Pinkalicious

Amelie picked out this all-pink outfit and wanted me to take a picture.

James insisted that he be in the picture, too, so I ran with it, even though they're being goofy.

Not quite as goofy as this one, though! (And you'll notice the bare tree -- I got my shopping done relatively early this year, but didn't wrap a single thing until Christmas eve. Eek.)

Magic Tree

We went to the magic tree on Christmas Eve and drove around looking for lights afterward.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas, blog readers!

Keep reading if you'd like to see all of the pictures that didn't make the Christmas card this year :)

I got this nutcracker decoration at an after-Christmas sale in Bernie at the Dollar Tree. Isn't it awesome? James is a little shorter than the nutcracker. Amelie is basically the same size.

James and Amelie's schools both had pajama parties on the day before Christmas break, so we got these fun PJ's.

Done!

Vibraphone

Sam is playing this tonight at the Christmas Eve service at church:

Christmas Program

Ready, Set, Learn! had their Christmas program last Tuesday. I didn't get any good pictures, which is kind of the point of the Christmas program :) James knows ALL the words to ALL the songs, but he didn't sing (or at least, not so that anyone could hear him).

There were cookies and milk afterward and the kids chowed down.

Amelie got sick the first day of Christmas break (and of course I'd already told the kids we could go to Bonkers. We made popcorn and watched a Christmas movie on TV instead). Her friend Hattie, who was supposed to go with us, also came down with a cold -- I figure they picked it up at school.

It's just a snotty cold, but so far she's missed a solstice party, my work party, and now she's going to miss the pageant and carols at church tonight. (And it's a tradition!) I think she can go to the magic tree afterward (also tradition) since that's outdoor and we won't be interacting with the other kids/families.

Leg Brace & Nutcracker

Two posts in one with this one.

Three Saturdays ago, Amelie woke up in a lot of pain. She cried out to me from bed, and said that her legs hurt. I thought that she was having growing pains, but then she was unable to walk. I thought maybe she'd get better over the course of the morning, but if anything, she seemed to get worse, so we got to urgent care at about 10:30. The doctor there manipulated her legs, which really hurt her, and wanted to send her to the hospital for x-rays and blood tests.

Long story short, we went home from the ER with a leg brace and instructions to get a wheelchair, since kids apparently can't use crutches very well until they're about 8 and she wasn't supposed to put any weight on it.

Aunt Holly, Amelie and I all had tickets to go see The Nutcracker ballet on Monday night. This is Amelie before we left:

And this is her when we got back, drinking cocoa. She loved it. After a particularly impressive bit of ballet (throwing the ballerina up in the air), she yelled out "Do it again!" I think next year, we can take James, too.

We couldn't get a follow-up with the pediatric orthopedic clinic until Wednesday, when we learned that she hadn't broken her kneecap after all. They said that she has a bipartite patella (so it just looked like a fracture, but really was always in two pieces) and probably had transient synovitis, which would explain her good spirits and how well she responded just to ibuprofen.

The school  wanted a release to normal activity, which they gave for the following Monday, but the receptionist wrote "fracture healed," which was not entirely accurate :)

Lunch

Sam made this lovely, pinterest-y lunch for the kids (apple slices, cheese quesadilla, leftover roast). Amelie ate about half of hers (as usual) and James dipped everything in ketchup (even the apple slices). Yum! Ha!

Belated Playdate

I shared these photos with Carly's mom (and I guess therefore I thought I had made a blog post about them) anyway, pictures from our playdate at the end of the summer.

The friend is pretty much exactly halfway in age between Amelie and James, and she played with both of them.

Look at that face!

This was the second time they played outside that day -- the first time there was a disagreement over the correct way to build a fort and Amelie had to have some alone time.

When Carly left, she said she didn't have fun because Amelie didn't want to play with her, and I was flabbergasted because they'd played and played and had a grand time. I didn't figure that when Amelie had the time-out that Carly would take it so personally!

James poking around in the dirt.

Aunt Helen

My great-aunt Helen turned 101 on October 12th. Can you believe it? 101! She looks pretty serious here:

But there she is laughing:

I took a video of James going in for a kiss. He might have been scheming about how to get a bite of her cupcake here. 

Now Aunt Tara is the one being silly.

We had cupcakes and drinks at the Stokelan Drive Nursing Home - Grandma Doris, Uncle Kerry, and Aunt Cheryl.

This is a little more representative of what the kids did during the party:

There were many selfies:

Awww, how sweet. I thought Andrew gave me his email to send this picture, but I can't find it - can someone contact me with his information? Andrew - if you're reading, you can leave a comment & I can get back to you.

Nana Jana and Aunt Helen:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!