Lyndsi had her annual Christmas dance recital last night.  For the last 2 or 3 years their school has focused this performance on the Nutcracker.  Which in theory was a good idea.  But.  Her school also does a lot of jazz and hip hop besides ballet.  It was just too much.  This year the director opted to go back to just a plain ol' Christmas theme.  It was nice.  Really nice.  The show ran smooth and was pleasant to watch. 

Lyndsi did a great job!  Her class danced to "The First Noel" and she was so graceful.  I love watching her dance.  She just has this angelic expression on her face while she is dancing.  You can just tell she loves it.  She really enjoys her class and her teacher. 

(Sorry for the slightly goofy picture.  My flash wasn't working and I didn't want to hold up the rest of the family from leaving.  We'll try for a better one in the spring!)  

The Nutcracker

Lyndsi and Sophie had their dance recital Saturday night. Lyndsi has been bouncing off the walls in anticipation for this for months now. She's been going to class 2x a week for an hour each class to prepare for this. She leaps and points her toes all around the house, but she would never show me her dance. She said she wanted it to be a surprise.

This was also Sophie's first time on stage. She's been a little stubborn in class-sometimes participating, sometimes just observing. Her eyes about popped out of her cute little head when she received her sparkly pink costume, though. I still wasn't sure if she would actually dance on stage, but dance she did. And she was adorable. Later that night she was throwing a big fit about going to bed (I thought). When she calmed down long enough to tell me what was wrong, she kept saying she wanted to go back on stage. She has asked me when she gets to dance on stage again at least twice a day since.

The honorable mention goes to McKay. He sat quietly and nearly complaint free (other than drink and potty breaks) through 2-2 1/2 hours of dancing. Way to go McKay!!

My little ballerinas

Sophie with our friend Ella. A first for both girls!

Sophie, Lyndsi and our cousin Krystal post-show. They had fun posing for us.

Ramble, ramble, ramble

McKay started soccer last month. His first game (pictured here) you couldn't pry the smile off his face if you tried. Ok. I guess some of it got lost in the concentration of the game. BUT-whenever I wasn't behind the camera he had this huge grin spread across his whole face.




Sophie also had a new beginning-dance! I love little girls in pink tights. The first class she was a little clingy, but she played along as long as mom would dance with her. (I'm sure that was lovely to see!) I wondered if she would do it at all until the teacher started their warm-up music. The first few notes to Mickey's mousercise was all I needed to know she'd be just fine. She is loving it and doing as well as a 3 yr old can in dance.





Off the topic of firsts....

I've been working around the house. Nesting I call it. Not for a baby but for fall. I think my subconscious has realized soon my little clan will be spending a significantly larger amount of time indoors. My very conscious mind realized I must be organized and cleaned up to accommodate that. :) So I've had a little bit of fun buying baskets for my bedroom closet, fabric to dress up some throw pillows, added a new bookshelf to the family room, figuring out what to do with the old one....I even washed all the bedding-sheets, baby blankets, animals, etc. (Not usually a one day event) and then remade the beds with the addition of a quilt for cold winter nights. There's so much more to do still.

Crazy, Busy Fun

Jeff's parents came to visit us over the weekend and to go through the Oquirrh Mountain Temple open house. I am so excited to be in this new temple district. I've had the privilege of going through the open house twice, and both times it just feels like home in a way that the Jordan River Temple never did. I know that temples do the same things all over the world but this one just feels like home. My kids did amazingly well. They were quiet and listened to what we were saying and were much more attentive to this temple than the Draper Temple. We're going to go one more time this weekend with my parents and my grandparents.

Lyndsi also had her dance recital that night. She looked beautiful in her costume (which is probably my favorite one she's had so far). Her dance was great and she knew it all. It's so fun to watch her sweet face light up on stage. My parents and Jeff both gave her flowers afterwards and she was thrilled to get two sets of flowers (a total of 4 flowers).

Saturday morning Jeff and I woke up at 5:15 a.m. to get ready to run the South Jordan Country Fest 5k. (Another reason his parents came to visit-we needed someone to watch the kids.) Admittedly, I was nervous before hand and wondering why in the world I was doing this again. I've never enjoyed the competition of a 5k. This one ended up being quite enjoyable. The route was fairly flat (yay!). I ended up passing people instead of them passing me, and I ran the whole time without really wanting to stop and walk. These are HUGE things for me, especially the last two. My finish time wasn't that great, but my placements left me quite happy-7th out of 23 in my age division and 22nd in overall the womens division. Jeff did AWESOME however! He runs much faster than me and took 3rd in his age group and 19th in mens. It was a great morning. (Thanks again Alan, Laurie, and Cami for watching the kiddos!)

(Seriously. You didn't think I'd post a post-race picture, did you?)

15 seconds of fame

McKay has this insane love of gettin his groove on. And it's hilarious to watch. How could I keep this to myself? Love that kid!




(Sorry about the quality-good ol' cell phone flix)

Dancing with the Sophie

So, tonight I was watching Dancing with the Stars while folding laundry. Sophie wandered down and started watching with me. All of a sudden she blurted out, "she doesn't have a shirt!" I almost laughed because it's true. Those women are barely covered. But, it wasn't much longer before she was captivated by the dancing and asking for some dancing clothes (not that I think she wanted to wear what they were). Thanks to Lyndsi, we have plenty of "dancing clothes" which Sophie wore and almost slept in. Here's my little "star"

She also has discovered her "piggy bank." She wants to carry it around whenever she sees it and has also discovered the joy of dropping those shiny silver coins in there.