Happy New Year!!

As you can see, we had a swinging partay to ring in the new year.

They don't really know what's going on, but they got to stay up late and eat junk food and have noisemakers and yell "happy new year!" a bunch.

So you know, that's like the ultimate in great days.

Don't you just hate when you try to get away from a new year's kiss so they tackle you and bestow it anyway?

Cheering or beating each other with noisemakers, your guess is as good as mine.

Wooz the party animal.

They're going to be up for 10 more minutes to (in the words of fina) "watch a ball fall out of the sky! Isn't that ridiculous?" (New year on the east coast, close enough for little guys.) Daddy already went to bed, but he gets a pass because you can be a bit of a party pooper if you spent all day getting chemo. And he stayed up through dinner and a "movie" and 2 board games, and even wore his new years crown the whole time, which is more than enough to make his little girls delighted.

Elf present

Fina was just sure she needed to buy Gideon the elf a present. I kept telling her no because I didn't want to have to deal with hiding it somewhere when the elf "goes home", but she went out shopping with grandma today and bought him a balloon at the dollar store. And she was so excited and adorable that I couldn't be angry. It's not a helium balloon, but a small balloon with a stick handle. And it's shaped like a snowflake, which is very thoughtful of her because elves probably like snowflakes, what with living in the land of ice and snow. We spent the whole rest of the day taking the balloon away from Eloise and giving it back to the elf.

So I strung it up like it's floating and he's going for a ride, because elves are magical enough to make their balloon float, right? Hopefully the weight of the balloon and elf don't break the thread or pull the hook he's tied to down overnight. It just has to stay up until after church, when we'll be heading off to my mom's house for Christmas.

In other news, Fina lost her first tooth tonight.

Turns out John is one of those people who is grossed out by loose teeth and by gap toothed grins. Also "the tooth fairy" is a little short on funds becuase I emptied all the change out of my wallet and she found it and put it in her little wallet, and it is probably frowned upon to give your kid money from their own piggy bank from the tooth fairy. The tooth was turning grey before it fell out, I don't know if that's normal or if she got punched and that's why it fell out. And it fell out when she was brushing her teeth and she almost let it go down the drain, but luckily she noticed in time and grabbed it. I don't know if I'm supposed to throw it away or keep it in a creepy tooth pouch in my jewelry box as a keepsake. I am going to err on the side of throwing away because eww, who wants to look at old dead teeth?

Truck

John's mom brought him his "merote" control truck, much to Fina's delight. She was sure that we'd need to buy a new battery, but we charged up the battery and it ran (although we had to buy 2 9v in addition to the rechargeable one it takes, because it was made in the 90s). John loved having a little minion around to retrieve it when he got it stuck in snow banks.

Apparently his sisters were never as amenable to such activities. Go figure.

Fina didn't mind (too much) that John is a remote control hog, she loved chasing it around.

Although I wasn't quite sure who was chasing who.

And eventually he did let her have a go at it. She came inside just glowing because she got to play with daddy.

Also today in the mail John's uncle sent us this super boring home video that John's grandpa (the one who writes the Christmas letters) shot one time when he was visiting. It's pretty much no talking but just slowly panning around the yard. Occasionally you can catch snippets of conversation in the background, but mostly it's just the sound of the wind blowing. At the end he filmed the kids a little bit, but apparently John was being a little shit head that day and kept running and hiding from the camera. There's one glorious scene where John's dad demonstrates how he chops logs with his really dull chainsaw and John makes an appearance when his dad drops a log and he runs in to pick it up for him and it looks like his head narrowly misses the chainsaw. The movie would be hilarious if you cut out most of the boring bits, although it might lose something because you wouldn't know that it was the "good parts".

Woo woo a trip to spokane

We drove down to Spokane to meet up with John's mom this weekend. John mapquested it and said "it's only 5 hours to Spokane, it won't be so bad!" 1. Mapquest actually says 5 hours 51 minutes, you don't understand rounding 2. We are traveling with children and every rest stop is going to be a production 3. It is the middle of winter and the roads are going to be terrible which will slow us down.

But his mom had never even met Eloise and really wanted to see John and the kids, so I gave in and we made the trek. And everyone thoroughly enjoyed themselves, even if we did end up having to stay an extra night because I couldn't bear to be back in the car on Sunday after driving all day Saturday.

John's mom had the worse end of the trip though, it's 10 hours from her house to Spokane and she was traveling with dogs. Everyone had a good time, but I was bad and forgot to get out my camera until John's mom was leaving so I got very posed pictures.

It's like when Dad's family gets together and they all stand in a line and you take their picture, but with more kids hoverhanding dogs and less line. Also I hadn't fixed anyone's hair yet so Eloise has the sheepdog look going on.

The greyhound apparently said something funny and distracted everyone so that the little dog could lick Eloise right in the face. He has trouble holding his licker.

Yet more Elf games

Fina got up this morning and said "Mommy, the elf is playing cards with Porkie and a moose wearing socks. And they got into the M&Ms!"

I darkly suspect Porkie of cheating for some reason. Bonus comedy option:

That angel looks rough. She's got a good poker face.

Elf shenanigans

John and I wanted to set the elf up photocopying his butt. Because that is hilarious, in case you didn't get the memo.

But we settled for the more kid friendly version, photocopying himself. The kids think it's hilarious, but he should have made 2 copies because they've spent the day fighting over who gets to color the photocopied elf. (And I moved him slightly after it printed, plus I don't want to waste more ink, plus I had to shut the printer off to make the light go off.)

Stuffed animals

I made this raccoon for my nephew for Christmas. I liked him.

He's simple, but nice. I made up the pattern as I went along.

But then I made this leopard for his sister. I was afraid it would be too hard because it had lots of pieces and confusing instructions.

But it went together really nice. And it doesn't really even look handmade. I'm afraid the raccoon will seem cheesy in comparison.

Elf on the Shelf

I don't want to be all "that guy" and clog up everyone's facebook feed with pictures of my elf on the shelf every day, but I can't help but take pictures of him sometimes when I feel I was particularly clever with placing.

Fishing in the fish tank.

Having breakfast.

Fi had to sit down and eat with him. They had a nice visit.

I think we interrupted his grooming ritual, he looks like he's just gotten out of the shower.