The Dojo is moving!

I've decided to switch everyone's favorite blog (what?) to wordpress.  You can still count on the same quality, if not timeliness, of blog posts you've come to know.  Just think it will be a bit easier for me to manage over there.

Here's the new blog address.  Come on over!

http://starsinthedojo.wordpress.com/

New Years!

Guys.  I'm finally blogging about 2013 and we're about halfway through it.  Better late than never?  Side note: way easier to blog about something when it happened as opposed to 6 months after it happened.  Who knew?

We have a tradition of celebrating New Year's with our dear friends, The Albrights, and this year was no exception.  Well, there was an exception in 2009, which I like to blame on Brenda, but was really due to my slight insanity after the girls were born.  Another New Years tradition?  Jingle Juice.  Delicious and oh so festive.  We had a great time!

Jo is SO EXCITED to be celebrating with us!

We, on the other hand, appear to be undecided about 2013.

I call this "Jingle Juice with a twist of Brenda"

Christmas - Part 2

Then it was off to Mimi & Grandbob's house for more Christmas fun!  We took the girls to their first Christmas Eve service and they did such a great job.  Kate sat in Grandbob's lap most of the time and Elle sat next to me and colored - both were as sweet and quiet as can be!  It was a sweet memory for me being with my family and my girls on Christmas in the church I grew up in.  Santa came to visit, we opened more presents, ate our Christmas breakfast (delicious as always!) and had a wonderful visit with everyone!  It's the bees knees being a parent at Christmas.  3 year old faces lit up with excitement and squealing with joy.  Nothing quite like it.

Being silly on the couch with Gabby

The Christmas Lily

Christmas lights

Playing with the aforementioned flashlights before church!

More presents!

Puzzle-mania

Uncle P!

Enjoying their new "iPads"

Bubbles on Christmas morning

Shooting some hoops on their new goal

Playing "store" with Daddy & their new cash register

Santa Kate

Hanging out with Mimi & Mickey

Post-Christmas morning relaxing

The one pic I managed to capture of our visit with the Porters!  Kiddos in motion.  Anna showed the girls the bouncy house ropes. :)

Packed to the gills and asleep! 

Christmas - Part 1

As usual, we had a wonderful Christmas with our families this year!  All this talk of Christmas in May is making me want to break out my Christmas music.  HA!

We spent the first part of our "Christmas Break" with all the Burns and enjoyed every minute of it!  We played guitar, poker, opened presents, ate tasty food, played, watched Christmas Vacation and played some more!  We also had fun celebrating Grandma's birthday and playing "Dirty Santa".

Practicing their chords with Coco

Cousin Kade about to school everyone in poker

Clowning around with PeyPey

Presents!

Favorite present?

A flashlight!

They seriously loved them.  Still do!

Cousins!  Hello flash!

Kate trying to gallop away on Kade's horse

Time to make the Cookies!

Back to Christmas - I know.  It's totally ridiculous that it's May and I'm still on Christmas.  Hopefully I can get back on track soon!

So, it's totally fun creating traditions - you can't tell I think that yet, can you?  I loved them growing up and I want my girlies to have that too.  Or maybe I'll just listen to them say "Again, Mom??!!  Why do we have to make cookies AGAIN?!"  :)

We had a great time making them together this year.  They both did an excellent job rolling out the dough and cutting them out.  Then they waited oh-so-patiently for them to bake.  They actually did, which was a pleasant surprise!  They did, however, want to eat them immediately, but managed to hold off until we could decorate them with our friends.

Kate is a minimalist with the frosting and was way more interested in eating them with the hot chocolate we had made in the crock pot.  Elle was the opposite and was a decorating machine!  Very heavy-handed with the frosting.  :)  We listened to Christmas music, decorated and then had cookies & hot chocolate.  They had a great time with their friends and throughout the whole process! 

Rolling out the dough

Elle's turn

Patiently waiting for the cookies to bake

Not as patiently waiting for their friends to arrive!

Cookie Decorating Central

Love the cheeks in this picture!

Caroline hard at work!

Ella getting some ideas from across the table

Getting the wiggles out after decorating

May I help you?  I'm busy having hot chocolate.

Drained it!

Like I said - Elle was a machine!  A 2 plate effort

Kate's simple yet festive creations

We also made cornflake Christmas wreaths during Christmas.  I remember loving them when my Gabby made them, so these were sweet, nostalgic treats for me.  And the girls thought they were fun and delicious!

I couldn't find Kate, so Gloria the dog helped out.

Fun adding the "berries" aka red hots

Saying Goodbye

It's been a long time, I know.  It's been a hard time.  I lost a precious friend in February - 2 days after I last posted actually - and have just not felt like writing.  Oh, I've journaled about it quite a bit, because writing is a good release and cathartic and easier than talking sometimes - but there's something different about writing about it on a blog, you know?  But I felt like I wanted and needed to write something.  So I will just say, I miss my friend.  She was precious to me and to my family and we miss her so much.  Tracy was one of the best people I knew - one I looked to for advice, encouragement and who was always willing to provide both.  She had a tender heart, a generous spirit, an outlook on life that not many people do.  She touched my life and her legacy will be carried on in her amazing daughter and by all of the many people who loved her.  A woman of great faith in her Savior, I know she is at peace, but it is so hard for those of us left behind.  A quote that our minister uses every Sunday comes to my mind - "Love in your heart isn't put there to stay.  Love isn't love until you give it away."  She gave it away every day.  And I was so blessed to be one of the recipients of it.  Goodbye, my friend.  I love you.

Christmas Lights

Like last year, we headed to our nearby Market Village in Smyrna and checked out the Christmas lights with our friends Ella & Ms. Tracy.  The girls had lots of fun running around!  They had endless amounts of fun looking at these lights and also looking for other Christmas lights any time we were out and about around Christmas.  Never gets old hearing "Mommy, look at THOSE Christmas lights!" Everything is always new and always exciting with these two.  Love it.