Doors, Beds, Swords, and Puppies

This is Mackenzie's door. She spent an afternoon making most of these signs. The sign says "Please knock. only come in when I say so." She copied it from a sign on Jackson's door. She copied the puppy from a puppy Jackson had made for Jordan. She has made several others.

Jordan's door. He has the first sign Kenzie made after copying Jackson's sign. she didn't space out her words at all so it's much more difficult to read :) It looks like it says this: Pleas ekno ckonl ycome in when I say so. It makes me smile when I see it. The white sign is something he made. 

This is a close up:

He wrote some random numbers and put stickers around them.

Mackenzie's bed is a little messy. This is how she cleans her room. She puts all her toys on her bed. She says she doesn't like to play on the ground because it's scary. She told me that when she was laying on the floor to sleep on it. I guess it's just scary to play on the floor, but not sleep on it. 

Coleman loves this sword. He carries it around pretending to cut things. One day there was a knock at the door and Coleman ran to it. Doug told him not to open the door because there could be a bad guy. Coleman said "if it's a bad guy, I'll cut him!"

Cute Kenzie

Valentine's Day

For Valentine's Day the kids all got a card and candy from Doug and me. Plus Jackson made all of us valentines. He worked all week to make them. He's a sweet boy that loves to give to others. 

He made Kenzie a stuffed animal and blanket for the stuffed animal. 

He made me a hot pad.

He made Doug a Seahawks hat that ended up being too small so he also gave him a snickers bar.

He made Jordan a Quell game. Jordan loves to play Quell on the Kindle and Jackson recreated it for him.

He made Coleman a search and find book.  I need to take a picture of the book. It is really cute. I'm going to laminate the pages as soon as I get some laminating sheets that will be big enough for it. 

We had some fun taking pictures...

Colie's finger got in the way of his picture. :)

Mackenzie and her candy.

She wanted a picture of the back of her candy and card.

First Half of February

Mackenzie loves creating. One week she was wanting to play preschool with Coleman. She made him a name tag and a cubby. They're working on the cubby in this picture.

Holding hands.

Jackson made a Norman Castle. He used Kix and melted marshmallow. Jordan chose to watch instead of make one himself because he thought it would be too gross.

We went to a Valentine's Day party at the Maple Valley Community Center with fellow homeschool families. The kids came home with a lot of valentines. Coleman had many suckers. He had me open one, licked it a few times, threw it away, and then brought me another to open. He continued to do this until he was out of suckers. 

Jackson with his valentines.

Kenzie with her valentines.

Jordan and his valentines.

Cute Coleman. He loves his tractor shirt. He always reminds us that Grandma Dance gave it to him :)

Coleman and Camryn playing school. 

Jackson and me.

Jordan and me.

Kenzie wishes she was a dog. She often pretends she is one. She made a leash with the headbands from the game Headbands. Jordan takes her one walks. One morning I came downstairs and he had wrapped the leash around the dishwasher that he was unloading. I guess he didn't want her to run away. :)

"Lucky" (she named herself after her favorite puppy in 101 Dalmations) and Jordan

Big Boy Bed

We finally moved Coleman into a big boy bed. I decided that since he was going to be 4 in a couple months that it was probably time to switch him. We talked to him a lot about it before and about how he had to stay in bed at night and wait until someone came to get him in the morning. And we told him that he would lose his blanket if he did get up. He really loves his blanket so we think that will motivate him to stay in bed :) He kept assuring us he would stay in bed so we told him he could have a big boy bed. 

 Last pictures in the crib before taking it down.

 I was sad to take it down and put it away. It's the first time in almost 9 years that we haven't needed a crib. (well some would say we haven't needed a crib for a year or so...:))  It doesn't really come apart it just folds which makes it really long and hard to store. We don't actually know where we're going to keep it. I told Doug we should have my dad make something out of it :) This crib was from my grandma and grandpa Riding. It was the crib my dad and his sisters slept in. And I slept in it when we visited their house, until I was 7 or so... So I'm kind of attached it and don't want to get rid of it. 

Doug (who works 95% of his waking hours these days) took off a Friday night so we could all work together to build it. This is the first kid bed we have bought from a store. Our cribs and Kenzie's bed were given to us and we bought the boys bunk beds on craigslist. It was kind of fun picking out a new bed. The kids loved helping to build it. They were all so excited for Coleman.

 When we finished the first part of his bed Colie put his pillow on the boards. I kind of think he thought he was going  to sleep like that even though he knew there was a mattress. Maybe thought the mattress would go on top of the pillow :)

 First time laying on his new bed.

 We bought him a trundle bed because the kid have sleep overs on Friday nights sometimes. They didn't have them for a long time because they had been playing too much or fighting instead of going to sleep. Coleman and Kenzie were excited to have a sleep over on the first night of his big boy bed. At first Coleman didn't want to. We were surprised because he always wants to have a sleep over, and had never actually had one because every time we've tried he just plays and plays instead of sleeps. But we think he thought that we were going to close the trundle bed when the kids were sleeping on it and that they would be stuck. He was scared for them. When Doug told him that we would leave the bed out then he wanted Kenzie to sleep in his room. She was so excited!

 Colie pretending to sleep.

 They did so great during the sleep over. We didn't hear a peep out of them.

And Coleman had been so good in his bed since he's been in it. He loves it and is so excited that he can climb in and out by himself :)

January

Here are some of the things we did in January:

Doug took Jackson and Jordan to the Thunderbirds hockey game. They got free hats!

 Kenzie and I got our hair cut. This is a before picture. And so are the next few... The official after picture is at the end of this post... I kept forgetting to take one. :)

 Not sure what was going on in this picture, but I think it's a cute one of Jordan and Coleman. Jackson and Jordan have been doing some sewing lately. I need to take pictures of their creations so we can all remember them :)

Jackson dressed up as Mario and was excited to use Coleman's Mickey Mouse gloves. They went well with his costume.

 Colie dressed up as Luigi.

 Kenzie as Ana.

 Coleman started Sunbeams! He loves it! They've been having his class come in for singing time since the beginning of December. I told him in the car that day that he might be coming into primary for singing time and he was really excited. Then he through himself on the ground outside of the primary room because he couldn't go in right away. He didn't want to go to nursery. I was really surprised because he loves nursery. I thought he would have a harder time transitioning. He was so excited his first day of being a Sunbeam that he got to stay in primary the whole time. And he has a really good Sunbeam teacher who makes class so fun for them. There are 6 little boys in his class. It is an energetic class :) 

 He still asks me some weeks if he's going to primary that day.

 January 5th was my Grandma Riding's birthday. We played Payday in memory of her. My sisters and I played it whenever we visited my grandparents. Although my grandma didn't play with us, it still reminds me of her because I loved playing it there:) I have the same version as she did. It's the best one :) 

 We also ate pancakes. She always made us pancakes for breakfast when we visited too. I think she made them everyday when we weren't there too. They were so yummy! I was going to have us a eat popcorn too because she loves popcorn, and I have her old popcorn holder that I loved to use when I would visit her, but we ran out of time. 

It was also my Grandpa Carlson's birthday on Jan 10th. I talked to my kids about him, but we didn't end up doing the things I had wanted to help us remember him. I was planning on us playing trick or treat, because we used to play that with him when I was little. I also was going to make a chocolate treat or at least eat some chocolate chips because he loved chocolate! I miss both of them so much! 

 Coleman was really into making me things for most of the month of January. He would cut up paper and then fold it and tape it. He would bring me the tape where ever I was and run to me when he needed tape. Sometimes if I was upstairs he would bring me the tape, run back downstairs, come back when he needed a piece of tape, run back downstairs, then up again to get another piece of tape and he would continue to do this until he was done taping. Sometimes he would bring his creation with him:) When he was done he would give it to me and say "I made this for you." He so sweet and loving. He randomly tells me he loves me quite often. When people hear him they always comment about how sweet it was that he said it. 

 Jackson started playing basketball. He made a basket in his first game of the season! He's number 2 this year. He didn't want to be number 1 because he's always number 1 :)

 It's blurry but it's the one I have where he's dribbling the ball.

 Jordan got a hair cut too. I never took an after picture, but it is short :)

I took Kenzie to see Cinderella at Storybook theater.  The play was for kids 3-10 so it was perfect for her and we both enjoyed it. She was so excited to do something fun with just me :)

 We got there about 20 minutes early and were able to sit in the very front row in the middle. I thought they were pretty great seats. There were a lot of other people in the theater, but  I guess they didn't want to me so close :) Kenzie kept saying she was bored and wanted to take lots of pictures by the stage.

 After seeing the first picture we took of her she wanted a picture with just the trees.

 Then she wanted one where you could see her Frozen shirt she was wearing.

 After the show she was able to take her picture with Cinderella.

 Amazon had some costumes on clearance so I bought a couple. Kenzie was excited about Lala Loopsy. Maybe she'll wear it for Halloween and actually be warm without having to have a lot of layers under her princess costumes :) I also bought a clown one that I hope a kid will want to wear for Halloween.

 Kenzie has been loving doing art projects lately. She loves coloring, cutting, gluing, drawing and writing what she draws. At her last birthday when I was buying her presents I decided to get her craft present to get her doing some art because she never really did any art things.  It's so weird to me to see her doing these things all the time now. Almost every day she gets out paper and markers. 

 Mine and Kenzie's after shot finally :) We got pretty similar cuts.

We took the kids to see Disney Jr Live: Princesses and Pirates. They did a Jack and the Neverland Pirates (Kenzie's favorite show) and a Sophie the first play. I thought they were going to combine Jake and Sophia, but they didn't. It was really like watching an episode of each show. I don't think we would do it again. Maybe if it was Mickey Mouse because Colie really loves Mickey. Mickey and Minnie were there for some of the show which the kids loves. Coleman and Kenzie loved the plays. Coleman thought the Jake one was scary though. Jordan liked them I think. Jackson wasn't feeling very good and wished he wouldn't have gone. I think he would have liked it more if wasn't sick.