This weeks dance pics

A day of dance

We started off Tuesday with a whole lot of dancing! The girls have a friend Joecy who is in dance classes and they had a "bring your friend" day, so Cambry went to class with Joecy and had a blast. They were so cute doing kicks across the floor and really following the teachers instructions. They danced for an hour then we went to Jamba Juice to give the girls a bit of recovery time and then off too our next ballet class! This weeks dance class was a hoot to watch. The girls got to wear tutus and fairy wings. I'm pretty sure tiny Brielle was wearing two tutus at one time. They were having such fun! I really thought Colbie was going to have a hard time being dropped off into a class by herself because of her history being dropped off at the gym or church nursery, but when it's for dancing she is too excited. I tried to be sneaky and get a video of them and you can see her see me.

Cambry and Joecy

Brielle
Colbs in her Flashdance attire.

The video

Makin Lemonade

As many of you know the girls Uncle Mike is going to India in February. The girls and I have been talking about ways to raise money for him, and my little entrepreneurs decided upon having a lemonade stand. They were so excited! We up our stand and made some really awesome Country Time Strawberry Lemonade, and we waited for our first transaction. Their cute friend Joecy came to help them and I'm pretty sure her sweet mom, Kristin, was our first transaction. After that it was slow going for a while (other than my family which all conveniently live in the neighborhood and dropped by), but business picked up and the stand was hoppin for a while. We even had one man give us $5 which was a huge tip since we were charging 25 cents. We made a grand total of $17.65. Probably not going to get Mike to far, but I think it's probably one of his favorite donations. If you are interested in his preparation for the trip and his journey you can read about it at www.toindiawego.com. We love Uncle Monkey!

Uncle Mike dropping by the stand.

Dance, Dance, Dance

Tuesday will go down in history as one of my favorite days as a mom. BOTH of my babies were signed up for a ballet class! When Cambry was in class by herself Colbie wanted to dance some much she could hardly take it and now it was her time to shine too. Her smile was huge when she was in class! Best of all, their cousin Brielle was in the class too so the three girls had a blast! I did not get the best pictures of all three of them together, but we have seven more weeks so don't worry.

Getting ready to leave for class. On all other days Colbie refuses headbands, but she insisted on wearing one to her dance class.

Finally at class and the three cousins are waiting for their names to be called.

Proud of her name tag.

I'm sure Cambry was asking when her solo was.

Goofing off afterwards.

This picture is my favorite of the day. At home I told Colbie to pose like a ballerina and she had the most serious face and tried so so hard to get one leg crossed over the other like in this picture. That is her "ballerina" move I guess, and she showed it to me again after class. I love how serious she was about it.

And of course little Brae was dressed like a ballerina hanging out with Cindy and I while the girls were in class.

An escalating problem

Okay, remember I told you in a previous post that there was a bit of an "incident" that happened while I was buying The Elf on the Shelf book and that I would post about it later? Well, it's later.

Let me set the scene. It took place in a giant Barnes and Noble store at the San Tan Mall which is super close to our home. I took the girls there to let them look at books, and play and to secretly come home with an elf. We played, we read books, we rode the giant escalator up and back down, so I only had one last thing to do: Purchase The Elf on a Shelf. The girls new we were getting the book, but I could not let Cambry see that the elf actually came with the book because he was supposed to magically appear at our house from the North Pole, and being bought at a Barnes and Noble did not seem magical at all. The display for Elf on a Shelf was on a tall wall that at one time had been full of books and was now down to the last five on the bottom row. I noticed that you could get your elves with different traits like lighter or darker hair, different eye color, or different skin tones. I really wanted one with super dark hair and blue eyes because it reminded me of Drew, so I was on my knees trying to go through the boxes trying to secretly peek into them without the girls seeing that the elf was in the box. I told the girls to stand right by me. I thought we were in the perfect spot because the display wall was away from all of the other bookshelves so their would be no pulling-every-book-off-the-shelf game going on while my back was turned. Just the display with a nice place for the girls to stand right next to me blocked in by the escalator going up. Perfect. Until I hear the blood curdling scream. I looked next to me and Colbie was standing there just as I told her, but no Cambry. I followed the sound of the scream and looked up and saw Cambry dangling on the outside of the escalator!!!! No joke. She had grabbed onto the outside of the escalator and was too scared to let go so it carried her up. I don't know exactly how high she was but I had to reach up to get her, so she was over my head. The display wall was the only thing that stopped her from being taken all the way to the second floor!!! She was bashing her head on the display wall and screaming as the escalator rail was slipping through her hands. Scariest moment of my life? Maybe. I reached up and got her down, grabbed Colbie and ran out the store. Once outside I inspected every inch of her. She had a goose egg on her noggin, but that was all. Mostly, she was scared out of her mind. Me too. We got ourselves together enough to go back in and by the Elf on the Shelf and go. (We got a medium dark hair on with blue eyes, but that's okay - we all lived which was a bonus) Surprisingly, Cambry got back on the same escalator the next day with no fear. Granted, she was holding my hand riding on the inside which I imagine is much less scary than dangling from the outside.

Christmas 2011

I just don't think that Christmas can get any better than this year! Oh, these kids were so excited and so cute! On Friday, Christmas Eve Eve, we went to Tucson to hang out with our family there. Uncle Will was wearing an amazing Christmas sweater! We traveled back the next morning and had a day with just the four of us. Christmas Day we had our own little Christmas and went to my parents house in the afternoon. It was perfect hanging out with family and watching the girls open their presents.

Christmas morning at our home.

Some awesome super girl outfits that Aunt Cindy made! The morning after Christmas Cambry sat up in bed and her first words were "Where's my cape?"

Thanks to all of our family for making this the best Christmas. We are so blessed to be able to have each and every one of you in our lives. We love you!