The Joke is On Us

We joked around this summer saying if we were still here around Christmas that we would go back to Marengo cave thinking at the time that we would be so long gone by Christmas.Well, the joke is on us. We are still here which we are trying not to get too frustrated about. So we planned to go back to the cave during Winter break. We decided that we would be cool like my friend Ginger's family and go explore another cave near by which is called "Mammoth Cave".

This was our tour guide. He was excellent. I forgot his name, but he was so hilarious, and he had such a cool Kentucky accent that it was fun to hear him talk.

It was raining the day that we went, so I don't know if this waterfall is always there at the entrance of the cave, but it was beautiful.

Family going deeper into the cave. We took the Historic Tour and there were some parts that were interesting to get through.

Fat mans misery was a part of the cave that the trail was narrow all the way up to your hips and the ceiling was low so you would have to stoop down. It wasn't too bad though, I think most people could do it even if they were a little bigger.

KP and big A coming out of Fat mans misery. It felt good to be able to stand up straight again.

Most of the cave is big open caverns and passageways to go through. It still amazes me that people would go through here with just lighted torches or lanterns back in the day.

This is the bottomless pit. As you can see it has a bottom to it, but back in the day when they would throw down their torches to see the bottom, the torches would go out, and the bottom is all sand so they wouldn't hear the torch hit the bottom. So they called it the bottomless pit. An early tour guide put a a tree trunk across it and climbed over to the other side. He was a brave soul. 

It looks as if it is snowing in the cave, but it wasn't. The camera just decided to focus on all the floating particles along with our picture. But it does make it look Christmasy with the tree in the background.
We decided that this cave was nice, but we thought that Marengo cave had a lot more interesting formations and things to look at then mammoth cave. So if you want to go spelunking, then we recommend Marengo cave.

Winter Break

The girls had a whole week off before Christmas and one full week after as well. There was a lot of game playing, t.v. watching, and down time at our house. It was good!!A friend had mentioned that some of the museums down town were free so we planned to go to some of them. When we got to one of the museums that were supposed to be free it wasn't. But we stayed anyway and made a day of it.

Little C was excited about the train at the Indiana State Museum, the other girls are growing out of it. But they humored their mother anyway.

You get a snowflake when you go around the loop. We haven't had much snow around here yet- but I am not complaining.

"B" wrote a letter to Santa and put it in the mailbox. I think she knows the real secret but is still trying to hold out hope. When Santa wrote her back it was a typed letter that had her name written in, and signed by Santa. She asked why Santa had written her name but typed up the rest-"Why wouldn't he just type in my name like the rest of the letter?" Yep- she is figuring it out. I will probably have two elf helpers next year.

We enjoyed some of the other exhibits of the museum. Here the girls are enjoying driving a tractor.

Little C is a girl who loves her puzzles. Hmm, I wonder where she gets that from?

At least it is nice to go somewhere and enjoy the Christmas decorations and bring in that Christmas feeling. Spending time with the best girls in the world always makes my day as well.

The girls get to open a present on Christmas Eve. It is no surprise to them now that they are a new pair of pajamas every year. Maybe next year I will switch it up and give them dresses or something- throw them off a little bit. They usually get different pajamas from each other, but this year I thought it would be fun to make them all matching.

Christmas morning sure is fun, but then it looks like your house threw up and you have boxes and paper and stuff everywhere. Usually we let it slide by for a few days before tackling the clean up part of Christmas, but this year we had to do it early. We were leaving town Tuesday and some one was coming to look at our house the next day, so Monday was "get the house back in order" day . But not having to look at this mess for too long was nice. 

Polar Express Party

Little C had a Polar Express party at school. They got to wear their pajamas to school and have some fun.They started with a craft. 

The principal came and read them the "Polar Express" story. Then they got to watch the last part of the movie and talk about the jingle bell.

They each had a ticket that would get punched with a different shape after each activity.

Then they frosted and decorated cookies and drank chocolate milk.

All done decorating! Some of the kids had their cookies piled high with candies and sprinkles. I was glad to see that little C didn't go overboard with hers.

Eating them is the best part!!

Mmmm Mmmmm Good!!

Losing them two at a time!

Little C has been complaining that her bottom teeth have been bugging her when she ate. So I checked and sure enough she had two of her bottom teeth loose! Man she is getting big fast. Getting out her first tooth was a little traumatic. It didn't really hurt her, but when she saw that her gums were bleeding she automatically thought something was wrong.

Getting out the second one went much better when we explained that everything was normal. Now we get to enjoy big toothless grins like the ones below.

December Birthday's

December is always a party in our house with my birthday in the middle of the month, KP's birthday a week later and then Christmas a week after that! KP took me out to breakfast the morning of my birthday and then made me a cake. He had to work the night shift on my birthday so he left the decorating of my cake to the girls. They asked me what I wanted and I requested a  flower.

They came up with a Daisy flower in a lawn chair relaxing and reading a book. Big A said it didn't come out as she had pictured it in her mind and said working with frosting was difficult. It looks busy but it was still delicious!

KP had to work on his birthday. They are short a pilot at the base and the other pilot's have to make up for it-hence the working all the time. So we decided to bring him his cake at the base.

He got a call to go fly a patient right after we got there. So we sang happy birthday to him, had him blow out the candles and he had to leave. Since it was an ice cream cake we packaged it back up and took it home with us and enjoyed it later.

At least he got sunshine and got to fly on his birthday. I guess you can have everything and eat your cake too.

Christmas Piano Recital

This year was little C's first piano recital. She told us that she was scared (nervous) to go in front of all the people. The girls played at a retirement home for the residents there. Here are the girls waiting for their turn.

 Little C at the piano. I ended up having to stand by the piano to make her feel comfortable enough to play her songs in front of everyone.

The other girls I got on video which is too long to put on our blog :(. But here is a picture of all the girls with their piano teacher. She has done great with them and they still enjoy playing the piano!! Major points there.

Thanksgiving Activities

My daughter's teacher passed out a list of "First Thanksgiving" recipes that he wanted the parents to volunteer to make and bring in to school so the kids could experience a real "first thanksgiving". I looked over the list and thought to myself "The kids aren't going to want to eat any of these" and so I decided to pick the least expensive one to make, because I didn't want to waste money and a lot of food. I decided to make a whole baked pumpkin stuffed with apples and maple syrup.
I served it up at school, and forgot to take any pictures of the inside or servings. I was right though- the kids ate the apples and thought the pumpkin part was not that great. At least I wasn't left with a bunch of pickled eggs, succotash, or swizzle drink.

Miss B's class had a project of making a turkey out of things you had at home and writing a persuasive speech of why you wouldn't want to eat this turkey for thanksgiving. She found an old watering can in our garage and decorated it. She did a great job.

The girls were in charge of making the fruit turkeys this year to keep our tradition alive. They had fun doing it, and they turned out pretty cute.

KP had to work a day shift on Thanksgiving so we brought the dinner over to his workplace and made it there. It worked out great. They got a few calls, but had to turn them down for weather, so they all got to eat with us.

Here is the whole crew. We were watching the annual dog show in the background. Good stuff I tell ya.

KP was allowed to grow a mustache for the month of November-something to do with men's health month. I just had to take a picture of it, because I don't think we have any other pictures of him when he has decided to grow facial hair at other times. I am glad it will be gone by December!

Perks of being in Student Council

Miss A got to emcee an awards assembly this last month. I wasn't sure if I would get a good picture of her at the assembly so I took a picture of her before school.

This is a short video of her demonstrating the different ways you can applaud the award winners. The other videos are too long to download to this. So family members will have to see them later.

House redecorating

This entry is mostly for myself. This is to remind me that all the changes and hard work we put into redecorating the house was worth it. I think our house looks better, even if I did have to paint over all the fun colors that I had in the house before. And the girls' rooms are a little plainer, but I fizzled out on having to buy more decor for the house. Now it is just a waiting game, the right buyer will come along eventually. 
Before picture of entry:

And then the after picture:

The great room before:

The Fireplace after:

Old Office/piano room:

New office/piano room:

Old kitchen:

New kitchen:

Old Master Bedroom:

New master bedroom

Old Master bath:

New master Bath:

Old A's room:

New A's Room:

Old B's room:

New B's room:

Old C's room:

New C's room: