Day 1, 2, & 3

I am quite surprised I had this calendar thing up and ready to go before December started. Shocker...

So December came and we were ready to roll. On the first day I told evelynn we could start the calendar. She got excited and we pulled down the bag. Before we opened it we explained to her why were doing this. And we also wanted to make it clear to her that not ALL the bags had a surprise for her. I explained as best i could that some did have presents for her, but they also had things for her to do with mama and papa and things for us to do for other people. Once we went over that a few times we let her open the first bag.

Day one: "The Tale of Peter Rabbit" // I found this at target in the dollar section (pretty sweet!) and really wanted to get it for our calendar. We have a pop-up book app on the ipad with part of this book. When evelynn opened it she knew just what it was. I was hoping she hadn't forgot about the book.

Day 2: Painting pictures for grandparents & great-grandparents // This was the first of our "doing something for others" bags. And you know that opening this bag was preceded by a "you remember, not every bag has a treat for you" speech! But evelynn did good because she loves to paint. I wasn't sure how she'd do with so many papers but she did good. Addressed, stamped, & off into mail land. Enjoy grandparents! 

Day 3: Making cookies // Evelynn loves to bake so i knew this would get her attention. She loved it and she loves being able to enjoy her treats.

There you have it folks. The first three days of our advent calendar.

Our Advent Calendar

Oh the advent calendar - AKA the small art installation! In my mind this was going to take a lot less effort than it did. But no! It took me about three or so days to fully complete and have it up on the wall. I had always wanted to buy one of those cute house looking things, but i always seem to miss them when they are on clearance after Christmas - yes, i'm one of those who waits for the 50%, 75%, & even the 90% off goodness! So now that i am ready to start doing an advent calendar, i am left to get my DIY on! 

As i was starting to write out my ideas for what would be in the bags i knew i wanted this to be different. I didn't want it to be 24 bags of "stuff" for evelynn. So i made a breakdown: 12 - acts of kindness towards others, 6 - little gifts for evelynn, & 6 - family activities. I will include a compiled list of all our activities/treats once we have finished this. But you will be getting sneak peaks at what we are up to with this whole adventure. 

 

Materials used to make our advent calendar:
- brown lunch bags
- colored card stock
- graph paper
- sharpie pen
- twine to hang them on
- clothes pins to attach them to the twine 

Inside the bags i used Christmas cards i hadn't used yet to write what we would be doing that day. I tried drawing little pictures to go with the writing so evelynn (3 years) would be able to know something without being able to read. 

'Tis the season

Well Thanksgiving has come and gone faster than the speed of light...this whole year has flown by that way! My Christmas skills are needing to be amped up a little bit now that Evelynn is getting older and she is so into decorations! I actually need to pull out more than stockings. 

This year I pulled out the boxes and Evelynn got so excited! So I pulled the totes out, put on the Sufjan Stevens Christmas album, and let Christmas explode all over our apartment. 

And with Christmas comes the tree. This year I wanted to do something different. I knew our apartment was too small to find some nook to put a tree for a few weeks. Then came Pinterest! I saw a picture of a tomato cage wrapped in lights. I fell in love and immediately decided that would be our tree this year. So I went to and called a couple stores with no luck - duh! if I gardened I'd know that now is not the time to be buying tomato cages and that they wouldn't be in stock! So I texted a gardening friend to see if she had one I could borrow. Score! I picked up the "tree", wrapped it in lights, and we hung our ornaments and topped it with the star. I love it and would almost do this every year!  

I also knew that I really wanted to do an Advent Calendar with our family. So after the dust settled from the decorations and the totes were stashed away, I started working on my Advent Calendar. This will come in another post...yes, it gets its very own post!

Lord willing, this is the beginning of a new start with the blog and I. 

the time has come...

i need to get back on this thing... 

so much is happening:

* evelynn is growing *

* we moved to WA *

* the Lord is moving in our new church *

* and some other things *

i am really trying to dust off my blog, revamp it, and get back to business.

bear with me...

- sweetwater

march in pictures

[reading to her kitty]

[just driving with mama]

[playing with the shaddix girls - basically her older sisters!]

<3

starting where i left off

so now that i have dusted off the blog, i'm going to sort of start where i left off when i posted our family pictures...in DEC!!!

we headed to cali for christmas again. and we were all excited for evelynn this year knowing that she would be more into presents and fun stuff since she was a year older. and boy were the presents waiting. tia and abue spared no expense! :] we dont spoil her too much at christmas since everyone else takes care of that for us. she even got this massive stocking that was taller than her...

[the said stocking]

[the family.]
[ love that we're all wearing similar colors. notice the little one slowly fading.]

[and she's faded! but we smile on.]

we stayed out there through christmas and into the new year. we weren't sure how evelynn was going to do or if we should have her stay up til midnight. so we went with it and just waiting to see how she would so. she lasted! stayed up, happy new year, blew horns, and ta-da, she made it! good times!

[happy 2011 from the dosers!]

we were able to drive out to san jacinto to visit steven's great aunt irene. she is the sweetest lady every...and makes the best fudge! evelynn loves to visit her too.

so yeah, after the holidays we made the trek back home to utah. in january we celebrated evelynn's half birthday. yeah we are those people. we've made her a little cake and get her a little present on her half birthday ever since she was born. it's something fun for us to do - one of those little traditions she'll always remember.

[licking the frosting that's colored orange and purple for dora]

and here is just some pure cuteness for you to enjoy...

[out like a light with her stuffed animals]

[loving her rain coat (and boots) from grammy dawn]

thanks for getting through this first installment of the great catch-up of 2011!
<3

loser...

yes, i'm talking about myself.

i finally got back on to blogger to catch up on some old blogs. and it just made me realize i have SOOO much to catch up on here...hopefully over the next week or so i can post a couple new things on here. there is so much going on in the mendonsa dungeon (dungeon cause we are currently living in a good friend's basement!).

<3