Writing and drawing

My girl loves to write and draw! Every time we go to Mom & Dad's without the dogs, she has to write them cards. And then give them to the dogs when we get back.

 Precious note. I think they must have learned about how to write the chapter:verses in Sunday School this day. 

 She spent quite a while one evening cutting out all those letters and gluing them to the paper! She loves that dog so much - I really, really hope Ellie lives a LONG life.

 This is my Christmas present (she couldn't wait to give it to me). Needless to say, she really looks forward to art class at school!

Jocelyn's 6th Birthday

At our house, November means crazy birthday weekends and Thanksgiving! We normally head over to Neenah to celebrate my grandma's birthday and see everyone over there. But with how Halloween and her birthday fell, and with Calvin having to be gone for work, we didn't make it over this year. Sad. We'll have to plan a different weekend soon! 

This was the first year we didn't have a big family party, because she had a friend party! I'm pretty sure she'd been asking about it for an entire year, and was so, so excited to have all her friends over. I tried to get her to have it at a location, but she really wanted to do it at the house. So, I planned a lot of stuff so they didn't have time to be bored or get wild and silly! It was, of course, a Frozen party. She invited 6 friends, and of course all of them could come! 3 from kindergarten, 2 from 4K and 1 is our neighbor. She had a great time, everything went off without any troubles at all, and I now know 7 girls in my house for 3 hours is manageable. It was actually really fun, and the girls she invited are really nice, fun girls. 

Calvin was in charge of helping with the cake this year. 

 And decorating!

 We discovered that if you're going to make this kind of cake, you should cut a hole for the doll's legs before you frost it, and don't just shove her legs in. It was a near disaster, but with some toothpicks and extra frosting, no one ever knew!

 Waiting very impatiently for her friends to arrive

 All the girls! We did lots of craft projects when everyone got there. They made the crowns out of foam, and I had foam stickers they could use.

Aubri, Ella, Annabelle (kindergarten), Riley (neighbor), Jocelyn, Becca, Nakiah (4K)

I didn't get any pictures of them making these crafts, because we were too busy helping! But these are Jocelyn's. They each made 2 barrettes - I cut out (with Mom's help!) a bunch of felt snowflakes, and we hot glued them on to metal clasp barrettes. And added jewels of course! 

 And they each made one headband with the same snowflakes and jewels. I think they turned out really cute, and I've seen her kindergarten friends wear them a few times, so I'm glad they're getting use!

 We also made snowflake ornaments. Jocelyn and 2 other friends were very deliberate in how they designed their ornament. The others just put on whatever beads they thought were pretty! So neat to see the differences in them.

We played games too, this was pin the nose on Olaf.  

 She has been talking about a pinata for an entire year too, so we had to have one! They make them with pull strings now so no one gets knocked in the face with a broom stick. But it didn't work that great - I don't think they pulled hard enough, or maybe the strings aren't attached well enough. Whatever - all they really wanted to do was get all the stuff inside!

 We played this fun game where each team had to dress one person up like a snowman with toilet paper. So funny to watch! Becca did a great job - she had done it before and knew just what to do!

 And finally, Frozen bingo

 Lunch was fruit, carrots and make your own English muffin pizzas

 The happy birthday girl! (See where the cake is starting to split?)

 Whew! Relaxing while they all went up to her bedroom for the last 30 minutes to be wild and silly girls. I could not have even attempted this party without Calvin and Kailee's help! They were both wonderful. I'm so blessed, as are the girls, to have such a wonderful husband!

 Her party was on Saturday, the 8th. Mom & Dad came back from Neenah on Sunday, so they stopped and we had a nice lunch, presents and cake for her birthday with them.

 Monday - her actual birthday! Sprinkle pancakes for breakfast.

 And snow! She was so excited that it snowed on her birthday! Pretty sure she was the only one!

 We even had enough that she was able to build a snowman after school

 Here's her annual bear picture! What a big girl.

 Monday night we had Pat & Anita and Cory over for supper and cake and another party!

So, at 6, Jocelyn is so much fun. She's a very kind, thoughtful girl. She loves her dog, Ellie, so very much and plays with her all the time! She still loves to draw, color, write and do any kind of craft. She's very creative that way. She's getting to be a really good reader and it's so fun to listen to her read - she has great expression in her voice. She enjoys playing dress up and pretend with all her stuffed animals and dolls. She loves to sing, and is often singing or humming throughout the day. She's a good eater, and not too picky. Takes cold lunch every day and doesn't get bored with the fruit, carrots and lunch meat! It's been such a cold start to fall that she hasn't been outside too much, and I can tell! She loves to be outside and will miss riding her bike this winter. She's still a momma's girl, and while she's gotten better about me leaving, is still not great about it. Most nights I have to stay in my bedroom and "read a chapter book" until she falls asleep. Tonight I left Ellie in my place. :) Truthfully I don't normally mind. I know the time is coming to an end when she'll need me like that, so if I can make her feel safe by giving up 30 minutes each night, I'm honored to be able to do that. Plus, 30 minutes to be forced to read a book?! Love it! She continues to be just a fun kid to be around and makes us smile all the time. We are so blessed to have her!

October

We had a fun October - fall is such a great time of year around here! Although with all the snow we have right now, you wouldn't know it. But, October was great! 

Jocelyn decided to be Anna from Frozen for Halloween. She has a dress-up dress, and so I didn't really need to buy anything for her costume. However, Halloween can either be gorgeously warm, or freezing and awful. So, I made a cape to go with her dress. I'm so glad I did - it was super easy and turned out really cute. And, Halloween was freezing and awful, so good thing I did! We also made a tooth fairy pillow that weekend. Good thing too, because this last Friday (11/21) she got her first wiggly tooth! She's been waiting and waiting to lose a tooth. She was pretty convinced that once she turned 6 it would happen. She was eating an apple, and started to cry because it hurt...Kailee discovered it hurt because it was wiggly! And we haven't kept our hands out of our mouth since! And she's telling everyone she knows about her tooth! I think it will be a while before it falls out - it's not that wiggly yet. Anyway, we have a cute pillow now for the Tooth Fairy.

 Mom & Dad came over for the day and we went apple picking - it was a few weeks into October, so there weren't a lot left, but the place we went was so wonderful. They had fun stuff for the kids to do, horse drawn wagon rides, pumpkins, squash and hay bales, and it was a nice family farm with owners who were so friendly and kind. 

 The guy let Kailee (who loves horses) drive the wagon the whole time! She thought it was pretty neat, and didn't send any of us over the edge of the wagon, so that was good.

The weekend before Thanksgiving we headed over to the Cities to go to the Zoo Boo with Elliot & Evan. we had such a fun time last year that we had to go back...I think it will be an annual tradition!

Buzz & Anna

 Now those are some dedicated parents! Angie made her whole outfit - she's so talented. What a cute Toy Story family!

 One of their friends came with too - Jocelyn was surprised to see another Anna! (Really?)

 Evan ditched his alien hat, but was so happy to just go along for the ride!

 The weather this night was gorgeous!

Here she is at school - they do a costume parade thru the halls. 

 And here's actual Halloween night. Anita took her out trick or treating for a little bit right away, but came home when it got too chilly. Then she was perfectly happy handing out candy the rest of the night! Love it!

 The weekend we came for the Zoo Boo, we stayed with Mom & Dad. It was Mom's birthday on Sunday, and it was nice to spend the weekend with them! We were looking for something fun to do on Saturday, and I had seen a few people post pictures on FaceBook of Severs' Corn Maze. It looked pretty fun, so we decided to give it a try. I'm so glad we did!  It was so fun; we spent hours there. The day was beautiful (a little windy) and there was a ton of stuff to do. Definitely will be going back next year!

 We started out with the maze, which was fun, and they had a map to follow with different signs you were supposed to find. It was fun about halfway, and then Jocelyn got tired of it and wanted to go do other things.

 The corn pit was so awesome. I probably could have stayed in there all afternoon! It was like a giant sandbox full of corn. And the corn is so smooth and fun to jump in and lay in! 

 We took turns burying each other - all the while trying not to think of all the germs that were in there. :)

 Then we headed over to the huge bouncy pillows. Again, could have done that all afternoon. Like a bouncy house, but better.

 Then it was time for some lunch!

 After lunch we went over to the Ultimate Corn Pit - this one had climbing stuff, ropes you could swing from and land in the corn (she was a bit too nervous to try that one). But she did make it all the way across the monkey bars!

 And what's a Midwest fair without a kangaroo?!