despite the tree being off-centered, we captured a decent picture.

But first a couple of out-takes:

This one has me laughing so hard. My dad and sister are poised and ready to go. My mom and AC have the same expression - annoyed. My mom is holding AC like a rag doll. Brad is looking at them and asking himself "What have I gotten myself into?"

And then there's this one. Safe to say the family was checking out at this point.

 But we finished strong, kinda.

Richard, the elf, made his annual visit to our home. Richard was on vacation for the first couple of days of December (read: I couldn't find him!!), but when he arrived, AC was happy to welcome him into our home. This is the first year that she truely "got" Richard, and it was fun experience for her.

On Christmas Eve, AC set out reindeer food in the year -something they made at school. She was shocked Christmas morning when she went outside to discover the food was gone! Love this age.

And that brings us to Christmas morning....another post.....

Back in 2010......

Let's play catch-up:
Mid-November, we had Round-up Sunday at church. Everyone dresses western and it's a time to 'round up' friends and family who don't regularly attend church - an outreach event of sorts. AC's dress has pink horses and blue horseshoes on it (in case you can't them).

And then there was Thanksgiving. We stayed home this year and kept a low profile. We were to get some things done around the house and just enjoy the time together. We invited another family over for Thanksgiving lunch. Afterwards, we all went to see the movie, Tangled. I may or may not have gone with a friend to Target at midnight to wait in line until 4am when they opened. :) I know you can get some of the deals online, but it's all about the experience. 

Here's AC singing a Thanksgiving song:

The same crazy friend who went shopping with me on Black Friday bought me a pattern to sew Anna Claire a dress. Brad was kind enough to buy me a sewing machine last Christmas, and to be honest, it has done a great job at collecting dust this year. So, we got together and sewed these little outfits for our girls. AC's ended up being more of a 'swing top' as I took too much material off the bottom for it to be a dress. She didn't care. Here's a glimpse of it when she wore it to the Hanging of the Greens service at her school.

 This year, Anna Claire is taking tap and ballet at school. A local dance studio comes to her school once a week for lessons. This past Saturday, her little dance class was able to go to the actual studio and show off their moves for the parents. The instructor had a helper there who Anna Claire quickly bonded with because this little girl's name is also Anna Claire.

Here they are waiting for the other girls to arrive. Anna Claire was cracking me up sitting like this - and so serious.  

 

We're still here....

Yes, it's January 5, 2011.
Yes, I realize I haven't posted since November 11, 2010.
Yes, we're still alive and doing well.
Yes, I have lots of pictures to post.
Stay tuned.....

This Child's Brain....

Anna Claire's brain is constantly in overdrive. I blame her father for this trait. Kidding. Seriously, though, she is always thinking and has an imagination that is beyond me. She's at such a fun age right now!

Sometimes I will sarcastically say, "That's lovely, child", usually when she has done something that she is proud of but makes this mom cringe (think boogers...I won't go into detail...you can thank me later). The other night, she burped (loud!), and I said, "Anna Claire!", to which she quickly responded, "I'm a lovely child, Mom!"

Last night, her little Wednesday night class took a tour of the church building. One stop was to Brad's office. Brad was there to answer any questions and talk to them about his role as pastor. Anna Claire's teacher pointed to his laptop and said, "What do you think he uses this for?" One boy answered, "To type". The teacher said, "Good. What else?" (I think she was hoping they would say, "Check e-mail", work on his sermon, etc.) Anna Claire quickly chimed in, "He checks Facebook!" The teacher quickly moved to the phone on his desk. "What is this?" "A phone", they all said. "Who does he call?" "People" was one girl's response. Then, Anna Claire said, "Yeah, he uses his phone to call people in our church that have ummmm problems!"
Great, Anna Claire. I can just see her at school talking to her friends, "My dad's a pastor. That means he checks Facebook and talks to people that have problems."

This morning, I took Anna Claire to school, and after dropping her off, the teacher asked to see me in the hallway. Her teacher is great, but she's not the warm fuzzy type, so I was a bit nervous. She came out in the hall smiling and talk about how smart Anna Claire is, what a vivid imagination she has, etc. I was a little shocked by the praise this teacher was giving b/c that's not usually how she operates. Then she said, 'But yesterday, Anna Claire did something I've never had another student do"......oh no. My mind started spinning! She started laughing which eased my fears a bit and said, "All the kids were playing at different centers in the classroom. I looked up and saw Anna Claire laying on her back up on the table. Her legs were up in the air. Hughes (classmate) was standing by her. I immediately said, "Anna Claire, what are you doing?" She confidently answered, "Oh, I'm having a baby!" to which Hughes quickly assured the teacher, "And I'm supposed to catch it!"
Mercy. Where did she come up with this???

Skittles Math

**This is the second post in one day....be impressed.**

Anna Claire loves numbers (read: not her mother's child!) and has recently shown interest in addition. When I found this downloadable game online, I knew she would really like it. The Skittles sealed the deal for her!You pick a flash card (ex: 7 + 4), place 7 Skittles in the top box, and 4 in the next box. Then you move all the Skittles to the last box and count them for the answer. Then you find your answer in the number set. This was good for Anna Claire to work on number recognition. We played this 'game' for a good 45 minutes tonight!!

"This is hard work, Mom!"

A friend gave Anna Claire a Halloween gingerbread house kit for her birthday. This is the first time Anna Claire has done something like this, so she was thrilled with the idea. She just couldn't believe how much candy was available to decorate the house! She was most proud of her 'pattern' on the roof tops - pumpkin, bat, pumpkin, bat. They are learning about patterns at school, so she's quick to make patterns out of anything.

And the glasses are back as a favorite accessory. She loves to wear them often.

Tonight, we took all the baby dolls for a walk. This is a major ordeal now with the addition of the twins.

This picture was taken at the beginning of the walk: (ignore the blue lips that she acquired from a ring pop)

As we were walking back up our driveway at the end of our walk, AC was pushing the stroller as if the twins each weighed 50lbs. and she was having to push them uphill. Poor Carly in the baby sling was about to fall out. At this point, Anna Claire declared, "This is hard work, Mom!" hahaha!

Silly girl with a ring pop still in her mouth.