THE PRINCESSES

Yesterday Rena and Maleah had their friends Madeleine and Allison over for the afternoon. They all decided that they needed to be princesses. And after they were all dressed up like princesses they decided they needed to dance! So, we danced the afternoon away with music from "party favorites" on demand! They loved it and it was so much fun to watch them!


(The pretty princesses actually only lasted until Cameron got home from school. After that they all turned into Storm Troopers and were fighting with light sabers!)

LEGO'S EVERYWHERE

Cameron is a builder! He loves to build with anything he can get his hands on. When we finish a gallon of milk or a box of cereal he is asking "can I have it?" and I know that means we are going to have some sort of new creation by the end of the day. In preschool last year his favorite activity was the craft table where he built a new airplane or boat daily out of toilet paper rolls, yogurt lids, egg cartons, string, tape......and anything else that was there that day.

BUT ever since last Christmas Cameron's first choice of building supplies turned into LEGO'S! We always had the big lego's when Cameron was little, but last Christmas he got his first set of little lego's -- and since then we have Lego's everywhere.

This was the first set that started it all.....................

And this is what we have now..................

..............little lego's everywhere! He builds some really amazing things and they keep him busy for hours, but they are all over the house -- in the living room, in Cameron's room, in the girls room -- I find Lego ships in my bath tub, when I open the drapes in the morning I find Lego guys lined up on the window sills and unfortunately when I vacuum I hear Lego pieces being sucked up never to be seen again!!

This past weekend I made the mistake of telling Cameron that I would help him rebuild his Walker (not just any Walker, though -- as I was informed -- it's the AT-AP Walker!). Do you know how long it takes to rebuild one of these things when you have like 15 sets all mixed together??? And could those pieces be any smaller??? Finally after many many hours we got it done and Cameron is happy! I'm just hoping that it stays together for more than a day because I'm not rebuilding it again anytime soon! :)

Oh, and did I mention that not only do we have all of these little lego's floating around the house, but we also have all of the boxes that these little lego's came in. I think a few of them managed to make it to the garbage, but Cameron insists that he needs to keep all of these ones................

AND now I've been told by Cameron that he is "just dying to get Ahsoka's ship" so he is saving his money and doing extra things around the house to earn enough money for it. Great -- more pieces for my vacuum!! :)

MY EVENING SNACK

Jeff thought it would be hilarious to take a picture of me (and post it!) with my evening snack of wine and honey nut cheerios. He just doesn't understand how I could chose honey nut cheerios over Doritos!!!

Is this weird???

LOOK, THERE'S MALEAH

Yesterday while I was watching the Inauguration with the girls we were talking about who everyone was, what they did and what their names are. We had a lengthy conversation about how President Obama has a daughter with the same name as Maleah. I pointed her out on the t.v. and both Rena and Maleah thought that it was pretty cool. Later in the evening after Jeff got home we had the news on and we were watching a clip from the Inauguration when Maleah spoke up and said -- "HEY DAD, see that girl on the t.v.? That's me!".

Do you think that Malia Obama gets to dress herself and is able to put together outfits that match and look as great as our Maleah's?

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JEFF

Yesterday was Jeff's 36th birthday and we had a busy day preparing for and celebrating his big day. First, we made a cake - everyone wanted to help.....

Maleah was in-charge of greasing the pan.....

Maleah and Rena were in-charge of taste-testing.....

The kids (including Cameron's friend Thomas who was over) decided we should decorate - they wrapped streamers around the rail upstairs, lined up Cameron's army men and Rena's Cinderella doll and horse and laid out all of the wooden blocks. It looked very festive..........

Time for presents.....

Cameron got Jeff a new sword.

Rena got Jeff a new teddy bear and Maleah got him a new travel coffee mug.

We ended the night with a piece of Red Velvet cake with chocolate frosting!

I AM PROUD

This morning after breakfast as I was cleaning up the kitchen I thought "wow, it's really quiet - I wonder what those kids are doing". A few minutes later all 3 kids arrived in the kitchen fully dressed and ready for the day. They announced that they all got dressed, brushed their teeth and brushed their hair. I was very impressed because we weren't even going anywhere and I hadn't asked them to do any of it. So, I told them all "good job", gave high-fives and went on cleaning up the kitchen.

A little while later I managed to drop a whole bowl of chex-mix in the kitchen that I was making and when it hit the floor and made a loud bang all three kids came running. They all grabbed a different broom and started helping me clean up. Cameron announced "the 3 dressed kids can clean it up". I said "great - thanks guys, I really appreciate your help". To which Cameron responded "no problem mom, we just want you to be proud of us!"...........I couldn't tell them enough how proud of all 3 of them I am.........for many, many, many reasons!

I might have chosen a different outfit for Rena since it is 15 below zero today, but since we are staying indoors I decided it was just fine!! (Oh, and the shirt was clean when she first put it on!) :)

IT'S JUST GETTING WORSE

The good news is that today we are at least suppose to get out of negative numbers.........at 11am it should hit 0 degrees (with a real feel of -12 still) and by 5 am tomorrow morning even our "real feel" will finally be at 0 degrees!!

School has been cancelled for the third day in a row so we are staying indoors and staying warm!

YUP, IT'S COLD!

Here's our current weather conditions..........

And here's my crazy family who decided it would be a good idea to see what -32F feels like.......

I think we all agreed -- it felt COLD!!

BRRRRRR............

I think I might just stay indoors in front of the fireplace tomorrow!!

What does "feels like -29F" feel like anyway? I guess we'll find out at 9am tomorrow. Jeff says he's definitely going outside to find out!

RENA'S CRAZY HAIR

Usually Rena HATES for me to do anything with hair (including brush it), but ever since New Years when Tami and Kari were here she wants her hair in braids. Both Tami and Kari fixed her hair for her when they were here and she loved it. So, she now requests braids often. But she not only likes the braids, she likes how it looks when she takes the braids out.

Here's Rena with braids (and my braids are not half as good as Tami & Kari's, but it's the best I can do!).....

And here's crazy Rena after she takes the braids out......

ROOM MAKEOVERS......(SORT OF)

When we made the move to Peoria and moved into our new house we made sure that each of the kids had their own rooms, their own things and their own themes. It seemed like the perfect plan at the time. Little did we know we'd be doing room makeovers 6 months later!

Rena got most of the things that came with us from Washington. She stuck with the butterfly theme, but did get a few new things to go along with what she already had.......a new bookcase, a new chair and a new bedside table.

Here's Rena's room before our latest makeover:

In Maleah's room we decided to go with the Fairy theme. She got all new fairy things.....including a new bookcase and bedside table.

Here's Maleah's room before our latest makeover:

AND NOW FOR OUR LATEST MAKEOVER...............

One very crowded room and one very empty room!!!

Ever since we got here to Peoria the girls have had a very hard time sleeping. (They went from sharing a room to separate rooms and they went from us being right next door to us being on a different floor.) They are both up a couple of times a night and they both say they are scared. So, instead of letting the girls continue to sleep in our room for the next couple of years we asked them if they wanted to share a room again. They were both very excited and ready for it!

Here's Rena AND Maleah's room after the makeover:

And here's the empty room after the makeover: (I guess it could now be called the Dora Dollhouse room!)

As long as I'm sharing kids decorating stories I might as well share Cameron's as well. When we moved here we decorated Cameron's room with all of the same things that he had in Washington......it was a cute boys room........had pictures of trucks and cars and things that he had made.

Here's Cameron's room originally:

And here's Cameron's room now:

Do I just love Darth Vader being the center of attention??? Not really, but it is what Cameron likes and I suppose it's just the beginning of what I have to get use to raising a boy!! And if this is the worst thing that he wants hanging on his wall right now than I can deal with it!! :)

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

We had a fun time ringing in the New Year and got to celebrate it with my cousin Kari and her family and my cousin Tami. They all arrived on Wednesday afternoon and the fun began...........

Dinner time.....with Rylee as our centerpiece!

Dessert time......ice-cream and cookies for everyone!

It's 2009.....

Tami, Stefanie and Kari - happy that we were all together!

Jeff and Cameron........Cameron was the last kid awake and made it until 11.50pm......he was so close, but was just too tired to hang on!

Craig loved the festive party hats and blowers that Kari brought for us!

Tami and Kari making a bunch of noise (not really, but they were trying!).

Even Tami's dog, Oliver, celebrated the new year with us!

The kids crashed in the basement and all slept on the floor together. If you look closely there are 5 little bodies there......Rena, Cameron, Carter, Maleah and Noah.