A Clean, Almost Ready House!!!

After months and months of dust and dirt from all of the hard work that went into putting our house together, it is all clean and that much closer for us to move in.  Steve and I met some new neighbors tonight with 5 children and we really liked them!  Our walk thru is next week, closing on Thursday and move in on Friday!  We started this whole process about a year ago and had NO idea that it would take all of this time.  It has been such a fun and rewarding adventure as Steve and I have chosen everything down to the color of the electrical outlets, not knowing how it would look altogether and now finally seeing the finished product.  There are a few more small details here and there that they will fix this next week and after we move in but the house is pretty much ready for us to move in!

Sod is going in probably tomorrow and we have a backyard.  Tonight when we stopped by the house, Luke made a run for it when we opened the front door.  A minute later I asked where he was and Steve, Joe and I looked up and saw him running back and forth on the new back patio.  It was awesome how excited these kids are to have a yard!  Too bad we are not supposed to walk on the sod for 3-6 months.... that will be pretty hard!

Growth Spurt

Sydney has grown more than 3 inches in 6 months!  She is 94th percentile in height and 49th in weight.  She is estimated to be between 5'6 and 5'10 when she is older. 

House update: less than 2 weeks to go

Garage doors have been painted, concrete on the back patio has been poured but still needs to be scored.  Hardwoods will be unveiled this Wednesday and the cleaners come in on Thursday to get the house ready for us.  Haven't yet heard about landscaping but i would imagine that would happen this week as well. 

Christmas Card 2012

Steve and I took this photo of the kids at Richmond Beach in Edmonds, WA.  It was a very hazy morning!

Santa's Visit 2012

Santa found us at our hotel this year thank goodness!  Mommy snuck and took these pictures before our Elf on the Shelf, Chi Chi flew back to the North Pole to be with Santa.  He will be missed but we look forward to seeing him next year.  Some of the favorite gifts this year was Ava's Pink Barbie Unicorn, Vacation House, Luke's Remote Control Monster Truck, Mailbox, Angry Birds Star Wars Jenga Game,  and Sydney's hoodie's, tights and socks.  The kids are also loving Daddy's new keurig coffee maker for the yummy hot chocolate it makes. We celebrated Christmas day with our dear friends, The Blekan's.  Megan made an amazing meal for us and we all enjoyed each other's company.

Ava's Cake Pops

I am finally back to blogging.  My A/C adapter died and we have been living in a whirlwind as we packed up everything and moved to a hotel for a few weeks.  Living at our hotel has been the simple life and we are all really enjoying it.  I don't have a house to clean so I have been spending some quality time with the kids playing games they received from Santa for Chrismas and playing with new toys.

Back to my post, Before we moved out, the kids and I made cake pops for Ava's birthday.  They were a little hard to make as they wanted to fall apart when we dipped them in chocolate but I ended up finding a work around.  I used a knife to spread the melted chocolate on them.  They were red velvet cake mashed with cream cheese icing and they had a special vanilla chocolate coating on them with sparkles that Ava picked out.  Ava's birthday was the same day as her Christmas Sing a long.  The kids all enjoyed the cake pops before.  I think we will be making these instead of cupcakes for a while.

Doors are installed!

7 hours later....

A very empty house :(  bittersweet.  The movers did an amazing job moving our ginormous furniture.

Moving day

It's been a crazy few days but we finally got everything packed with Pop Pop's help and we will be checking into the hotel soon.  Today is the last day of school for the kids till January 3rd...yay! 

Sisters

Ava and Sydney have so much fun together these days.  Ava just loves being the older sister and has so much patience with her feisty lil sis. Here they are playing Dress up and dolls.  Sydney is OBSESSED with her bitty babies right now.

Ava's 4th Birthday Party

Ava had her special birthday party on Sunday, December 9th.  She invited 4 of her girlfriends and their Mommies to have lunch at the American Girl Store.  We have never eaten there before so did not know what to expect.  We couldn't of been any happier with it!  The girls each got a goody bag with a shirt for their AG, a cup and plate to feed their AG, a plastic purple balloon and stickers.  Everyone got to chose an appetizer and entree for lunch and we all got ice cream and cake for dessert.  Ava looked so happy this year when everyone sang "Happy Birthday" to her.  It was a great time!  She and I went and had manicures before our lunch.  Daddy stayed at home with Sydney and Luke and we brought home some cake for them.  Ava told me the next morning that it was the best birthday ever and was so genuinely Thankful for it.  I am so proud of my little 4 year old... she deserved being a princess for the day!

School Pictures 2012/2013

The girls just had their preschool pictures done a couple weeks ago.   They turned out cute.  I wish Sydney was smiling big enough t show her dimples, but I am happy that she isn't showing tonsils in this one!  I do not have a digital copy of Luke's picture or a scanner so I took a picture with my phone, not the best copy but oh well.

 Ava's teacher, Mrs. Fortney has watched Sydney grow up from the time she was in my belly until now.  She was watching her on the playground yesterday and she was telling me how funny Sydney is.... that she has so much attitude.  I guess she fell down and she got right up, brushed herself off and started clapping for herself.  She definitely is an original... that Sydney Bean of ours!

Ava sitting between her 2 BFF's- Pea and Nicolas

Santa Picture 2012

I really thought we were going to get 3 big smiles this year but that definitely did not happen.  Sydney was having an off morning and told me as soon as she saw Santa that she would not be sitting on his lap.  But Ava....  I really have no idea what happened.  She would not smile for the camera and when I asked her why she didn't, she said it was because she wanted Mommy.  Oh well, makes for yet another Santa picture filled with lots of character!  Thank you for smiling so cute, Luke!