trimming the tree........

Our tree is up, it's officially Christmas! Here's our sweet little tree decked out with all our old, new, funky, collected, treasured ornaments. E says we should call it the "memory tree," because each ornament has a memory connected to it.

These are my little elves helping.

Aren't they so cute together?

She was very serious about where everything should go....

I think this is hilarious......my two bald-headed boys. And doesn't our tree look like it's about to topple over? Derick actually taped it to the table with packing tape so it's topple-proof!

Here's the men, inspecting the branches.....

I love this........it's some sort of dance to the tree fairies I believe. :) She was dancing all over the living room with the top of the tree, and this is the one precious moment I caught!

winter zoo-going.......

We're trying to make use of our year-round zoo passes all winter, so we took our first trip to the zoo on a sunny but chilly day. It was so fun! A lot of the animals are inside so it's easy to warm up in between playing and walking around. They're getting all ready for the holiday "Zoo-lights" so we'll be going back in the next few weeks to see the spectacle! Should be festive!

Isn't this bat creepy? He's about 12 inches tall, and his wing span is between 2 and 3 feet wide!

The kids' favorite snake slide.....

The steamy rainforest.....

Up the steps to the waterfall.....

This guy was being very friendly, he came right up to the fence to say hello.

Here he is walking over us......

Mr. Giraffe....

There's our friend the zebra in the background.....

giant violin......

It's a good thing they make child-sized violins, the poor girl can barely reach her arm all the way down the instrument. But she just has so much fun playing twinkles on Mom's violin!

trains trains trains......

We build a lot of trains at our house these days.......all different shapes and sizes of tracks! This is boy who loves trains, riding them, building them, and playing with them. And this is his "cheese" smile for the camera!

Birthday Party!!!

I just have to share a few pictures from E's party last weekend, the theme was dolphins! (This is one of those pictures I think they'll love to see when they're 16!) :) She decorated her cake herself, with all her little favorite sea creature toys.......

The presents, of course, were wonderful! I didn't get a good picture of all of them, but the girls were so excited to share, and E just loved everything.

The girls seemed to be having a great time with lots of dancing, pinata, hula hooping, and crown making (and of course a bit of candy eating!).......

(I love taking pictures of this little one!) :)

Loot bags filled after the dolpin pinata.......

And the pizza feast!

Thanks girls, for the great time!

Halloween 2009.....(a little late!)

I just realized I hadn't put pictures of Halloween up yet, so sorry, better late than never, right? Here's my little Dolphin and Dinosaur! Aren't they great? They were both warm and cozy in their big furry costumes, and we had a great time cruisin' for candy! :) (My favorite part was when they walked, they each had a little wagging tail! Soooooo cute!)

Happy Birthday!

This was our birthday girl 5 years ago at age 2, and here she is today! :) We're in the midst of an all day celebration here, with lots of presents, good food, and much more fun to come! It's been a wonderful 7 years with this little angel in our lives, Happy Birthday Sweetie! I love you!