The Doctors Wife

Christmas Catch Up

We have had so much fun this holiday season! We enjoyed Magglio and all of his antics and this year we added a fun advent calendar and had so much fun with different activities/ projects each night!

I really hope that Hannah and David grow up with great memories, and I hope that the holidays are a particularly special time for them. I want them to enjoy the fun of the season, but my deepest wish is for them to embrace the love of Christ. 

This year's advent activities (not in order) so I can remember next year!

1. Add a new ornament to the tree (this year we added a ballerina and a Woody)

2. "Elf" the neighbors

3. Write a list for Santa

4. Go to the Christmas Train 

5. Watch It's A Meaningful Life

6. Make Oliver and Sophie holiday treats

7. Go look at Christmas lights

8. Decorate a gingerbread house

9. Pick out a gift for Daddy

10. Watch A Charlie Brown Christmas and pop popcorn

11. Pick out gifts for a needy family from our church

12. "Rudolph" Daddy's car

13. Christmas craft (foam Christmas trees)

14. Watch How the Grinch Stole Christmas

15. Make Christmas cookies

16. Pick out Jesus' birthday cake

17. Read the Christmas Story and play with nativity puppets

18. Open and read a new Christmas book 

19. Give a gift to Ms. Meggie (our babysitter)

20.  Go see The Nutcracker and add a nutcracker to our collection

21. Have Christmas ice cream for dessert (peppermint chocolate chip- they didn't like it!)

22. Do a good deed for someone (without them knowing)

23. Open gifts from each other (they were so sweet picking out gifts for each other)

24. Shop for groceries for a family in need

I hope that you all had a very Merry Christmas!!

All Aboard!

The Christmas Train!

We took a little trip to ride the Christmas Train- it is so neat! It was our first year to do this and I hope it becomes a family tradition. It is an amazing Christmas village with all kinds of activities, we took a carriage ride, rode the mini train, rode the carousel, visted Santa, had dinner, rode the big Christmas train, and had so much fun! There were carolers and lights every where, so the ambiance was amazing. The best thing is that the Christmas train tells the story of Jesus, the real meaning of Christmas.

On the mini-train- they had so much fun, David was so excited to ride the "chugga chugga choo choo". Their sweet little faces were lit up the entire night, and it was such a great family night. I took a ton of pictures, but this was one of those nights that I hardly got any with them both looking at the camera without having a goofy look. Evidence of said goofy looks:

Yeah....he was very excited! We had so much fun and they are both still talking about it and I hope we will be able to get tickets next year!

 

 

 

Elf On A Shelf- Magglio is back!

Last weekend our Elf, Magglio came to our house. He comes when the Christmas decorations are put up- we think it's because the decorations make him feel a little more at home. ; ) I saw the cutest idea for a breakfast here and knew that I had to do a version of it. Her breakfast was adorable and I LOVED her letters, (googly eyes?!? LOVE!) so of course I had to steal borrow the idea. Here was our "North Pole Breakfast"

 

Hannah loved it and was super excited that Magglio brought them their very own snow globes that they could touch as much as they wanted. (because there is no touching Mommy's)He also brought some coloring books, stampers, and stickers and little reindeer notebooks to put their stickers in. (David had his eyes closed in EVERY shot I got, so no pictures of my little man, but he was very excited). This was a really fun way to welcome Magglio, and I think it will become a fun tradition. 

Magglio has been up to some new tricks this year. The last 2 years he has just moved around from spot to spot, but this year (thank you pinterest) he is stepping out of his shell. One night he dyed the milk his favorite color...

Hannah thought this was great and loved it even more when we got home later in the day and he had moved out of the fridge (too cold) and onto his favorite spot at the top of the tree.

Last night he had a little tea with Woody and Heidi:

They both thought this was fun, and Hannah was especially excited because he used her "good dishes" that are put away and only brought down when David isn't around. Magglio doesn't do something this elaborate every night, but he has a few fun things planned that he will do every few nights. What about you? Do you have an elf that visits your house?

 

Thanksgiving...

Just a little late! Hannah and David were both pilgrims for their school programs this year and they were precious! I think I ended up with more video than photos, which is kind of a shame since I am terrible with the video camera! Here are a couple of pictures of my little pilgrims:

 

We also started a new tradition this year- I saw it years ago on a blog and knew that when Hannah and David were big enough I wanted to do it... A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving! We love the Charlie Brown movies at our house and the "feast" that Snoopy prepares is right up Hannah's alley!

I put the popcorn inside the paper-bag turkey, and Snoopy wore David's pilgrim hat. : )

Daddy "carving" the turkey

Hannah LOVED this, she thought it was so much fun! We actuallly got her to try a few jelly beans, she wasn't too crazy about them, but at least she gave them a try! (Yes, her pickiness even spreads into "treats")

David loved having dinner with Snoopy and I think this will be a fun night-before Thanksgiving tradition!

David is drinking "green juice" - Bolthouse Farms Green Goodness or Naked Juice Green Machine are our favorites- thought I'd add this in, otherwise I know I'll get questions asking what in the world is in his cup!  ; )

The Charlie Brown feast is popcorn, jelly beans, toast and pretzels if you've never seen the show

Halloween Fun

The last couple of weeks have been a blur of activities! Before Halloween is completly irrelevant here are some fun pics from that weekend:

David participates in a little gym class, and the gym had a carnival. Hannah and David had so much fun- they had a balloon artist and he made David "Rex" and Hannah a flower bracelet. They had fun playing, making crafts, getting their faces painted and having snacks.

After David's gym carnival, we went to a local church's festival. They had lots of games and inflatables and my kids had a blast!! 

And finally...trick or treating!

I loved their costumes and they had so much fun!

 

Trick or Treat!

Woody and Jessie hope that you got lots of your favorite candy!

Pumpkin Patch

A couple of weeks ago we headed out to the pumpkin patch. The night before I set the table for a special pumpkin breakfast- I had planned on making pumpkin muffins, but ran out of time, but luckily I had some pumpkin waffles in the freezer from a couple of weeks ago. The next morning when Hannah saw the table she was so excited, it reminds me how important it is to take that extra step to make things special. It really isn't that much extra for me to do, but makes things so much more special and memorable for Hannah and David.

Feeding the baby goats at the pumpkin patch- they sure were cute!

A few hugs waiting for a pony ride...

Can you tell that someone was super excited? Ha!

Picking out the perfect pumpkin...

I love this one of David- he was so proud of himself! And I love his wind-blown hair!

We had a great day- I am so thankful for my two sweet little pumpkins!

Obligatory Easter Pictures

I hope that you all had a great Easter! We had a very cold, very wet day but were able to spend the day with our families so it was worth the rain. The Easter bunny came to our house on Saturday since he knew that we would be heading from church to my parents home on Sunday, and the kids were super cute with their baskets. Hannah is quite the egg hunter, while David took a very relaxed approach and opened up each egg as he found it. The dogs even "helped" find a few eggs, but were very disappointed that the kids did not share any of their candy. We made cute bunny pancakes  and had fun with some of the fun things that the Easter bunny left. Sunday we got up to a down-pour, and headed to the early service at our church. Our church has just completed a huge add on that has more than doubled the size of the church and it was the first Sunday in the new sanctuary. It was a beautiful service, and it was packed! After church we headed home to change since it was much cooler than expected, then we headed out to my parents and it rained the entire drive, thankfully nothing severe although we were a little late. We had a delicious lunch and then the kids had egg hunt #2. My mom has a huge basket of fake apples in her living room, and David always plays with them, instead of putting eggs in his basket, he loaded it up with apples.

We had a great time visiting with our families (Mike's parents joined us for lunch and the egg hunting festivities) and headed home in more rain. On our drive home we had to go through some hail, and David was not a fan. Bless his heart, it was loud, but luckily it did not last too long and the hail was small. The kids (and parents!) were exhausted by the time we made it home, but we had a great day celebrating the resurrection of Jesus!

 

Valentine's Ideas

I had a couple of emails asking me about the activities I am using for my wreath. I am doing very simple things, but I will share for those who were wondering (or if you are snowed in and need something to do!)

Making Valentine's for the Grandparents

•Read a special Valentine's book (x2) (I already mentioned the first book, and I picked up a couple more from our library)

•Make Valentine's for Grandma & Grandpa and Grammy & PaPa (She used an entire glue stick for you Grandma!)

•Bake Valentine's cookies

•Pop Popcorn and watch Be My Valentine, Charlie Brown

•Make a Valentine craft (x3) I don't have anything specific planned, I am going to see what I'm up for when the time comes  ; ) Nothing a quick search on Swagbucks can't fix if I can't come up with anything! (If you don't do Swagbucks, you are missing out, it is like Google, but it randomly gives you points for searching- and you cash in your points for prizes, I have gotten a ton on Amazon gift cards using Swagbucks, and if you sign up, click on my link above and I will get referral credit : )

•Deliver Valentine's (we will be seeing family for David's birthday)

•Take Valentine's treats to dance class

•Make a Valentine's house- (I bought a gingerbread house to make before Christmas, but the sickness from hell hit our house the week before Christmas, and it never got done, but I didn't want to toss it out, and I am not saving it for a year, so we will decorate it with Valentiney candy and call it good)

•Watch a special Valentine show (again I have no exact plan, but will have my DVR ready to catch a Valentiney episode- surely something on Noggin will be Valentine related?)

•Help make Valentine treats for the puppies (heart shaped, of course!)

•Take a special treat to Daddy at work

See? Simple things! I think those of you who asked may be a little let down! For the crafty stuff/ valentines I am trying to use up old scrap-booking supplies so I am not planning on buying anything so I plan on making something up depending on what all I find, or if I see a cute idea somewhere that fits with what I have on hand.  Anyway, I hope this gives you an idea of the kind of things we are up to!

I love how they are concentrating on what they are working on so hard! Hope you guys are all staying warm!

 

 

Valentine Countdown

I am a fan of Valentine's Day. I decorate, I send cards, I bake cookies, I like it. I'm not sure why I like it so much, but I do. Maybe because it helps fill in the weary winter between Christmas and spring? (and seriously, I am so over the winter, that groundhog had better not predict 6 more weeks of winter) This year I knew I wanted to start a new tradition with my kiddos, and I knew I wanted to do an advent style countdown with different activities for each day. This is what I came up with:

I saw something similar to this somewhere in blog-land in the fall (with cute little leaves) but I have no idea where so I can't give credit. I took a styrafoam form, covered it with strips of leftover fabric, and hot glued the clothes-pins on, then I numbered the little hearts, each heart has a corresponding envelope that has the daily activity.

The notes are from the dollar section at Target, and the whole thing is hung on a command hook. (I love them and think they are so useful!) Today we read The Story Of Valentine's Day. All of the activities I have planned are pretty simple, but presenting them to Hannah and David this way makes them so much more memorable and special. (I hope!) Each day we turn the heart over to the blank side of the heart.

So on Valentine's Day, no numbers will be left, just little hearts.  The whole thing took me about 30 minutes to make. Hannah is very excited and if Hannah is excited, David is too!  I hope that these are the things they remembers about their childhoods!