Busy Saturday

 We started our Saturday off with basketball first thing in the morning. Eli is coming through the cheerleaders!

 Cute little boy running down the court...

 look at him dribble... he is wide open... for a little while.

 Then off to gymnastics competition. Elizabeth's first one and she was not sure she wanted to compete, First up is the double mini... looks like a great straddle.

 She did a great job with her passes (routine) during the practice but when it was time for judging she messed up and did not really complete them and ended up with a score of...0. However the good news for her is that she had no competition for her age and level so she placed 1st!!!

 Next up is tumbling. This she did great on!!! She is in the middle of her cartwheel here...

 then back roll.. plus lots of other things I didn't post.

 Final score for Lizzy!!!

 Another first place medal!!! Unfortunately we were busy watching the girls after Lizzy that we did not realize they took her to the stage for her medal so we missed that pic!

 Next up trampoline....

 Again another first place win... with no competition.

 She is so excited about her 3 first place medals!!! This a girl who did not want to even go to the meet to compete... now is super excited and can't wait for the next competition. As we were walking out of the convention center she said "I love competition"!!! That is what it is about. We did not care if she placed as long as she had fun doing it... granted she enjoyed it even more because of her first place medals!

Basketball Season

Basketball season has begun for Eli.. He is #5. The first two pictures are from his first game. It was pretty funny to watch. All the kids are in kindergarten and just learning all the rules. The hardest one for them to remember is dribble the ball and walk/run... there were many players running while carrying the ball;)

 The next two pics are from Eli's second game. This time he was a little more interested in his opponents light up shoes! He is still in the white uniform and you see him and the other little boy in the back ground checking out the shoes.

 As one of the coaches walked by the boys he heard this conversation: "Man your shoes are cool... ah your shoes are cool too".  Meanwhile everyone else is playing some b-ball.

Birthday Party

What better way to end a Christmas vacation than with a dress up birthday party!!!

 Elsa is helping Elizabeth "build a snowman"

 Caroline and her snowman she built....

 Lizzy and her snowman she built!

 Prince Charming and Elsa give the girls polite manners lessons and as they leave the "castle" we had a picture time... the little girl is also named Caroline and she was in everyone's picture... she did not want to leave Elsa.

 Prince Charming, Caroline, Caroline, and Elsa

Great Wolf Lodge

Another thing we were able to do on our extra week of Christmas vacation was go to Great Wolf lodge when very few other people were there. This was Eli and Lizzy's first time to go. While Greg was checking us in, the kids were checking out the fun to come.

 Elizabeth was very hesitant at first. She thought everything looked fun, but was not so sure about water slides. The first one we went on was a tube ride that we could all go on together. Elizabeth held my hand the whole time.. in line... on the ride... at the end she said "that was fun, lets do it again". Then she was off... she did not hesitate on any of the other rides. I would say her favorite place to play was the wave pool though. She would go and just play in there by herself for a long time. In fact one time Eli followed her in the wave pool and she told him to stop following her, she was playing by herself. (She and Eli are in the middle of the picture)

 My oldest beauty, having a great time at the lodge!

 This was Eli's favorite place to play... I don't know where all he was but when I could not find him he would be in this structure somewhere...

 either coming down a slide or running across the many bridges

 I would say this was Caroline's favorite place to play. If we were not going down slides she could usually be found up at the top part (see her head peeking over )... up there you had many ways to dump water on the people below in the lazy river.... she spent a lot of time in that area!

 Overall the kids had a great time. They continue to ask when they can go back. Actually Elizabeth wanted to live there! They were the perfect age to go because they were tall enough to go on all but one water slide! They were also old enough the us parents could sit at a table and watch them play!

Christmas Break

We did not have a white Christmas... in fact it was in the 70's on Christmas..but the great thing about Texas is wait a few days and it will change.. literally it was 70 on Christmas, cold and cloudy on Saturday (the day after), tornado's on Sunday (thankfully none at our house), and snow on Monday!

 Later in the week back to sunny and jumping on the tramp they received for Christmas.

 We had an extra week off that the local schools did not have so we took advantage of that and went to the zoo! It was great because there were very few people there!

 Eli had a good time playing with the baby monkey! He would put his hand on the glass then the monkey would put a hand on the window.

 Tiger exhibit

 The lions were all sleeping so sweetly when we got there... but add three kids who like to yell and wake up the dead... three of the four woke up!

Christmas

Kids getting in the Christmas spirit.

 Christmas Eve tradition... open one gift (pajamas) at Grandma and Grandpa's house

 Christmas morning: we have a ninja turtle

 and Betsy Ross

 and a super excited girl who got her own tablet!

 Greg received a new wheelbarrow that holds all three kids!

 More present time