Ellie's Music Program

Ellie's school had their annual music program on Friday. This is the third one I have been to and I am telling you they get better every year. We have a wonderful music teacher at her school and I can't imagine the work it takes to put it together with closet o 600 students! The theme was "The Way of the Seasons" and they featured songs associated with each season. Ellie's grade had Fall so they sang "Bat Dance" and "My Friend Tom". They did a great job! Ellie really enjoyed it. My sis in law had gone to the morning performance and then was nice enough to sign Ellie out to go out to lunch. Jack and I met them at Mr. Goodscents after I picked Jack up from preschool and we had a nice lunch together. We love Aunt Julie!! Ellie then went back to school and Jack and my mom and I went to the afternoon performance. This was the first time I have taken Jack and he was so good (probably because he played Ellie's DS the ENTIRE time---what did we do before electronics!!) It was a great afternoon!
On Sunday Ellie had her last basketball game of the season. We really enjoyed this season and had a great time watching the team grow and develop together. This is their 2nd year together and they really showed good chemistry this year. We will miss our Sunday afternoon basketball games but are looking forward to soccer starting in about a month---yeah for Spring!!!!

Lunch with Aunt Julie!

Jack at the program with the DS!!

Music program

After the program in Ellie's classroom

Last basketball game

End of game--handshakes with the other team--great season Wildcats!

Ice Skating and President's Day Weekend

We had an "ice skating kind of weekend"!! The weather was nice over the weekend so we decided to take the kids ice skating at Mahoney State Park because we had been talking about for a while. It is such a nice place to skate. It's outdoors but under a pavillion so it's not too cold. Ellie loves to ice skate and this was just Jack's 2nd time so he still feeling it out but he seemed to enjoy it a bit but was really a lot more concerned with when it would be time to go play in their indoor play structure :) Ellie is actually pretty good and now wants to take Ice Skating lessons thanks to our Brownie field trip on Monday night. So not only did we ice skate on Saturday but we also went on Monday night. I had set up a lesson for the troop at Hitchcock and the girls loved it! They got 30 min of instruction and then 30 min of free skate. It was a lot of fun and a great field trip! I never ended up getting a pic of the troop which I'm bummed about :(

Watching the Zamboni clean the ice--pretty exciting!

Mahoney State Park indoor playground

Indoor playground at Mahoney

Yikes!! Ellie wanted to try my wedding dress on when were at my parents!

Ellie, Jack and Claire at Bounce U

Ellie was trying to convince Jack to go down the slide--he wasn't having it! He refused so I had to go up and get him :) Love them so much!!

The kids are headed back to school today after being off 1/2 on Fri and then all day Mon and Tues for Presidents Day and Teacher work day. Monday Ellie had a friend over and Tues we took her friend Claire and went to Bounce U. The kids loved it---we were literally there for almost 3 hrs. We have been there several times before and normally they are ready to go after about an hour or so but not yesterday--they played and played! Overall we had a good long weekend and we are ready for some routine back!!

Valentine's Day

Jack and his friend Hamdoul at their class party

Doing the "Jungle Song"-pretending they are sleeping

Dancing

Andrew, Jack and Sophie

Passing out Valentine's

Ellie's class party

Jack, Ellie, Isabella and Allison

Valentine's Day dinner

New DS game

Seeing the fish for the 1st time!

Valentine's Day 2012

Cake for dad

Valentine's box

We had a nice Valentine's Day this year! For the 2nd year we have a tradition where we decorate for Dave and make him a nice dinner and cake! This year we decided (thanks to an idea from my friend Jill!) to start getting Chinese takeout for our Valentine's Dinner. Chinese is pretty much Dave's favorite food so we thought that would be a good plan. So Chinese it is from now on :) During the day the kids had their Valentine's parties. Jack's was in the morning and Ellie's in the afternoon. The morning didn't start off well---I had a flat tire!! So I was worried that Jack would miss his party but Dave rescued us and came home from work and changed the tire and we were on our way! During Jack's party they passed out their Valentine's, had a game and made a craft and had a snack. I love going to his classroom and seeing all the kids---they are so cute it makes me smile! Jack just loves it and especially his friend Hamdoul---they are a riot! After lunch we headed to Ellie's party. Jack has fun going to her class and seeing the "big kids". We played some games and had a snack! This year I chickened out on the Valentine's box and had my crafty friend Lisa help Ellie---it turned out nice--very formal but nice--almost looked like it could be used for wedding cards :) Ellie doesn't get to into making the box (she is following in my non-crafty footsteps--darn!!) so she really didn't care what it looked like--she just wanted to hold my friend Lisa's dog Tuffy the whole time!! But it turned out cute and she liked it and that's what counts! After we had our Valentine's dinner we gave the kids their gifts---a couple of games for their DS and Leapster and then...........our new pet fish!!! Ellie always begs for a dog so this was the next best thing :) So we now have a new pet in our family....Mr. Doodles--love the name! They are into it and Ellie makes sure to feed it every morning and night (even though the darn thing doesn't eat---I'm so afraid it's not going to make it!) But the kids were happy and that's what counts! So that is our Valentine's Day in a nutshell---nice and low key--just how I like it!!

Snow Weekend!

Reading together!

Snow-Sat Feb 4, 2012

Snow day! Sat Feb 4, 2012

Such good helpers :)

This is pretty much what they wanted to do all day--stay in jammies and watch movies!

Finally came back out to play!

We have had a very un-winter like winter so far this year. So when we got about 9 inches of snow this weekend it was a big deal! The news had hyped it up as usual so I was prepared for the snow day with lots of movies and groceries! We woke up Sat morning to a lot of white stuff. Ellie declared it a "pajama day" and we pretty much never did get out of our pajamas! It was actually kind of nice to have a day with nowhere to be and nothing to do. We watched several movies and Ellie's favorite was the Justin Bieber movie. She really hasn't been that into him but I had heard the movie of his life was pretty good so when I saw it at the movie store I got it. She loved it and it really is a good story about who he is! We also watched Spy Kids which Jack loved. Neither of the kids really had any desire to go out and play in the snow--what kid in Nebraska doesn't want to play in the snow---MINE! I pretty much had to force them outside (Ellie still in her jammies under her snow clothes!) and they were ready to come back in after a few min. Dave made Ellie stay out and help him shovel of which she complained through most of it but oh well! They came back in and finally later in the day Ellie wanted to go back out so we all went back out and they played for a while. Jack is not a huge fan of the snow even though he loves talking about weather and kept saying "it's gonna snow, and lightning and thunder"--I swear that kids is going to be a meteorologist---he loves weather!! All in all it was super relaxing snow day! Sunday we ventured out and went to church and then decided to take the kids to a movie at the cheap theather. We saw "Puss in Boot's" and it was cute. It was only Jack's 3rd movie but he did great--he sat pretty much through the entire movie--of course being entertained by a ton of snacks but who cares!! Now we are settling in for a cold week and the reality of winter. At least it is already Feb and spring is around the corner :)