Christmas celebrations

We have had a whirlwind of Christmas celebrations for the past two weeks straight.  Two weeks ago were all of the school parties, and the all-school prayer service.  We were cookie-making machines, and were able to give a ziploc of homemade treats to each of the girls' many teachers, who are each so very special to us.  We also took the girls to a Santa brunch after Katie sang at church on the 18th.  And we went to a rollerblading party when school was out!

Last week, Mom & Dad C came here for an early Christmas.  We opened presents in the morning, and we all loved our gifts!  Then we went to a Polish restaurant for lunch, and then we visited a Polish market and a Polish bookstore, before going to an Italian market.  Our dinner was a hodgepodge of homemade gnocchi and takeout Italian subs, but it was good!  Then we walked around downtown Rochester to enjoy the lights.  The pictures don't do it justice - the lights are amazing!

We drove to Wheaton to celebrate "real" Christmas.  We had a leisurely time visiting with friends and family while we were there.  The girls didn't wake up too early on the 25th, which was nice.  We opened presents (again loved them all!), went to church, enjoyed a yummy brunch at Joe & Nancy's plus more presents, and drove to Racine for Christmas dinner.  An exhausting, but fun day!

On our drive home, we stopped in downtown Chicago to see the Blue Man Group.  The girls loved it!  But we got home very late at night, and had to push back "our" Christmas by another day.  Santa brought lots of presents to our house while we were gone, and they had to spend another night under the tree.

Yesterday was a very relaxing day of opening presents and playing with all the new toys.  The girls played outside in the snow (a rarity so far this winter), and we all went to the pool for fun.  The girls had a sleepover in Megan's room last night; all three were curled up in Megan's bed.  It was so cute!  They slept fine, and weren't up too early - as far as we know.

Today we attempted to tame the mess in our house, and filled our garbage and recycling bins to the brim!  We also did a little shopping with our gift cards, and cleaned up part of the basement.  The girls spent the day playing with their toys, and they're having another sleepover tonight, this time in Katie's room.  Jessi is on the bed, and Katie & Megan are on a "nest" of blankets on the floor.  They are all very worn out and are sleeping great.

Thank you to everyone for the generous gifts of presents, and for spending time with us if you were able.  We have had a wonderful Christmas this year, and we look forward to an even better 2012!

We had way too many pictures to add to this blog post, so I uploaded them to Snapfish to make it a little easier:
http://www5.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=8015521008/a=55285543_55285543/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

Merry Christmas!!

December so far...

We've had a very busy month so far.  Are you surprised??  :)  The month started off with Chris on a trip to Italy for work.  He had an exciting flight home - on a private jet with the CEO!  The day after he got back was the Rochester Christmas Parade.  Chris helped to build the school float, and the girls walked in the parade.

Famous kids - they were on TV!!

Fan club at the parade

Jessi loves doing her own hair, and everyone else's! 
Most nights I have to spend 5+ minutes taking out dozens of
clips and other accessories out of someone's hair.

Jessi has really gotten into puzzles.  She loves to show off
her skillz and never allows a sister to help her.

Last night we decorated our tree.  It's so beautiful! 
(even if there are no ornaments up high)

 On Tuesday, we celebrated our 14th wedding anniversary.  Well, there wasn't a lot of celebrating.  We had to squeeze in Katie's tutoring and a dr appt before we went out for dinner.  And in the parking lot of the eye dr, Jessica got "tripped by my mama" (as she puts it) and fell HARD on her face.  Her hands were in her jacket pockets, so nothing broke her fall.  She was bleeding everywhere - she had two split lips, bloody nose on both sides, and a badly scratched up nose.  Her lips and nose swelled up quickly.  She spent most of the night with ice on her face!

That night we went out to dinner at a Japanese hibachi place, where they cook the food in front of you.  It was a big hit with the girls, except Jessi was afraid of all of the fire.  Not even the onion volcano could make her smile.

Today we took Jessi back to the eye doctor to pick out her frames.
Here she is!  Her new glasses are brown on the outside, and deep
purple on the inside.  It is subtle, but very cool.  Her lenses will
be in within a week, and then she will be sporting specs all day,
every day!  Poor farsighted baby!

Also today, we hung the rest of our outdoor lights, and we put up all of the decorations in the house, including 5 nativity scenes and dozens of snowmen.  We also baked peanut blossoms and watched Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer.

Cookie monsters

Add in choir practice, ballet practice, and LOTS of homework and special projects, and we have had a whirlwind of a month so far!  This coming week will be full of end-of-the-year stuff at school etc, and then it will slow down.  The girls are in school til the 20th.

Kennedys visit

Right before Halloween, we had a special treat - a visit from Mom & Dad Kennedy!  They got to see a glimpse of our fun, action-packed life.

We listened to Jessica's preschool class sing us several Halloween songs

We got to pass out candy to her class during the "parade" in the gym

Jessica's 4yo preschool classmates

On Friday, we also went to mass at Megan's school, and toured Katie's school.  On Saturday, we saw Megan's last soccer game, where she scored a hat trick!  (what do you call it in soccer when you score three goals??)  And we saw Katie's last soccer game, where she NEARLY scored a goal.  We made cupcakes for Mom K's birthday, and made "finger" cookies just for fun.

Cupcake decorators

Finger cookies, complete with sliced almond fingernails on one end, and the other end dipped in raspberry jam to look like a bloody stump!  They were delish!

Grandma and Grandpa with the girls, before heading out to Kruse & Muer to celebrate Grandma's birthday

On Sunday we enjoyed breakfast donuts at Knapp's in downtown Rochester

 As you can tell, we all had a fun time, and Mom & Dad K needed a nap by the end of the weekend!  :)

Jessica

Big news - Jessica is blind as a bat!!  She flunked her vision screening at her 4yo checkup, so I made an appt for an optometrist visit today.  She is severely far-sighted and has very bad astigmatism.  Guess who's getting glasses??!!  She tried on a few pairs today and they were all ADORABLE on her cute little face. We will wait til next week when Chris is home to pick out "the" pair.  Be on the lookout for pics of Jessi's new look!

Halloween! (a month late)

Just had to share a few belated, but cute, pics from our Halloween festivities!

Katie the ballerina in her school parade.

Megan the pioneer in her school parade

 Katie & Megan had a half day of school on Halloween, and got to wear their costumes to school for the party and parade.  We spent the afternoon carving our pumpkins.

Jessi is just cute!  Her preschool Halloween party was the previous week.

Trick-or-treaters

 Katie went trick-or-treating with her friend Maile and her mom.  It was the first year we didn't all go out together...Katie is growing up!  Megan and Jess went out with Chris for a while, and then went out with me for a while, and then came home to pass out candy with us.  It was windy and cool, but not too bad out.

Megan's Angry Bird pumpkin

Katie designed and carved her pumpkin

Jessica's kitty pumpkin

Katie (ballerina) with her stash

Megan (witch) and her stash

Jessi (Belle) and her candy haul

Megan organized her candy - look at each shelf!

The girls enjoyed sorting and trading their candy for WEEKS!!  We have pretty much forgotten about the candy by now, thank goodness.  It was another great Halloween!!

November

Let me do a quickie overview of November, in pictures!

Girls playing outside on one of the many warm November days we had.  Notice Jessi's bare feet!

Girls playing in the leaf pile in our back yard.  There was much screaming, running, and jumping!

Family pic at Grandpa Christensen's visitation

Siblings all together

Cute pic!

All the Christensen cousins (aka grandchildren)

Grandma Christensen with the grandkids AND great-grandkids

Our little family

Grandpa's funeral was on a very warm day, so after the luncheon, we went back to his house and took a family walk to the woods.  The girls found lots of corn and beans to play with!

Our final carrot harvest, and our first stalk of brussels sprouts (of four plants)

Yummy rainbow carrots from our garden!

Jessi would NOT eat the squash or brussels sprouts one night.  She didn't put up a fight, she simply fell asleep at the table!

Girls singing together in the combined Children's Choir (Katie) and Praise Kids (Megan and Jessica).  It was the very first time Jessica was in the choir!  She did a fabulous job.  It was Megan's first time this year, and she did great, too.

All in all, November was a fabulous month for our family.  We had many days off school and Chris had several days off work.  Soccer was over, so we had lots of free time compared to Sept & Oct.  We had time to go swimming once a week, go on lots of walks, and clean up all of our gardens and the yard.  The girls are working hard in school, and are all doing very well.  We are in a great routine of homework and reading each night.  Megan loves to read to Jessica, and Katie loves to read to both of them!  I feel surprisingly rested, and ready for the chaos of December!  (let's hope this feeling lasts!)

Thanksgiving weekend

Happy Thanksgiving!  We have had a fun weekend so far.  We hosted Thanksgiving, and the highlight was Chris' deep-fried turkey.  Everyone loved it!



Thanksgiving feast with Mom & Dad Christensen, Joe C. and his girlfriend Stephanie:

Joe & Stephanie spent Friday with us, too, before they flew back to Boulder.  We hung out all day, and the girls were extra crazy with an audience around.

Today started off on a very sad note.  Chris took Kenny to the vet, who confirmed what we thought - the FIV disease progressed quickly.  Kenny was down to only 8 lbs, and has been vomiting and poo-ing everywhere in the basement.  We made the difficult decision to put him to sleep.  RIP, our Kenny-cat!

Later today, we took the girls to the zoo to enjoy the warm weather.  We saw all the animals, and had a picnic lunch outside - without coats!  The new lion exhibit is way cool - we got so close to the lions!

 The butterfly house was a huge hit, too:

I put up some Christmas lights today, and ordered our Christmas cards.  The tree may make its appearance tomorrow!  I want to get started on Christmas stuff ASAP since Chris is heading to Italy on Monday, and we have a busy week (month!) ahead.

Hope you enjoy this mini-update.  I am going to try to get caught up this week.  Wish me luck!

Jessica's first day of preschool

First, here's a picture of Megan in uniform, on her second day of school.  Now she goes to school full days, rides the bus, and wears a uniform every day.  Such a big kid!

Now, on to Jessica!  Today was her first day of 4-year-old preschool!  She has been counting down the days all week long, and she woke up this morning exclaiming, "Today all three girls get to go to school!"

Just a little excited.

Beautiful new backpack.

Jessica in front of her school.

Hanging up her backpack - she's "5 apple" this year.

In front of her classroom.

Coloring page.

Jessi and her new teachers.  Mrs. Laskos (on the left) was Megan's 4yo preschool teacher.  Mrs. Sigelko (on the right) is the new assistant teacher.

Today was meet the teacher day, and the parents stayed with the kids for 1 hr to let them meet other kids and play with all of the toys in the new room.  On Monday she'll go for 1 hr on her own, and then from then on she'll be on her own the whole time (2.5 hrs every MWF morning).  She's soooo ready!