Christmas!

A little out of order here, that last post of Soren was after Christmas. Christmas Eve we had our traditional dinner of Shepherd's pie and salad and a yummy drink. Then after telling the Christmas story, reading some scriptures and singing some carols together, we opened one present of the kids' choice, and one they would wear to bed that night :-)

Here are a few scenes from our Christmas Eve and morning...






Soren played with this all day!!!

The kids got foam swords and ax in their stockings and have had a great time fighting each other with little injury :-)

Soren's tea party

The girls got this tea set for Christmas, and Soren REALLY likes it :-)


Soren also REALLY likes candy canes.... (oh, and his sunglasses!)

RenFest

The Texas Renaissance Festival!! SO cool, we had a great time with the kids. I had no idea how HUGE it would be, you could spend all day there easily (if you didn't have three young children, that is). I wish I would have gotten pictures of some of the great costumes many people wore there, but in place of it, I downloaded this one above from their website to get the "effect" of the place.


Face painting a must!!


Cool dragon


Cora may have chosen this one from having watched "Bolt" a lot lately...


These boat swings were so cool!! They could pull a big long rope to go higher, the girls love it.

In the meantime, Soren had a blast running down this hill over and over again.


The girls getting harnessed up for a pretty thrilling ride...

An easy start, Isabelle was a little nervous at first...


This is Cora way up there. Pretty amazing, eh? Isabelle went up just as high also. They LOVED it. Before they had their turn, watching other folks flying up, Isabelle said she definitely did NOT want to go on. But when her little sister said she wanted to try it, well, she had to go too. They asked to go again the rest of the time we were there. I would have done it too if I didn't have my current issues with motion and nausea.


A fun elephant ride with just the girls. Brad took Soren on a camel ride, but the picture turned out too dark. We ended the evening watching fireworks as we trekked back to the van. What a day!!! Earlier in the day Isabelle had her last soccer game, a piano recital and the girls attended a birthday party before we went to RenFest. Needless to say, this happened on the way home:

Halloween!

It was hard to get pictures of the kids right before going out to trick-or-treat. Just a little excited! Isabelle and Cora helped make their fairy costumes. Cora also got to wear hers to her little pre-school a few days earlier and was quite thrilled with it all. Such fun. The girls were looking forward to Halloween all month! Soren really got into the getting candy thing. But he got a little mixed up as to what he was supposed to say. After "trick-or-treat," the girls would shout "Happy Halloween!" So eventually Soren would say something that resembled "Happy Birthday to you treat!" (he loves the Happy Birthday song), with a few other mumbled Sorenwords mixed in. His MO was to have me hold his bag while he reached into the candy-givers bowl and grab as much as he could with one little paw and put it in his bag, then attempt another grab before I would stop him. Our neighborhood was wild with kids and parents, lots of fun!

Cora gets ready to show off her costume at pre-school

My little green monster....

Ducks

There's a park not far from here with a man-made pond and lots of ducks. The ducks have no fear of people, and some aggressively approach if they sense food is available. It freaks out the girls a little, but Soren is totally unfazed. That expression he's got is not fear, he is laughing and chasing them!

Modeling

We had a little modeling session, mostly to catch Soren in his church outfit. He actually likes it and I had to trick him into taking it off. How about Cora and her modeling pose here, watch out with those big eyes and pouty lips! And Isabelle looks so grown up. Sigh...

Consensus is, cookie dough wins everything

I love it when they want to get up on the counter to help with cookies. Soren has lately discovered what we're all doing up there, so it becomes a little crowded :-) . Whenever all three are doing something together my heart swells to busting. They are so beautiful, I can't believe they're mine.