Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, etc.

I inadvertently skipped almost 2 months of blog updating, which I hate to do because I so easily forget things that happen, but....life happens.  And in the last two months, LOTS of life has happened around here...
 
Boys started frisbee for their school and rec basketball.  They are on the same team for both, so it's like having each do one sport, which makes it doable.  Frisbee games are usually COOOLLLLDDD.  But it's fun to watch and quick.

Our friends who moved to New York (Rebecca and Rani) came and visited for a few days...and brought almost a foot of snow with them!  What a crazy week this was.  We so enjoyed reconnected and sharing life together again.  We began with an awkward surprise at Julia's school.  She did not even recognize Rani at first, then didn't know what to do.  But soon they were chattering away and spent their days playing in the snow, crafting, etc.  

We had a lot of extra friend time during our snow days.  

Rebecca was here for her birthday and we enjoyed having some ladies over to celebrate.

Though many of our planned events were canceled or postponed (like holiday concerts we had to redo in January...not quite so festive!), the snow melted just in time for this one crazy weekend, in which we had Kids' Night Out Christmas party, with Gray's chorus concert to run off to in the middle....

 ...then the boys' first basketball game the next morning, followed by watching Joshua's friend Katelyn skate in the Nutcracker, followed by the Christmas Shadow Play at church, followed by an Ugly Christmas Sweater party for me and Matt.  So much fun crammed into one weekend...with Mimi and GrandGene visiting to top it off!

Just before Christmas, Matt's parents took us to a nice new Mexican restaurant called Uncle Julio's to celebrate Julia's birthday.  She got to break open a delicious chocolate piñata for dessert!

Then we headed off to celebrate Christmas at Mimi and GrandGene's.   Julia, Mimi, and I saw a beautiful Nutcracker performance in Charlotte.  The boys got their sports time with their cousins.  We did our gift exchange with family and enjoyed great food as always.

The day after we returned was Christmas Eve and we celebrated that as our Christmas Day, because Matt had to work those nights.  We had a nice big, traditional breakfast and then opened gifts--first the ones the siblings got each other at Durham Rescue Mission...always some interesting choices.  The kids' favorite gifts from us seemed to be laser tag for the boys and microphone/disco ball light for the girls.

 On Christmas Day, we went over to Matt's parents' house in the afternoon for games, gifts, conversation, and food.

 After Christmas, it was FINALLY (or so it felt to Julia) time to go to town on birthday party plans.  She had already gotten an early celebration with one friend, who took her to a Chinese restaurant.  But there were many more friends she absolutely had to celebrate with.  She planned a huge, detailed, sugary event that included shopping, dessert out (but bring decorations to enhance your dessert), sleepover, and stations of all her favorite activities, complete with a dessert for each one.  We pared down quite a bit.  With Mimi's help and the help of my friend Lisa, we pulled off several stations with crafts, a science experiment, yucky jellybean tasting game, dance party, movie with candy choices, and sleep.  Thank you Matt and Barnette for that loft, in which we shut them all up for the night and didn't hear a sound till a reasonable morning time.

 The next morning was Julia's actual birthday.  After playing with a couple of her party guests for the morning, we had a laid back day, then went to her favorite place to eat (Subway) and headed to another basketball game...or social hour for the girls.

 This year, Matt is assistant coaching and though the boys have only won 1 game, they have learned so much and improved a ton.  They are so much fun to watch with many, many steals throughout the game...just not quite enough baskets going down.

 New Year's Eve was another fun one (though sadly, Matt had to work and missed it).  We had a game afternoon with a couple of other families and then headed to a big party with neighborhood friends.  They did an early "balloon drop" countdown, we ate tons of food, watched sports, and had a great time.  We stayed ALMOST till midnight and the kids did surprisingly well-- even Allie.  At one point we were trying to locate our kids to make our exit and my friend opened a bedroom door to find Allie standing in the doorway aiming a big nerf gun, as it was her job to protect something or somebody.  Her brothers have taught her well.

We celebrated Matt's dad's birthday on the 3rd with a short dinner, as he had just had a big surgery on his ankle.  

 Gray got contacts the first week of the new year!  He loves them and we love seeing all of his sweet face.

 We continued to brave the cold for frisbee watching this month.  There are actually two girls under that blanket by Allie.  Did I mention these games are cold?!

 Thursday tradition:  Matt began a new regular work schedule that has him home every Thursday morning, snuggling Allie on the couch while I teach.

 We had another KNO meeting in January...we got several classes to each color a small paper with part of a letter on it...then we put it together in a big mural (it says KNO).  Love these kids.

 Big news.  Little Allie moved to a big bed!  She was so proud.  She did comment that her legs don't go down to the end (by a mile), but she likes it.  Julia was very attentive the first night, checking on her until she went to bed herself and moving down to Allie's bad when she was scared in the night.

 January marked the end of the first semester of school.  Joshua had an art show, Julia had her Christmas concert, and Gray had his band concert.

 And that brings us up to the present.  We enjoyed doing a couple things this weekend out of the ordinary and very fun.  First we went over to UNC to watch their gymnastics team compete against NC State's team.  Julia was fearlessly dressed in her wolfpack attire, distressed at not being able to find her pom poms and settling for bringing an NC State pillow.  We sat conspicuously in the front row.  It was so cool to see such strength and talent.  Lots of fun.  Then last night we went with a group to do swing lessons.  We laughed a lot and enjoyed meeting so many different shapes, sizes, colors, and personalities of people, as we had to rotate partners constantly during the lesson.

The last two months have been so full.  The next few are sure to be the same, as we wind down with basketball and frisbee and gear up for volleyball and lacrosse, not to mention Chinese New Year and Valentine's Day festivities, Allie's Family Day, and Gray and Matt birthdays.  As always, so much to be thankful for.  

Update in Pictures

I really want to keep up with this because I really love family memories, but life is so full that it hasn't gone so well lately.  Let's see if I can hit the high points of the last 6 weeks...

Let's face it, this is a pretty high high point.  :)  Who doesn't love a toddler in 80's workout clothes?!  Allie rocked this costume and later even won a prize at the Halloween party she was decked out for.  

So much fun to do Halloween with friends!  We had some families over for dinner on this night and then all went to a party together.  Here are some of the girls doing makeup beforehand.

That's Joshua in there.  This costume lasted about as long as it took to take the picture.  Too little mobility for him.  

Allie wasn't the only one that went 80's.

 The boys finished up the cross country season with a county meet in which they were given the championship trophy in error.  Whoops.  They did win overall, though--just not this last meet.  

Joshua got his belated birthday party and began with a huge frisbee game on the big field in our neighborhood.  They played for hours, which worked out well because Matt was a little tied up with an uncooperative tree in our backyard.  But that's a whole other story.

Post-frisbee pizza dinner.  Yes, we let all these boys spend the night in our house.  Sooo thankful for that loft, where they were sequestered from 11 pm on and who knows what happened in there.  They cleaned up the next morning by downing dozens of leftover cans of pepsi with blatant disregard for sanitation.  Oh, teenage boys.

Halloween itself was a happy night, as each kid got to spend it with friends (and me too).  Matt was happy to hold down the fort at the end of the driveway and hand out candy, sometimes to unsuspecting nieces who thought he was just some "sketchy" guy.  And no, he was not in costume.  :)

Gray had his first Halloween out with no adults and he and his friends did a great job staying together, in spite of our worries.  

I stuck with these lovely ladies.  Julia was so psyched about her costume (Gamora from Guardians of the Galaxy...which the boys would never have been allowed to see as young elementary kids, but that's what you get when you are a tough little sister with two big brothers) and loved trick or treating so much.  The big girls were good to wait for Allie, who went nonstop for quite awhile, not even want to be in the stroller....then hit a wall and zoned out.  The girls made up their own system of waving their glowsticks and getting a wave back from the moms to find their way in the dark after each house.  At one point I remember them laying down in the culdesac from exhaustion, but still protesting when we called it a night.  

Meanwhile, Joshua was creeping around the other side of the neighborhood, taking frequent breaks because T-Rex is not real fast.  :)  He had a great time with friends and even managed to cross to the other end of the neighborhood at the end of the night to see Nanny and Pa.

In November, I got to go with my dad to watch a State game.  It was cold, a little wet, and we lost.  But it was so nice to be in another world for a bit and just get to hang out with Daddy.

Gray has had lots of friend time this month, with several of his buddies-new and old- having birthday sleepovers.  I love that he's keeping the usual suspects around but also making several new friends with the influx of kids from other schools that happens in middle school.  

He and Matt got to go to a Duke game on a beautiful fall day.  They ended up with great seats, thanks to a family friend.

With the end of the fall sports season came the sports banquet.  We enjoyed watching the boys get several awards for their team's success and keeping up their grades.  I remembered that when Gray went to Joshua's banquet last year and saw him get a scholar-athlete award, he began to plan to get one for himself, asking me if organization counted in the awarding of this medal.  Well, buddy, it did and it didn't.  It's been tough at times for Gray to stay on top of the organization stuff, but somehow he managed to pull things off anyway.  

The girls cannot get enough of friend time.  When they get playdates, it tends to look like this...lots of pretending, dancing, performing, and happiness.

We spent Thanksgiving with Matt's family this year.  Matt was able to take off a few days and not have to go into work after we ate, so that was really nice for him.  Gray awoke Thanksgiving Eve feeling terrible with an ear infection, cough, etc.  He and I stayed home for Thanksgiving at first, but then he slept and was like a new man!  So we headed over to eat and before I knew it, he was out in the yard playing football in the cold.  Can't keep that boy down.  

We had a fun visit from Jeannie and the boys to finish off our Thanksgiving weekend.  The kids have so much fun together.  Julia gets right in there with the boys and my big boys get a little more "little kid" to hang with their younger cousins.  

We got our Christmas tree December 1st (Julia is not happy with having to bend down to fit into the shorter face here) and the kids had it decorated in no time.  We also did our shopping trip to the thrift store, where the kids all bought each other gifts for about $20 total.  

We also kicked off the Christmas season with a party for Joshua and some friends.  It was the first mixed gender party we've had and even though these kids play frisbee together all the time, they aren't so comfortable with this kind of socializing.  They warmed up from their segregated circle here and all had a good time and Joshua can't wait to do it again.  

We finished our weekend with the Hillsborough Christmas parade.  We were so bummed that the bands all canceled due to threat of bad weather, but we had fun hanging out with lots of friends anyway and it was very mild out, which made it even more enjoyable.  

Julia had a trial gymnastics class and loved it.  She'll start after the holidays and cannot wait!

If the weather cooperates, we have a whole lot coming up this month and it's all so fun!  We have three concerts next week, several frisbee and basketball games (the boys had their first frisbee game last night and Joshua was thrilled to get a score), some service events, parties, a visit home, and some special guests.  So many blessings in this special time of year!!