Sunday

Amelia had a tea party with my mom.


Christmas Musical at church today.  It was nice, but the nicest part is that we don't have to go to practice on Tuesdays anymore.




Fuzzy picture of Lucy's solo

Well, I am officially on vacation.  We will return to school on Jan. 6th.  This is the good year for Christmas vacations...when Christmas falls on a Wednesday, you get two full weeks off.

We have been non-stop busy Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, but it's great to know that tomorrow we can be busy again and not have to fit in work and school.

Friday night, Lucy, Toby, and I went to see a former student's performance of The Nutcracker at Walnut Hill School for Performing Arts.  We went last year also and it is a great production.  When we go, Lucy always says I might want to go to school here.  Lovely boarding school campus and obviously a concentration on the arts.  Toby on the other hand, doesn't like the idea of boarding school.

Friday at school felt like non-stop fun, which is very tiring.  We baked and decorated sugar cookies in our class.  Then made many different crafts and wrapped them up for family.  I went to Amelia's preschool party and had a sub in my room for most of the craft time.  The 3rd graders in my class went rollerskating in the afternoon, and one of my students was surprised by a visit from his uncle who had just returned from being deployed in Afghanistan.  On top of that, I had lovely gifts to open from my students.  I received so many art supplies for our classroom which will be great to use when we get back to school, along with gift cards, books off my wishlist, and some lovely cards that made me cry.

Saturday, Sam took Lucy and Toby to Youth Hoops at 7:45 in the morning, Lucy's last youth hoops for this year.  Toby has one more next Saturday.  Then we went to Lucy's basketball game in the afternoon.  She got another basket and they lost by one point in a very exciting game.  From there we exchanged gifts with my aunt and grandmother, had dinner at the Japanese place, and went on a light drive to one house in Whitinsville, where we spent an hour watching the choreographed show.

Today was the Christmas musical, then we had Children's Church.  Amelia went over my mother's.  Lucy worked on her Christmas gifts.  Toby and Sam worked on my grandmother's car, and then our neighbors came over a for a visit.  I grocery shopped, and now we are all in bed.

Tomorrow we will bake and cook for Christmas Eve and Christmas, and attend a Bowler Christmas party in the evening.

My Christmas cards finally arrived and I mailed most of them today, except for the international ones.

We are going to Disney in June and are able to make our dinner reservations now.  We will be there for Amelia's birthday, so I am reserving breakfast with Cinderella for her birthday.  She is VERY excited.  I also cleaned her room today, throwing out a lot of paper and junk which she likes to keep.  She knows her room very well and keeps it very organized, every morning she makes her bed before she leaves her room.  Anyway, she quickly noticed things were missing and was quite upset, but hopefully looking at all of the gifts under the tree will help her realize that she needs space, especially since her room is 6 feet by 6 feet. :)

In the summer, Lucy will be moving onto the porch for her bedroom.  Sam will put in new windows and insulate and Amelia will move into Lucy's room, then she'll have more room for her things.

I have so many books to read over vacations, so I should get off the computer and get reading.  I'm also busy thinking through my goals for the coming year and will spend some alone time next week writing them out.

At some point last week, I said to Amelia, "It's better to give than to receive."  She replied, "It's definitely better to receive than to give."  It is pretty great to receive, especially when you are 4 and a half!