Holiday Sensory Boxes

I put holiday-related items our bean and rice boxes.  It kept the little girlies busy while I made dinner/cleaned and Liz did her homework.  Of course I did have to sweep up lots of rainbow rice and beans from the floor afterwards.

It was Ellie's first time with a sensory box and she did pretty well (once I convinced her to stop spooning rice onto the floor).  Of course she also unwrapped all the fake presents in her box and even started taking bites out of the styrofoam inside (she spit it all onto the floor).

Thanksgiving Part II

Having tired ourselves out at Longwood Gardens the day before (with six kids in tow there was always at least one misbehaving or pouting or whining or in some other way being unpleasant), we spent Friday mostly at my brother's house (we did have a several hours break at Chick-Fil-A).  We napped, lounged, and whatnot while the children played and even put on a fashion show for us.

On Sunday we went to Sacrament meeting then drove home, arriving in time to unpack, linger over lunch, and go on a walk during day light which was so pleasant because usually we return from weekend trips really late at night.

Lainey's "noodle fingers"

Family walk

In the evening we played games.  It was Lizzie's first time playing Yahtze and with typical beginners luck she (and her teammate, Drew) beat me with well over 100 points.  Below she is celebrating her Yahtze.

We also played Headbanz.

Thanksgiving Part I

We went to Pennsylvania to stay with my brother and celebrate the holiday with his family.  Dinner was delicious (though as usual my kids filled up on rolls) and the company was fabulous, as always.

 This weird fake smile is a recent development.  Ugh.

Somehow this is the only picture I got of Willa and Lainey.  Oh well, better luck next time.

 We spent Black Friday at Longwood Gardens.  It was crowded, but very nice, and really the weather couldn't have been better.  We enjoyed seeing the trains, fountain show, decorated trees, gingerbread replicas of Longwood buildings, various tree houses, and traditional Christmas plants.

 I loved seeing all the Christmas decor made of plant material.

Liz and Iris

 The kids were upset that we wouldn't let them go to the indoor children's garden (because we didn't want to deal with soggy children), but they seemed to recover when we let them roll down a small hill.

My attempt at getting a shot of Ollie & Ellie together:

November Catch Up

I've been a lazy blogger/family record keeper lately and this is my attempt to catch up.  Here's some of the things we've been up to this past month (as far as I remember):

We had crazy warm weather.  It was warm enough that I had my heater off for nearly a week and my home got warm enough to turn on the AC.  I didn't turn it on of course, I just opened the windows because I just couldn't stomach paying for AC in November.  At any rate, aside from open windows we also enjoyed some outside time.  The pictures below are from an outing to Huntley Meadows.

(Elli couldn't quite figure out how to use our magnifying glass.)

We enjoyed our first overnight babysitting swap.  The kids enjoyed a couple sleepovers, we tried our hand at caring for six kids (and succeeded!), and we earned a blissful 24-hour kid-free break.  I can't wait to do it again (I swiped this picture from Sarah's blog).

Lizzie finished off her soccer and basketball classes (whew!).  She also enjoyed helping out when our ward served thanksgiving dinner to a local assisted living center, though she got her feelings hurt when one of the residents said she looked like she was wearing lipstick.  Hard life when one of your problems is that your lips are naturally dark.

Alaina continued to enjoy "Joy School," though you wouldn't know it the way she cries and kicks and otherwise carries on when I drop her off.   She continues to love all things princess, daily requesting to "be a princess" when she wakes up (meaning she wants to wear a puffy skirt or her raggedy dora nightgown all day).  She also developed a love for the show, Phineas and Ferb this month (she calls it "Can and Ferb").  Now she regularly talks about Jeremy Candice, pretends to be Hinz Duffenshmurtz (showing us her "----inator"), and asks "Watcha doin?" 

We bought a digital piano.  The kids are loving it.  I love laying on the couch, reading while Andrew practices a song.  I need to find a teacher for him and Lizzie.

The whole family attended Lizzie's Thanksgiving luncheon at school.  It was the first time Andrew has ever had Veteran's Day off and it was wonderful.  Okay, the food was just typical gross school lunch fare but it I was able to volunteer without having to worry about Lainey and Ellie and that was very nice.

I made comforter covers for Liz and Laines--nothin fancy, but for me a big accomplishment.

The older girls have spent the month decorating their new cardboard playhouse (I could have sworn I had a picture of the whole thing, but no.  Sorry Mom).  They love it.  The only problem is Ellie loves it too and she still doesn't understand that it can't support her weight. 

We finally did a couple Thanksgiving/fall crafts.  We repeated our gratitude turkey from last year with the standard things we're grateful for written on the feathers (Lainey's only entry was: dinosaurs).  The girls also painted fall leaves on a bare tree printout (thank you pinterest).  Liz used a cotton swab for her leaves, but Alaina insisted on using a paintbrush and when she was finished I couldn't even see the tree anymore.