I really think that blogging monthly is much harder, so I don't think I will continue this. However, that being said, it has been much easier to quickly catch up the blog in this manner. Hopefully 2013 will allow more time for blogging...
December 1st - A blue and white baby shower celebrating my sweet friend Kim and her baby boy (who is now only three weeks from making his debut!).
While we were celebrating a new baby, Grace was headed off to celebrate her buddy Eric's 6th birthday. She seemed to have a great time at Bricks and Mini-figs.
December 2nd - Another crazy Sunday - church, Sunday school teaching, lunch with the Diefs, choir practice... After our long weekend we didn't make it to Home Group.
December 3rd - More blood work for my thyroid, now just waiting for results.
December 4th - Some mornings are not easy to get Claire out of bed. She might look happy here, but this is the third bed she has crawled into this morning looking for a place to hide.
After dropping Grace off at school, spending the morning at grandpa's house, picking up Grace from school, running a few errands, and trying to have some sort of rest in the afternoon, a quick Starbucks date seemed important.
December 6th - Claire's first "real" trip to the dentist. She did great... and her teeth are perfect! We also learned that Grace has 3/4 of her 6 year old molars. Her first permanent teeth!
December 7th - Today I drove 96 miles... to school, to BSF, to a car dealership, to a gas station, back to school, to the grocery store, to our house, to Newberg, to my house, to the bank, to a restaurant, to a friend's house, back home. We spent the morning doing our usual, the afternoon in Newberg visiting my grandparents, and then evening we spent buying a car (and then celebrating by having dinner with the sweet gal who sold us her car).
December 8th - Christmas tree hunting! Last Christmas we found a little tree farm in the hills between home and Sherwood that grow a very specific type of fir trees. We loved our tree last year, so we headed back up the hill to cut another Nordland Fir. It was a dry and sort of sunny day, but it was freezing! I very much enjoyed the wood stove in the barn before heading home.
December 9th - Grace's first Christmas program at church! She had been working hard learning the songs and the hand motions for everything. She was a bit distracted on stage, but did pretty well for her first time up there. Ella and Brennan were also performing, but with the bigger kids. It was fun having a lot of the family with us for the evening as well.
December 10th - Today there was an in-school field trip for the kindergarten classes. There are two students this year who have dads that are firemen. It was fun to have them come and teach the class a little fire safety, answer some questions, and show off their gear. Even Claire and Big Guy got to hang out and enjoy the firemen.
Claire and I stayed for recess before heading to my doctor appointment. I loved seeing a very optimistic Grace taking on Sydney in tetherball. I think in this game the 8-inches Sydney has on Grace is a definite advantage.
And since I mentioned the doctor... we did go see the doctor to get results from the last blood draw. The results were really inconclusive. One number got worse, two numbers got better. We upped dosages of some supplements, started new supplements, etc. I'll go back at the end of January for more blood work to see if anything we are trying is working. In the mean time I am also scheduled to see an endocrinologist in January to get a third opinion I'm still unsure how we will move forward, but feel good about seeing a specialist before we get too far down this path. Stay tuned...
December 12th - On 12/12/12 at 12:12 pm Claire and I were sitting in the school parking lot waiting to pick up Grace. Nothing super special, but we did document it just because.
December 13th - During the summer both girls participated in the Washington County Library summer reading program. We had no idea all of the neat stuff that would come from that... free food, free books, free roller skating, free Timbers game and a free Blazer game. We had sort of forgotten about the Blazer tickets until the last minute, but it worked out to our advantage. All of the free tickets for the game we were supposed to go to were sold out, so they bumped us to the San Antonio game. It was a great game to watch, and even at the very tip-top of the Rose Garden we had a great view. The girls had a lot of fun at the game (though Claire did prefer to sit on the stairs than in her seat). Because of Grace's great cheering the Blazers pulled out a sweet victory, though we missed the free chalupas by 1 point. After the game we drove home through SW Portland so we could see Rudolf and the giant Christmas tree on our way home.
December 14th - I love watching Claire's art work develop into recognizable things. She tends to spend a lot of our waiting-in-the-carpool-line time drawing. Today she drew this wonderful picture of Merrick!
December 15th - Tonight we headed to Lake Oswego for dinner and Christmas Ships with the Tatsumis. We tried to do this two years ago, and instead wound up in the hospital with a very sick Claire. Thankfully this night went off without a hitch. When the girls were cold, and had their fill of candy canes, we headed up to the shelter to warm up by the fire.
December 16th - Tonight we enjoyed a great concert at our church with my mom and dad. Though not quite as good as last year, we still really enjoyed the music and hearing the stories of the musicians. I hope they will be back again next year...
December 17th - On a hunt for some final Christmas gifts, Claire and I headed out to IKEA this morning. I learned that on Mondays you get free breakfast in the restaurant. I also learned that before 10 a.m. everyday of the week you get free coffee in the restaurant. We enjoyed a quick 2nd breakfast together and then did a lot of shopping (and playing) before rushing back to pick up Grace.
Since it was a dry night, we decided to bundle up and head to zoo lights. Thankfully all of our snow clothes were still out from our Christmas Ship adventure, so bundling up was easy. I couldn't tell you what was different, but I think this was the best light display at the zoo that we've seen. There was just something extra good about it this year.
December 18th - We woke up with SNOW! and it continued snowing the whole way in to school. Today was Grace's class Christmas party, so Claire and I were planning on staying for part of the day anyway. The kids had a lot of fun playing games, coloring pictures and making ornaments. There were also tons of yummy snacks. All the while the snow continued to pile up outside. By the time recess came around there were a few inches on the ground. The kindergartners had a blast, and good thing too, because by the time their second recess rolled around it was all melting. Instead of playing in the snow, they were taking turns sweeping puddles out of the covered area (another kinder favorite activity).
That night we met the Diefs and Brownlees at the Spaghetti Factory down on the waterfront to celebrate Gary's birthday. After dinner we headed out to see if we could catch the Christmas ships floating by. We missed the ships, but enjoyed a long (cold) walk along the water, a trip to VooDoo doughnuts, and visited the big Christmas tree at Pioneer Square before heading back home. It was a really fun night out with everyone.
December 20th - Claire and I got to have a special morning play date with Sarah and Zoe. The girls seemed to really enjoy playing together while Sarah and I had some time to just catch up on life. Today was also Grace's last day of school. After picking her up we headed to another doctor appointment for me and then enjoyed a late lunch at Baja Fresh (yeah for happy hour!). Merrick came home early and then we headed to a local church to give blood - celebrating our healthy Claire who, two years ago to the day was given three blood transfusions that saved her life.
December 22nd - I love this girl... and her old man pj's.
December 23rd - After church, and a few errands, we headed to Newberg to celebrate Christmas with the Diefs and Brownlees. Usually we eat dinner at a nice restaurant, but this year tried something a little different and shared a great meal at Megan and Scott's house. I think we all really liked the change. After dinner we headed to Gary and Margaret's house to open gifts. Everything given this year was homemade - and great! It was a great way to kick off our 2012 Christmas celebration.
December 24th - After a lazy morning with Gary and Margaret, we headed home for some last minute Christmas shopping... yep, we do leave some most of our shopping for the three days before Christmas. We got all of the girls stocking stuffers and even bought a new kitchen table for ourselves. We then rushed to get out the door to get to church for the 4 p.m. Christmas Eve service with Craig and Melissa. I have never seen Athey so packed. After church we all headed over to mom and dad's house for dinner with Warren and Pauline. The girls ended up falling asleep there while we visited, but we didn't stay too late since we had a lot of gift wrapping left to do.
After all the wrapping was finished, I snapped a few quick pictures of our glowing tree. My favorite ornaments of the year were these sheep. They were one of the crafts I had done with my Sunday school class this month, and thankfully I had enough left over cotton and pine cones for each of my girls to make one. Grace also made this wonderful angel tree topper for our tree.
December 25th - Christmas morning we spent at home - just the four of us. We ate cinnamon rolls and smoothies for breakfast, read the Christmas story together, tore in to loaded stockings, and enjoyed opening fun gifts from each other.
The afternoon and evening was spent at my parents' house. We opened gifts, had a wonderful meal (pile on!) and just hung out with family. It was a very merry Christmas indeed.
Claire didn't get to do candles at church, so we reenacted it when we got home on Christmas night.
December 26th - Circumstances didn't align well for time with Kelsie this year. Between business and sickness we only got one brief afternoon together. The girls didn't seem to mind and had a great time playing together.
December 27th - The Taiseys came over tonight to play games. After dinner we played one game with all of the kids. They seemed done after that, so we put on a movie and started a game with just the grown ups. Three movies and almost six hours later we wrapped things up. Needless to say, Lego Champion was a huge hit!
The rest of this week was a blur of activities - dinner with friends, time with family, running errands, church, etc. It went by quickly and New Year's Eve was upon us before we knew it...
December 31st - Our traditional NYE was spent in McMinnville with the Gibsons and Schilps. We did all the usual - food, fireworks, friends, more food, not enough sleep, etc. We let the kids celebrate with the east coast with the fireworks and a sparkling cider toast to ring in the New Year. With all the excitement I don't think my girls actually fell asleep until well after 11. Merrick and I were up with our friends until almost 4.
Our morning was quiet - cinnamon rolls, breakfast casserole, strong coffee and lots of WiiU games helped get us moving before we packed up and headed on to Newberg to celebrate the New Year with more family fun. We are thankful for these friends... and these traditions.
