Merry Christmas!

Lots going on this month... it's nice to be busy with nice things.

 First we visited a very special Santa :) 

The kiddos sang at the ward Christmas Party-- Yoda is doing a little boogie-pose off to the right, he's in a blue shirt. 

Mimi is in the middle, wearing pink.  She was super serious, but we were able to get this little smile our of her.

Yoda is in the back row, just under the flag.  This was a school choir concert.
Parker also had a school orchestra concert that same night, Greg attended so I don't yet photos or video from it...

We also visited Nana's good friend's house for cookie decorating and model-train inspiration.

Mimi was in her first play- Scrooge.  She was the pudding vendor and the tallest in the cast.
Here's a brief video, it's toward the end of the play.

There is a lot of work to do on the train track.  Every Christmas I think, "this year I'm going to make this happen!"  Fingers crossed! 

Fight walk

On Sundays when the weather is good, we make the kiddos go on a walk around the block.  Every single time they fight us on this... so now we call it the "fight walk"

On this Sunday Fight Walk, Yoda wasn't having it, so he jumped on Mimi's back. 

Words...

Mimi, "I don't like grammar, expecially since 'funner' isn't a word!"
Me, "Did you just say expecially!?  That's not a word either"
Mimi, "hee hee"

**************

Cooking show person, "I used caramel flavoring..."
Yoda, "ewww"
Parker, "why don't you like that?"
Yoda, "I don't like caramel"
Parker, "it's like carmel ..."
Yoda, "oh, I like that"

Hour of Code

Check out this dance that Mimi coded up. Click on "how it works" to see her code.

Bio Art

A few weeks ago we went to a Girl Scout outing where they taught us about bacteria.  Then they gave us Petri dishes and we sort of brushed the bacteria to create a picture. 

Mimi did BB8 and I did Starry Night

 The day of, it looked like almost nothing. 

A few days later the bacteria grew and created these...

While we were all in the car...

Mimi, "Wow, that's a black van with tinted windows!"
Yoda, "It must be the C.E.O.!"
Parker, "Do you mean the F.B.I.?"
Yoda, "Oh, yeah, that's it"
Me and Greg *haha
Yoda, "Is that going on the blog?"
Me, "Yup!"

Young Women's

For Mimi's first Young Women's in Excellence she made a poster and explained a little about jujitsu.  She also demonstrated how to escape if someone is grabbing your arm.  Go against their thumbs!  Greg was holding on TIGHT and she was able to break his grip, even when he held with 2 hands. 

 

A bunch of the Corvettes from the parade

This post is for my dad!

And... a golf cart! 

Halloween round up

 Yoda is now our last kiddo at the Elementary school.

 Here he is as a very serious Jedi, Obi-Wan Kenobi from Episode One.

This is my 11th! year as a parent at this school and his totally awesome teachers created the coolest party game.  Each group of kids made a catapult out of Popsicle sticks, tape and rubber bands.  At each station they launched pumpkin erasers at targets and recorded their points.  It was sweet to see the kiddos get really into it, work together and solve problems. 

 We finally hit a pumpkin patch on the soggiest weekend of the month.  

 Mimi is a "Dark Dragon".  Sense a theme with her?  Dragons, snakes, dinosaurs?  

Here's her wings. 

 Parker's pumpkin says "GMO FULL" -- super scary/funny.  Yoda's is a symbol from a video game.  And Mimi has her cute "pump-cat" from girl scouts, her mini pumpkin from a Young Women's activity, and her funny faced one all the way on the right.

 Parker got a shift at work, which was awesome, then he handed out candy with me the rest of the night.  He is a Yu-gi-oh character.  

 

We did our best to make his costume look like this guy.  He made it to the 3rd round at the costume contest at his high school.  Last year we played it safe and did a minimal costume, we should not have!  Those kids were dressed up a TON!  

Homecoming

Yoda was picked to be one of a handful of students from his elementary school to walk in the High School's homecoming parade.  This was a first for us.  When we got there, one of Mimi's teachers found us and told us that Mimi had also been invited to walk, but wouldn't be swayed, silly Mimi.

The parade went down the street by the high school, and then did a loop and came back around to the beginning, so we knew we'd see him twice.  

Waiting for the parade to start. 

As she went by, Mimi's teacher yelled to her and finally convinced her join in the parade.  

Here she is throwing her hand in the air in victory. 

Yoda going by once...

 And Mimi coming by at the end. 

 Then Yoda's last appearance. 

The boys stayed for the football game and the girls went for take out :) 

a look back

While looking through photos we found this one, it's Parker and his aunt doing a "T" pose back in '06 or so.

Oh, those serious faces!!

Coming next week, parade photos! 

Eagle Court of Honor