The Nutcracker

A few years ago in Montreal, I started a new Christmas tradition with Arabella. Each year, she and I go see The Nutcracker. And we both love it. Instead of fighting with traffic, we decided to take the light rail into Charlotte. It was perfect, we got off the train just a few blocks from the theater. I love to see her excitement when we are waiting for the performance to start. It was fun to see how this theater interpreted the performance versus in Montreal. Arabella and I agreed that we liked the performance in Montreal better. We had a fun afternoon of "girl time". I love being able to continue on this tradition with her no matter where we live.

After the show, she and I attended a reception where she was able to meet cast members and have her picture taken with Clara and the Prince. She was so excited to meet them. She even received a poster with the cast autographs. It was well worth the extra $10 we paid to attend.

Pre-Christmas Fun

We have had a busy month and once again, I am busy playing blog catch-up! But that is what happens when you are having a ton of fun and the month of December becomes busy. Saturday, December 14th was a busy, blur of a day! But we had fun and that is what matters. One tradition that we started this year with Arabella, was the turkey wishbone. We cleaned and dried the one from our Thanksgiving turkey and then Arabella and Jay each took a side and pulled...

She was thrilled when she ended up with the larger piece.  She made a wish and I hope it comes true for her.

Later that day, we went to our clubhouse to visit with Santa.  The Clubhouse Committee put on a great event for the kids in our neighborhood.  There were sweets, drinks and of course the big man himself, Santa.  Arabella was so excited to sit and talk with him, Max, not so much.  I was happy because I didn't have to trek to the mall and brave the lines and crowds there to see him!

That afternoon, we attended Arabella's Cheer Team Christmas Party. The girls had fun playing and decorating sugar cookies that we made and brought to the party. It was nice to relax a bit and enjoy some "mom" time. All of the girls get along so well which is so nice, given that they all have strong personalities.

And to round out the day, Jay and I attended his Caterpillar district office party. It was fun since we don't often get to have a night out.

December Lowes Build & Grow

Last Saturday, Arabella and Jay went to Lowes to participate in the Build & Grow clinic. This month, they built a holiday train. Arabella was excited because the sickers that smelled like peppermint, chocolate and cookies. It is super cute and she was very proud of her badge. Her little apron sure is filling up and she is already looking forward to the next project!

Messy Maxton!!

Max and Arabella couldn't be different when it comes to eating food. When Arabella was this age, I don't remember her making quite as much of a mess as Max does. Maybe it is beacuse he is a boy, but not only does the food get all over him, but it ends up everywhere. Just yesterday, I found some on the window sill in the kitchen...no idea how it ended up there! Anyway, he loves to eat and pretty much will eat anything you give him. He wants to eat whatever we are eating (Arabella was the same way) so I just give him what we have and he is happy.

He was even trying to share with Arabella!  Maybe he gets so messy because, afterwards, he usually ends up in the bath and he loves the bath (Arabella did too).

Planting a Garden at School

A while back, Arabella's teacher sent out an email asking for help to clean up the little garden outside her classroom. Since it is a bit hard to get involved at school (that is a whole separate blog post), I decided to help out with this project. I was the only one who volunteered for this project, and that is OK with me, it wasn't too big of a project and I enjoyed working with her teacher to figure out what we could do. She wants to be able to tie it into a science lesson throughout the year. So one, rainy and damp Saturday morning, I went to the school and cleaned up the bed. It went from this:

And about 30 minutes later...

We decided that the children would have fun planting and learning about bulbs. And that it would become a fun science lesson in the spring when they start to push up through the soil and bloom. Arabella's teacher picked up some new soil, I purchased some bulbs that were 50% off at Lowes and a few other parents sent in some bulbs to be planted. Max and I went to school one day last week and we planted about 60 bulbs. I explained to the children which way the bulb needed to be put in the soil and they had fun picking out which hole (I pre-dug holes in the interest of not getting them too dirty and to save some time) to put their bulb in. Each child planted 2 or 3 bulbs and are excited to see what happens.  Max had fun seeing all the kids and was on his best behavior.  He enjoyed being out in the sunshine and warmer weather. I can't wait to hear about it from Arabella when they start to see some growth. I am sure it will be a beautiful little garden in the spring!

Wordless Wednesday

Jack's Adventures

Arabella loves waking up every morning and searching for Jack. She has been leaving him snacks and notes. It is the cutest thing. Max even knows who we are looking for when we mention the name Jack. Just today I was holding him in the living room and when Arabella and I said the name "Jack" his head turned and he looked right where Jack was hanging out.

This year I have been getting creative - thanks to Pinterest and my friends on Facebook - with what Jack does around the house. Arabella loves it when he does something silly and I have fun creating the scene.

Here is what Jack has been up to this Christmas season...

He swung from the light in our foyer. This "set-up" took 45 minutes and Jay and I got into an argument about how to do this. He told me that from an engineering standpoint, that is couldn't be done, Jack would fall and that it should be done a different way. I told him that I saw it done on Pinterest, so it had to be do-able (yeah right) and I wasn't going to go to bed until I did it! Guess I proved the engineer wrong this time.

Jack and Barbie went for a reindeer ride.

He had a late night snack of marshmallows and made a mess on the floor!

He zip lined across the room!

He got tangled up in some lights when he was decorating a few little trees. Arabella checked him out really close - she wanted to make sure he was OK.

He got stuck in the wine press!

And this morning, I think he was a little late getting back from the North Pole and he got stuck in the blinds!

We can't wait to see what he does next!

First Friday

Every first Friday of the month, our town has activities in the downtown area. This month, it was all about Christmas and the theme of "A Christmas Carol". The town was lit up with beautiful white lights. The weather was so warm, we didn't even need coats and I was sweating in the light sweater I had on. It was odd to think it was the beginning of December and it is so very hard for me to get into the Christmas spirit with this weather. I miss the snow and cold. That aside, we enjoyed walking around and watching the living windows where parts of "A Christmas Story" were being acted out. Arabella ran into her cheer buddy, Cadence, and they had a great time figuring out the themed treasure hunt. There were carolers and carriage rides, however, I promised Arabella we would go back on this Friday night for a ride since the line was super long. We enjoyed spending time together in the fresh air. It was fun to see the sights of Christmas coming alive.

The living windows. Arabella really enjoyed watching the scenes being acted out.