Peacock Lane

Portland's answer to the "Candy Cane Lane" tradition.  We went after Christmas, on a pretty drizzly night. But, it was worth it.  It wasn't crowded at all!  :)

Mistletoe

This was my favorite house.

Us

Shalom

Kiddos

Nightmare Before Christmas Represented!  YES!

Amen.

AMEN!!!

The kids' favorite

It's That Time of Year!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Tea Party

Today, we continued our celebration of Alayna's birth with a small tea party here at the house.  Every time we have a party for her, we run into the same problem--no one can come!  It is so close to Christmas and everyone has other engagements that take precedence over a child's birthday party.  I can only imagine what it would have been like if she had been born on her due date, December 24!  But, 5 little girls did come for the party plus my sister and our wonderful neighbor Alison.  The grown ups drank tea, but the girls had hot apple cider.  Plus, we had little sandwiches, fruit, carrots, and homemade brownies.  The girls brought dolls and we set up a tea party for them too.  We did a few craft projects, played hide and seek, and there was even a little makeover portion (one of the little girls brought some play make up).  It was a fun time!

There were over 60 photos from the party, so I picked the 12 best to represent here.  I am posting the others on FB.

"Tea" time

The girls were trying to talk "British"

Cheers!

Brownies!

Setting up the doll's tea party

One girl arrived late, so almost all the guests

Opening gifts

Saying goodbye when the first friend had to leave early

Sock puppets! (Thanks Aunt Jill!)

Decorating goody bags

Singing Happy Birthday!

Seven

Today is the day we celebrate our sweet Alayna.  I cannot believe it's been SEVEN years since she was born (at 8:29pm) at French Hospital in San Luis Obispo, CA.  I remember that pregnancy because it was my best one, as well as my best labor and delivery.  It was my only all-natural birth (I had wanted all of them to be natural) and I was "accompanied" (as she put it) by a midwife through the delivery.  I didn't see a doctor once during the entire 9 months until the pediatrician came after she was born.  From start to finish, it was about 6 hours long.  I couldn't have asked for a better day!  And I am so thankful that God gave us such an amazing little girl to be a part of our family!  We love her so much!

Since Peter works 2-10 and it was the only time we could celebrate (on the big day) together, we had cupcakes for BREAKFAST this morning.  And we let her open her presents from us and grandparents.  We will actually be celebrating her birthday tomorrow (Peter's day off) and on Saturday afternoon.  Tomorrow, we are going out to dinner and going ice skating as a family (per her request).  On Saturday, we will be having a little tea party at our house for her and 4 friends (she invited 7, but only 4 are able to make it).  She is so excited about that!  And we are so excited that this precious little girl is in our lives!  Happy Birthday, sweet Alayna!

Christmas Tree Decorating!

Winter is here!  It is cold in Portland (but it hasn't been all that gray and wet--we've had a lot of sunshine the past few weeks), and it smells wonderful outside because if all the Noble and Douglas Firs that grow naturally here.  Love it!  And, because they are native to the state, we get fresh cut trees for about 1/2 what we would have paid in AZ for the same tree (that would be at least 1 or 2 weeks old).  Our home really feels like Christmas now with the tree up and decorated.

Tamale Time

Growing up, Christmastime meant one thing in our family.  TAMALES!  Being half-Mexican, it is a tradition to make tamales and eat them on Christmas Eve on my Mom's side of the family.  Usually, our family would get together on the Saturday after Thanksgiving and make dozens (I am talking like 30 dozen) of tamales and then package them and freeze them for Christmas.  When I moved to Arizona and could no longer be a part of this process, it made me so sad.  So, last year, I decided to try making them on my own.  It was about a 50% failure and I was discouraged from trying again.  But, now, here in Portland, with Jilly here to help, we decided to make some up this year.  We made 9 dozen regular ones, 2 dozen black bean and corn ones, and my sister is making some chicken molé ones (will probably make about 3 dozen of those).  They are all delicious!  Now, it really feels like Christmas time.  :)

Aunt Jill helping J make his first one

Ta-da!

Helping Alyana

Finishing it up for her

Peter helped out at the end

Sissy, hard at work!

First batch of 3 dozen!

Not as good at Grandma's, but still DELICIOUS!

Our Little Performer

Alayna has been doing an after-school music class for the past couple months through the Sun program at her school.  This term's program concluded this week and her class sang a song and did a few demonstrations on what they learned.  It was a short, but sweet "performance".

Alayna and Amalia

Properties of Music

"Dynamics"

DAYS 8 & 9--Decluttering & Christmas Decorating!

I didn't post yesterday because we didn't do much worth documenting.  We went through the kids clothes, toys, books, and other "stuff" around the house in major declutter mode. Then I cleaned while the kids spent some time at the neighbors house.  All this to prepare for today, which is Christmas Decorating Day at our house!  We put on some jolly Christmas music and got to work!  The only thing missing is the tree (oh, and the outside lights, but Peter is going to do that tomorrow morning, since it was drizzling most of today and it isn't supposed to rain at all tomorrow).  We don't have a fake tree, so we don't like to get one any earlier than about 2 weeks before Christmas, so we have a bit longer to wait for that.  But, the house looks festive and it is beginning to look a lot like Christmas.  :)  After dinner and showers, we sat down to read from A Christmas Carol.  It is our first time reading through as a family--we are going to try to complete it before Christmas!  We read for about 45 minutes, taking turns reading out loud (Peter was at work during this time, unfortunately).  We are reading an abridged version, made for families, so it isn't as "wordy" and formal as the original version.  It may be a huge undertaking, but we are going to give it a shot.

Stockings 

Front window

 Where we will hang Christmas cards

Manger scene 

(Note the absence of the Magi, who were not actually there the night he was born.)

Table

Abridged version of A Christmas Carol

Reading

Even though it was an abridged version, it still had some challenging words for our newest reader.  

Big brother helped sound out words.

Now, it really feels like Christmas is close.  I love this time of year!  Can't wait for December 10th, so we can get a tree!!!!