December Joy

So much happened in December!!! I had so many DIY (do it yourself) projects planned.  I bought a lot of fabric and towels that I planned on making these bibs as gifts.  I've been wanting to repurspose all of the Bridesmaid dresses from my sister's wedding.  I had my lil guy's blanket to finish, his beanies to crochet and cards to make for Christmas presents and the list goes on and on.  But those soft yummy cheeks and those eyes looking at me.  Oh I couldn't resist.  I didn't care to make anything.  I just snuggled up with my lil guy and spent time with my girls and who could blame me right?  They grow up so fast.  They really do.  So I manage to do a few things here and there but December was still so eventful. 

I even painted 4 cabinets.  Of course since then I've decided to change my mind and we are now getting glass cabinets.  Then I spent some time repurposing my sister's braidmaid dresses as gifts for them.  My sisters and I still haven't grown up.  We still wear hair clips on our hair;)

 The very first day of December was Ronin's Baby Blessing
It was such a beautiful day.  What a wonderful blessing at the end of the year.  We had an amazing turn out of people.  Thanks to all the cousins that came up and even great aunt and uncle.  I had two of my non member friends showed up to the blessing as well.  Our lil guy was all dressed in white with his cute lil tie and white romper.  He was just perfect.  He is perfect.  We seriously could not ask for a better and cuter baby.

Ronin was blessed that he would be a good kid;

Grow up to love family; Love in your heart
Tenderness and compassion (which will be great when he's a husband and daddy)
Seek out intelligence and good things in this world; Take good things to others (Dan said that he wanted to phrase things differently so by this he means bringing the gospel to others, our little future missionary)
Enlighten others by your presence
Grow closer to your sisters

My cute sister and brother in law spent $700 per ticket to come out and see Ronin.  Wow we feel loved!!!

 

Ronin had his 2 months check up.  He was 13 lbs 3 ounces and 24 inches long which put him at 90% for weight and 85% for height.  He got a bunch of complements on Facebook for being a cute chunky baby.  I just love him.

After everyone left, we took the girls to a dinner movie.  We had a fancy night out and had dinner while we watched FROZEN.  The girls fell in love with that movie and we had a great time together as a family.  It was hard having all those wonderful visitors and then go back to just us.  Reena and Debrie cried a lot when their aunt and uncle left and then their Nama and Papa.  We made sure we scheduled playdates with their cousins for their sake.

The Christmas season started fast this year for us.  I felt like it just snuck up on us.  I had 3 Glee performances.  I think that took up a lot of time.  All the rehearsal times and concerts took a huge chunk out of my week, but what's Christmas without music.  Reena had a school concert also on the same night as one of my concerts and I had to miss her. She sang beautifully

The other fun thing we got to do was be in a live Nativity.  Ronin was born at the perfect time to be able to play baby Jesus.  I think my favorite part was having the little kids come up to us pulling their parents closer to tell them that our Ronin is baby Jesus.  Our church building was beautifully decorated with nativities around the world.  I will ha e to have a separate post for those pictures I took there.

Brie had her and of the year dance and gymnastics performance on the same day.  They were back to back and she did an absolutely beautiful job.  I was so proud of her.

We had some cute little elves helping to decorate the tree.  They did a perfect job!  We had Dan's Aunt Margie and Uncle Ardell over for dinner and treats.

We made treats for the neighbors

I had some fun time taking Christmas pictures of my kids.  Unfortunately I had already send in our Christmas cards so these will probably go up on our walls instead.  Love these of Ronin in my new studio.

Other Christmassy things we did

We had a Christmas music theme at prescoltt Brie and I were in charged of

We sang What child is this as a family at Church.  I even sang a verse in Vietnamese.

We performed the 12 days of Christmas song as a family.  The kids memorized this song and sang it everyday.  It really set the Christmas mood.

Christmas Eve with friends.  Our friends the Strobells came for a Christmas Eve dinner and we did some caroling and Nativity telling.  Ronin telling Santa he's been a good boy.

Twas the night before Christmas

To all a good night

Christmas morning!!!!!

BEST PRESENT EVER!!!  DON'T YOU JUST WANT A BITE OF THAT CUTENESS?  I posted this picture of Ronin and my Fb friends were drooling over him.

The Astles came for a Christmas dinner and sleepover on Christmas day.  Pictures are worth a thousand words.  These kids adore each other

We pumped up the air mattress and got out some sleeping bags and these girls were in heaven!!!  I love how much they love each other.  They can never get enough of each other.

Ellie and Annie in Reena's clothes.  Yeah they love each other.

Fun day was had by all.  Cheers to a new wonderful year!!!!

We wish everyone a Happy New Year!!!!

 We are getting ready to go to a Stevens Family Reunion.  We are heading to Brian head to ski/snowboard and so Seattle thought it'd give us a heads up.  Dan and I have skied a handful of times but you can tell how much we love it but me telling you that half an hour from our house is a ski resort and we've lived here for 5 years and have not tested it out.  It's just so much work.  You've got to bundle everyone up, then if they need to go potty in the middle of it, you've got to take it all off, then if they complain they're cold you have to stop, then you have to get chains on your tires, then, etc... so yeah we just wait for the snow to fall occasionally and mommy could just sit inside drinking her hot chocolate while her kids play outside.  It's a very rare thing that it snows down here even though up on the mountains half an hour from here it snows quite often.  The Cascades is a different thing.