Beach Garage Is Back

We are super excited to have a garage back!  Still need to do the painting, but the weather has not really been conducive to painting recently.  Looking forward to organizing and filling it up this summer.  #1 goal is to not fill it up with a boat that we never use!  Anxious to fill it up with some other toys though. 

Who Needs a Pool...

When you have a pile of leaves to jump into!

Runner

Another 13.1 in the record books!  Official time 2:07:55, pace 9:46. 

Ella and Ella

These girls are two peas in a pod!  They have been "Ella Wolf" and "Ella C" since they were in the baby class at Bertha Alyce. 

Braces!

Addy has a whole lot of metal in her mouth now!  So far so good, only a couple of days with some Advil and she was totally fine.  Think she has mastered eating now, although her first lunch after she got the braces took quite a while to finish. 

New Years Eve

Very cold New Years at the beach, but we vegged out inside for most of the time.  We did make one quick trip to the water though

This year we all watched the New Years Time Square show and both girls actually made it up to New Years New York time.  They were losing steam at the end but they hung in.  Definitely a record!  Michael and I made it up to midnight central time.  Not necessarily a record, but definitely an accomplishment.  We started the new year with everyone sleeping in past 9 which was a very nice treat. 

Christmas Day

Santa and the grandparents came bearing many, many gifts - I didn't think that our in-house Toys 'R Us could hold much more, but turns out there was room on the shelves.  Again, great times with family celebrating the big day!

 The girls were package unwrapping machines this year!

 

 Ella wouldn't pose for the annual Christmas morning photo.

 

 The girls getting ready for Uncle Tom's Christmas Day Feast.

 

Kind of blurry and a very slouchy Ella, but a cute pic nonetheless.



Christmas Eve

Another fun Christmas Eve that started with church and ended with good food and fun.

Ms. Reardon's 2nd Grade Hoiday Party

On the last day of school before Christmas break, Addy's class had a fun celebration too.  They had donuts, played games and exchanged gifts for books. 

 Giving Ms. Reardon her gift from the class.

 

Wrapping her classmate up like a snowman.  Pretty impressive toilet paper wrapping job, until he moved a minute late and it all broke apart!

Cats and Kids

This one is for the record book - the cats hanging out under the Christmas tree with both kids within range...the 2 blobs under the tree are the cats!

Happy Hanukkah

It is our last year to have any kind of Hanukkah celebration in the house since Ella will be moving on to Kolter next year.  Ella's pre-K class had a cute party to celebrate and fortunately I was able to go and join in the fun.

 No party is complete without cookies and icing.

 

Me and my girl!

2014 Christmas Prep

 Pickout a Christmas tree. Done

 

 Decorate Christmas tree. Done.

 

Tell Santa what you want for Christmas.  Done, but with a bit of nervousness on the part of the 4 year old. 

 

Take pic with Santa with no tears or screaming.  Done, but with a bit of a nervous smile on the 4 year old! 



Thanksgiving

Another fun year, with a bit of a twist on what we've done for years now - Aggie football had to be factored in, so we had an early lunch at the Denson house and then Michael and I headed to College Station for the game. 

 The Thanksgiving cookers, minus Aunt Jean who was taking the pic

 

 The Thanksgiving cookers part two

 

 Hungry cousins making funny faces

 

 We were all 4 smiling at this point, the people in white were not so smiley at the end of the night.  Super fun to have the family rivalry on Thanksgiving now!  Looking forward to watching the game from the couch with everyone next year.  Hopefully the Aggies can pull off a win!

 

This one is a classic!

Space Center Houston

We were excited to have Heidi and Susan in for Thanksgiving and even more excited that they came in early so we had a few days to hang out.  Ella and I met them and Grandpa down at Space Center Houston one day (poor Addy was in school still!) and we got to run around that place.  And I literally mean run around...because that is what a 3 and 4 year old do in a place with wide open spaces!  Not sure how much they got out of the experience but they seemed to have fun.  The only pic I got of the 2 of them was dark, but here are some of me and Ella

Me and Ella and the shuttle carrier airplane that Houston got in lieu of one of the actual shuttles.  Still pretty cool to look at.  Kind of makes the shuttle look small which is strange. 

 

 Ella at the original Mission Control

 

Ella and the really big Saturn rocket.  At least I think it was the Saturn...was definitely a really big rocket.  We mostly walked/ran alongside the rocket, not a whole lot of reading about it. 



Reunion Weekend

Finally it was Michael and my turn to go to a game together - and this time with a lot of friends!  Game was not so great, it was cold and rained the whole time, but we stayed until the fourth quarter to watch the Aggies lose.  Still had a great time hanging with good friends!

 Me and My Girls.
We missed our girls who have left Texas and have more than a short drive to get to College Station so couldn't make it.

 

Cute but blurry pic of us before we put the ponchos on and headed out in the cold and rain.

Mommy-Addy and Daddy-Ella Day

What a fun day we all had today!  Was somewhat of a divide and conquer family day.

Mommy-Addy Day
Michael got to take Addy to her first Aggie game, but I got to take her to her first Aggie game where she actually saw the Aggies score and win!  Granted it was not a pretty game, all that matters is that we got the "W".  Was a gorgeous day to sit outside and watch football.  Fortunately we had a  blanket to snuggle up in when the sun moved and we ended up in the shade.

 We got to watch the corp march in - I got a lot of questions about the corp and I had no idea what the answers were.  I suggested Addy Google them when we got home.  We did conclude that she did not want to join the military when she was older and I told her that I was OK with that.

 Addy in Kyle Field

A game day selfie!

Daddy-Ella Day
A bit further down South, Michael and Ella were having an adventure of their own.  I must say I am a bit jealous too.  They went to Moody Gardens Aquarium and did the penguin encounter.  They got to hang out with penguins and learn about them and watch them do art.  The most fantastic part is that they actually won one of the "paintings" that they watched the penguin paint.  Here is the penguin, her name was "Mo", doing her thing

And here is Ella holding up the masterpiece.  It is hard to see but it is black and yellow footprints.  Super cute!

Happy Halloween

 Elsa and our wizard of Gryffindor

 Yarwell neighbors did not disappoint!  The kids had a blast running up and down the street collecting candy! 

 Here are our spooktacular pumpkins we carved.  Didn't realize how small the cat eyes were until we finally put candles in them!

Let the Halloween Festivities Begin!

First step was a visit to the St. Luke's pumpkin patch to find the perfect pumpkins to carve.  Fortunately there were pumpkins galore to choose from.  I think we looked at every pumpkin before we settled on "the ones".

Then a play date with our wonderful neighbor friends ended up in a big pumpkin carving party that was super fun.  Ella was settled on carving a cat pumpkin, done.  Addison started off wanting a dog then changed her mind 10 times and finally decided on a "W".  I realized we don't have pics of the carved pumpkins, but we'll capture those on Halloween.  

 Ella dove right in and was unphased by the goo!

 Addy the carving pro.

Addison carving with her neighbor BFF Will.

 Then the annual trip to Zoo Boo.  Best part of this trip was that it was the 1st time they got to wear their costumes!  Addy is a member of Gryffindor from the Harry Potter book series and of course Ella is Elsa from the Frozen movie. 

 If you will remember back to our San Antonio vacation last year when we went to the wild animal park and the zebra head in the car that made Ella terrified of zebras - well, I think that she is trying to overcome her fear by riding the zebra on the carousel at the zoo.  It was a BIG step.  In the past she has refused to even look at them at the zoo.  Even sitting on the back of a fake one is impressive.