Rainy Day

Eli loves to reuse trash, and here's our latest creation!

He wanted to make another bird house, but seriously how many of those do you need?

Google came to the rescue with this cute idea, maybe now I'll have 15 min. of alone time!

Happy Valentines Day!

We did the ever popular lollipop picture Valentine, along with everyone else.

I think it's fun to get a picture of your friend, even if it's not too original.

Swimming continues

Swimming lessons continue...

Eli's favorite new thing is jumping off the diving board, he just can't get enough.

Out Of This World Pizza

The cars are Eli's favorite, he'll only ride the red one though.

Evie

Saree

Kylie

Herbie and Ryley showing off their moves.

The Boys

Watch me!

The opening of the presents

The whole gang

Clockwise around the table

Ben, Evie, Ryley, Herbie, Eli, Kylie, Saree and Lilly

We had such a great time. I swore before that we'd always have simple home birthday parties, but man are they a lot of work. Eli really wanted to go to Out Of This World Pizza this year, and I ended up loving it. My house wasn't completely trashed afterwards and I didn't have to make any custom designed cakes with matching themes, ie: John Deere or Construction. I say we make this a tradition!

Eli is 5!

Well he will be tomorrow anyways!

Stats

Height : 48 inches

Weight: 52 pounds

Shoe Size: 2

Clothing size: 7

Percentiles:

110 % height (my best guess)

96% weight

At least when people ask how old he is I can tell him 5, that sounds more believable than 4 for such a giant kid!

Party pictures still to come...

Cake Pops

We did Cake Pops for Eli's Birthday at preschool today, they were a hit!
They're easy to make and just the right size for kids, not to mention tasty.

Eli, as usual, had very specific requests. He wanted strawberry cake, with red chocolate and red, white and pink sprinkles. I told him we could have that, but they would look like they were for Valentines Day. He replied "that's okay, the girls will love them". Oh my, we're going to be in serious trouble in a few years!

Rachel kindly let us borrow this : Babycakes Cake Pop Maker
It worked wonderfully and cooks these tasty spheres in only a few minutes.

I'm totally making these for every birthday from now on, I've already got a plan for Lilly.
Hello Kitty Cake Pops

Bath time fun

We saw this idea on Pintrest, glow sticks in the tub.
Now the kids as if we have glow sticks every night, good thing they sell them at The Dollar Store.
Hint: It looks cooler with bubbles

Lilly

Eli painted Lilly with orange washable marker. Luckily it was washable, it came off pretty easy in the tub!

Lilly's rat nest she set up while watching her show.

This was from Eli's preschool party, she loved this hat!

Christmas morning playing with her new (from Goodwill) Barbie house.

Christmas Morning

Eli's Christmas Program

Christmas Robes

The kids wanted robes for Christmas. Well, I think Eli wanted one and then Lilly just wanted to be like Eli. Eli was very specific about his, it had to be red (his favorite color) and he wanted it to have white stripes. After Costco and Target failed to have anything he wanted, we headed to JoAnne's to check out their fabric. Eli couldn't find stripes, but he said this print was even better because snowflakes "seem more like Christmas".
Lilly is easy, she's still obsessed with Hello Kitty so the choice was clear. It seems like they have Hello Kitty stuff everywhere, so I thought a robe would be easy to find. Alas, I ended up sewing two robes! I finished them this afternoon, and since it's so close to Christmas, and the kids have seen them from the get go, I just let them have them today.
They both loved putting them on after the bath, it was a little hard to convince them to put on pajamas.

Lilly was a crack up during her "photo shoot". She has the wackiest personality, and loves doing anything to get a smile out of you.

Funny Lilly

Check out the Video on You Tube

Preschool and Santa

Stay tuned for the final Santa Picture, it didn't upload for some reason and as usual it's midnight, so I'll deal with that tomorrow.
Eli brought printouts to show Santa of the toys he wants for Christmas this year. This way there will be no confusion, and he'll be sure to get the right toys. Santa asked if any were for Lilly and Eli said "no everything is for me, Lilly doesn't need any presents because my Mom already bought her something"!!
Santa said his favorite cookies are Snicker doodles (thanks Santa, now we have to make these and they're one of my least favorite cookies). He also said that he has 6 reindeer and they prefer baby carrots (which we never buy) because they think small carrots are like candy.
My Christmas to do list got a little longer after that visit, isn't Santa supposed to be helping me out? I mean he gets all the credit and I'm doing all the work!

Eli had an art night at his preschool last week. Lilly was able to attend with us and she loved it. I think she'll be more than ready to go to preschool next fall.

We made gingerbread play dough, painted picture matting, collage candle holders, shakers, bracelets, and shoebox guitars, what a night!

Getting ready for Christmas

We had a frustrating night putting up Christmas decor with little "helpers". Lilly was trying to eat ornaments (yes, she's 2 1/2) and Eli was throwing them at people. Needless to say, we weren't feeling the Christmas spirit. Eli told us the next day, "Mom you know what we're missing? Being Happy! We should sing songs, love each other and hug at Christmas." Thank you Eli for reminding us what it's all about!

We also went back to Strawberry Fields Christmas Tree Farm, where any tree is $10. We love this place, but were sad there was no snow yet this year. Last year was a magical, although cold, experience. We still had a great time, and Eli picked the final tree! Cutting down our own tree is one of my favorite things about living in the Northwest. The Christmas song "Christmas in the Northwest" might be my lest favorite thing!

The rest of Halloween

This was after trick or treating around the neighborhood, it was cold outside and the lens fogged up, kind of funny! Ben is dressed up as an in n out cook, everyone in the finance department dressed as cooks like they were "cooking the books".

We also went to the Hillsboro Airport Open House. We go every year, I guess it's a tradition now. Eli loves all of the trucks and planes, and they hand out candy and have little crafts and face painting. It's all free, so what more could you ask for?

Lilly has entered the "difficult to photograph" stage, so it was hard to get anything with her looking at the camera. Thanks to Courtney for the other picture from Trunk or Treat, it's the best one we have.