Holiday Decorating

As always, the girls had super fun decorating for Christmas this year. It was a little later than normal since we were away for Thanksgiving. The tree usually goes up that weekend. We added another tree in the family room this year that has colored lights and was decorated by the girls. We also made many batches of chex mix, puppy chow, peanut butter blossom cookies and decorated sugar cookies for the holidays.

Happy 9th Birthday Taylor!

Left to Right: Alyssa, Paige, Taylor, Ashley, Paige, Addison and Toree

It is totally crazy to think that Taylor turned 9 this year. I always tell her she is not allowed to go into the double digits so no more birthdays for her. She celebrated in early December with 6 of her friends by getting pedicures and manicures. We then came back to the house for games, cake and ice cream. She said it was her best birthday ever but I think she says that every year. We had a small family birthday with grandparents, Aunts, Uncles and cousins on her actual birthday.

Disney World

This year we spent Thanksgiving at Walt Disney World. We suprised the girls early Tuesday morning, before Thanksgiving, with a 8 day stay at Disney. This had been in the works for some time so pulling it off as a secret was a success in itself. Needless to say, they were SUPER excited! We had great weather all week with the exception of rain one day but you can't let that stop you. We ended up buying ponches and kept on going. We spent that day at Hollywood studios trying to watch most of the indoor theater shows. The girls had great fun swimming in the hotel pool while it was raining that night. We enjoyed time at The Animal Kingdom, HollyWood Studios, Epcot and The Majic Kingdom. Some of the major highlights were a princess lunch with Cinderella, Ariel, Snow White, Aurora(Sleeping Beauty), and Belle, Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Parade and Fireworks show, Dinner and Breakfast at Chef Mickey's where you get to see Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Donald Duck and Goofy, The Bibbidy Bobbidy Boutique where Emma and Taylor got made up as princesses complete with hair, makeup, nails and fairy dust. Ella wanted nothing to do with this. One of the most interesting parts of this trip, compared to our visit 3 years ago, was seeing the girl's different personalities. At 3 years old, we threw Emma & Ella in the stroller and rolled away. They obviously were much more aware of their surroundings this time and were very vocal about what they wanted and didn't want to do. Taylor is very easy going and goes along with most things without complaining. She really enjoyed The American Idol Experience and The Toy Story Mania 3D game. Emma enjoyed seeing all the characters and would want and did sometimes wait in line for hours to see them. She was super excited to see Tinker Bell, Silvermist and Rosetta who are all new at Disney. Ella, well... as always, she was Ella. It depended on her mood what she was up for. Some characters she really enjoyed and others not so much. She really enjoyed the castle shows, parades and theater shows like Finding Nemo, Beauty and The Beast and Little Mermaid. It was a super fun family vacation that I hope the girls will always remember!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Champ

My beloved Champ dog passed away suddenly and very unexpectedly early Sunday morning. He was a very dear part of our family and will be incredibly missed. He was my first "baby" when I brought him home at only 5 weeks old. He quickly grew into a 100 pound lap dog. For the past 11 years, he has been the biggest "baby" in the house and we expected to have many more years of enjoyment with him. Champ was and will continue to be very loved!

Happy Birthday Mom!

Sue and Becky in the back. Mom, me and Jane sitting.

Mom...aka Grandma B. turned 80 last week....doesn't she look great! Dave and I took a quick trip Saturday to Illinois to suprise her at a birthday dinner my sisters planned. It was great to be there and see her expression. I wish the girls could have gone but we thought it would have been too long in a car for such a short trip. They spent the weekend at Grandma & Grandpa Sharpe's having their own fun.

Happy Halloween

The girls had great fun this Halloween....even Ella. She did dress up and planned to stay with daddy to hand out candy but caught up with us a few houses down the road and then loved going door to door. The school was collecting candy for the troops over seas so the girls loved going through their candy deciding what to keep and what to part with. They all gave up quite a bit. The school collected 4,000 pounds in all.

Digging in to carve pumpkins.

Taylor....aka "The Cowgirl"

Ella...aka "The 50s girl"

Emma....aka "A Monarch Butterfly"

Major Update!!

It has been over a month since our last post. What have we been up to? Well....I have been trying to settle into a routine of getting 3 little girls up and ready for school on time, packing lunches/snacks/water bottles, checking back packs and homework folders and that is just the morning. Taylor is doing very well. She is doing great in all subjects and has really improved in math. She is still taking piano lessons, as well as, a hip hop and jazz dance classes. Emma and Ella are loving school, too. They have both counted to 100 and are working on letter sounds, sight words, simple reading and journaling. Emma is continuing with her swimming and dance class and Ella....well she is just being Ella. She loves to do anything outside.

Apple Picking

Last weekend, we had great weather and went on our family apple picking outing at MacQueens Orchard. I can never tell what the girls like best. Picking apples, climbing the trees, eating apples or eating homemade donuts and cider.

Late Summer Fun

End of the season tomato picking and...

....eating. The girls went to Grandma & Grandpa Sharpes to pick tomatos and of course ride the lawn tractor and wagon.

Watch out! Taylor's behind the wheel.

School Days

The school gang!

Back L-R: Tanner, Ethan and Matt.

Front L-R: Ella, Taylor, Ashley and Emma.

The girls on their first day of school. Emma and Ella starting kindergarten(can you believe it) and Taylor going in 3rd grade. Wow....what a day! I must admit that this day was much easier for the girls than it was for me. I was so proud to share this day with the girls and held in all my tears until I got home. The girls and I filled each others pockets with kisses and hugs to use throughout the day which helped. Emma & Ella were so excited the night before that they had a hard time settling down to sleep and were up bright and early dressed and ready to go. This was all good but made for a very long day and crabby evening after a full day at kindergarten. Things have gotten easier now we are into a routine after a couple weeks. They are all loving every minute!

Meeting Sara, the school therapy dog, on the first day of school.

Taylor with her teacher, Mrs. Mahler. This is who she was hoping to get. She had heard she was the "cool" 3rd grade teacher and she seems to be great!

Ella and Emma with their teacher, Ms. Kronmann. This is her 1st year teaching and seems to have lots of fun learning activities planned. The girls come home excited and ready to go back every day.