Nails and Facials

 Christmas evening, the girls all wanted to try out their new facial masks and paint their nails. My first inclination was to say I needed to do other things, but just as I was about to, I felt the Spirit remind me that I had been praying for ways to connect with my kids more. So we painted nails and put on facial masks, which looked more like ghost masks. And it was fun!

Christmas 2019

 We had a great Christmas this year. We try hard to help keep the focus of Christmas on our Savior and giving, so the kids get to give gifts to each of the family members. It is so neat to watch them get excited about finding a perfect gift to give each other. This year Joseph even created a scavenger hunt for Ruth to find her gift, wrapping the first clue in a tiny mint tin. (This created much pre-Christmas conversation and angst.) I am grateful that they are so giving and loving to each other!

The Giving Machines

This year Denver was one of the cities selected to have the Giving Machine. It is a neat vending machine where instead of buying food, you buy things needed by people around the world. We encouraged the kids to earn money to be able to buy something for others in need. Ruth chose soap, Joseph bought a blanket, Miriam purchased a starter library, Rebecca bought meals for a women's shelter, I got some toilet worms, and Jack bought a sheep. It was a fun experience and helped us all to have a little perspective on life this Christmas Eve.

Christmas at Grandpa Mike's

Every year we get together with Dad and all the siblings that are in the area for a Christmas celebration. This is the only time all year we see some of these family members. We had a nice time visiting with everyone: Aaron and his family, including Samantha, Ryan and their three little ones, Ali and Alejandro, Jacob and Trish, Jonathan, Naomi and kids, and Brittany, as well as Great Grandma Wickham. It was fun to see everyone.

Carri, Samantha and Samantha's new baby

Aaron with jingle bells in his beard

Miriam, Ruth and Rebecca with Great Grandma Wickham

Ruth holding Samantha's new little one

Derik

Rebecca with Santa

Miriam with Santa

Joseph with Santa

Ruth with Santa

Brittany Huff

School Showcase Fall 2019

We had our end of semester school showcase and it was an exciting time. Miriam and Joseph were both recognized for working hard and completing the requirements for their Shakespeare class, which included reading at least 7plays, memorizing the Marc Antony soliloquy in Julius Caesar, and writing lots of papers. They were crowned as part of their recognition. Very exciting times.

Ruth also worked hard and had a great semester. She was able to perform a song her class learned as well as perform an Irish dance she learned. It was a successful semester and everyone had a good time.

Being Brave

Ruth was invited to a birthday party at Loveland Laser Tag. She was so excited to go, and it was fun to watch her experience new things. She is often reserved at first, but she soon got over that and jumped in.

 When she was on the ropes course, I could see her nervousness and caution in taking the next step. But she kept on going, even with her fears. She was brave and persevering. She is sure growing up!

Hexaflexagons

For our opening in school every day, we watch a video about some interesting topic. Today we watched a Vi Hart video about Hexaflexagons. Basically the idea is that you fold a strip of paper into a hexagon, and because of the way it is folded, you can flip it so there are three unique faces to the hexagon. 

 The kids were quite taken with this, and after the pains of figuring out how to actually get it to work, this has produced days of entertainment and learning. Lots of geometry and patience is required!

 There was also a renewed interest in art because to truly see the three different faces, you must color the three faces in unique ways.

The Zoo

 Ruth has been asking to go to the zoo for a long time, and since it was a free day, we decided to go. No one else wanted to go with us, so just the two of us went. Ruth wanted to see the lions, tigers, and penguins. She liked listening to and watching the zookeepers work with the animals. She even talked about being a vet when she grows up!

They had these cool Lego creations of animals throughout the zoo. The picture doesn't do it justice- that's a lion made out of Lego!

Cooking lessons

It is important to me that the kids learn life skills before they leave home. Every week each child is responsible for helping to make dinner (or another meal) with me. This way they are learning cooking skills as well as building a personal cookbook for each of them. 

 Ruth loves to make dumpling soup. She is so happy to help cook, and can do a lot of it on her own.

Joseph made pizza for the first time and got lots of flour all over. I asked him how he could clean it up. "The vacuum!" He thought it was great to vacuum the counter.

Halloween 2019

 Halloween is not my favorite holiday, so when Jack was going out of town over Halloween, all the festivities fell to me, including trick-or-treating. Now trick-or-treating is fine as long as I am in my house handing out candy to the cute little kids. I wasn't so thrilled with the idea of taking big kids around the neighborhood, especially when we got upwards of 6 inches of snow just a few days before and the temps were supposed to be cold.

So I suggested to the kids that we could have a Halloween party for our family with special food, a fun treat, games, and we would end the evening by watching the new live action Aladdin. They thought this was a great idea. I was thrilled to stay home.

These are the only picture I got of our festivities, but the kids all had a good time and didn't even ask to go out trick-or-treating.  I'd say it was a win all around! Now just to convince them we should do this every year...

Tinker Crate

For her birthday we got Ruth a subscription to Tinker Crate, a monthly subscription box that has some STEM project to create. Ruth and I had a great time working together to build her paint spinner, including building a circuit. She seemed to have a really fun time.

Ruth's 9th Birthday!

We had a great time celebrating Ruth's 9th birthday. She wanted a How to Train Your Dragon party with her friends. So we made Toothless shrinky dinks, tried to get Toothless to fly through a ring, played charades and had a pinata. She had a fun time!

Casa Bonita

Ruth had been wanting to go to Casa Bonita for a while. She was little enough the last time we went that she doesn't remember it. So we decided to go for her birthday dinner. The restaurant itself seems like it is going downhill, but the cliff diving was neat to watch and we had a fun time as a family.

Trunk or Treat

 This year I was really pleased with the kids' choices of Halloween costumes. I felt like they had some thought and depth to them rather than just something they saw while we were walking through the store.

Joseph loves the book series, "Fablehaven" by Brandon Mull. He is also slightly obsessed with bad guys. So Joseph decided he wanted to be Navarog, a dragon prince who appears in the form of a human and convinces everyone he is a good guy until his true colors come shining through. Joseph decided how he was going to create this costume himself, with a normal jacket that he attached wings we cut out of an old sheet (attached with duck tape!), as well as a construction paper mask on the hood and a sword at the waist. This is the essence of Halloween to me: creativity, work, and literary characters.

 Ruth loved the How to Train Your Dragon movies. She really wanted to be Toothless or the Light Fury, but we couldn't find a costume or a way to make a costume that would let her fly, so we settled with Astrid. I'm glad we could find that, at least!

Miriam was quite punny and decided quite a while ago she wanted to be a Disney Crews (Cruise). Ha ha ha! Rebecca was also a Disney Crews, but I didn't get a picture of her. She is fleeting these days!

The Pumpkin Patch

 We have had a tradition for years to go to Anderson Farms for their fall festival. The kids have lots of fun picking pumpkins, playing with all the neat toys, and petting the animals. This year we also got to watch them shoot pumpkins out of a launcher and see how far they flew until they splattered. Lots of fun! Miriam came with her friend as well, but I didn't get any pictures of her!