The Saturday 7

4 days til Christmas!!!! It's been another fun week of preparation and celebration!

1. On Sunday, Levi got to perform in his first Christmas "program." He sang two songs on the stage in front of church. He waved when he first spotted us, but then he very seriously watched his teacher and sang his songs. My phone's awesome camera is not so awesome at zoomed in pictures, so this is the best I've got:

After church on Sunday we all went to Luke and Esther's house to celebrate Ruby's first birthday!

It had snowed just enough the night before to make the big hill in the backyard slick enough to slide down. The kids had a blast.

Watch out for the lake!

2. On Tuesday night we went to Justin's grandparents' for dinner followed by our annual trip to the gardens to see the trees and trains. I didn't take very many pictures, and I hate this picture of me, but it's the best we got.

Posing with the tree from our motherland. (The Netherlands)

3. I finally finished the 5th Harry Potter book this week. I've started it roughly six times, but finally decided to power through it. One of my goals for this year was to read all of Harry Potter, and it's the only one of this year's resolutions that seems at all attainable at this point, so I need to hurry up and finish! Book 5 was 901 pages.

I'm still not loving them. I'm sorry. They're ok. I like watching the movie after reading the book, and doing so makes me realize how rich and deep the books are compared to the little bit the movie touches on. But I'm still annoyed by Rowling's formulaic writing style. I've got 10 days to zip through the last two. They've got to be the most intense, right? I should be able to get through them over Christmas break. Then I can get back to my regularly scheduled fluff. 😁

Only one more to go to reach my goal of 75 for the year!

4. This was the girls' last week of school before Christmas break. Hallelujah! Don't get me wrong. I love them going to school, but I hate getting them up, ready, and there every day. Haha. I'm excited to sleep in next week and stay in my warm house! Anyway, it worked out really nicely this year that Lucy and Lena's class parties were not on the same day, so I didn't have to hustle back and forth between them. Also, I wised up and sent Levi to my mom's both days so I didn't have to chase him around either. I was just able to enjoy my kids and help out at the party.

Pin the nose on the snowman

I actually planned most of Lucy's party. I was stupidly nervous that the kids would think everything was lame, but they seemed to enjoy it, and it went really well! Unfortunately, because I was "running" things, I didn't take any pictures. Oops!

5. Last night Justin took the kids to a movie, so I could have 2 solid hours to watch Harry Potter and wrap their presents. I had 3 left when they walked in. But I finished them last night, hauled them to Niki's today, and am feeling ready for Christmas!!

6. And today was "cookies with cousins!"