Christmas Morning

We had a slightly rushed Christmas morning because church was at 8 instead of 9.  But it was still enjoyable.  N2 were able to look in their stockings and open presents from Santa and have a yummy breakfast of cinnamon rolls before church.  After church they opened the rest of their presents.

 They got lots of socks in their stocking and fuzzy socks to wear overnight.  Plus they got gloves that have a mitten cover (you can see that in Natalie's picture), punch balloons, penguin and snowman cups, Monsters University shrinky dinks, magic wands, and Dora bandaids.  Natalie got a yo-yo and fun magic beads that when you put in water they expand and you can splat them and when they dry out they return to their original tiny size.  Noah got crayons that look like Legos that you can color with and build with as well as a dragon.

Santa got Noah knights and Natalie fuzzy bunny slippers.

 After church they opened lots of books, a couple movies, presents from each other (Natalie got a penguin Beanie ball from Noah and Noah got a shark ball shooter from Natalie) and a plasma car.  I haven't gotten a picture of them riding their plasma car but they love it!

Dueber Christmas

On Christmas Day we got together with my family.  Marcie's girls had made some Christmas pinatas and they kids took turns trying to hit them open before lunch time.

 I like this one because you get the pinata opening (the light is kind of exploding-not sure how I got this picture).

We started with a very yummy dinner of brisket. twice baked potatoes and more!  Then we had family picture time.

Finally it was present opening time.  I think all the kids were very excited but they did a nice job waiting their turns!

All the kids really enjoyed playing with the pirate ship that N2 got for Christmas.  They played with that for quite some time!

We had a great time!  The adults got to play a game and hold Nathaniel while he slept the whole day and the kids got to play together and watch cartoons.

Peanut's Last Hurrah

The last night Peanut was in our house, he decided to leave with a bang!  He made elf size pancakes again (like he did last year) and sad to say Peanut didn't get around to making them until after his bed time.  Maybe in future years he can manage his time better so he can go to bed earlier!  This year Peanut left a picture scavenger hunt around the house for N2 to figure out what Peanut did and where he was.  These are the pictures he left around the house (he left them on the walls of the stairway, the bottom of the stairs, the hallway to the kitchen and on the fridge.

Can you guess where he is?  You guessed it, in the refrigerator next to the pancakes!  N2 didn't find him without my help.  When they did find him, they kept opening up the fridge to talk to Peanut that I was tempted to move him out.  Before bedtime on Christmas Eve I let them give Peanut hugs because Santa was going to take Peanut back with him but Natalie refused to touch him because she didn't want Peanut to lose his magic!  So long Peanut!

Merry Christmas!

We hope you have a blessed and happy Christmas celebrating with your family.  Here are some pictures of N2 that I took for the Christmas card.

Gingerbread Houses

I finally got around to making gingerbread houses with N2 and decorating them.  The smaller houses are much easier to put together than the larger houses!  Less falling apart and less breakage of pieces when taking them off the pan!  I gave them quite the assortment of candy to use  plus black licorice twizzlers and gingerbread marshmallows.  We didn't use most of the candy!  I took the rest in to my students for their gingerbread houses they were making later that week.

(Before you ask, yes, Noah's shirt is on backwards and inside out.  He often wears his shirts backwards-he says he likes it).  They loved using the twizzlers but they did NOT stay on unless I piped the frosting on the back.  The following day I found that some had fallen off overnight so even that much frosting didn't help.  Twizzlers just must be too heavy.  Natalie's favorite candy was definitely Neccos.  She used most of the roll!  They also really liked smarties and the gingerbread marshmallows.  Gumdrops and snowcaps were not popular and neither were m&m's.

Natalie's house has a Necco path and Noah's has a smarty path.  They both have 3 people around the house somewhere.  They both have gumdrop chimneys.

Natalie the ballerina

Natalie is taking ballet classes this year and will continue to next year and have a recital in May.  I am sure excited!  She seems to love ballet!  I didn't expect her to want to do ballet, I thought she would want to do tumbling or maybe tap dancing or soccer but she chose ballet.  She really focuses and works hard!  The last class before winter break was parent observation.  We got to watch the whole class and see what they do each week.  They really have learned a lot of ballet!

They start by practicing their skipping.  I didn't realize Natalie could skip until a few weeks after ballet started.  She must have learned how to skip in ballet.  Then they do stretches.  Natalie is really not very flexible compared to some of the other girls in her class!  I need to figure out how to help her stretch to be more flexible.

Then they generally do bar exercises but they did them in the middle so we could see.  Here is first position, second, and third positions.  They must have not learned 4th or 5th yet.

Then they practiced plies and releves.  She doesn't turn out her knees when doing plies but instead bends her knees forward.  I'm sure they will work on this in ballet and not in pre-ballet (that's what she is in).

Then they moved onto tendus, passes, and battements.  They tendu front and side (she's much better to the side).

 Then they showed us more ballet moves moving across the floor.  I didn't get photos of this because it wouldn't have looked like much!  Instead I got videos.  I'm not sure why she needed to play with her mouth at the end of all the passes!  They practiced walking on their toes like ballerinas, doing ballet running, chasses and leaping.

Then they finish by getting ribbons and doing free dances.  The teacher does freeze them and suggest different types of dances (but very abstract like ballet, jumping, reindeer, quiet, etc).  I did not get good photos as Natalie stayed in the back and was generally behind other girls.

She really loves ballet and I look forward to seeing her recital!

More Peanut

Peanut has been causing more mischief but staying away from marshmallows.  He defaced our pictures by cutting out faces from newspapers and taped them over our faces!  Needless to say, Natalie was not amused and immediately took the faces off the photos and threw away the newspaper.

Peanut also TP'ed the bathroom one day when there wasn't much toilet paper left.  N2 were fine with that!

Everyone in our house is sick and Peanut is no exception.  Natalie has an ear infection, Noah has an unidentified sickness which antibiotics has helped-maybe a sinus infection, and Brian and I have colds.  Peanut had to lay low one day, drink honey water, eat a popsicle and get some rest.

I didn't get photos of Peanut everyday but he was in our toy helicopter flying it to the tops of the lights.  He was in Noah's candy bag on the top of the fridge (Natalie was relieved he was not in HER bag) and he was in the pocket of the advent calendar.  His latest stunt was trying to ride in a dump truck down the stair's banister.  N2 decided that was not a safe idea!