Lazy Sunday

Beauty shop-ing

Snuggling
Begging

Pouting

Working

Lego building

Fort constructing

Sleeping/TV watching

Now that's what I call a lazy Sunday!

I'm so glad Santa brought the girls these Rudolph noses in their stockings. The only thing better would have been if they actually blinked red like they were supposed to. This is one of my favorite pictures from Christmas!

Maya's Christmas Program

Maya had her Christmas program on Thursday. It was pretty much a repeat of what we saw 2 years ago with Maggie. Same anges, shephards, wiseman and Mary and Joseph, same songs.
Not that it wasn't totally cute though. How can 4 and 5 year olds NOT be cute when they're wearing these adorable angel costumes.

I mean..come on...isn't she the cutest little angel you've ever seen!

She belted out the Christmas carols, changed to fit her classes theme of going "Around the World". To us it was like deja vu, but she thought it was great.

Even the same teachers....who are fabulous by the way. And the nicest people you will ever meet. They are the ones who should be wearing angel suits...there are some characters in Maya's class that definitely require the patience of angels. : )

What we've been up to...

We've been busy...as is obvious by the lack of blog posts. As you can see from the pictures below, we've been busy!

First it was Bella's birthday. Our little lovely is now 9 years old. She got a new (on clearance from Halloween) spider which she promptly tore apart and destroyed the squeaker. She also got homemade pupcake treats that were a hit!
The Christmas tree was found, purchased and decorated...after about 3 trips to Target to get lights. Sigh.....

Maya's been quite the little performer lately. We've been attending LOTS of performance, both of the singing and gymnastics/dance variety. Very entertaining.

Here she's singing a Christmas carol, but usually its one of her kids CDs and let me tell you - she is quite the diva!

Maya and her BFF Lily have been playing...ok, mostly dancing and dressing up.

One day when Lily, Meghan and Chase were over, I set this sensory tub for Chasey so the girls could do a craft at the table without him drooling all over everything. Lets just say the girls liked the tub as much as Chase did.

Ahhh, they finally got to the craft...decorating Christmas shapes with stickers, glue and other stuff found in the craft bins. : )Here are the results of multiple crafts.

I found a couple of recipies for chocolate goodies and were just begging to be tried, so I enlisted Maya and Lily to help. Good thing Maya went and found those little aprons. I know the table looks clean in the picture, but trust me, it was COVERED in chocolate, as were the girls for the most part. : )

These Giant Mallow Cups and Christmas Krunch bars were super yummy!

So that's what we've been up to. Today we traded in the girls too-small ice skates for new ones that actually fit and headed to the rink. Their skating is much improved from last year already on our first time out. We are crediting it to their roller blades, but who knows. Pictures to come. : ) Tomorrow we're off to the Macy's display and the Holidazzle parade. Good stuff!

False Start

False start to Christmas. Maya found her Santa gift in the office closet tonight while I was at work. She and Aaron were playing hide and seek until she spotted that pink beauty in the closet. He said she was NOT to be denied that car! : ) I knew it was THE gift this year for her since she just got her American Girl doll for her birthday from Grammy and Poppy! Aaron said it was all he could do to get her not to go to bed with it! Gotta love it, even if it means I need a plan B for her Santa gift. Hmmmm.... : )

Maya turns 5!

Maya Brynn Kelly is 5 years old!

I know its hard to believe, but its true! Since her real birthday was on a Monday, we celebrated on the weekend. First up...presents!!!!

The BEST PRESENT EVER!!! A new balance beam from Grandma and Grandpa and mom and dad!
Next best, a new workout outfit from Auntie Callie. She LOVES it!

Is there any doubt she likes it?? : )

No birthday would be complete without one of mommy's famous princess cakes.

With her birthday being on a Monday and since we were unable to celebrate that evening due to me working and Maggie being at gymnastics, we picked up Lily and headed out to the Mall of America to ride the rides! You used to get in free on your birthday...to all of you who are thinking this as I was...not true anymore. Bummer.

They had the Diego bus all to themselves!

Giddy up horsey!

Their favorite..the swings!

Ready to ride the frog hopper (or whatever its called!)

The looks on their faces were priceless!

Choo-choo!

Ready for the hot air balloons to lift off.

Checkin' out the sights at the top of the ferris wheel, sporting her new shirt Lily got her. They visited Winter the dolphin on their trip to Florida. So cool!

Another favorite, the little roller coaster. It got an "this is awesome!"

Oh yeah! Hands up!

Add in a trip to look around the American Doll store and lunch at McDonalds and you get a great 5th birthday!

Ghosts & Goblins Meet

Maggie's last meet was the Ghosts & Goblins meet, aptly named, since it was on the weekend before Halloween. The girls didn't have their best meet, but it was another good experience for them.

Waiting for warm ups to begin.

The best part of the meet was after the competition was over all the teams had a costume contest. The girls' coach was the Cat in the Hat and the girls were Things 1-8! Maya was not to be left out and I made her a Thing 9 shirt. She thought she was hot stuff and jumped right in with the big girls. The girls didn't win the costume contest, but their coach, Tiffany did win for best coach's costume! Next up, the State meet in December. They are working hard to show their best stuff!