A Little Christmas Preview

While I have been away from blogging, I have been enjoying the weeks that lead up to Christmas.  A lot of time was spent with family, friends and in the stores!  I have some great stories and pictures of Christmas Day that I will share later.  For now, here is a preview involving Christmas crafts and jammies!

 So proud of his Christmas chain!

 Cheese!

(you can also see the Santa ornament he made)

 Can't forget about this precious little girl!

Christmas jammies!

 

A Very Harry Birthday

For Ella's 11th birthday we decided to celebrate in a magical fashion.  Ella has read (and loved!) the series and has been working her way through the movies.  We (Frank parents and I) thought that she would love to celebrate her birthday with the Harry Potter theme.  Thanks to my insane love for Harry, Dan and Reb's creativity and inspiration from my friend Kelly, the party was starting to come together.  It was a surprise and the week before, a letter was delivered to the fireplace inviting Ella to attend Hogwarts and to attend a party to celebrate her acceptance.  There are a lot of pictures, so sit back and enjoy!

After Ella arrived, the first thing that needed to be done was the house sorting, receive her class schedule (had the list of things to do at the party) and get her wand.  Ella was excited to be placed in Gryffindor and look at her class schedule.

 I played the role of DumbleKenzie!

 Checking out the class schedule

 The wands

 The happy Gryffindor

We first needed to attend Potions class.  Our teacher was Professor Vaniverus Severus.  She was a good teacher, although she had a hard time teaching and doing the potions herself!

After potions class, we visited Weasley's Wizard Wheezes run by Fred Weasley.

We played with exploding canisters

Next we went to Honeydukes and The Three Broomsticks for some refreshments.  All of my food pictures turned out really bad, but Rebekah did a great job making food from Harry Potter!  We had cauldron cakes, chocolate frogs, Botts jelly beans and cockroach clusters.

 
We finished our time with cake, presents, the Harry Potter Scene It game and a Harry Potter movie.

 Ella "lit" the candles on her cauldron cakes

Thank you Ella for letting me be a part of your birthday party.  

I think it was as much fun for me as it was for Ella!

Happy Birthday Ella Sue!

Ella is 11 years old!

Picture credit: jamie hudson photography

Ella loves animals, enjoys school, plays the clarinet, is detail oriented,

likes to eat bread and loves raw spinach, still calls me Meme, plays video games with Josiah,

is silly-crazy, kind, tender-hearted, a great big sister, loves Jesus and her family!

Ella, you are a beautiful girl with a big heart.

Happy Birthday Ella Sue!

Stay tuned!  Details on the Potter Party are coming soon!

Looking to the Past

This past Friday night I got to spend the evening with "my kids".  Anyone who knows me, knows which kids I am talking about.  Josiah, Ella and Vani are some of my favorite kids and I love getting to play "in-town auntie" to them!  While I was baby-sitting them (can I even say that anymore?  They watch themselves nowadays.) I had my laptop with me.  While I had it out, we looked through my Picasa files and watched all the random videos I had of them.  It literally brings tears to my eyes when I realize what a special part I have been in their lives.  From birthdays to school programs to lazy days in the backyard, I have been there for a lot of it.  I feel truly blessed.  Since these 3 kids are so cute (or at least they used to be until they got sassy with the mouth) I thought I would share some of our favorite videos!

In the first video, Josiah is in first grade waiting at the airport for Dad, Mom and new sister Vani to come home from India!  In the second video, Ella is 4 1/2 and it is also at the airport.  In the final video, Vani is 3 celebrating her birthday and singing the birthday song herself!

Man, I love these kids!