Christmas 2011



Our beautiful and silly family



All the cousins at Aunty Emily's house



  

                             

Lining up in height order

 


Papa John telling stories

  



Chloe wrote a letter to Santa asking him to come back tomorrow for more cookies.  We were only able to make one kind on Christmas Eve.  She also drew him a map on how to get into the house since we don't have a chimney

     

Chloe was VERY excited to see Santa and his reindeer had eaten the cookies, drank the milk AND tried the seaweed we put out for them. 



So excited to open gifts Christmas morning! 

*note how she is fully dressed*

Chloe absolutely has to do her morning routine

before we can go downstairs for Christmas. 



Trying on her new pajamas, pillow pet, and overalls.  "JUST

what she'd been asking for!!"  She was all smiles.

  


After we opened gifts we started doing some of the fun Christmas Day crafts that Santa had given in Chloes stocking.  I got this amazing photo of her while she was finishing a wooden ornament.

Whenever she spells ornament its "ordamet". 



Letters with Santa

These are the adorable letters and pictures Chloe left for Santa this year. 

 "Come through the back door.  We got rid of the chimney." 

"Back Door." 

"Front Door, where you are."

"P.S. Walk to the back door." 

"Fried Seaweed.  Yummm"

(The sticky note she left so she could give Santa and the reindeer a taste of seaweed, which she loves.)

By Chloe Rhodes

Come back tomorrow.  There will be gingerbread cookies on the counter.  Please come back tomorrow. 

I love Christmas.  Thank you.  I love you, Santa. 

She was so excited to find this letter from Santa in her stocking with her gifts!!

Piper Puppy

Here is Piper Puppy eating a cucumber.  She was such a silly little girl, always ready for playtime.  

She found a quarter

Chloe was at gymnastics last week and as we were leaving she came up to me holding a quarter she'd found and asked what she should do with it. 
I asked her what she thought she should do.  She said she wasn't really sure, but that she wanted to give it to Abby. 
I suggested we ask if there was any policy about finding items or money to give to the office.  When we found out that she could keep it, she was so excited to give it to Abby when we got home. 
I don't think it even crossed her mind to keep it. 

Colors get married

From Shell:
Chloe: You know what would make sense? For a red circle and a yellow circle to get married and have an orange baby.

I love how this kid thinks!

Drawing in the van

For a couple days Chloe was drawing in the van every time we went anywhere.  I love that she is so creative.  Here are some of her masterpieces.

She's so smart, among other wonderful things.

Chloe was playing a reading game on his iphone: Chloe: "My dad's phone doesn't know how smart I am."

We recently had a teacher conference. Chloe is above levels in all areas: reading, writing, math. She colored some pictures for her teacher yesterday and put a bunch of math problems on the back for her to include: 2+3=5 an the like. But also: 7+7=14, 6+6=12, 100+100=200, etc. She does a perfect job on all her math assignments and has time to do word and picture problems on the back of her pages. She wrote numbers up to 100 with zero mistakes within an allotted time that most kids don't finish in.
She is just excelling in every area, and I'm so proud of her.
This morning while she was having quiet time before we got up, she folded and put away her own laundry without being asked. I really love having such a responsible, clean-conscious little girl.
She told me they are having a pajama drive at school and she wanted to give some of her own money for the drive. So she got out her piggy bank and got money to brig to school. She also went through her books and is donating the ones she doesn't want anymore. She is generous, and thoughtful, and loving.
I'm bursting with pride today.

Grey hair

I told Chloe she gave me grey hair and she said "But I don't have any."

Halloween 2011

Halloween 2011

We had such a fun and creative halloween!  I talked to Chloe far ahead of time about what she wanted her costume to be.  She told me she wanted to be an alien.  So I concieved this fun, and pretty costume idea with googley eyes, shimmery dresses and feathers.  Then we went shopping and picked out the fabrics together.  As we were shopping she decided that she was not only an alien, but an "alien princess".  I spent the majority of one weekend sewing and testing, and mistaking and sewing and consulting with her.  She was so excited every step of the way.  As I got each element of her costume done, she wanted to wear it around the house.  When Halloween came, she was so excited to get her costume on after school. First we visited Grandma Kris and Papa John and got some trick or treats from them.  Then we went to the community halloween party at Bloedel Donovan Park and she had fun playing the games and winning small prizes.  Part way through the festivities at the park, she discovered the face painting booth.  She asked to be painted like a tyranosaurous rex.  From there on she was no longer an alien princess but an "alien princess baby t-rex"  We finshed the fun at the party and then went home to our neighborhood for some trick-or-treating. At first when she started going around to the houses she was bashful to approach the door.  I told her we believed in her and that if she wanted to trick or treat, she needed to do it.  Abby and I stood out at the sidewalk and waited for her. Even though she was nervous, for the first couple houses, after that she was excited and running up the walks.  One of the neighbors had some "mommy candies" for us- truffles! She was telling each house about her alien princess baby t-rex costume, and many of them told her it was the best and/or most creative costume they'd seen all evening.  Chloe was confident and excited.  Our Cul-de-sac was the perfect number of houses for candy and timing.  We made our way back to our house and as it was nearing bed time.  In the morning, I tried to tease Chloe that Abby and I had eaten all of her candy the night before, but I didn't trick her for a second.  She'd already seen her stash. 

Wobcops

Wobcops? Who knew! :)
I love this.

Wearing all the Clothes

One day we were all joking around about wearing silly outfits and things that were opposite of what you'd want to wear.  Abby ran upstairs to "get ready" to go and came down in various funny outfits that made no sense one of them was a bathing suit and a big winter vest.  We were laughing so hard together.  I took a turn and put on something crazy mixing pajamas and scarves and boots.
Then Chloe decided to put on some crazy clothes and this is what she came up with.  My big, fuzzy robe, a work vest, my rain jacket and Abby's winter coat.  It was super funny to see her trying to walk around and move with all of that on.

First grade School Photo

Here she is!!  The big first grader! 

Here she i