Christmas Wishes (& Goodbye 2007!)

I am fighting the urge (& loosing) to begin this post with the words 'And so this is Christmas... another year over...' etc! I must try to be more creative with the Christmas post for 2008! Anyway, above is the photo that I used for this year's family Christmas card. I wanted to do an easy card this year to save time & also make the most of the fact that for one year only our children could dress up as the 3 Kings & baby Jesus. The end result was fantastic (if I say so myself) but getting to it was neither easy or time saving! We had fun dressing up for the piccie though & I am very glad that we managed to do it! I do hope the cards reached everyone I posted them to- the postal service is so hit & miss these days!
This year we put our Christmas tree up very early (for us). The boys loved decorating the tree which they did pretty much unaided meaning our tree was lacking in decorations in some areas & over crowded with them in other parts! I love that though!
The tree was topped off with the lovely angel/fairy that Jordan made at church from a doily, some wool & ribbon & a wooden clothes peg. Gorgeous!
The boys & I had great fun making fairy cakes into Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeers to give to their teachers & some of Jordan's close friends at school. I had fun making the green & red baskets to present the cakes in as I ran out of time to do it with the boys too! (We had had a mad few weeks with cars breaking down, parties & school plays, various illnesses & all the usual stuff so time just flew by!) I have to say that these cakes were so easy to make but they really impressed the recipients! I must apologise to Grandparents, Auntie Helen & all the Godparents who should have got some of these cakes too only I got ill....

Our Christmas Day was spent at my parent's house with my Uncle Ben joining us as well. It was a lovely day which we all thoroughly enjoyed despite me still being ill with a yucky bug! Luckily I was the only one in our family to get it... The boys were spoilt rotten- I've never seen so many presents under the Okines tree! We actually opened a lot of presents on Boxing Day too which I really like doing as it makes Christmas last longer!

At tea time on Christmas Day we had a special cake made by my mum as well as jelly & ice cream. The boys loved it! For some strange reason, known only to himself, Lee began a hearty rendition of Auld Lang Syne although it became apparent that he was a little hazy on the words past the second line! It was great fun though & the boys thought shaking everyone's hands about wildly at the tea table was brilliant! Thankyou Mum & Dad for hosting Christmas & for making it all so lovely.

Annie enjoyed her first Christmas in her own quiet way too. We have been so blessed this year. I certainly didn't imagine at the end of 2006 that at Christmas 2007 we would have a lovely daughter as well as our 3 beautiful sons! I wonder what 2008 will hold for us all.....? I hope & pray that you all have a fantastic year. May God bless you in abundance! ;0)

It's A Baby!

Today was Timmy & Luke's first public performance at school! Their class performed 'It's A Baby!' musical nativity by Out Of The Ark Music. It was fantastic! Luke was a visitor travelling to the inn in Bethlehem & Timmy was a shepherd. Their flair for the dramatic showed itself every now & then in the show, Luke especially got a few laughs for his over enthusiasm! Timmy prepared for his part in the play thoroughly & asked me a lot of questions about it before hand, particularly why he had to take a lamb as a present for a baby! I'm not sure I gave him a satisfactory answer though...

Hopefully, if it works, you can see a tiny clip of Luke's favourite song 'Innkeeper's Song' which basically is about the innkeeper being very busy & the inn being very very full! (I wanted to put on the Hallelujah song but the video clip was too big which is a shame coz all the kids are dancing & singing about giving God the praise for Jesus the Saviour's birth). Luke is on the very far left & Timmy on the very far right of the picture! (Click the picture above to play the clip!)

All in all it was a fantastic play & well worth everyone's hard work! ;0)

And the winner is...

... Mr Lee Davies! Well, actually what happened was this... Lee & I went to watch Jordan's school Christmas play this afternoon & as we were leaving the hall, the headmaster, Mr Anderson stopped to talk to Lee (Lee is a parent governor). While they chatted I spotted the Golden Pump award that Jordan's class had won for having the most children who walked to school in Walk to School Week. I piped up 'Ooooh! The Golden Pump Award! I'll just take a photo of it..' to which Mr Anderson said 'That's my favourite school award. Why don't you take a picture of me presenting it to Lee!' So we held an impromptu award ceremony in the school corridor!!!
Now, back to the play... It was a lovely lively nativity play with Year 2 children taking the main parts & the majority of the Reception & Year 1 classes being in the choir. They all sang really well & did some excellent hand jiving in the 'Hallelujah!' song! It was good fun!

And back at home, little Miss Annie is well & truly loved by her 3 big brothers! ;0)

Beetle Drive!

My sister Helen bought Timmy & Luke a modern version of Beetle Drive for their birthday which they absolutely LOVE! We've played it several times already. I must admit that we discovered pretty early on that strict following of the rules would lead to frustration as in order to build your beetle you must first throw a one on the dice to get the body... After many, many attempts no-one managed to roll a one so it was decided that we'd just give everyone a beetle body to get things going! Anyway, we can thoroughly recommend this game. It's great fun! Thankyou Helen! ;0)

It's Party Time!

On Saturday afternoon 9 children & assorted adults descended on our house to officially celebrate Timothy & Luke's 4th birthday. It was a simple affair but lots of fun!
To begin with each child made a dangly snowman to take home. We got rather a lot of glue on the conservatory floor & a few snowman eyes rolled around but otherwise it went very well!

We played party games including pass the parcel (thanks Mum!), musical bumps, hunt the pegs & pin the tail on the donkey (which, as Alfie & Charlie's 8 year old brother said when he arrived with his mum at the end to pick them up, is something you don't see very often these days!!)

The highlight for many of the children was of course the party food. We had pizza, crisps, tomato, carrot sticks & cucumber as well as a fairy cake & a chocolate finger biscuit. Yummy!

I finally managed to make the boys the birthday cake I had planned for them to take into nursery school. I had to try to make it simple but incorporate sweets, trains & 4. I think I managed it! Either way, they loved the cakes...

...and loved having everyone sing happy birthday to them & watch them blow out the candles!

And of course, no party is complete without a bit of dancing & alcohol! No, no, there wasn't any alcohol but I think Will looks like he's had a few beers in this piccie, don't you?!! Charlie & Timmy did the sweetest dancing together but I just couldn't capture it on camera. So, three cakes & one party later, Timmy & Luke really are four years old now!