Sarah: 6 Years Old

Princess Sarah is 6 years old! Here's a little bit about Sarah at age 6:

• Life is basically one big dance show. Sarah is always dancing. She started taking ballet classes this summer, which she was super excited about. Sarah loves coming to choir practice on Sundays so she can dance in the back of the room while we sing.
• Finished pre-school and started kindergarten at Treasure Valley Classical Academy. Her teacher is Mrs. Frederick. She loves to learn and has started reading. She also loves learning about math. Her favorite part of the school day is riding the bus. 
• She is a great big sister and loves taking care of Kate as well as her baby dolls and animals. If Chris is in a compliant mood, she also loves bossing him around. Their favorite game to play is doctor.
• Sarah is quite the artist. She loves to draw, paint, and make things from clay. She is getting better all the time. Her favorite things to draw lately are unicorns, horses, and birds. 
• Still Daddy's girl. This year, Sarah and Daddy have been working on creating an illustrated book of the Lassie stories he tells her at bedtime. Daddy is writing the stories and Sarah is drawing the illustrations.
• Her best friends are Lucy Snow and Jacob Hoyt.
• Sarah is still our silly, strong-willed, crazy girl, but she has calmed down a lot, especially since starting school. It is fun (and a little sad) to see her growing and changing into a big girl. We love you, Sarah!

This is what most of Sarah's photoshoot actually looked like: 

A few moments from this year:

 This girl was SO excited to get a baby sister. They are one day away from being birthday twins. She could hardly stand it when she had to wait a week after Kate was born to meet her.

 Sarah went through a phase this year where she got very shy in front of people. During her pre-school Christmas program, she wouldn't sing and kept looking at the floor. Eventually, she just laid down on the stage.

 This is the result of Daddy dressing Sarah for church. A unicorn. Chris was wearing a Christmas elf outfit.

 Matching sister outfits for Easter

 Looking fancy after a trip to the hairdresser. She always giggles when she gets her hair straightened because she thinks she looks silly.

 Sarah got to go fishing with Daddy and Grandpa several times this summer, and she loved it. They caught several fish, and Sarah was happy to help gut, cook, and eat them.

 Open house day at school

 Sarah's signature curls have relaxes a lot this year, but she still has amazing morning hair.

 Family photo 2019

 Leaves at Grandma's

 Playing in the leaves at the Columbia River Temple

 Elsa for Halloween

 Looking adorable with Anna and Kristoff

 Sarah and Kate had an amazing unicorn birthday party at Grandma's house. We started with unicorn lemonade

 Anne and Grandma made a beautiful rainbow unicorn cake.

 Anne spent days making unicorn treats for the party!

 Unicorn bark

Unicorn fluff

 Sarah was very excited about her light-up, dancing unicorn from Grandma and her sequin flamingo from us. She also got a kit to make her very own polymer clay creations. As usual, every gift was the most exciting thing she had ever received.

Happy birthday, Sarah!

Kate: 11 Months

Kate at 11 Months:

• Loves being outside. She starts giggling as soon as we go out the door, even if the weather is bad.
• Generally terrorizes her siblings if they are playing something within her reach.
• Worst. Sleeper. Ever. Her favorite trick is still staying up for hours in the middle of the night. Mommy is threatening to wean her in the next few weeks to see if it will make her sleep. 
• Her tongue is always sticking out.
• Learned to clap.

• Loves the dishwasher. I have to sneak into the kitchen to do the dishes. Otherwise, Kate will be there joyfully pulling everything out. She gets very mad when you shut the dishwasher.

• Kate has some great dance moves and loves music. She also gets way too excited when we turn on the tv. 
• Finally put away the 6-9 month clothes and broke out the 12 month size.

• Cruises around the furniture, stands in the middle of the room and dances, and pushes things around to walk, but we can't get her to attempt any steps on her own. She is being stubborn.

•  Crawls like a spider.

• Charms us all with her smiles and giggles, which are always ready.

 Playing with her friend, Taylee, at church (and by playing, I mean stealing toys from each other). Taylee lives two houses down. She and Kate were born on the same day in the same hospital.

 She loves pulling things down, but now she is also trying to put them back. She spent ten minutes trying to get this towel back up on the oven after she pulled it off.

Kate loves books!

Chris: Age 3

Chris is 3! This has been a big year for Chris. Here are some highlights:

• Learned to talk in amazingly grammatically correct, full sentences. We left him at Grandma's house for a week, and he magically went from saying one or two words at a time to telling us stories. Everyone is amazed at his speaking skills.
• Became a big brother when Kate was born in November. He loves helping with Kate, and he is a great big brother (as long as she isn't stealing his toys). 
• Sleeps like a champ, and is a super easy kid to get to bed. (a rare child in this house)
• After much difficulty, finally learned to ride his tricycle.
• Eats just about anything if we can get him to sit still long enough.
• Has very high cuddle needs, especially in the morning. You can tell if Chris hasn't had adequate morning cuddles because he is grumpy. Life cereal is his favorite breakfast.
• The terrible threes have hit, and there is a lot of crying and tantruming going on lately.
• Loves playing in water, whether it is the bath, the sink, the tub, the hose, or the water table.
• Knows all of his letters and numbers and is starting to learn their sounds.
• Started potty training 6 days ago, and he is doing great!
• He is a very independent player and is pretty happy to be left on his own in his room to read or play trains. In the morning, he wakes up and plays happily until we come to let him out, then greets us excitedly.
• Still definitely Mommy's boy, but he loves Daddy now too. He has learned that Daddy is the fun one. 
• His favorite toys are his wooden trains, Play Doh, Hot Wheels, Little People, and any kind of building toy (legos, blocks, magformers, etc.) He also loves puzzles.
• Favorite Shows: Baby Einstein, Stinky & Dirty, Chuggington, DinoTrucks
• Favorite Place: Grandma's house
• Favorite Foods: olives, watermelon, pineapple

 We started Chris's birthday with pumpkin spice cinnamon rolls before church.

 After church, we decorated the cake, and of course the birthday boy got to lick the beater.

 We partied with family at Grandma & Grandpa Hindman's house. He had some help from Sarah & his cousins opening his gifts. He got cars, a puzzle, a Little People carnival, and trucks.

 Chris was very specific about his cake request. He wanted a chocolate cake with lots of red letter B's. No one knows why. He was thrilled with it.

 Blowing out the candles. Only took 50 tries.

 Delicious!

 Chris's potty training selfie. I had a hard time convincing him to ditch the diapers, but now he is very proud of his undies, which he says are very soft and comfy.

 Finally mastered the trike.

 Happy boy!

 Cutest kids.

We love you, Chris!

Kate: 10 Months

Kate is 10 months old! Here is Kate at 10 months:

• Standing! First, she got really confident pulling herself up to stand on the furniture. Now, she is standing straight up from the floor. She hasn't attempted any steps yet, but I bet we will have steps before too long.

• Kate LOVES to laugh. She giggles all day,and it is infectious. If anyone is laughing near her, she will always join in. She is always good for a courtesy laugh.

Kate loves food. Pretty much all food. I handed her half of a toasted tuna cheese sandwich, and she was in heaven for about 20 minutes. 

 

• Sleep: something we don't do enough of at our house. I suppose we will keep her anyway.

• Kate loves water, both in the bath and in the pool. Chris was playing in the baby pool one day, and she was not about to be left out, so she crawled right in.

 First trip to the county fair. It was pouring rain, but we had fun.

First concert! Kate got to see The Piano Guys with Mommy & Daddy. She loves music. She gets up on her knees and dances. Her other signature move is the head shake.

Practicing those standing skills. She hasn't figured out how to cruise around the furniture yet.

 Modeling another of Mommy's church dresses.

 I always have to get a shot of those beautiful eyelashes :)

 She's been doing a lot of chewing lately, and she has been pretty grumpy. Maybe that first tooth will make its appearance soon!

• Now that Sarah is in school all day, these two get to spend the day with Mom. We have lots of fun together.