Gingerbread Houses and Friend's Christmas

These gingerbread houses kept the kiddos occupied for a few hours during our first day of Christmas Break.  I was so thankful to have the Friday before Christmas off.  It's a great day to get any last minute things done before the craziness begins.

Last year, we got the kids separate houses and that seemed to work out better!  Much less arguing this way!

Then, that night, we celebrated Christmas with the Davis, Frye, and Faller families.  We had a yummy meal of prime rib and the kids got to decorate cookies for Santa.  This is always such a fun memory!

Another Eaglebots Win, Matt's Birthday, and Christmas Concerts

The Eaglebots did it again!  Got 1st and 2nd place in their second tournament on Dec. 1 with a combined high score in the state!  It is so fun to watch all their hard work pay off.  Congrats!

We also celebrated Matt's 41st birthday!  He is so special to our family so we were happy to celebrate him!

We have been going to Nappanee Missionary Church since August, but the kids REALLY wanted to take part in the Christmas Play at Union Center.  So, for most of October and November they had practices on Wednesday and Saturday.  They both played the part of toy farmers in a toy shop.

The kiddos did a great job and the set was amazing as always!

They didn't have big parts, but they enjoyed being a part of the production.

2 days after the church performance was the school concert.  Emerson had several lines that she had auditioned for.  She did a great job speaking.  This will probably be her area of expertise!  She's a great performer!

After the concert

Oh, Christmas Tree...

Our annual trip to the Christmas Tree Farm was a little different this year.  We were worried we wouldn't have time the first weekend in December so we went a week early on the way home from West Lafayette.  We stopped in a little town called Idaville on the way home.  The place was really cute!  The kids were disappointed that we couldn't see Santa and Landon even asked if we were still going to Eby Pines.  So, I guess we'll go back to the normal place next year.  But it was a fun change.

The kids are always so great with decorating (and undecorating) the tree each year.  They always like to put on their special ornaments and I have gotten much less OCD when it comes to the "perfect" tree.  Ours was a little too short, a little bald in a spot, and ornaments were way too close together.  But it was perfect for us!

The finished product....let the Christmas season begin!

Thanksgiving and Purdue Basketball

We went to dad and mom's for Thanksgiving this year.  It was nice to have Todd and Cathy join us too!  We had a great day with LOTS of food.  The kids enjoyed watching the parade and playing together!

 Landon played us some Christmas songs on the piano.

 Cathy brought some ornaments for the kids to make.

 The next day, we headed down to West Lafayette for a basketball game.

10 year old boys are so silly!

 The kids were so excited because we came down on a Friday so they had all day Saturday to play with Gunnar and Clella!  The girls enjoyed dressing up and boys played Mario Cart.

Honor's Assembly, Snow Day, and Robotics

 I got to sneak out of class for a few minutes to see Landon and Emmy get their awards at the Honor's Assembly.  Landon earned Perfect Attendance and High Honor Roll.   Emerson earned Honor Roll.  We are so proud of both of our fourth graders for their hard work so far this year!

Landon caught me before I went back to class and said, "Aren't you going to take my picture mom?" 😘

 We had our first Snow Day of the year on November 15th, which is so early!  It was also the night if Parent/Teacher Conferences so those had to be rescheduled for another night.  But we had a grand day at home.  The kids played outside for HOURS together in the snow.  It was a 30 degree day and a lot of snow,  perfect for playing in!

 Landon had his first Robotics Tournament in North Liberty.  He had to be at the school at 6:45 am and we didn't really have any idea what to expect.  We learned a lot about the scoring and how things worked.  Landon's job is to check with the team we are working with to see what their robot can do so the kids can make a plan to try to get as many points as possible.   He loves it and loves practice.  Woodview's teams did great!  Red team got 1st and Blue team got 2nd.  They qualified for the State Competition in March.  They also won the teamwork, design, and excellence awards!  Their hard work and dedication was so apparent!  Way to go!

Basketball, Snow, and Serving

Landon always wants to do ALL the camps/sports/whatever is offered through the school, so he had fun doing the Panther Baskeball camp for 4 nights.

Last Friday (Nov. 9th), we had our first snowfall of the year.

On Saturday, we had the opportunity to make meals with NMC for Feed My Starving Children.  We worked together to fill bags of food to be delivered all over the world.  It's always a great time serving others as a family!