Christmas Eve...

For the past 10 years, our Christmas Eve tradition has been to host dinner at our house for my family and Corey's Mom. We have added going to Mass together at the Mission San Diego, because that is our church and it is nice to attend with family. So it ends up being an afternoon event. This year we added the fact that Ben was in the Christmas play during Mass. He was one of the angels! He was so excited to be in the play and super excited that his extended family was going to come and watch him! The bonus was that we had to get there early and we got great seats (for everyone). He did a fantastic job (says I, his Mom).

After Mass, we headed back to our house so that everyone could finish up their portion of dinner (it's a potluck), so that we can eat and then open presents. The kids are all giddy with Santa coming tonight and they want to open presents, now! They were good and were able to wait for all of us to be ready. Everyone got in position and the present unwrapping started. Once started it was hard to stop. Noah really wanted his presents and let me know (loudly) that he was ready for another. It is so great to see how much more aware of what presents are, and who Santa is from year to year.

We look forward to hosting every year and hope that next year we have a bit more room in our home to host a dinner indoors. Tonight, it began to sprinkle before dinner and while we were prepping but when it came time for us to sit, the skies cleared and stayed clear for our meal. That was nice but it was chilly!

Our angel

Cousins

Noah watching Marissa play a game

Ben playing tic-tac-toe with Uncle Chris

Our 10th annual dinner on the patio

Playing with new toys

Nutcracker...

Granny took all of her girls out to the ballet today, we went to see the Nutcracker downtown. We may have seen it when I was a little girl but neither of us could remember it. Hannah and Marissa were in ballet this year so it was a little special show for them too. We really enjoyed it. There were tables full of ballet souvenirs, nutcrackers, ornaments and toys for the girls to buy afterwards. There were even spots where you could meet the dancers after the show. Hannah got a musical jewelry box much like the one I used to have when I was a little girl. She also wants a jewelry box from Santa this year. I think she'll be OK with having 2, she has so much jewelry already. We're really looking forward to our next ballet!

After the show, the boys joined us for dinner at Corvette's Diner. We were all very hungry after the show and it was nice to include the boys in our venture out.

Marissa and Hannah

In our seats

Vanilla shake at Corvettes

Laguna snow...

We went and played in the snow this afternoon. Our local mountains got about 2 feet of snow this week and it was a beautiful sight. Many times we have been and the snow is just OK but today it was nice and fluffy, deep and so cold. It was great. Every time we've gone sledding until today Noah has cried in the snow, never wanting to sit on the sled by himself and certainly not with Daddy nor myself. He was content with staying in the car. But today he loved it, not one tear, just "I want to do it again...with you (or by myself)" It made it fun for us. Hannah has also never expressed interest in going it alone but today she was a little spitfire (see the video below).  She would throw herself on the sled and took it down the hill, crashing, flipping, jumping, rolling in the snow and squealing with laughter the entire time! Ben was also having a great time. I think he might be getting a cold because he was a little quieter about it today, but that might have just been his mood too. 

We left after it got dark and were the last to leave. It was absolutely beautiful. So if you have a chance to get to the mountains, go! And have fun! There should be more snow coming after this weekend too. :)

On a sad note, we broke a sled, I'm not quite sure what happened to it but it looks like someone kicked a hole through the middle of it... one down, two to go. We threw it out. Maybe Santa will bring us one with handles so that we can steer it.

Noah and Daddy

Tree with sunset sky

Crash landing

Coming down

Ben

Noah

and a video clip of our daredevil girl and boy. I was standing in the street and they would come right out and land on my legs if I didn't move quick enough. You can hear me narrating but in the background you can hear Hannah squealing with joy. She loved it.

Field trip...

For our monthly homeschool field trip we went to the New Children's Museum downtown. It was great and the kids had a great time. We tagged on a trolley ride so we wouldn't have to worry about parking and that made the day extra long and fun. By far the favorite spot was the mattress room, the whole room was a big bed and there were mattresses on the walls with big tire pillows all over the place. They spent the most time in there and got all there jumps and jiggles out. Perfect for little monkeys. There were a few rock walls that they could climb, Ben loved those. A rain house that was cool to run through the keyhole door and listen to the rain, bubbles, blocks,  art, pillows, shadow play, theater, who can forget about lunch and so much more. There were friends to play and experience it all with. The scooters were a big hit and every time we passed them each child jumped on one. We would love to go again and again, they had that much fun.

Scooters

Shadow art

Shadow play

Mattress room

Rock climber

Julian...

We had another open house today so we decided to go to Julian for the day. It was awesome and so unplanned. Sometimes the unplanned days are the best times... We ate lunch at a delicious pizza place in Wynola that we've been to before and then headed into Julian. I thought we'd check out the book store first but as we walked up I thought maybe that would be a bad idea with rare books in the store and all. So we turned around and went for hot chocolate and cider. Yummm... It was (literally) freezing cold outside at a cool 32 degrees F so getting a hot chocolate was the best.

As we were driving home through Cuyamaca, we saw quite a bit of snow on the ground! We stopped at Paso Picacho Campground to play for a while. The kids had a blast. Noah kept picking up snow and throwing it at Daddy. Ben did that for a while too but then decided to do some climbing and some snow collecting. Hannah made a snow mountain on a log and everyone had fun. We found icicles hanging on the rooftops, Hannah broke some off and ate them, it was so much fun. It was cold and getting dark so we headed home.

Hot chocolate with Christmas sprinkles

Outside the coffee shop (yes, Hannah has a Halloween shirt on...so does Ben!)
Snow

Gotcha Daddy!
Noah
Ben & Daddy
Icicles
Rosy cheeks

O Christmas Tree...

We picked out our Christmas tree today. We always go to pick our tree up in the evening and it is usually chilly. Tonight was especially cold with some wind and sprinkles, so it felt quite a bit like winter. We are a bit hesitant to getting a tree this year because we are trying to sell the house, but we had to. When we have a Christmas tree in the house it is a bit crowded. So we think we will put one of our couches in the garage for the time being and just put the tree by the window. We'll see.

The kids were thrilled with our tree hunt. We always go to the same place because they are close and usually have a nice selection of trees. The kids wanted to pick out some real nice tall ones but they just won't fit in our house, maybe for the next house (next year?). They went from tree to tree and said "how about this one?", "oooh I like this one, it's all fluffy", "which one are we going to get?", "this one's good", or "how much is this one?" When we finally picked one the kids ran to get "the man" and had him get the tree and bring it to our car. They ran and jumped around until strapped into their carseats. We put it on our patio until tomorrow evening, because getting it all decorated tonight was just too much of a task for us. It's a bit late.

Tomorrow (after the open house) we will get all our decorations out and decorate it as well as our house. We are feeling a little bare and without spirit. We did manage to pull the countdown to Christmas calendar out but that is all we have out right now. :)

Cemetery...

Playgroup today was at a park that used to be a cemetery. It still is but they've just added a playground to it. Some kids wanted to walk over by the tombstones so we went and they started asking questions about what it was. I tried to explain that when people die they are buried and then the tombstone is put on top but all some of them got was that someone died. They walked around saying "someone died" and pointed to the tombstones. Then they wanted to know what the stones said. Then they wanted to climb on them. They were pretty old stones, some that we saw were from the 18oo's. It was pretty cool, we'd never been to that park before.

"S"
Lookout
Walking amongst the tombstones

Update on house...

So we've had lots of showings and several 'successful' -whatever that means- open houses (with another coming up on Sunday), we've had two offers but both backed out because they "aren't ready for the committment of owning"...what a cop-out. Ugh. It is frustrating and really hard to keep the house "show ready" with three children who just want to play and mess it up. So lately we spend a lot of time outside the house, at the park or elsewhere. But we haven't had a call during the week for a few days so I think the interest is slowing down. It's OK. We don't plan on selling to the lowest offer. We need to sell at a certain price point so that we can buy another. If we go with the lowest offer we won't be able to afford another house in the size we need (cuz we need a big house now). We aren't in a hurry either. If we can sell, then we sell. If no one is interested then we stay, no big deal. We've managed living here until now...we can do it for a bit longer.

So that's it! I think I need to bury a St Joseph statue in the yard. I've heard it works!

Craft day...

We went to our monthly craft day for playgroup at a friends house and while the craft was fun, they had more fun doing the block puzzles. I’ve never seen Hannah so into these puzzles before today. Santa might have to bring some to our house this year!

Legos...

Ben is so addicted to creating with his Legos and it is even a catchy activity with the other children in our house. Here are some of his latest (not best but still good) creations.

Super Musician...

Tonight Noah treated us to a music show where he is "super musician". He really got into it. Enjoy!

Open House...

We went to Coronado this afternoon for a bit of Christmas cheer. Coronado hosts an open house where most of the stores stay open later than usual. Everyone walks around, enjoying the cookies, hot chocolate or cider that is offered by the merchants. Some have candies to give away. It's a tradition that we are just starting to get back into.

Tonight, we started out at the Ferry Landing where there was a “mountain of snow” (more like a little hill). We stood in line forever to get onto the mountain, they played on the snow for a few minutes and we went on to decorate cookies and sit on Santa’s lap. We even found some hot chocolate and cookies to keep us going until we got dinner.

We headed to the west side of the island to watch the parade while we ate. We brought a blanket and ate picnic style while watching the parade. That was fun. The parade went by and we were all cozy on the blanket together. Santa was the last in the parade and he came in on an old fire truck. Noah went wild about it. He lit the big tree and then we went walking around. We met up with my family and walked around to see what we could find. We found a band playing music and the kids went wild running around and chasing each other. They even did a little dancing with Grandad. Santa found us and did a little dancing too (I got a video clip of his groovy dancing).

Ben on "snow mountain"
Hannah is armed
Noah was first to talk to Santa. He wants a truck.
Ben and Hannah with Santa
A moment to sit
Dancing with Grandad

And here's the video clip of Santa doing his dance on the street in front of Vons.

Holey...

Time for some new shoes for Ben! I don’t think we’ll be buying crocs again though because that boys feet devours them within a few weeks! And his feet get so dirty with all the holes in them.

Sea World...

Daddy came to Sea World with us today. I organized a trip for homeschoolers and we had a great turnout. We walked around with some friends and ended up staying way later than we were allowed. Here are a few pics from the day.

Quick stop near some dolphins
Penguins
Ice wall with bear paw prints
Polar bear cave
Beluga whale (Noah)
Tracking the beluga
We're so strong!
AR AR AR
Jumping around with Laurel
Hannah and Laurel going solo