Waiting for daddy

On Monday nights, I keep the girls up for an extra 30 minutes so we can pick up daddy from school. Sometimes that extra 30 minutes gets really tough. So one night after Family Night and showers, we went to Barnes and Nobles for some light reading until it was time to pick up daddy!

Lou Who found a friend to share the book with!

 But apparently she needed more friends and there must have been some insubordination because she ended up having to teach them who was boss!

Meanwhile the cutie Curly enjoyed her Dora book!

Thanksgiving

We had a really fun Thanksgiving! Though we missed our families, we are grateful for some new friends who invited us to spend it with them. 

The extent of our Thanksgiving decorations at our home!

 Our lovely host and hostess did an amazing job decorating for our dinner though!

Our glorious feast!

I took this picture later, but these were the cute turkeys on our plates!

After dinner we played minute to win it and it was so much fun! I wished I had taken more pictures, but here is Curly and her friend trying to do one of the events of putting multiple Penne pasta on spaghetti noodles with their mouths.

 Here's one of Haans' events. He had to rub Vaseline on his nose and move cotton balls from one bowel to another. Super cute!

Afterwards we were invited to another get together for more dessert. This was a group from our ward and they had so many kids running around it was such fun chaos and made me think of all the chaos I missed at home!

I made this pie just because I wanted to make a pie for my family. Funny thing was I was talking to my mom right before I started and she said I should just skip the effort of making it and buy one at Costco for $7. I kind of laughed and thought "no way" I can do this! Well..... I did do it, but with 2 little girls running around and me messing up the pie dough twice (I had to start over twice!!) I was kicking myself for not taking my wise mother-of-nine-children's counsel. Oh well, next year I'll save the energy on something else and go to Costco! But at least it did turn out yummy!

But I love this holiday because it always helps me remember all my many, many blessings - small and great! I ALWAYS have much to be grateful for, even when going through hard trials!

Little Trip

I got to take a little trip the week before Thanksgiving back to good ol' California!!! Just a side note-I am sorry I didn't get to see all the friends I wanted to during this 2 1/2 day trip. 

My reason for going was because my Bedstefar (that's how you say Grandpa in Danish) passed away at the good old age of 98! He lived an amazing life and I was so grateful, my extended family helped me make it to his funeral to celebrate his life. I sadly had to leave Haans and the girls, but I did enjoy the free time of not chasing after little ones!

My Bedstefar and Bedstemor immigrated from Denmark in the 50's after joining The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. There were no temples in Europe at the time and they wanted to seal their family together for time and all eternity, one of the many blessings that happen inside the temples. So they moved across the ocean with 2 trunks, $50 and four kids, my dad being the youngest at age 1. They ended up settling in CA and Bedstefar became a mason by trade and was so good at brick laying he started his own company, until they opened the health food stores and then sold them to their kids to go on a mission back to Denmark to share with other Danes the great news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. 

There was lots of fun stories about his life and many funny quotes and memories. It was such a wonderful experience to be there to celebrate this amazing patriarch, who sacrificed so much for his immediate family and then his extended family so we could be blessed with the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. I too am grateful for my own testimony of Jesus Christ that I have gained through his example and other amazing family members and friends. I know through Christ's Atonement and His Resurrection I will see my Bedstefar again. And that will be a happy reunion! We ended up counting how much posterity Bedstefar left behind..... 120 and counting! I will sure miss him, but am so grateful I got to have him be a part of my life for so long!

My parents got to play airport taxi to a lot of us! Thank you so much!

The sisters and Bedstemor!

The triplets! Just kiddin', but a lot of people get the brothers mixed up!

Apparently Bedstefar ordered Danish weather for his funeral, cause it rained a lot!

Cute niece!

I LOVE my family so much!!! I sure miss them but am so grateful they are some of my best-est friends! We like to sing in my family, and one evening we all sat around at my parents home singing different songs, from Phantom of the Opera, The Proclaimers, Fantastics and even Nacho Libre! Oh it was so fun and so funny!

We were only missing Haans and my girls and one of my sister's husband! Otherwise we were all there!

Thought this was an amusing way to end the funeral! It's Bedstefar's car!

Can Life Get Any Better?

We recently visited the Disney store and if you can't tell my girls LOVE anything princess!

This picture cracks me up. 

Can life really get any better? I have 2 princess dolls!

Cooking and Baking

Anytime I am going to make anything, the girls insist they help which is wonderful and also challenging.  They each have their own spot (but of course fighting erupts when one sister gets on the other sister's chair). And they also HAVE to taste test everything, from creamed butter and sugar to whipped egg whites. And then of course their is the arguing about whose turn it is to put something in the bowl or whether or not Curly is big enough to crack the eggs all by herself. But they are getting good at being mommy's little sous chefs. My hope is that I am making good memories with them. 

 We are working on eating our broccoli. Notice the cheese? Well, still struggling!

We especially LOVE making chocolate chip cookies! And eating the dough is an absolute must! They sure are cute in their aprons!

Playtime

Since I don't have my mom or sisters who let me crash at their home at a drop of a hat, I have been hanging out at our home a lot more, which is an adjustment for me, but as my parents are always reminding me, change is not a bad thing. 

So we have been doing a lot of dress up. But of course we also turn it into a dance party!

 Lou Who is showing me her disapproving look at taking her picture! Pretty convincing!

 The girls have also been doing a good amount of reading (well looking at pictures) and I love it. Curly has been even such a good big sister to read to her little sister.

Something frustrating about our local library is that we can't or won't stay long. It's not very kid friendly. The bottom floor is the kids section and check out desk and the first time I went I was reading my girls a story and was asked to be more quiet. It's not like I was yelling or even talking loud, but I apparently wasn't whispering quietly enough. The 2nd time we went, Lou Who was been a bit noisy and we kept getting the stare down from the librarian. So now we grab books as quick as possible and run. I have since concluded that the 2 Barnes & Nobles in our area are our new libraries. The kids can be  kids and I usually can find what shelf they have grabbed the books from. Plus they have AC. Curly is always asking when we can go back to the book store. Don't worry we have bought 2 new books. 

Since having the home school pre-school at our house, I have been trying a FEW new crafts with the girls that I find online.

 Lou Who didn't want to show me hers! Such attitude for a little one!

Hope you all counted your many blessings this year too! Yesterday I had to "escape" from these precious little girls and left them with their daddy and went to  the beach to think and write in my journal and made a gratitude list. It sure does help eliminate the negative thoughts and feelings!

Happy Halloweenie!

We went to the pumpkin patch with some of our pre-school kids. Cute farm, but would not recommend going on a week day when you have to go as a "school." Aloun Farms is about 30 minutes west of Honolulu and although the place is cute, we didn't enjoy our "school" experience. But I have heard the weekends are better as they are open to the public. Still glad we didn't have to settle going to the supermarket to buy a pumpkin, but it did make me miss our little pumpkin patch back home. 

 Making Halloween cookies with princess themed cookie cutters. The palace was the haunted house and the princess high heel was the witches shoe. And stars just because. Then I "tired" to make a few pumpkins using a knife. Oh well, we did our best! Note to self: get Halloween cookie cutters. Also this is one of those activities that seems like a really great idea to do with kids and it is because they enjoy it so much. I just need to remain more calm when frosting is flying all over the place.

 They were so excited they got to wear their costumes three different times. Once for a Halloween party, then for our ward Halloween party and then for Halloween itself. Lou Who was so obsessed with her wings that I couldn't even take them off to put her in her car seat. I just had to bend them around her.

 Lou Who wouldn't put her hand in the guts, but she did think about it for awhile. 

 Curly had no problem and enjoyed the squishy feel.

We sure missed trick-o-treating with all our cousins this year but we still had a lot of fun with our new friends. We were invited to go with some of our pre-school friends and their friends and had a blast. See how happy Lou Who is?

 Instant BFF's since they were both princesses

 Attack of the little people!

 "Don't even think about it?" Lou Who really got into the candy idea this year. It is so funny and cute to see her run to the door but then get shy and bashful. She couldn't muster up the courage to say trick-or-treat. But had no problem reaching into their bowls of candy. She sometimes said "dank you!"

Happy Halloweenie!!