Trip to Ohio

Jason's dad has recently retired from the church he has been pastor of for 22 years. His last Sunday to preach was the Sunday before Thanksgiving. The church was planning a big celebration to honor Jim & Sharon that day and they secretly invited all of the family. So all of us were planning to be there for the celebration - but Jason's parents didn't know we were all coming. In fact, I don't think they had even mentioned the celebration to us. So they were VERY surprised to see lots of surprise guests Sunday morning! The day was one of great joy, celebration and praise to God.After the celebrating on Sunday, we went back to our hotel. When we visit Ohio, it always seems to be a chilly time of year, and as much as our girls love to play in the pool, we try to find a place with an indoor pool. This was a new hotel for us and they did have an indoor pool - in fact our room looked out on it - which means our girls asked constantly when we could go swimming.We did spend some time in the pool every night - and they loved it!Monday, we headed to the Cleveland Children's Museum - a great way to spend a chilly, rainy day. It's a really great museum and all the girls really enjoyed it. The water table was a big hit! Emma found it first.Rachel & Cousin Becca enjoyed it too!They had a barn area with lots of large stuffed animals. Heidi enjoyed loading them in to the back of this pickup truck.A girl who likes to shop. And Rachel wanted to get in the cart!Tuesday morning we met Jason's dad for breakfast then hit the road at 10:15AM. We have never made the drive in one day since having kids. But we did it Tuesday rolling in to our garage about 12:30AM. The girls all traveled SO well. And portable DVD players are a life saver! Hopefully they will all travel well again as we head to PA after Christmas.

Heidi's List for Santa

I have some catching up to do on posts, but had to post this before I forgot it. Jumping from Halloween to Christmas...

Heidi has a project to do for school this week - cut out 5 pictures of things she wants Santa to bring her this year and attach them to a paper stocking. I mentioned the project to her this afternoon and that we needed to look for pictures of things she wanted Santa to bring her. She paused for a minute, then said, "will Santa see the stocking or will you email him?"

I told her if we got her stocking back from school, maybe we could take it with us when we go see Santa & Mrs. Claus next Tuesday and she could show it to Santa. (If you remember from last Christmas' posts, Heidi is not so fond of Santa, but is fine with Mrs. Claus. And thankfully, Mrs. Claus travels with Santa when they visit Lockheed. ;-)) She asked me if Mrs. Claus and Santa talked. I took that to mean - do they have voices to talk. So I said, "yes." However, she meant it - do they communicate with each other; because her response was, "I love Mrs. Claus, 'cause she's my friend. I'll show my stocking to Mrs. Claus and then she can tell Santa." This child always has a plan. :-)

Baby Dolls

Heidi has enjoyed playing with baby dolls for a couple years now, I guess. Rachel has observed and has really taken to baby dolls. Because she was frequently wanting to hold one of Heidi's baby dolls (she has 6 or 8), and of course it was ALWAYS the one Heidi NEEDED at that particular time (read between the lines: because Rachel wanted it, she all of a sudden needed it - even though she hadn't paid it any attention in recent history), Rachel received several baby dolls for her birthday in September. So now she has her own. :-)But they still want each others at times.It is so cute to watch her play with them. She puts them in the doll stroller and pushes them around the house; she puts blankets on top of them when "they go night-night"; and she feeds them bottles - including making a sound with her mouth like they are drinking. :-) Too cute!

Three Yellow Jacket Girls

So a friend of mine suggested I post pictures of all 3 of our girls when they dressed as a yellow jacket their first real Halloween. I wasn't sure we had one of Emma (or really, where it was - we've crashed a computer since then), but Jason recently found one. So here you go - just for fun!
Emma 2004Heidi 2007Rachel 2010

Halloween Weekend

It has been a packed Halloween weekend. It started with Heidi's Fall party at school on Friday. They wore their costumes to school and ended the day with the party. They had yummy Halloween snacks, heard a Halloween story, made Halloween necklaces and then played Halloween Bingo. Jason was off on Friday, so he was able to join in the festivities too!Then after Emma got home from school, it was off to a pumpkin patch.Rachel LOVED the baskets of little pumpkins. Just her size! She would pick them up one at a time and put them on the ground - then after a handful were on the ground, she'd start putting them back in the basket. At one point, she emptied almost a whole basket into our wagon - one at a time.Many pumpkins were in and out of our wagon, but this is the one we came home with - along with 3 little ones (they are behind Rachel in the wagon).Saturday morning we took a break from Halloween festivities and met another family from church at a park called Arabia Mountain. It's a granite outcrop much smaller than Stone Mountain. But it is a great hike for the kids and it was a beautiful day to enjoy.There were these rock/granite mounds all along the way marking the path to the top. I think Heidi climbed almost every one on the way up.Emma on top of the world!Thankfully they didn't push each other in. :-) There were lots of shallow ponds at the top - washed out areas in the stone where water collects when it rains.Jason carried Rachel up and most of the way down.And I carried her the last part of the way down.
It really was a fun outing. We'll have to do it again sometime.

Then Saturday night our neighborhood had their annual Halloween Party. This year it was in our cul-de-sac - which was very convenient. We helped host it, but that just means putting out tables for food to be put on and providing the paper products - pretty easy. :-) It was a fun time. It's amazing to see how many kids there are in our neighborhood - and lots of young ones! It was also neat to see neighbors who have lived here for a long time connecting for the first time.

With it not actually being Halloween, it was a little confusing as to whether or not the kids should trick-or-treat after the party or wait 'til Halloween - or go both nights!!! We ended up doing a little both nights. And as a result, we have way more candy than we need. But the girls enjoyed it. Heidi especially enjoyed it. Tonight Emma and Rachel were fading quickly, but Heidi wanted to keep going. So Jason drove Emma and Rachel home and Heidi and I walked home trick-or-treating along the way. She did say she was tired as we were turning on to our street. :-)

And here they are...

Emma - ThumperHeidi - CinderellaRachel - Yellow Jacket (of course)The best we could get of the three of them together.
And couldn't resist including this one...Daddy's Little Pumpkin.
It's been a fun weekend! Now it's time to recover from all the activity.

Curls!!!

Gotta love Georgia humidity - brings out the serious curls!! :-) I can't wait to see what her hair looks like as it continues to grow. I'm guessing she'll look a bit like Emma. Here's curly Emma at age 3.

Happy Birthday Heidi!!!

Heidi is 4 years old today!!! Where does the time go?

We decided to have a friend party for her for the first time this year. She invited all her friends from preschool, plus several others. So we had 15 kids join us yesterday for the party at the facility where Heidi takes gymnastics. They have in-ground trampolines, slides, an inflatable bounce house, a tall inflatable slide, a rope swing, foam pit, and lots of things to climb on. Everyone exerted a lot of energy and had a good time.

Heidi & Jason playing with the parachute. Everyone held a handle and walked around in a circle singing Happy Birthday to Heidi.Friends waiting in line for the rope swing (our girls weren't interested in doing it).Heidi in the foam pit.Happiness is climbing for Rachel.Emma having fun!Jason and Heidi jumping.Daddy in the foam pit.After everyone was done playing, it was time to go in to "the party room" for pizza, cake and ice cream. Heidi got to wear the "birthday crown."Heidi had asked for a Cinderella cake. I remember my mom making doll cakes for my sisters way back when - and I want to try to make my daughters' birthday cakes just like my mom has always done (and still does) for me. (Thanks Mom!!!) So I tackled Cinderella... After reading up on assembly hints online, baking two cake mixes and lots of blue food coloring, Cinderella emerged. :-)I was very pleased with how it turned out. And Heidi really liked it too.

Heidi and Cinderella.Blowing out the candles - one at a time (and everyone is leaning in to watch).I think a fun time was had by all and I know Heidi enjoyed her party. She is blessed to have so many wonderful friends. When we got home from the party, she wanted to open her presents. She received lots of fun, neat, and very nice gifts from her friends. She has already started playing with lots of them! Thanks everyone!!!

So that was yesterday. Today as her actual birthday, she chose where we would go for lunch after church - "Welcome to Moes!" :-) Grammy and Papa were able to join us and we had a great lunch together. This afternoon she actually had another friend's birthday party to go to, so we did that. Then it was just spending the evening at home. And I made her request for dinner - Kraft Mac 'n Cheese - easy to please. :-)

Happy Birthday Heidi!!! We love you!!