[christmas day 2010]

Christmas day finally arrives! The kids were up earlier than EVER! 8 AM! hahaha... they usually sleep in until 9 or 10 cause they stay up so late... it was sure fun watching them open their presents they're so animated. The expressions are priceless! 

I made us girls matching pjs out of cherry fabric. 

It was a nice quiet day the next 48 hours as they whipped through all their toys... the most played with would be their new DS games! I can't believe Super Mario Bros is still so popular after all these years.

Avila asked mostly for barbie dolls, Alannah anything with a horse on it, of course! Avila made me a bunch of ornaments from school and she did an amazing job on the gift wrapping and handmade card!

Alannah got a new winter jacket in her favorite color, also matching bed sheets too!

The girls were so sweet they got my number!! Mmmhhh... caramel corn crunch!

oooh Coco looked so chic in her new pink jacket. poor little thing needs a haircut so badly!!

Santa was sweet enough to bring the top item on their list! It's a pillow! It's a PET! It's a PILLOW PET! I must say that it was extraordinarily soft. Will be good for road trips and watching movies.

And little Coco got lots of new treats and two new outfits. Here is one of them, not sure she was happy with them but it sure made the rest of us happy. Hahaha.

And Alannah got her dream horse barn handcrafted by her amazing and talented Grandpa. It was beyond her expectations and she is one happy camper today.

We had a really nice relaxing dinner with the family and friends, dinner was delicious, Grandpa made a delicious turkey, shawn made a sweet ham and Eero brought over bread pudding which was just YUM!!

So happy we got this picture of everyone, it was quite comical, for some reason my camera was set on a 2 sec timer, I didn't even know it had that setting, and didn't want to figure it out how to change it once I finally got everyone in place and so tried 3 times to run into the picture and stand next to jason, and after breaking into a sweat I gave up and sat in the corner.

Bye Bye Christmas 2010! Phew I am ready to sleep until 2011! hahaha

[merry merry christmas 2010]

The turkey is in the oven, the presents are all unwrapped, stockings unstuffed...

Before I hop into the shower and get ready for Christmas dinner, I am finally posting our yearly Christmas card. I hope everyone in Australia got theirs in time, 

even though I got them printed in October, I heard some people didn't get theirs until yesterday!! Ugh!

Anyway, many thanks to my friend Fara Smith photography who took some amazing family pics this year, including ours, and the design turned out so cute, I have to say its my favorite of all time!! I also must mention that it was about 97 degrees at the time of the photoshoot too. It was incredibly inconvenient! hahaha...

Some of  you may also have gotten this front side, with Corey.

 Here are a few more favs... post processed by me, some of which didn't make it into the card. 

The girls outfits turned out so cute. I made them from fabric I already had in my stash and it was so much easier than to try to find coordinating outfits at the store. I hope to make some more next year. I used the same pattern for the dress as this one http://alexandrafrankel.blogspot.com/2010/11/sew-much-fun.html

This one was one of my favorites but didn't make it on the card due to layout issues. hahaha.. but its so cute!!

Now that I'm looking at this picture I wished I  hadn't cut my hair this week! hahaa... it was so long! Look at Avila's face, I just wonder what she's thinking of? Probably "I bet this smile will be perfect"... hehehe.. and I'm sure Alannah is thinking "are we done yet?"

Shots like these were really difficult because it was so hot we did not want to be this close together! LOL! I swear there were beads of sweat dripping from our foreheads. wow. who would've thought, we took these in October!

So there we are Frankel Family 2010. The girls are just getting bigger and bigger, and everyone else keeps getting older and older. LOL! Thanks for stopping by! I hope you got everything on your Christmas list! OXOXOXOX

http://alexandrafrankel.blogspot.com/2010/11/sew-much-fun.html

[its beginning to look a lot like christmas!]

This year I've noticed that a lot of people were just not in the holiday spirit. Perhaps its the toll of the economy or the fact that it hasn't really been that cold. Not sure...  I know I myself was dragging, and if  it wasn't for the girls dragging the Christmas decorations & the tree into the house and leaving them in a pile for me in the front doorway, I would have been happy not to bother with any decorations. But because of the girls and their persistence we got our tree up the day after Thanksgiving, but I  did NOT want to put ANY of the ornaments from the previous years. I was just so bored of seeing the SAME tree EVERY year. And I found out I wasn't the only one! I really loved all the white & silver trees I've seen lately in the magazines & blogs, but I didn't have it in the budget to get all new ornaments, considering we had to replace a bunch of the lights which decided not to work anymore. But then my in-laws surprised me with four boxes of silver globes!! I already had a ton of white snowflakes accumulated from over the years and so we were able changed it up a bit with little cost. I am so pleased with the results and have been enjoying looking at the tree.

Avila's class had a holiday party in which she crafted this awesome snowflake ornament from foam which fit in perfectly. Below we found these doves at the dollar tree and I had to have them! Too funny! we couldn't resist adding a few of our picture ornaments from our usual frame ornament tree.

So the girls went to Grandma and Grandpa's for FOUR days!! The first day I spent cleaning the house and then I was able to do some projects that have been on my mind for... literally years! I always wanted matching stockings... but didn't want to spend a ton of money, and I saw these on one of my fav blogs DEAR LILLIE and I already had a bunch of burlap and trims in my fabric stash, I made five stockings for NOTHING!! I swear the sewing machine was the BEST Christmas present EVER!

Here's a better view.. I should've taken pictures before I hung them cause now most are too high, oh well I was able to take 2 of my favorites... yes.. Coco gets a stocking too. hehehe

I LOVE receiving mailed Christmas cards, I wish more people would send them *hint* *hint*, I may just cross you off my list if you don't reciprocate!!! hahah just kidding.  We LOVED the ones with family pics on them, the girls loved checking the mailbox everyday and adding them to  our card garland.  Yes we added ours too cause it was my favorite one out of ALL the years we've made Christmas cards. I'll post it and more pics from our annual family photoshoot tomorrow!

 

Thanks to my good friend Fara who came over and helped  made me a batch of toffee for the family who have been waiting anxiously ALL year for it. I am the worst at making them, I either burn it or undercook it. 

So instead of toffee I made these cute boo boo pillows, the tag were also courtesy of DEAR LILLIE.  A perfect size pillow to soothe little bumps and bruises, burns and other ouchies. 

The girls and I beaded necklaces as presents. I made burlap gift bags and again gift tags were printed from DEAR LILLIE!!

For the class teacher gifts this year we made spa pillows filled with rice, flaxseed and lavendar. I love that you can put them in the microwave or freezer and use them to ease headaches and bruises. I think they will come in handy after a day with 34 little munchkins! :-)

We packaged them in clear bags and made our own gift tags.

Well that's about it, I still have to run out and get some stuff I forgot for Christmas dinner tomorrow... but I wanted to post this picture that Avila drew of her daddy. Not bad for a 7 year old! Love that she even drew in his green lantern shirt, it totally cracks me up!!

I hope its looking a lot like Christmas at your house too, MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! xoxoxox

[dance recital december 2010]

This year Avila's dance school did a production of "The Grinch who stole Christmas" it was incredibly cute. Unfortunately the school doesn't allow photography during the show so I can only share with you these pictures I took during dress rehearsals.

As always she was a champ! She did an amazing job remember her steps,
she did two numbers, one for tap and one for ballet. Just too cute!!
We are so proud of her and we can't wait to see her next show.

[a very sweet baby newborn!]

Sorry I have been totally missing in action! Wow... I am finally finishing up the last of the orders and I think I had my last trip to the post office. One of these days I will use the USPS online post and print!! That will be my goal for next year. My girls and I have also been busy making Christmas gifts too, which turned out SUPER cute I can't wait to share those.

Anyways... I wanted to finally upload this pictures of baby Micah, here's a flashback to Micah in mommy's tummy. 

And he arrived safe and sound all 6 pounds 9 ounces of perfection!

Already a perfect model, I can't believe how tiny they are and how fast they grow!

I'm sorry but I can totally EAT him up like a pastry! Soooooo stinkin CUTE!!! I cannot wait to watch him grow into an even cute toddler.

Thanks for stopping by... I promise I won't leave it so long until my next post!!