Never Too Old

Today you could say our family Advent activity was kind of a cop-out. We went out for pizza as a family. I knew ahead of time that today was going to be a busy day for the girls and I so I purposefully made this our activity. I did not take pictures of dinner. I promise we were all there and it was yummy.

There was a part of our Oklahoma trip I failed to mention before. We visited the local library's fabulously fun new playground. Everyone got in on the fun. Big, small, tall, short, old and young all joined in the fun. I guess you are never too old to play on a playground. Thankfully I had my camera to capture all the fun ;0).

All bundled up to go play

Papa pushing The Bear

Aunt Lauren down the long and twisty tube side

Curly came next

Aunt Katie's turn

The Bear loved sliding down with Uncle Luke

Not so much sliding down with Gran

Pulling Lauren out

A proud dad pushing his 27 yr old daughter on the swing

Weeeeeeee!!!!

Big Brother's turn to push little sister

Daddy swinging with his Little Bear

Activity Advent Day 2

Today was Daddy's birthday. Unfortunately he had to work and then he had a final exam in his hardest class tonight. Major bummer. I am happy to report though, that he aced his final! Woo Hoo! So today our activity was to make homemade birthday cards and Christmas decorations for his office. The girls loved it. Hopefully Daddy will too.

The Set Up

The Bear hard at work

Some of the finished trees

Advent Activity Calendar

Two years ago my sweet friend, Emily, made us a family advent activity calendar. It's 24 small decorative envelopes filled with a fun family activity for each day. It's simple activities but presented in a fun way for the kids. I'm hoping to put up a simple blog each day of our activity. I may miss a few but hopefully I'll catch most of them. Today was our first activity. We brought out The Elf On The Shelf for the girls. The first part of the story says that we as a family must name our elf from Santa. Our elf was given the unique name of Elfy. The story behind the Elf is that he is sent here from Santa to watch our kids and see if they are being naughty or nice. Each night he goes to the North Pole to report to Santa any good or bad things they did. Then he returns before they wake up each morning. He moves around the house to different places. Each morning it's a game to find him around the house. His only rule is you cannot touch him or he may lose his Elf magic. Elfy seems to be a hit so far. Hopefully he works at keeping our two little girls on the nice list.

Okie Thanksgiving

This year for Thanksgiving we drove out to Oklahoma to spend Thanksgiving with Gran's family. We broke the trip up into two days for Curly and The Bear. They did well with the drive but I was definitely reminded why I loathe long car rides and if economically possible would prefer to fly. Prior to leaving home we warned the girls that we would be in the car for a long long time and they needed to just sit back and enjoy all the wonderful movies we were bringing for them to watch. We made it about an hour before Curly asked if we were at the hotel yet. Actually she said " Are we at the woo-tel yet". Just call her Curly-lou-woo from Woosville. It's fitting for the season.

On Wednesday we got to Oklahoma, where the wind sweeps cars right off the road. Or, Oklahoma, where the toll roads will make you go broke. Just kidding but not really, the wind and tolls are no joke in that state. We stayed with Aunt Debbie for the three nights we were in town. We had a wonderful time catching up with our Oklahoma family. Friday was the Auburn/Alabama game as well as the Tulsa game. Daddy's cousin Tyler works for The University of Tulsa and got us football tickets to the Southern Miss vs Tulsa game that evening. We all watched the first half of the Auburn game before we had to leave for the Tulsa game. That was NOT the half to watch. It was actually quite depressing. Tyler showed us around the Case Athletic Complex where he works. All the coaches offices were in there and they all had big TVs in their offices. Many had the Auburn game on so some of us (not me because I was a nervous wreck) watched the last quarter of the Auburn game. This was definitely the one to watch because we WON! Woo Hoo! The bliss of our victory made watching the Tulsa game even more fun. Tyler was able to secure some sweet sideline passes for Daddy and Luke. The rest of us sat around the 40 yard line. Not too shabby. Tulsa prevailed beating Southern Miss in a shoot out.

Sadly on Saturday we left our Okie family and drove through many a toll booths on our way home. It felt good to finally get home on Sunday. We've all been catching up on our sleep the last couple of days. Enjoy the pictures from our trip.

Our Family on Thanksgiving

The whole family on Thanksgiving

Meeting new cousin Piper

Riding down to check out the lake

The Bear's happy place, Papa's shoulder.

Us with Tyler before the Tulsa game

The whole gameday crew

Celebrating the Auburn victory at the Tulsa game

Indian Curly

The Thursday before Thanksgiving, Curly's preschool class had a Thanksgiving feast and performed some songs for all the parents. Curly was a little Indian girl. She loved feeling like she was Pocahontas. Daddy worked from home that day so he was able to come and enjoy the festivities with the rest of us. A few days later we left on our long road trip to Oklahoma to celebrate with Gran's family. I'll post about that after I catch up on my sleep. Traveling with 2 little girls has wiped me out.

The Pilgrims and The Indians

10 Little Indian Boys and Girls

Proud of our little Curly Indian

Two of her besties Hailey and Claire

My sweet Indian girl

Differences

Sisters

The other day we got into the van to go run some errands. I just asked the girls what music they would like to listen to while we were out and about. Curly responded by saying, " I want to listen to whatever music you want to listen to mommy". The Bear said, "I want Veggie Tales!". It made me laugh. I turned around and they were both smiling so sweetly. Both very proud of their answers.

Curly is a pleaser. She is a smoozer. She loves to make people happy. Partly because she is just a really really sweet girl by nature, but also because she knows buttering people up will benefit her at a later date. The Bear, on the other hand, knows what she wants and is not afraid to let you know. She will fight for what she wants and she doesn't really care what you think about it. She expresses her opinions and is very proud of them.

Each night when we are putting the girls to bed, I ask each girl what they would like to thank God for in their prayers. Curly usually has a long list ranging from her family to flowers to food. The Bear always without fail says herself. I then ask her if she would like to thank God for anything else and she says "I'm thankful for me and for God". She is so funny. No self esteem issues for The Bear.

Happy Halloween

I always ask my kids what they want to be for Halloween. I think it's cute when siblings dress alike with a theme, but I also love letting them pick something they really want to be. I'm usually pleasantly surprised by what they pick. This year I asked The Bear first and she instantly blurted out "Minnie Mouse!". I would have never thought about Minnie Mouse, but she was so excited about her idea. Curly went through a few choices and finally decided she wanted to be Pinkalicous. If you have no idea who Pinkalicous is you obviously do not have a little girl. This costume was completely and totally perfect for my pink obsessed girly girl.

We had a super fun Halloween. It started on Friday when we attended a fun Halloween party at my friend Eva's. She throws such fun kid parties. There were many games, prizes, lots of festive foods and a ton of adorably costumed kids. Friday night we carved our family pumpkin. Well actually Daddy and Curly carved the big pumpkin. The Bear painted the little pumpkins and I supervised and took pictures. Saturday Daddy was in school all day (BOO!) so the girls and I met some of our best friends at a local mall and had a fun morning riding the mall train, playing on the playground, story time at the Disney Story and lunch at Chick Fil A (of course). For church on Sunday, Curly wore her soccer uniform. It was "team" day at church so kids were encouraged to wear their Upward uniform if they played a sport at church. Sunday afternoon we attended the fall festival at Curly's preschool. We had a great time with friends and Curly's teachers. After the festival we headed home for dinner and then trick or treating around the neighborhood. The Bear only made it to a few homes before she had hit her limit. She and daddy headed home to hand out candy while Curly and I finished the neighborhood.

Scary Pinkalicious

Scary Minnie Mouse

Playing games (sorry it's so big)

"This stuff is yucky!"

Painting Pumpkins

Pinkalicious and Minnie Mouse

Minnie riding high on Daddy's shoulders

Sweet Friends

Prom Pose

Fishing with Daddy