New Year's Eve Wacky Style

We had a fun little New Year's Eve Wacky Zackey style! We played games new and old, Todd gave the kids new PVC fort materials, we had a feast of apps, and had a silly dance party! It was really pretty chill, which was just right after a busy Christmas.

We cheered with the kids at 9 to ring in the new year New York style!

Butterfly Fun with the Girls!

We celebrated the last day of the year with a fun little girl trip to the Science Center (Q stayed home with Papa and had Olea over to play!). We enjoyed playtime there, and the butterfly house. The 3D butterfly movie was the highlight, the best being when the kids all reached out to try and grab the butterflies!

 

Looking forward to more science center fun this next year with our pals!

Grandparents

 All year I appreciate all the time we get to spend with our parents, it's such a treat to have such adoring grandparents in our lives, here are a few moments...

Meeting Twins!

 What a better way to end out this year of babies then by meeting 2 more?! And the bonus, one is ERIN! New baby Erin and her twin brother Brady are the little sibs of one of my students Alyce, whom I've taught for the past few years now! I brought them a meal after Christmas and got to have some snuggle time.

 

They are each a wonderful size for being twins, but still so tiny, and lovely to snuggle! Congrats Conroy family!

A Martin Christmas at Gigi's!

Gigi was kind enough to let us host the Martin family Christmas this year! We had nearly the whole family there and it was so much fun! The was SO MUCH FOOD, lots of wonderful time to talk, a hilarious white elephant gift exchange among the cousins, a silly Martin family trivia game, joy and laughter the whole night!

At one point Hazel (in her pink sparkly beret from Gigi) played the role of photographer:

Nice work H, nice bribe material shall we ever need it.

Here we are socializing, taking breaks to open Gigi gifts, and eating all together!

 Some of the silliness with the white elephant and trivia game:

And here are all the cousins!  Well minus Nola and Sam that is!

 

 What a blast of a Christmas party it was!

Christmas Morn 2012!

It was a blur of fun, happy kiddos at the Zackey home Christmas morn. Somehow the gifts under the tree really took over this year (some large gifts for gparents helped ;)). Those awesome Big Wheels from Pop Zack were the instant hit though and totally made the staying up on Christmas eve worth it for Todd. 

 They took off on the big wheels trying as best they could to do laps around our kitchen, and had fun with their stockings before taking a breakfast break.

 Then they got to open their big Santa gifts (they were SO happy this year) and a few from Mama and Papa too!

 We also spent some sweet moments enjoying new gifts and Papa and I had fun getting our gifts too!

Then, Nami, Danpa and Dashel arrived and some rushed fun ensued all over again! Danpa opened his BIG gift ;) of an arrow target (wrapped in deer wrapping paper). Nami enjoyed her birthday and Christmas gifts, and we all had a good time together before getting ready and heading down to Gigi's.

Ah, Christmas, what fun!

The Wizard of Oz

 Hazel and I were lucky enough to get to see an amazing production of the Wizard of Oz at the Children's Theater. Anna coordinated a group so we got the awesome school rate and I'm so glad she did! Though H was at times terrified and hiding in my lap, in the end she too really enjoyed the well created production. The actors, the costumes, the singing, the set, it was all better than I even expected. I'm hoping this means "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" can be added to our list when H and I need to belt out a good musical tune! 

 

After the show we went with Ella to see the trains at the Armory (Q and I had had a date there the previous Friday) and grab some snacks for the way home.

 

It was absolutely an amazing morning!

Hazel Angel

At Maplewood Preschool they have a big Christmas pageant every year, and this year Hazel was an angel. She loved getting dressed up in her sparkly halo, and has been singing "Away in a Manger" quite well on her own. The show also happened to be the same day as the first SNOW! and right before we were already planning to see The Wizard of Oz with friends in Seattle, so it was a busy morn to say the least! The kids all were very sweet, and I was proud of how Hazel did. She got over her shyness and sang and did the gestures very well!

First Snow of the Season

Today was AMAZING! First off we woke up to the beautiful snow scape of our backyard. Then the kids (well namely Quin) got ready in a flash for some snow play! 

  

I wasn't about to stifle the fun telling them school etc. was still on, partly cause I thought any second I would get an email from the school saying it was delayed. 

 

Q was out there a good 20 minutes or so kicking snow soccer balls to watch them explode, and generally playing in his own world while H and I were in pj's. We got our gear on and joined him though cause it looked like so much fun!

 

We had to take advantage of the very sticky, perfect for snowman making stuff since it was likely to turn to rain by afternoon (it did). So I made this guy with some help (Q made the "hat", H helped roll etc.):

 

Watch out, he can through a mean snowball too! The fun we had in the snow reminded us all how much we enjoy winter and we can look forward to the official beginning of it this week!

More Rosie

Rosie our Elf has still been up to lots of tricks these days at our house:

She's been: drawing faces on our Santa pic, making snow angels in flour!, playing dreidel with H's bear, cutting snowflakes, hiding in the Christmas tree, sitting in a bowl of mini marshmallows with her tiny santa mug, reading up on St. Lucia, peering on the globe, and getting ready to make a gingerbread house!

PEPS 2 Party

After our PEPS party Hazel and I went up to Everett to have a baby PEPS party! I was invited to the Christmas party for the group I led this fall and since H had always wanted to meet the babies, this was the perfect excuse. She really did love seeing them all and playing with them, as did I they are at such a fun age. I didn't happen to catch the group pic this time around, or any with H since she was playing photographer! 

 

We did have a really lovely time and I'm happy H got to snuggle some babies with me!

PEPS Christmas Party!

We had our 7th PEPS Christmas party! It was really wild and fun with these kiddos who are getting so much older. I can't believe it's been 7 years! Really, I didn't believe it so I took a little tour of PEPS Christmas parties of yore...

Year 1

Year 2

Year 3

 

Year 4

 

Year 5

 

Year 6

 

And this year, YEAR 7

Really, 7!?! These kids are full on KIDS now!
(In 7 years I got the group shot twice, yay me! ;))

Meet Rosie our Elf!

We got an "Elf on the Shelf" from Gigi this year and the kids have been having fun trying to find her in the morn. They named her "Rosie" and sometimes she is "Rowdy Rosie" or
Rascally Rosie". This is what she has been up to the first week+ we had her:

 In case you wondered that's Rosie: on the light, decorating a little felt tree, hanging off the calendar on Dec 1, in an advent holiday book bag, writing with lipstick on the bathroom mirror!, in the freezer!, in Q's boot, and stuck outside on St. Nicholas day! She's been having fun!

Santa!

We headed to the island to see Santa! 

We got our letters all written:

 

(translation = Q would like surprises and legos shock! and H a fairy toy and brown haired doll)

On the boat I talked the kids into posing for me in their Santa outfits from Gigi:

 Then at the cottage we met up with some Anna's and kiddos! We had fun visiting while waiting our turn, having hot cocoa, cuddling baby Vivian, and chatting about the big guy!

 

And here was the big moment!

St. Nicholas Day

Here are the kiddos with our good pal Emri getting ready for St. Nicholas day!

You know just polishing up the muddy bogs...

 And then opening those boots on the 6th after he arrived!

St. Nicholas is so thoughtful, he brings socks along with treats a little toy!

We also got in the spirit with Emri doing some baking:

We love our Wednesday Emri time, and she and I love to do cooking together!

Winter Concert

Quin was in his first MW winter concert! 

Unfortunately it also fell on the first day in forever that both kiddos woke up WAY TOO EARLY! Really?! So, they were wiped out, and the show was unintentionally later this year.

 Q is the yawning one in front of Ms. P. ;)

 It was a lovely show though and we really enjoyed this talented group of singers!

I think Q and his classmates enjoyed their songs with props the most! They all did a wonderful job!

Reindeer Time

I took H and our pal to see the reindeer at Swanson's and we met up with more pals while there! We got there in time to feed the camel Curly, and the reindeer too.

 We played on the sleighs,

 then we said hi to the fish, had some cookies in the cafe, and saw the train display,

 We rounded out our time with a goodbye to the camel and reindeer, and some more silly play on the sleighs!

It certainly is fun to celebrate the season with friends!

Waldorf Winter Faire

Hazel and I went to the Holiday Faire at the Seattle Waldorf School today. This will definitely be my favorite new holiday tradition, it was delightful! *Please don't look too closely Gparents this was a wonderful gift making opportunity. And we even got to be there with pals towards the end of it,

 I just wish we could go again next week!

Ornaments of the Year

This year was a bumper crop for ornaments! Truthfully though the last few years have been... While certainly some will not likely stand the test of time, it's a joy to have so many handcrafted creations adorning our tree, 7 of these were by H this year! I wanted to remember all the new ones so when we packed them up today, I snapped a pic: