Ella~6 years old

Ella Bella, you are NOT your sister even though you look alike.  You are ornery and my little firecracker.  You love to be silly and you are the jokester.  You definitely like to follow your sisters lead, but still manage to beat to your own drum.  I am noticing a little competition in you when it comes to your sister.  I can handle a little competition if it pushes you both to your best.  You love to show off what you've learned in school and your favorite subjects are "math, reading, art, gym, science and music"  I do believe that is all them this year :-)  You are my go with the flow kinda girl. You have told me you want to learn how to play guitar and piano and I am A-OK with those choices. 

Ella still has to wear her braces at night for her club feet.  We are trying to keep her on them as long as we can.  She is starting to get an opinion about them, but so far still wearing them.  However, this is the last size of braces they have so once she outgrows them, we will be done with them.  I hope and pray that your feet and legs maintain what we have done and that you don't have to undergo a surgery.  Not that it would stop you because you are a bit feisty too. 

You my girl can grow a little, but not older!  I do NOT want you to grow up.  I love your spunk, your style and your behind the scenes shenanigans you do.  I love you so much!!

 

Josie~6 years old

 Josie, where do I begin to describe this girl.  She is kind, sensitive and very motherly-this hasn't changed.  But the blossoming personality that is coming out, I like.  Josie is very inquisitive and asks lots of questions.  She really wants to know what's going on and when.  I think she's going to be my PLANNER!!  Her imagination is quite large.  She always has GRAND ideas for art projects and experiments and things to do.  She is really becoming very observant (which isn't always for the best) and her memory is unbelievable to me.  She can now recall things from over year ago.  She is smart and has a zest for learning and enjoys school. 

Josie I love you to the moon and back!  I love watching you grow, but you have now had strict instructions to stop!  I want to freeze you where you are right now! I hope you always know how strong you, how smart you are and how loved you are!  I hope you ROCK 6 like you have your mom and dads lives! 

 
 
 
 
 

Birthday Girls

 September 17th, 2018--My girls are 6yo.  It seems like yesterday we were in the hospital awaiting to take them home.  Although the past 6 years seem to have flown and I have really caught myself enjoying this stage with them.  I've enjoyed many of the other ages, but kindergarten seems to be pretty great.  The girls are independent with most things, I can trust them, they communicate well and yet are still so very innocent and fun. 

 

We started the day cinnabuns or in this case cinna6 buns.  They loved it

 

The girls before their Christmas concert at school

They're 6!!

 

Although Joey and I don't celebrate their birthday until June, they still got to open a few gifts.  We also went out to dinner and the waitresses sang and clapped for their birthdays.  And what birthday wouldn't be complete with out taking birthday treats in to school.  They had a great birthday and presents to open will be here soon at Christmas :)

 

Dance

The girls have been taking a combination tap and ballet class this year.  I never see them dancing at home, but are always willing to go to class. I did get a few videos of them dancing: the first is a sneak video from the door and then second video is a little Christmas performance at the end of class.  I love the concentration.

 

 

Christmas Party

An annual tradition over the years has been the John Deere Christmas party!  And 2018 wasn't any different.  Here is this years picture and then a collage looking back throughout all the years!  Same great date that I know and love! 

 

Feast of St. Nick

 I really feel like we are the only family that celebrates St. Nicks day.  I will continue to do it as well.  This year St. Nick left matching Christmas PJs and some candy.  The kids were very excited.

 

Eli was VERY excited but even MORE when he saw the candy.  He didn't really care at all about the PJs

And of course, we would get pictures in our Christmas PJs

Snow Days

We got home just before the snow storm and then it hit.  I am so glad we were not driving in it.  It came down fast and hard and so we had a snow day from school on Monday.  The kids couldn't wait to get out into the snow.  We built a fort, I pulled the kids in the sled, shoveled the driveway and of course we had hot cocoa!  It was a great day to be home.   

 

The neighbor kids came down and played as well.  It's always nice to have friends so close even when you can't drive.

Ella made snow "pancakes" for us. 

Eli just doesn't quite fit into the sled this year.  This is the last year with that sled

Eli loved the snow and was one of the first ones to want to go outside, he loves being outdoors.  I realized this snow how fun Eli is to watch explore the world.  I get so busy with life and sometimes Eli acts like a terrible 2yo and his innocence of enjoying the simple things like the snow gets lost.  I am really trying to focus more on the fact that the kids really are small for only a little bit.

Thanksgiving

Well, we made it to Ohio again for thanksgiving this year.  It is so quick and such a long drive and now we have the girls school schedule to work around, it makes me wonder if we will keep doing this trip and this be our last.  And then this year a MAJOR snow storm was coming in on Sunday that would make us be driving thru snowpoculus the entire drive home.  so to avoid that we left Saturday night and drove late into the night to go home.  Traffic is GREAT when driving that late. 

 



We spent Thanksgiving day as usual at the Shultz side.  It's nice to see everyone and let the kids play.  The girls were very excited to see Sophia, they hadn't seen her since she stayed at our place this summer.  



Eli was feeling left out so he wanted in the picture

Eli had a great time with uncle Josh.  Eli really warms up to other guys pretty easy so it was no surprise he got along with uncle Josh.

Josie and Aunt Nancy.  Josh and Nancy hosted this year and everything was delicious-Thank you!

Uncle Joe and Lexie made it up too.  They stayed in a hotel so of course there was swimming.  We brought all the suits because we knew ahead of time. 

Eli and Lexie sure had fun and got along.  But poor Lexie wasn't feeling good and had a fever so she wasn't quite herself.  But with medicine, she would perk up.

Four little monkeys all in bed

We ate A LOT and we drove A LOT, but we still managed to get some play time in. 

Family Pic 2018

This year I did my family pictures.  Here they are.....the few good ones.  Turns out doing pictures with a tripod and little kids is hard. 

 

 

 

Josie wanted to take our pictures so I gave her my camera and here is our pictures she took!  Not bad!  I'm pretty impressed with her skills!

These kids!  So cute, so grown, so ornery!  Eli gives me a run for money most days, but this little stinker cooperated and looks so dang cute, its hard to stay mad at him! :)