January Happenings...

Sorry I'm such a blog slacker! When there's lots of things volleying for your attention, the blog tends to get put on the back burner. That being said, I am trying to update the blog at least once a month. So without further ado...here's what we did in January.

The first January happening: RR's annual b'day party! The kids had a great time helping with this. We put up a few decorations, bought him some gifts, and made a yummy dessert (cherry dump cake with ice cream...cherries are RR's favorite). We had a great time celebrating RR's b'day...his 37th...creeping ever closer to the big 4-0!

I let the kids each pick out a gift for Daddy. Bubs was intent on getting him fish. I asked him a dozen times, and his answer was always fish. And Bubs founds just the right thing: bathtub squirting fish. RR loved it, of course. :) The Bean picked out a more appropriate gift: jammies for Daddy.

The kids made some "door decorations"

On to the next thing: the Bean's K-4 circus party! I cannot begin to express how excited the Bean was about this party. The kids in the class all dressed up like circus performers. The Bean initially went back and forth between acrobat, elephant (what?!?), and clown. We ended up deciding on clown, largely b/c her friend Lynley was going to be a clown too. We went to the fabric store and let the Bean pick out her fabric for the clown outfit...with a little guidance from Mommy, of course. (FYI, if any of you are looking to make a clown outfit, I used a basic pants pattern, just made them a little bigger, a "peasant blouse" type shirt pattern, and this clown collar tutorial. Oh, and we found the coolest sequined turquoise sneakers that matched!! They were $6 at Hancock's...it was meant to be.) We painted her face with Crayola markers. Hope that's not bad...they are washable!! A real clown and a juggler were the class entertainment, and they had popcorn, cotton candy, and lemonade for snack. There was a face painter there too. How fun is that???

The Bean and her BFF, Lynley

The whole K-4 class...the boy with a whip was a lion tamer...how creative is that?!

Last happening: snow day! This was the most recent one, which was technically in February, but I'm putting it on this post anyway. We went outside all bundled up, and we threw snow balls, slid down our snow-covered slide, and went for a short walk in the neighborhood. We had a ball! And finally, the kids get to put there cute hats and mittens that I "splurged" on. (Splurged means I spent less than $10 on items that we used very infrequently...I just hate spending even 50 cents on stuff we hardly ever use. I'm cheap that way. I do not mind some sock mittens.)

Other un-photographed January events: Bubs first dentist appointment. He did great! We love our pediatric dentist. They have a fun play area to wait in, then they give you lots of cool stuff, like stickers, the obligatory toothbrush and toothpaste, and tokens to the "Treasure Tower"!! (Basically the Treasure Tower is a vending/gumball type machine of little trinket-y kid items like sparkly bracelets and bouncy balls, etc. But the kids love it!)

One more note if anybody is still reading - we find out the gender of our baby next Tuesday! I do not have a "gut" feeling about this one. I was pretty sure I knew with both my other pregnancies, and I was right both times. This time it's anybody's guess. Speaking of, anybody have a guess?? I will be 18 weeks tomorrow and am feeling great.