Merry Christmas!

Ready for Santa!

Gingerbread "Festivity"

Our gingerbread projects, on two different days, didn't start out "festive", but I'm afraid ended that way when Rowan had complete meltdowns because they both didn't go exactly how he had imagined. The house didn't look just like the picture on the box, and we didn't have any candy for the gingerbread people, as they had had when he decorated his gingerbread man at school.

I was only able to keep my temper for the second meltdown by documenting this tragic face (taken post rolling on the floor, kicking and screaming).

It was too late in the afternoon for good light in this photo, but I still had fun playing with the tree bokeh.

Rowan's Holiday School Program-2010

A few weeks ago Rowan's school had their holiday program. He was a little nervous beforehand, but did really great. I found it interesting that the school did not have a Halloween party since not everyone celebrates Halloween, but that they did sing some religious songs for the holiday program. Maybe they figure that since there was a Hanukkah song in with all the others it was okay?

Morning in San Francisco

The morning before Thanksgiving we spent a little bit of time in San Francisco. Not too long, because we were worried about afternoon traffic getting out of town, and we were also all a little grumpy from not going to bed until (at least) midnight the night before. We made a quick-ish stop at the Ferry Building where we got donuts (egg free!), chocolate, bread, and cheese. After that we went to the Golden Gate Bridge for a quick walk before heading to Santa Rosa.

the bay bridge

Ro outside the Ferry Building

Niamh's first donut ever! Complete with four-year-old attitude.

I wanted a picture of all three kids together in front of The Bridge, but that wasn't in the cards.

Little Bird

"Mama, when I jump it feels like I'm soaring like a bird!"

12.6.10

St. Nicholas visited our house last night, leaving the kids a few treats,

three new figures for the nativity scene,

and three new Christmas books. This year Muriel received Mr. Willowby's Christmas Tree, Niamh received The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree, and Rowan received Christmas Day in the Morning.

We ended the morning with Italian peppermint hot chocolate and a sad, sad attempt at making eggless St. Nicholas bread. I thought that a sweet dough like what is used for cinnamon rolls would be a good substitute for what the bakeries in Morges make. Cook's Illustrated has a recipe for quick cinnamon buns that don't have eggs. It sounded perfect! The recipe though did not have yeast, which made it more like a biscuit dough, which is very hard to shape into little St. Nicholas men. So next year I will try again, this time with a yeast dough!

Static Electricity

The static electricity in our house since we came back from CA has been out of control. It's not only doing crazy things to the girls' hair, but every time we touch a light switch we get a nice jolt of electricity. I hope that this won't last the rest of the winter!

12.1.10

Happy first day of December!

Back Home!

Golden Gate Bridge

Goat Rock Beach, CA

Half Moon Bay, CA

We returned Sunday afternoon from our Thanksgiving weekend visiting Pat's family in California. There were a few bumps, such as the kids not going getting to bed until midnight (CO time) on Tuesday night due to airplane issues and me getting another round of strep throat. I'm also pretty sure Niamh was feverish for a few days. In spite of all that it was a pretty good trip. Most of the photos I took are all still on my camera; these are from my iPhone. We are slowly, slowly getting back to normal here, so hopefully I can get some more pictures up this week.

A Sixth Birthday Interview With Rowan

I've come across several bloggers that have a tradition of doing birthday interviews with their children. I'm hoping this is something I can maintain year to year with each of our own children, as it's such a great idea!



A couple of notes: Rowan's alleegah is his bunny (pictured in the post below), the Shinkansen song he talks about is Bullet Train by Choo Choo Soul, and the airplane book he talks about is DK Big Book of Airplanes by Caroline Bingham. We did a practice interview a few hours before this one was recorded and many of his answers changed in that short amount of time.

Rowan-Six Years Old

Happy sixth birthday to our sweet boy!

Train Party!!!

Rowan turns six tomorrow (!!!), and had his birthday party yesterday. Including our own children there ended up being thirteen kids at the party, which was quite chaotic. At least, that's how it felt to me. Ro had a great time, and it seemed like the other children did too, so I suppose we can call it a success. The kids played with Pat's electric trains (a huge hit), decorated train cakes, played games, and ran around like crazy.

A special thanks to our friend John, who took all of the above photos. In all the madness I took none, so I'm very glad John volunteered to be our party photographer!

Muriel & The Big Red Thomas Book

Friday, 11.12.10

misty sunrise

egg-free chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast

sick boy

potty practice (I think Niamh was as excited about this as Muriel)

preparing for Rowan's birthday party next week

trying on her big brother's hat & backpack

playing in the melting snow

Niamh loves the snow

poor mitten-less Muriel

Muriel + Paint

First Snow in Colorado

We woke up to a bit of snow this morning. It's melting now, but the kids had fun playing in it this morning. Even our little sickling, Rowan. He is in the midst of another one of his bouts of fever, where he has no symptoms except for a high fever which comes and goes.