New Bulletin: One of My Children Agrees To Talk To and Be Photographed with Santa!

some time to breathe...

Oh my goodness, was this month more than I expected!  So many parties and events, even though I tried to downsize.  We are in a good place now, though.  Work is done for me until Jan. 5, so is school for Cadence.  Matt finished his master's program.  The last party was attended on Saturday night.  

It feels really good.  We are staying home this year during the whole break, mainly because Matt has to work for some of it.  We are hosting guests, but it's really good for us this year to not be rushing to pack and drive.  Especially because Piper has a UTI (that involved visiting the Urgent Care at Wal-mart yesterday afternoon) and Cadence has a runny nose.

In the middle of all our events last week, we found some time to play in the yard Friday afternoon.  Cadence and Piper built a birdhouse.

Clearly, we dressed ourselves for this occasion. That's a pink polka dot and brown jacket, a black headband, a red and green cherry dress, green pants, and pink plaid shoes.  I feel like Piper is going to be a fashion risk-taker.  

No word yet on whether the birds have moved in.

"Making these cookies should be called a celebration of noses...

Because they smell sooooo good!"

It's the most wonderful time of the year

We love decorating day!  We put all our Christmas decor up last Sunday.

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first day

It's been quite a few months since I last documented our "first day", but I like how it captures the everyday bits of life.  Here's our November 1st, in the parts where I took a picture (everything else was mostly laundry).

most of this salad was from Cadence's school garden!

Matt is building a motorcycle seat!

Our Pumpkin cat is missing. We're praying for his safe return,

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Halloween and All Saints Day 2014

We jammed a bunch of Halloween activities into a couple days this year.  First, on Wednesday, we finally carved pumpkins.  We used the pumpkins we inadvertantly grew in July.  One had a hole in the bottom, but that was fine, since we used a drill to do our jack-o-lantern designs this year anyway.

I had to do some sewing on Wednesday night to prepare Cadie's Tinkerbell costume (the dress was done for the birthday party back in August, but we needed a little cape like the jacket Tink wears in The Secret of the Wings).  I also had to sew her Deborah costume for All Saints Day at school, which they celebrated Friday.

sewing for Deborah

Trick-or-treating was Thursday night.  All the little campus kids get together and go to faculty homes and dorms.  If you ask them, the best part is riding on the big kid school buses to get everywhere.  Here's some of the crew waiting to head out.

that building with the columns in the background?  my library

one of friends' families was two penguins and Antarctica!

I made that Belle dress too!  Our buddy E borrowed it!

The girls were happy with their costumes.  Cadence knew for months that she would be Tinkerbell, but Piper kept changing her mind before settling on a "puma cat."  She learned about pumas on Go, Diego, Go! and has been telling people facts about them.  

Finally, here's Cadence in her Deborah costume, ready to go to school on Friday.

Happy Halloween...

From Tinkerbell and a "puma cat"!

(We actually did our trick-or-treating yesterday.  More pics to come tomorrow.)

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Piper is 3!

Last week, our littlest girl turned 3. She requested a chocolate cake with vanilla frosting (I did a variation on our favorite friday cake and simple buttercream).  Piper is so...herself.  One of our friends was watching her at the girls' birthday party this weekend and commented on how she just doesn't care what everyone else is doing.  She was going to do her own thing and have fun.  On the other hand, she usually lets her big sister have her way and is happy to hand over a toy or a snack.  I have her here next to me to answer some birthday questions.

Favorite color: pink (this is new)

Favorite food: chicken and fries, like at Chick-fil-a

Favorite book: Little People Zoo Book

Favorite show: Dinosaur Train

Favorite Toy: Applejack pony

Favorite song: Dinosaur train song

Favorite activity: drawing and "playing with my toys when I'm a big girl"

Favorite movie: Frozen "I'm not scared of Marshmallow. I'm not scared of that guy...Marshmallow turns out to be a good guy."

"That's me with a sticker on my face."

She got some special things for her birthday.  Cadence gave her this green toys flower building set and you can see the $3 she got from her buddy GrandDado.  She also got a suitcase from Nana and Dadder (which she had really been wanting) and a really cool Princess Anna costume, made by Dassa.  In addition to a few little things from Matt and me, we took her to Walmart and let her pick out a present.  We weren't sure what to expect, since she'd been saying she wanted everything from "all the headbands" to "another yellow snake."  She examined a lot of things in the princess/dolly aisle, under the supervision of Cadence, of course.  But as soon as she saw Applejack pony, a stuffed version of this My Little Pony, she didn't even want to look at anything else.  

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John 13:14-15

¹⁴ Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. ¹⁵ I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you.

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Inspired by SouleMama, {this moment} is a single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

Theme of the Week: Clothes, Fabric, and Sewing

Matt's mom has been teaching sewing lessons forever and I still make things, so it was only natural we had a clothing and sewing themed week around here.  Cadence is particularly interested in making things; I think partly because she sees sewing and knitting in her Montessori classroom.  She practiced hand sewing this week...we'll get around to using the machine eventually.

Reading: Joseph had a Little Overcoat by Simms Taback, Ella Sarah Gets Dressed by Margaret Chodos-Irvine, and Blue Hat, Green Hat by Sandra Boynton

Piper is rocking her dress-up clothes

Playing: Dress-up of ourselves and dolls and Nina Ballerina Magnet Doll

Our fabric decorated letters

Making: Sewing Shape Cards (see below), Fabric Letters, Beaded Wands (we threaded pony beads on chenille sticks), and a purse for Emma the Doll!