One Last Project

 Before we ring in the new year I wanted to get one last project under way.  I still had the blocks from September to piece together.  It was my month for Do.Good Stitches.  The blocks were still trickling in close to November, so I finally have all of them.  I like how it turned out.  

Christmas Dinner Delayed

We waited to have Christmas dinner until Grandma and Grandpa Thompson arrived.  It's always more enjoyable when shared with those you love. 

Daddy also happens to be a little dramatic with his presentation of the meal.

Finished and Sent Off

In the mix of the holidays I was also trying to get a quilt done.  I decided to pull out my walking foot for the quilting.  My only sadness is that some of the fabric got bunched on the back.  I thought I had pinned it well enough, but clearly I was mistaken.  I love the big block look though.  I may have to revisit this quilt pattern.

Christmas

 Christmas was a simple and quiet day around here.  It did however start very early.  The kiddos were up at 5:45am to open gifts. Little Man got quite the kick out of his personalized socks that have Luna and Stella on them. 

Aunt Liz sent her childhood Star Wars toys and the boys were thrilled!

The funniest moment of the day would have to be when Little Guy forgot to breathe he was so excited about his Iron Man action figure from Grandma and Grandpa Thompson.  He started to shake and turn red and then he exploded with a huge, "YESSSSSSSSS!!!!!"

The kittens loved their presents as well.  Happy 1st Christmas Luna and Stella!

We had our traditional Christmas Breakfast and then we Zoomed and Facetimed our extended families.  Little Lady disappeared to build her Lego Hogwarts Clocktower, and the boys rotated all day between playing with light sabers and Star Wars action figures.  I wish you could hear them singing the Star Wars theme song as they were playing (somehow Iron Man became a part of their Star Wars adventures on Hoth).

Christmas Eve

Joel was at the hospital working, so Christmas Eve was pretty low key.  We listened to Christmas music while we baked and decorated sugar cookies for Santa. 

They each chose one cookie to give to Santa. 

I wasn't sure that I could find the cookie under all those sprinkles.  Little Guy was very exuberant in his usage of sprinkles.

And of course, they sampled some of the cookies as well as dropped off some to the neighbors. 

I think the excitement caught up to Little Man, because late in the afternoon I noticed it was rather quiet.  He had gone to his room and fallen asleep.  We woke him up before it became an issue of him staying up all night when Santa needed to come. 

After dinner we had our Christmas Eve devotional.  They opened up their Christmas Pjs, and then each family member had to contribute something.  This year all of them chose something musical. 

Little Guy has been learning "Joy to the World" by ear, so he chose to share that.  Little Lady and BB joined together.  She played piano while he sang "Do You Hear What I Hear?"  It was adorable.  BB has the sweetest voice.  

Little Man played "I Wonder as I Wander."

Afterward we opened our family game, and then finished the evening by reading Luke 2 together.  Spoiler alert: It's a really fun game and Jesus was born!

It was a simple but truly lovely day. 

December Dates

We snuck in our dates right before the holidays commenced.  Little Man wanted to go out for breakfast with his dad at The Shack and then go present shopping for the kitties.  Rule 1: Never let the individuals who are the biggest softies for the kitties be the ones to do the kitty Christmas shopping.  I'm fairly positive the cats ended up with more presents than the humans. 

For our date, Little Lady wanted to do breakfast take out from The Shack and wrap presents.  She was sworn to secrecy, and then she and I wrapped her brothers' presents.  

Winter Break

 One final project for Little Man and then he was done for the year with school.  He had to make a model of the blood stream.  We used corn syrup for the plasma, red hots for the red blood cells, some stale mini-marshmallows for the white blood cells, and bone sprinkles for the platelets.  

We couldn't visit the class parties at school this year, but they still got dressed up in their ugly sweater attire for the last day before break.  

Luna decided to celebrate the beginning of winter break by almost falling out of the tree.  Sigh.

Holiday Recital

This year we split the Christmas recital into 3 recitals to keep the numbers down.  Everyone was spread out and then clumped by family with masks.  It's a bit odd, but it's so nice to hear live music.  The second recital was basically the Thompson recital.  Hahahaha.  This recital was special, because all 6 of us performed.  Even Joel sang in this recital.  It was wonderful!  

Little Man played piano and guitar.  BB played piano. Little Lady and Little Guy played a piano duet - so cute!  Little Lady sang and played piano.

We celebrated a wonderful recital, because honestly, it was one of the better performances for all of them.  We introduced the kiddos to Salvadorian food - papusas.   They all loved them!  It's a new favorite!

Flooring!

You know you're getting old when you get this excited about new flooring.  I'm so excited the backroom now has a floor!

The first picture is at about the half-way point in the project.

The project meant the kitties couldn't be down in the basement for about a week, and they took full advantage of ravaging the upstairs at night.  That is, when they're weren't cat napping.

It's so nice that they can sleep down there now.

A Preschool Christmas

 Little Guy is officially on Winter Break, but he had quite a bit of fun before the week ended.

There was no Christmas program this year, but they did sing to us in the parking lot.  It was cute and short and sweet, so it definitely was my kind of preschool program.

He was pretty proud of their tall tower!

Lately, Little Guy has taken to writing "notes" on any paper or notepad he can get his hands on.  This is one of his notes to me.  The only words he knew how to write by himself were Matthew and Mom.  The rest is his pretend words.  He translates it for me, so that I know what it says.