Dance Party!

It's no secret that we love a good dance party around here. I recently downloaded the theme song for the movie 'Frozen' and me and my girls have been dancing it up all day! They were being such good (and funny) dancers, that I decided to record them. That's when Jos got weird. She started being silly for the camera, but we still got some gold.

Things to notice: 1. Sammie starts copying Josie. It's cute. 2. Josie's (and Sam's) still poses where they have one leg in the air - almost like a yoga pose. Not sure what that is, but my girls think it's a super fly dance move. 3. When Sammie falls over and screams - and I start laughing. She's not hurt. It's an excited scream. 4. Josie's clubbin' outfit. Her hair's a mess (from some hard core dancing) and she's ready for da' clubs. In her defense, we were dancing to Pitbull and Ke$ha also.


Then we tried again. Josie had some signature moves she wanted me to capture on film. Again, I am laughing pretty good during this video, but it's well warrented. My favorite part of this video? When Josie waits for the crescendo of the music to get her drama on. My girl's got skillz.


What I learned from these videos: I need to get these girls back into dance class.

Love these ladies and our impromptu dance parties!

Christmas photo dump!

It was a great Christmas over here. I won't really say much about it except that we spent the whole day together as a family. There was lots of joy, lots of laughter, lots of eating, lots of love, and lots of fun. My very favorite way to spend my time. 

Josie with her new stompeez slippers:

Checking out Noah's loot:

The girls got a new play kitchen from Santa. It was a hit!

Dream Lite's Hello Kitty pillow pet:

Sammie's new baby (Justin named her Persephone. It's awesome to hear Sam try and say that name):

New Cinderella dress up dress:

Feeding her new baby (and Abby Cadabby doll - the hit of the day):

Not too many pictures of the boys on here. They got a lot of new Skylanders and a few new video games (in addition to other, less lazy inducing gifts) and they spent practically the whole day doing this:

Handsome boys:

I love my kids in their Christmas jammies:

Sammie was a present opening machine this year. She didn't even care whose gift it was or what was in it, she just wanted to unwrap stuff. Although, she did find a lot more joy in it when the gift was something that appealed to her. Behold, the unwrapping of her Sesame Street iPhone:

Josie channeling Cyndi Lauper. Very fancy. Funny side story: every year, I get a People magazine in my stocking. This year Jo was looking at the best dresses section with me. Every time she saw a dress, jewelry, shoes, etc. that she liked she'd gasp and say, "Oh! Mom, that's SOOO fashion!" This girl kills me. And yes, she is SOOOO fashion here:

Sammie is also very fashion:

The aftermath:

Sammie's Christmas basically consisted of all things baby doll and baby doll accessories. She loves this so much. She carts all this stuff all around the house but her favorite place to set up 'house' is right at the bottom of the stairs. One day I'm gonna break an ankle.

More Wii (Now before you get all outraged that I let my kids sit around in their jammies and play mindless video games all day, rest assured, that's exactly what I did. It's not something we make a habit of around here - in fact I usually restrict video games to one day a week - but it was Christmas and they were excited, so I let it go. Judge if you must.):

Josie got a make your own necklace kit from Uncle Bubba and Aunt Lisa. It was perfect. It combined her love of jewelry with her love of projects. So we made necklaces:

We enjoyed lots of great food (traditional Peterson family Christmas breakfast, treats all day, and a delicious ham dinner), played some really fun games (man, I hadn't played KerPlunk in forever!), and ended the day with a family movie night where we screened 'Despicable Me 2' - which is already a favorite around here. It was a great day spent with my five favorite people on the planet!

The day after Christmas I took Josie to see 'Frozen'. She'd gotten the Princess Anna doll and matching dress up dress for Christmas and was wearing it around. I thought she'd like it more if she actually knew who Princess Anna was. So I let her wear her costume to the theater. A few things: 1. Frozen is a really great movie. I highly recommend it. 2. Taking a spunky 4 year old to the theater dressed like the main character in a princess movie is awesome. She was beaming the whole time (because people were constantly admiring her). I highly recommend this also. 3. For Josie, going up to the front of the theater and dancing during the closing credits is a must in any movie we take her to. I love how confident she is. This girl is pretty amazing:

This is not my best picture (I look a little drugged and, oh no! I'm missing my top lip! Where'd it go!?!) but I love the look on my girl's face. She looks so happy. It was really fun to go out with her.

Josie and I also went to hit some after Christmas sales. This girl loves to shop (she is, after all, my daughter). She was killing me. Not only were we SO fashion, but she actually said - as we were leaving, "Momma, we look so cute. People are going to look at us and say 'Wow, look at those two cute girls!'". She keeps my self esteem high. Thanks Jos!

That same night we went out to dinner as a family. Justin asked Clayton where he though we should go. Clayton's response, "I don't really care. As long as it's fancy. 'Cause that's my style." So we went to Olive Garden. Ya know, because it's so fancy. Just had to share that little treasure! My kids are pretty funny.

We've been spoiled this week. Not just with gifts (although that's certainly nice), but with infinitely more important things. Justin has been home most of the day (if not all day) for the past week and we've spent a lot of time together as a family. Doing this makes me realize just how much I LIKE these people of mine. I genuinely enjoy being around my family. Justin is still my best friend and makes me laugh like crazy and my kids are awesome people with spunky and fun and unique personalities. The past few days have been such a vacation in the best, most relaxing sense of the world. Justin goes back to work on Monday so the magic will end, but the past few days of being together was definitely my favorite gift of the Christmas season.

I'm thankful for my Savior and his humble birth into this world. I'm thankful that we have a season that we can celebrate not just his birth, but his life and love toward all mankind. I'm thankful that during this season people are usually a little kinder, a little more generous, and a little more tender with each other.

I hope your Christmas was full of love and laughter. I hope you were able to feel some of our Savior's love, as we were. 'Til next year - Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

We hope that this Christmas season provides you with as much love and happiness as we have over here. We are truly blessed with the knowledge of our Savior and His love for us. 

Merry Christmas!
Love,
The Smiths

The rest of December (so far)...

Here's what we've got:
We made "ginger bread trees". Really, they were just sugar cookie cones turned upside down and decorated, but the kids had a great time.

Some of us were there for the decorating, some of us were just there for the knife full of frosting and the candy...

 Classic Sam:

 Guess who was just there for the candy and frosting-knife:

 The finished products (they turned out so cute, but the kids learned really fast that they didn't taste as good as they looked - too much sugar...even for the kids!):

 Then we colored holiday pictures to hang up in Justin's clinic:

 Sometimes, we need to take a break from the holiday festivities to eat this baby:

 We went to Justin's holiday party at work (where the girls got to see Santa again):

The kids and I have been running around doing countless Christmas errands (which I am happy to say are now completely done)!

At the clinic holiday party white elephant exchange, we scored with this Minnie Mouse gumball machine. Sammie snuck up and helped herself (and then did the classic Sam "eye close" when I tried to take her picture).

The Sunday before Christmas. Once again, we were in a rush to take pictures on our way out of church so they're not great pictures.

Clayton's face is a little scratched up, Sammie's baby doll just had to be in the picture, Josie's sporting the fattest lip I've ever seen, and Noah's smile looks a little scary but I think this is still the cutest little group of kids ever! I mega-love them.

 Sweet girls:

 Handsome gentlemen:

Close up of Jo's fat lip. She was running around and fell into the corner of our game table. Her lip is enormous and her gums are cut and swollen as well. It was pretty tragic when it happened and Josie's really NOT a fan of having a fat lip (she told me this morning that she thinks she looks like a monster) but she's handling it much better now than she was. Hopefully it'll be back to normal by Christmas!

This weekend our good friends, the Petersen's, came to visit. We had a blast. The adults went to an awesome Straight No Chaser concert one night and out to a nice dinner another night. The kids just basically enjoyed a lot of time together playing. Plus, we got to meet their sweet new baby Kate. I LOVED snuggling with that sweet tiny girl!

It got sad when it was time for them to go though. Noah and Enoch have been best friends their whole lives. The fact that they live in different states and only see each other a few times a year has done nothing to change their relationship. They play perfectly together and parting is always a teary affair. You can see on Noah's face how sad he is that Enoch's leaving:

Thankfully we know we'll see them again soon (and, fingers crossed, we can convince them to move to Idaho with us)!

December has just been flying by. I can't believe there are only three more days until Christmas! There are still a few things left to do around the Smith house to prepare, but we're excited to do them. Hope you're having as wonderful of a holiday season as we are so far!