Excuse me?

Yesterday I was asking Josephine (8 years old) why it took her so long to get her shoes on.  She looked up at me, and let out a sigh, "Momma, come on.  Can't you see I'm having a struggle?"

Early today I asked her if she understood what I had asked her to do.  She looked at me with her big brown eyes and said, "No, Momma.  I'm still perplexed."

Ok, so maybe these are not huge vocabulary words, but, when you hear them used by your baby girl, they are amazing.  So is she.

Kai Pan

Why are these children all smiling?  They are enjoying one of our newest BallTeam Christmas traditions - Kai Pan.  For the last two years, James' Dad has taken our family out to eat at a Japanese restaurant - Kai Pan.  It's one of those cool places that cooks on the grill right in front of you.  Our chef gave a running narrative of what he was doing, insulted American cooking, aka microwaving, and actually threw broccoli at three of us - asking me first to open my "sexy lips" and catch.  He was quite the entertainer.

Here he is in action shot.  The food was really good.  It was so good, in fact, that we brought home to go boxes with our leftovers and we ate it again for a late supper.  With five kids, it's hard to find one place that everyone likes.  Kai Pan is our family favorite.

Jim wasn't able to come this year because he caught an untimely stomach bug.  But we had pictures of him with us at Thanksgiving.  For Christmas Kai Pan, we get Jean, his wife of almost 30 years, James' step-mother.  Here she is with Samantha, who wasn't in the first picture.  Merrii Karisamasu.

Central Christmas 2012

Charlotte and Josephine had their Christmas program this week.  One of the perqs of living in the Bible Belt is that a Christmas program REALLY IS a Christmas program.  It's not a holiday celebration.  Teachers use words like Jesus and Nativity.  I, for one, appreciate it.

 

The ladies sang with their classmates and each class did about three songs.  Charlotte, with the rest of the fourth grade, played Silent Night on the recorder while the audience sang.

 

I was able to get this energetic group of girls to stand still long enough to get this picture.  In order from left to right they are: Josephine, Drew, Kendall, KoryLynn, Charlotte and Ryan.

The interesting thing about this group of friends is that they are three pairs of sisters.  My two are Charlotte and Josephine.  Drew and Ryan are twins, and Kendall and KoryLynn are twins.  Charlotte has another set of twins - two boys - in her class at church.  Twice the fun!!!

My two beauties posing for the Momma.

Christmas, 2012

Charlotte, fourth grade, 9 years old

Josephine, second grade, 8 years old

Wee Care Christmas 2012

Jay Michael attends a preschool class at a Baptist church three mornings a week.  He adores it.  Tonight was the Christmas program.  He was very excited.  His teacher, Ms. Teresa, is wonderful.  Jay Michael always says, while is playing at home and something interesting happens, I have to tell Ms. Teresa about that, Momma.  I also have her to thank for Jay Michael's newest favorite saying, "That is correct."  I know he's picking up lessons at school when he smiles at me and says, "Momma, that is correct."  Oh. My. Gosh. Cutie.

And here he is with his friends - the starstruck blonde to his left is Lane, his best bud.  The dark haired boy on his right is Luca.  These three boys are in a class with nine girls.  Ms. Teresa says they stick together.

 

His class, with three other four-year-old classes, sang three Christmas songs - all religious.  And, they recited Luke 2:11 - For unto you is born this day in the City of David, A Savior, which is Christ the Lord.  Yes, they recited it.  I melted.  It was a very nice presentation, with cookies after.  We had skipped supper to be there on time and so we let Jay Michael pick where he wanted to get supper.  While he was eating is hamburger, he said, Momma, do I get a hamburger because I was so good at singing?  Yes, baby boy.  You did great!

Local Celebrity

Salisbury, Maryland, the town where I grew up, held its Christmas parade last weekend.  And who is this jolly camouflaged elf?  It's my brother, Eric, and his lovely wife Abbey, riding on the float for the Veterans.  Everybody wave!

Before and After

The transformation - only a few minutes with Dad and his clippers gives JMichael a much needed trim.  From mop-top cutie to monk.  He's growing so, so fast.

Four years old, November 2012.

"Tis The Season

There are those of you, and you know who you are, who just can't wait to start the holiday season with music.  A few songs stand out to me as holiday classics.  They might not be the first ones you think of, but, they are icons for my generation.  Since I see this blog as my way of preserving our story for posterity, these have to be included!  Enjoy!