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Thursday, February 23, 2012

Happy 7 Ellie!

Ellie turned 7 on February 4th. She'd been asking for a Chronicles of Narnia party, ever since we started reading the series in the Fall. We tempted her with Monkey Joe's, or Gymnastics, or even Chuck E Cheese. But she knew what she wanted, so we transformed the living room into the 100 year winter. (sort of.)

We started the party with a showing of the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. That's 2 hours down right there!

Then we played games that were all quite easy to manage-- "Pin the light on the light post"; "Guess the Narnia character pinned on your back"; and "Guess what Narnian object I'm drawing"... at the end we needed more games to fill the time and spontaneously added "Witch-Witch-Aslan" (instead of Duck Duck Goose)... and had Witch Freeze Tag ready if it hadn't been rainy. (i.e., you could do this.)

Daddy ordered the cake, and in my opinion, knocked it out of the park! You've got the Narnian forest, the Eastern Sea, and even the lion figure! Way to go dad!

I'm not sure we'll ever have a 4 hour party again, but all in all, she was quite pleased with the outcome. Love you Ellie!

This pic wasn't from her party, but she wanted it added: For Xmas she got a matching dress with her new doll, which she wore to school the day before her bday :)

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Winter Sledding Fun

This winter has been MILD. Only ONE decent snow! Last year we had 6 missed school days and went through several bags of ice melting salt. This year, not one missed day! BUT, regarding the learning curve required for southerners to thrive in the cold, we have acquired some QUALITY sleds this year. Well, they were cheap at Walmart, but compared to the ones we bought last year, they are rockin'. Big enough for 2 kids, or kid + parent!

At the girls' elementary is an EXCELLENT sledding hill... I have some cute videos as well but all my recent attempts to upload have failed. But you can imagine... What goes up, comes down face-first, on your back, on your hiney, with a smile or a frown.

Saturday, January 07, 2012

Christmas 2011 in Pics

Thanks for your prayers for me in China. I'll have to write about that in another post! I returned on the 18th, and unfortunately brought some nasty version of the flu home with me. I was pretty darn sick for about a week. But if you have to be sick, it was a good time to be, because there was a lot of help around!

We spent Christmas 2011 in our friends' lakehouse in on Lake Kiowa. Thanks so much, McCann's, for your generosity! With most of our family in Texas, it was a great location to invite everyone to come too. We were with my parents, Jim's parents, my brother Aaron and his wife Kristen, Aubrey and Taylor; my sister Jennifer, Tim, Ethan and Elise. We missed Meme & Papa, the Lamottas, the Bishops, and the Dingo's!