Miheret's Birthday, and other pictures from the last month

The birthday party was a hit (after Miheret realized that you can have a party at home...apparently she thought that you had to leave the house for it to be a party).

The Birthday Girl!

The dreaded Dora Cake.....read the icing saga below!

Deciding what part of Dora to eat!

The side effects of the dreaded black hair icing!

Mitike enjoying the Cake portion of the evening.

Tenaye has more fun with the Balloons..she's not really a desert kinda gal! (I wish I had that problem!)

Opening presents...serious business..

Hey this is fun...

Some other happenings in our family...

Tenaye is getting so big! Here she is helping Mommy by feeding TK her supper.

Tree Decorating

Christmas concert photos..coming soon ( 4 down..1 more to go tomorrow afternoon!)

Cake Decorating 101

Yes, it is 2:06 am...and why am I up you may ask...well it's a long story based on what I thought was really good planning..but turned out to be really bad planning.

So you may have recalled me saying at one time or another that I like to make and decorate all my kids birthday cakes...well that hasn't changed...but after tonight...I have a different perspective about it :)

To back up a bit- Miheret's birthday is Dec. 23. As this is her first birthday party ever - we didn't want to have it only 2 days before Christmas and then have her first Canadian Christmas...it would be so overwhelming for her. So we have been trying all month to find a date that would work to have her birthday party (just a family one). It finally came down to tomorrow (or I guess today..LOL.) Dec. 16th is the day. I thought it would work out really well! I would bake the cake tonight, and then Tenaye and I could decorate it tomorrow afternoon while Miheret was at School. Then Bill would take the girls swimming after school, while I decorate for her Birthday party super...right on..great plan....

...except I forgot, or didnt' realize, that Dec. 16th at 2:15 pm is Miheret's Class Christmas Concert at school...so much for being able to decorate in the afternoon..so that means that I had to bake the cake and decorate it tonight...no biggie..I can start as soon as the girls go to bed..nope I have TKD, ok..I can start as soon as I get home from TKD (8:30 ish) shouldn't be too bad...

...except I sent Bill on some errands for me (gotta love 24 hour Superstore this time of year) and forgot the grocery bag in the back of the Van that had all my ingredients for making and decorating the Cake ..that I bought this afternoon. Oh well, I guess I wait until he comes home to start...so 10 pm ish..

...really how long can it take? Miheret wants a Dora Cake - easy- my friend has a Dora cake pan that I borrowed...mix, pour, bake, decorate..no problem...not so...as I just finished at 2:06 am...it was a bit more involved than I thought!

So here are somethings that I learned about decorating cakes - really at one point I thought I was going to end up with an 80 year old bug eyed Dora Cake!

- DO NOT START at 10 pm!
-Have more than 1 end for the icing bag...especially when you need to use like 15 different colors...changing them all the time is really annoying!
-If you need Black icing...realize it before you start baking at 10 pm and then buy it don't try to make it! Trust me!
-Dora is supposed to have a nose..hmm...oh well maybe they won't notice. (It's 2am and everything is sort of cleaned up..)
-next time make Bill stay up with me to clean as I go!
-Maybe rethink my whole 'The birthday cake has to be a surprize" theory....so I can make it in front of the kids....hmmm...
-Follow the directions in the order they are printed!! They are that way for a reason..and I might have had nice eyes..instead of scary buldgy eyes on dora...hmm...maybe she won't notice.
-Have enough icing bags, one for each color...so the vibrant purple doesn't turn into a very weird purple with stripes..
-LOOK at the picture after reading the direction - so I don't color the hair Blue!
- I am sure I learned a whole lot more..did I mention..don't start at 10 pm! But it is now even later (or earlier..) and I have 2 girls that will be up in 4 hours so I'd better try to get some sleep.

Pictures of the "Dora" cake and the birthday party to follow. (Along with video and pics from 5 Christmas concerts...Yes count them 5!! with only 3 children in school..and tree decorating.. :) )
Hopefully I'll get caught up soon!

Happy Birthday Dad!!

This post is a bit late. It was Dad's birthday last week. The actual day was one of the busiest days we had all week - so normally we would have celebrated on a different day, but Miheret is big big big into birthdays right now - so we had to have Dad's party on his birthday!

The day looked something like this...the girls helped me to bake the cake in the morning. Then once all the kids were home from school they decorated it and hid it before Dad got home. Dad rushed home from work to take the girls to swimming lessons...this gave me 30 mins to finish the birthday party plans. Bill and the kids arrive home from swimming, we quickly sit down for supper (my parents joined us as well) and ate. As soon as we were finished eating - (well honestly some were still finishing their last few bites...but we had to move!) in came the cake..a great rendition of "Happy Birthday" was sung.. Cake and ice cream were served...while eating cake gifts were brought in and opened...then 35 mins after it all began - Bill was out the door and back to work for Parent/Teacher interviews....HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD! 20 mins after Dad left for work - the kids and I were out the door to go watch a musical production of "The Princess and the Pea". So that was the worlds fastest birthday party! Fun was had by all! Here are some pics to prove it :)

The kids decorated the cake themselves!

Just a cute shot of Grandpa and his girls! TK was in bed or she would have been right in the middle of this - she is Grandpa's Buddy!

This was so funny, had to include this as well. Today when I was chaging TK she kept making this face , squishing up her nose, wanting me to give her an eskimo kiss (rub my nose against hers) she would do this over and over until I gave her a kiss!

Auntie Jan...When were you here??

I can't believe it fits!! That little red outfit you gave to Mitike..that was way too big for her...well it now fits!! She is growing so fast!! I tried to get a good picture of her in it for you - but well...she never (and I mean NEVER) stops moving! Here are a few (of the 50 some I took) to get a half decent one!



She has a new trick..she likes to sit down whenever she sees the camera...here she is on her way down!



Got her standing..but looking / walking away from me...

Now she is refusing to look at me with the camera - she is pretending to watch something more entertaining up the stairs (there is nothing/no one up the stairs)..

Now - looking the other direction as I think Mommy caught on to the fact that there is really nothing fun upstairs to look at..

This is the best I got..and I had to trick her to get this one..I hid around the corner from her and focused the camera (button half way down) on a specific spot and then waited for her to walk through the frame...She LOVES to play Peek-a-boo..so as soon as I call PEEK..she comes running!

Well there you have it...her new red outfit...and the saga of getting a picture for Auntie!

The other 3 are playing downstairs and waiting impatiently for the time to leave for Masagargar 2 ...(as Tenaye calls it...Madagascar 2)...they are super excited to go to a movie. This is Miheret's 2nd movie in a theatre and I am not sure if she is more excited for the movie or the popcorn!

Halloween Part II

Sorry for the delay getting the rest of the Halloween pics up - but I actually lost my camera...ok..more misplaced it..I have to stop putting things in safe places...

So - after school Miheret and Mekonnen rushed home to change out of orange/black and into their costumes. Mitike also got in on the fun!

ZORRO!


SNOW WHITE - I don't think she even knows who Snow White is (don't think we have gotten to that story yet) but to her she was a princess and that was all that mattered! *Yes and I didn't have time to remove the orange/black crazy hair!
Our Little Lamb!This was just to cute!

The Lamb wouldn't sit still for any group pictures..manged to caputre this as she was walking by Miheret.Snow White, Zorro, and Tenaye the Good Witch :)

Halloween Part I

Here are the girls..ready for school...

Miheret had orange and black day - with instructions to wear a funky hat or have funky hair...so here she is all ready to go! After school Mihere will change into her "Snow White' costume...will post pictures of that later..and Mekonnen will transform into Zorro!

Tenaye goes to a different school this year, and was allowed to wear a costume to school..here is our littel "Good Witch" on her way!

The costume is really way to big..but she insisted on wearing it - so last night I did a really bad job of safety pinning it in a bunch of places so she can wear it....no time to sew :) (Or can't sew....one of those reasons!)

Miheret's First Box Braids

Miheret's hair is finally long enough for me to do box braids on her. She was soo excited as she has been asking me to braid her hair like this since she first saw me do Tenaye's hair like this shortly after we got home!


Her hair is great- I have not used any elastics or snaps or anything on these braids...just braid and twist and they hold nicely.


The braids are not uniform...for a reason..tomorrow, Halloween, they are to wear orange/black to school and either a funky hat or funky hair....well I couldn't pass up the opportunity for funky hair....


This hair do is not funky you ask??......Just stay tuned...she does have to go to school today....tomorrow we will put the finishing touches on her 'Halloween' hair.....You'll have to wait and see!
The sunglasses were her idea!


Stay tuned....

Carving Pumpkins

Here we go...cleaning the pumpkins! Mitike really wanted to get her hands in there too...but had to settle for hanging out with Grandpa instead :)

Each of the kids draws their own face on their pumpkin without any help from anyone...we use a dry erase marker so they can draw and erase many times over until they are happy with their pumpkin.

Afterwards, mom cuts out the faces - exactly as they had drawn them. Here are the final results.

BOO!!!! Happy Halloween!!

(The little Pumpkin is Jack :) a small jack-0-lantern candle holder that I have- Mom needed a pumpkin too!

Where???

The other night at dinner Tenaye announced that she wants to go to "Wiinnie the Pig"...can anyone figure out where she wants to go?!?! :D We know..just wonder if you do....

Gold Style Cleaning

Mitike has been big into sweeping (or trying to lately). Here she is with her broom...she of course doesn't like the kids broom that we have..she must have the full size one!

Of course, never to be out done...Mekonnen got into the act and came up with a new inovative fun way of sweeping the floor....Ok..not sure exactly how effective this was but they sure had fun!!

This past weekend Mekonnen and I headed up to Yorkton for his Tae Kwon Do tournament. It was my first night away from the girls - it was very tough to leave - but they had a great time with Dad, and got to attend their first bowling birthday party while we were gone. Everyone survived and had a great time.

Mekonnen and I had a good time in Yorkton at the tournament. Mekonnen had worked hard all summer on his TKD so he was very well prepared for this tournament.

The morning brought us the Poomsae (Patterns) competition. Mekonnen performed an amazing pattern (Tae Gueck 4) taking the Gold and scoring the highest marks I saw in the whole tournament..ranging from 8.4 - 9.1 out of 10! Way to go buddy!!

Having just tested for his Green belt, Mekonnen was sparring in the Green/blue belt division for his age/weight/height category. His first match was a nail bitter - very close all the way through, at the end of the regulation 3 rounds it was tied 9 - 9....ahh....overtime is sudden death - first point scored wins....Mekonnen was awesome, patient...waited for his chance..then 'wham' quick front leg turn kick...Point...win! :) He continued on undefeated to take home the gold!

Mekonnen performing his pattern.

We also had the opportunity to visit with some great friends while we were there!

Green, Fall Leaves, Snow, Birthday, Turkey and more...a very busy weekend!

Well...we have certainly had a packed weekend...it all started at the end of the week with a big wind storm..not too exciting except it blew all the leaves from the neighbours very large tree into our yard. The next day, Mekonnen was out there raking them into a big pile to play in. He was so excited to do this, but Miheret couldn't figure out why they would want to play in 'leaves?!?!'....anyway they ended up having a ball and in the end she said "Mom, Leaves are fun!" Here are some pics from that day.

Then yesterday we had a bit of a snow storm! Miheret has been asking and asking about the snow, what it's like, when will it come...we made a mistake of watching a movie with her that takes place in Antartica - in the movie the ice breaks up and one person falls through the ice..so she was worried that once it snowed the ground would break and she might fall through..

Anyway, late Sunday afternoon it began to snow...here are some pics of the kids out playing in the little bit of snow that had falling. Note - Miheret doesn't have mits/gloves on - she didn't want to wear them....so she started playing without them...soon giving in and asking for a pair... "It's COLD MOM!" were her exact words..LOL

She really had a lot of fun in the snow - but didn't like it landing on her face!

After our fun in the snow we headed in for Thanksgiving dinner and one excited little girls 4th birthday! Here is the cake....for those of you that don't follow the WHL...this is the MJ Warriors Logo...Yep that is what Tenaye wanted...and it wasn't a whim..she has been asking for a warriors cake for an entire year..so she got it! LOL Funny girl...had to wear her most beautiful dress, from Mexico - and have a warriors cake!

A few days before her birthday - Tenaye was suddenly into Birthday hats...so we made sure everyone had one! :) Even Grandpa and Great-Grandpa - such good sports!


This is what we woke up to the next morning!
So once all bundled up - out we went to play in the snow. Miheret was very hesitant to touch it at all at first..but as soon as Tenaye went running past her running through the snow...it was all good and Miheret was out having a ball in the snow.

Making Snow angles

Miheret discovered it didn't hurt to jump in the snow!

Tenaye loves to stand under the trees while Mekonnen makes the snow fall from the branches..Miheret decided to join her in the fun.....

Miheret didn't find it as fun as Tenaye!! LOL

Mitike also joined in the fun...this is what she did for almost the entire time out in the snow..

Yep..that's it ..she just stood there! SHe was too funny..laughing and giggling..but refused to walk or move in all the 'gear mom made me wear!' She would at times even refuse to stand up straight and would lean back - so we would have to stand behind her so she wouldn't tip over!

At one point I sat her in the snow - thinking she might play with the snow then..but no..she just sat there :) I guess I now know the secret to keeping her still! (She is NEVER still when inside the house!)

And last, but certainly not least - Mekonnen worked extremly hard - training all summer in TKD - and this past Friday he belt tested in Regina - and succeded in getting his Green Belt. (He was very excited - as he jumped from Yellow striaght to green -missing the belt inbetween!) We are very proud of you Mekonnen!


Mekonnen with Grand Master Kim. We are part of Kim's Tae Kwon Do, Grand Master Kim's club from Regina - he does all the testing.

Mekonnen with our instructor from Moose Jaw, Mr. Chow - Mekonnen trained with Mr. Chow all summer preparing for this test.