Halloween

First off, my sisters came into town for a girls' trip. We had a great time! One of the highlights and actual motivation for the trip was attending Michael Jackson's "This Is It" movie together. You see, we grew up dancing to Michael Jackson music together. We got matching MJ t-shirts for the event. See above. And it was so fun watching the movie with people who I know love and appreciate MJ's talent and music like I do. It is a must see, if you like MJ. At the end of the movie we sang Michael Jackson's songs together. It was great!! Thanks to Nat and Jennie for a great week. (Another highlight was seeing The Lion King together at Broadway San Diego. Thanks for the surprise!)

Carving pumpkins just before Halloween night. You can kind of see the bow that was planned for this Jack-o-Lantern. That was of course Maddie's idea.

This is Mitchell's "scary" pirate face. He also had a pretty scary "Argh."

Just before trick-or-treating... the beautiful Monarch butterfly and the "scary" pirate. Both kids picked what they wanted to be for Halloween and had a lot of fun trick-or-treating. Overall, Halloween was a success... the kids were happy!

Thank you Ritz!

I had a warped memory card and took it to Ritz Camera, they saved 825 pictures. Hooray for Ritz Camera! Here are four of the recovered photos, more to come...

Madison loves dressing up, uh, can you tell?

She also loves putting curlers in her hair at night, so it is curly in the morning. She literally skips and twirls even more often when her hair is curly.

Super cute boy on Easter morning. He is still toting around his blanket and oftentimes a car.

Madison with her curly hair on Easter morning.

What Will You Celebrate?

I wanted to go to Disneyland on my birthday, much to my kids' delight and much to Eliot's dismay. However, because it was my birthday my wish was granted and we ALL had a great time!

Yes, I got a sweet button that said "Happy Birthday to Angie" and so I got birthday "shout outs" from all the cast members. Awesome!

Waiting in line for the Peter Pan ride. Luckily I had these lollipops to keep the kids occupied.

I LOVE this "Celebrate" Dance party, almost as much as Madison... maybe even more.

Mitchell's First Day of Soccer

He's got some serious "moves!"

What an attentive student!

The shirt was more like a dress, which Mitchell was unsure about, but he held it together and scored a bunch of goals.

Coach Smackey is getting the kids ready to run! Mitchell had a great time. Yay for soccer!

More of what we've been up to!

Performances!

Picnics!

Padres!

What we've been up to!

Playing with our cousins. Mitchell with cousin Sydney.

Playing at the park. Maddie on the monkey bars.

Playing at the beach with friends as often as possible.

Learning to swim.

Thanksgiving Extravaganza!

We had one of the most festive Thanksgivings this year. It started off with Madison's Pow Wow Music program a week prior to the actual Thanksgiving day. The kindergarten classes put on a wonderful performance. They were all dressed up as Native Americans. They chose their own names. Madison was Sweet Crow. They sang several songs and after the Pow Wow the parents (dressed as pilgrims) joined the children for a Thanksgiving feast!
Here are some of the kindergarten girls with their papoos backpacks. The girls looked so cute.

Madison did such a great job singing. She was trying so hard to stay in character as Sweet Crow. She had all the movements and words down. She has been continuing to sing the songs all week.

Thanksgiving morning we head to our friend's house, the Rollins, along with the Oscarsons to begin warming up our Thanksgiving feast from Claim Jumper. Surprisingly, we did end up spending quite a bit of time in the kitchen heating up the food. So here is a picture of the lady folk with our pilgrim hats (courtesy of Madison's kindergarten class) in the kitchen- me, Mary, and Erin.

All of the pilgrims are featured here. Eliot, Angie, Kenny, Erin, Mary, and Curtis.

Maddie, Ellie, and Millie coloring turkeys beforing the feast.

Eliot and Angie as pilgrims.

After the noon time meal we all headed to our separte houses for naptime. Then we reconvened at our house for dessert and gingerbread houses.

We tried to keep the kids occupied with a Christmas movie so the adults could play a game. It lasted for a little while.

Eliot and Curtis attempting to construct the gingerbread houses.

Maddie and Ellie are such cute friends!

Me and Mitchell hanging out in the front yard while the boys played some football.

It was a truly wonderful Thanksgiving. Thanks to our friends who made it so fun. A special thanks to Erin for documenting the day. Now on to the next celebration!