Ballerina Time

Abby had an opportunity to go watch her two babysitters (Kitty and Susie) and their sister Sadie perform in LSSU's dance recital this afternoon. She had a great time. She was very excited about being able to wear her fancy "Belle girl" dress and "nursery" shoes (translated: a white dress with multicolor polka dots and white patent leather shoes). She even let me put a bow in her hair. And boy did that girl strut around the Fine Arts Center. She did nap through part of the recital, but when she wasn't sleeping she was having a good time and her running commentary was cracking me and our friends up.

Olivia skipped out on the recital and watched some baseball with her dad. I'm pretty sure he was pretty relieved to get out of watching the dancing. He was also pretty impressed with both girls, who let me sleep in until 8 a.m. Steve got to sleep until 9 because I made sure to get the girls downstairs pretty quickly once they both were up and making noise. We both needed a morning where we could "sleep in." Once upon a time we would sleep until 10 or 11 on a lazy Saturday morning... that was a long, long time ago.

Let it Snow, Let it Snow

So most of our Christmas cards have been sent out and we are now ready to reveal Abby's beautiful Christmas photo. It's a good thing we took this picture when we did because now the snow is too deep to even attempt to take an outside snow picture. And, when we did this one it was around 30 degrees - today it's a balmy 9 degrees (brr... it started at 1 degree this morning)!

Abby was wonderful last night at Steve's office Christmas party. She had a great time visiting with the assistants and other dentists. I think she almost stole the show, although some of the white elephant gifts were pretty hilarious! We somehow ended up with some animated goodies, including a dancing Santa (in his underwear of course). Abby likes copying Santa's dance, so we may have to capture that on video for everyone to enjoy.

Today's adventures include making my first cheesecake (it's a peppermint and chocolate recipe that thankfully doesn't require baking) and also making a dish for Steve's work brunch tomorrow. Abby is going to be getting a lot of practice cooking today. She will probably also get some practice eating.

Veggie Tales Dance

Mirror, Mirror...

Someone has been enjoying the ability to stare at herself for hours (okay... maybe minutes) in her new mirror. She really cracks us up. There is a small stool that came with her vanity and she won't use the play set until you set her on the stool (she's a little too short to get onto it herself).

We had a long and busy day yesterday. Steve got up way early to go to Gaylord and pick up the load of Angel Food. I ended up awake at 4 am too. And when I tried to get up at 6 to shower and get ready I woke Abby up, so we all had a pretty early day. Abby and I helped out at the church wide garage sale (and got rid of a lot of stuff) and then passed out the Angel Food when Steve and our friend Kevin got back with the food. By the time we made it home we were beat.

We let Abby watch the Michael Jackson music video special last night, since we couldn't find anything else we wanted to watch and love him or hate him Michael Jackson made some very entertaining music. Abby had a great time dancing. She may have even learned a few new moves. She continued the dancing at church today. She's going to have to be enrolled in dance class as soon as she's big enough. Speaking of classes... tomorrow Abby and I are going to enroll her in a tot swim class. The class also starts tomorrow (we think), so we'll probably be hitting the pool as well. Steve and I thought it would be a great skill for Abby to learn early in life, especially since Grandpa and Grandma Hodges have the pool to swim in and we have lots of lakes to play in around us.