Lorien's Kindergarten Christmas Program

Last night was Lorien's Kindergarten Christmas program. Lorien was SO SO SO excited to show us how well she could sing "Jingle Bells," "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer," & "Feliz Navidad!" She was so cute up there in her reindeer ears. I am SO proud of her. My little girl is growing up. I can't believe she's in Kindergarten!

Santa Cruz with Auntie Marc

We all went up to Santa Cruz to visit Auntie Marcene this last weekend. We wanted to see her house & give her her Christmas present from us this year. I didn't realize how CLOSE Santa Cruz is to us!!

Being the wonderful Auntie that she is, she had candy, toys, juice, cookies, & presents waiting for the kids when they arrived. Each of the kids got an adorable new outfit for Christmas from her.

We couldn't keep Bladen away from the little wind up toy dinosaurs she had. He wanted them all & he wasn't going to give them up for ANYTHING!

After seeing her house, Auntie took us to a fun lunch at a Mexican food restaurant right on the beach. The food was GREAT (I LOVE chips & salsa) & the beach was a blast!

After the beach, Tylee & Auntie Marc took the kids to see Tangled while Trek & I got an alone date to see the new Harry Potter movie. It was SO wonderful!!!! Thank you Auntie for such a fun day.

Yearly Kids Pictures

On Sunday I got all the kiddos all dressed up in their Christmas suit & dresses & took pictures of them in front of the Christmas tree. They grow up way too fast. Such cutie pies.

And of course Bladen had to break out the cape. Kids!!! Don't EVER come between a dude & his cape.

Superhero work is exhausting!

Merry Christmas from the Potter Family!

Messy, Messy Girl

Do any of your kids come home from school looking like this?

I swear! My little Lorien is the sweetest little thing in the world, but she is such a mess. What does she do all day at school? Play in mud? Climb trees? (Neither would surprise me!) This is what I find EVERY day when she walks in the front door after school. . .

Come on sweetie. . . let's go take yet ANOTHER bath! (she really is a sweetie though)

My Hero

Trek's parents got this adorable cape & mask for Craiger & gave it to me at my baby shower in Vegas. Well, as I was unpacking it into the baby's room, Bladen wandered in & I couldn't resist putting it on him. . . now I can't get him to take it off.

My little hero! He can rescue me ANY TIME HE WANTS!

Advent Tree (my first big sewing project)

A group of girlfriends in my neighborhood decided to start meeting together once a week to work on some sort of sewing project. I almost didn't go because heaven knows that I can't sew & that I HATE sewing! But my friend kept nudging me to come. . . & I'm sure glad she did. Kiona (my friend) sews all the time & she was determined to teach us ladies that sewing wasn't as terrible as we all thought it was. So she TAUGHT us how to use our machines & together we each made the same project: a HUGE Christmas Tree advent calendar with pockets. I LOVED the advent, but was VERY unsure I could make something so complicated myself. So after 4 weeks of working with the gals, I was able to finish it.

Is it perfect? Not by a long shot. But boy am I proud of it. . . not because it's fun for the kids for Christmas but because I took the patience to learn something new for myself & I DID IT!! I completed something hard all by myself & it looks fine! Now that I know sewing can be LOTS of fun, I can't wait to get started on our next project. Next month we're going to learn how to use patterns. I'm SO excited. THANK YOU KIONA for sparking a new hobby in my life.

Now to convince my husband that I "need" my own embroidery machine like Kiona's . . . (it's only $700. That's not a lot is it? ha ha ha Just Kidding!)

There are 24 pockets on my tree to store candy for each of the kiddos. Then each day they get to pick a piece of candy out of the right pocket leading up to Christmas Eve. SUPER FUN! The kids LOVE it & that makes me even more happy than completing it. Hooray for bettering yourself with continued learning!

Road Trip Fun

And of course, a Potter road-trip just wouldn't be a road-trip without SOMEBODY getting sick on the drive. Bladen threw up the ENTIRE RIDE back to Monterey. (that's 9 hours of throwing up, just so you know!) By the time we got home, he was sitting in a LAKE of puke. I promise we tried to clean it up the best we could every time he threw up, but it was hiding! So I spent the entire night after driving all day, cleaning & sterilizing his car seat. Little imp. Why do my kids ALWAYS do this? (He's fine now of course. . . just got a little car sick is all)

Thanksgiving on Saturday

On Saturday we were finally able to have our traditional Thanksgiving dinner since the entire family was there. Mom of course woke up at the crack of dawn to get everything ready & in order. We first had Talon's birthday breakfast, got that cleaned up, & then started on dinner. I ran with Dad to the store to pick of a few last minute necessities.

Talon & Carolyn invited 3 of Talon's friends from work to share the holiday with us. I love Thanksgiving. I just love gathering around together & talking & stuffing our faces until our bellies ache. It's FABULOUS!!! The food was WONDERFUL as always. Cadence & Tylee got to battle it out for the magical wish from the turkey's wishbone. Cadence beat Tylee of course & she wished she could be Rapunzel from the new movie Tangled. (Oh to be a kid again!)

Poor Mom & Dad were pooped after all the preparation. I loved seeing them snuggled up on the couch fast asleep. They always do so much for us.

After dinner we all went to the movies to watch the new "Tangled" movie. It was absolutely adorable. I loved it. I always love Disney Princess movies. My girls were in HEAVEN. Then we came back home & started talking & telling stories once again. And of course a Potter get-together wouldn't be the same without a sibling wrestling match.

Somehow it always ends up being Talon & Trek fighting in the end. I swear those two have to battle it out until they're ready to pass out.

And I think they finally realized they're not as young as they used to be. After about 20 minutes of wrestling, they finally just gave out & lied there like they were dead. It was hilarious. I hope my boys are as close as Trek is with his brothers. I love it.

And then we were all off to bed. Everybody had to go home the next day, including us. We had to get up at 4am so we could leave by 5. Ugh. The car ride is always my least favorite part. That & the fact that I absolutely HATE saying good-bye. It was a fabulous Thanksgiving with wonderful people. I miss Trek's family already.