The Nutcracker

Grace at dress rehearsal.

Last December Grace went to watch the ESO (Eastern Shore’s Own Art Center) production of The Nutcracker. If you remember I posted about her dramatic re-enactments of the scenes with Drosselmeyer and the Nutcracker. In January she began taking ballet lessons. So this December was her chance to dance in the real Nutcracker. She did awesome! In the Spring she was SO nervous before her performance, this time she was loving it. She couldn’t wait for her turn to dance on Saturday night. I wish I had some video to share, but the camera was set to the wrong setting so it didn’t record. BUT we have ordered a copy of the official taped performance, so we should have a copy in February some time.

Grace and SE before heading out to the show.

Grace and Leah before their Nutcracker debut.

We were so glad that Chris’ parents (Mimi and Grandaddy), Chris’ sister and her family (Kathy, Jeff, Ben, and Jackson), my brother (Jeremy) were all able to come out to The Shore to watch Grace dance. We missed my mom and dad who couldn’t come due to my mom’s health and the dr.’s concerns with her traveling. But, they were with us in spirit. Ben and Jackson were such good sports. The ballet is not high on the list of fun activities for boys ages 7 and 10, but they were really excited for Grace and hung in there for the 2 hour plus performance. Grace was only in the 1st 4 minutes of the show….

Decorating for Christmas

After we got our Christmas tree from the Montessori fundraiser we were able to start decorating the house for the Christmas season.  After hanging the ornaments the girls voted to let Uncle Jeremy put the angel on top of the tree.

 Now that the cold weather is here, it is fireplace time at our house.  Chris loves to lay on the floor after a long day of work.  The girls love to join him for some night time snuggles.

Thanksgiving 2010

The boys, frying up the turkeys.

This year we had a smaller crew than usual for our Thanksgiving feast, just my parents and Jeremy. We made enough food for twice that many and did a pretty good job on the 2 turkeys Chris fried. Grace made the place cards by doing some leaf rubbings and we left space for everyone to write something they were thankful for.

My parents brought down a copy of “The Sound of Music” and the girls got to experience watching the classic on Friday night. Now Sarah Elizabeth will occasionally burst into song with “So long, farewell, so long…” (her words) as a tribute to the classic Von Trapp kids good night song. It’s really cute.

 

Injecting the turkeys on Wednesday night.

 

Hanging out with PopPop.

Swinging with MeMa.

Turkey carving time!

Grace practices her dr. skills with MeMa's I.V.

Storytime with MeMa.

A Special Grandpa Visit

Chris’ dad and Janet made a trip out to visit us in mid-November.  They were with us for about a week and the girls had a great time getting to know Grandpa Bentley and Janet.  Grace made her first attempts at riding her bike without training wheels during their visit too.

The training wheels come off!

A nervous ride down the driveway.

Books before bed.