Father Daughter Dance

Emily went to her first Father Daughter Dance, the Girl Scouts "He and Me Country Barn Dance." After getting dressed we were waiting for some friends and had time for an impromtu photo shoot out front. She is such a pretty girl...

Her and her guy...

Her, her friends, her guy, her guys friends...

Everyone met up at the Rugen's House and the dad's took their girls to Chili's for a pre-dance date dinner while the moms and siblings stayed at Tammy's for taco night. I think they had a great time. We'll see what next year's theme is...

And a Couple More...

Along with 100 pictures these were a couple of my favorite videos from our last sledding trip to Prescott. We can't sled all the time...well Emi could. In the downtime we had Dance Parties. Abi is getting pretty good!

This next one is Emi and I sledding down the side of the mountain. She is getting to be quite the adventerous girl.

Driveway Sledding and 100 Pictures...

From the front of the house...

to the back of the house...

It doesn't snow like this often in Prescott. Maybe once a season and sometimes not even that, so for us Zonies, Desert Dwellers, whatever you choose to call us, this is kinda a big deal. Emi loves the snow and we promised her whenever it falls we will go play in it and we are fortunate enough to be able to make good on that promise. This year, in Prescott, so far there have been two really good snow storms already and it's only January. There has been record snow in the north of our state and throughout the country so I guess it's maybe not that big a deal, but we love it anyway.

Even my sweet "city girl" Squish got in on the games this time. Last month when we came sledding for the first time (and had a BLAST!) she wanted nothing to do with it and sat inside, alone, watching cartoons the entire afternoon.

Day 2: Look at the backyard! Notice the basketball hoop and the playhouse? They kids were in heaven!

I love this too, a man doing man things. Travis shoveling snow, but not from the driveway (although he did shovel the roof and rain gutters)...off the bbq so he could grill dinner. Yes, he's nuts! Our friends drove up to join us for dinner and brought their little girl to play in the snow for the first time. Brian bought filets to grill for dinner in the snow.

SNOWBALL FIGHT!!!

Snow Tunnels...

Sledding, this time in the neighbors driveway. It's WAY steeper than ours and way faster as poor Billy learned. Don't know where my mothering skills went, but I let him sit on a saucer and fly down that hill before doing a safety check. If I had done the safety check I would have known that was a really bad idea...Poor kid got about halfway down when the high speed wobble started and then WHAM, roll, tumble the rest of the way down. His lower lip took the brunt of the trauma, but he's a tough little guy and after a brief recovery he was right back at it, only this time he chose the slightly slower inner tubes and a chaperon.

Back in our driveway...A perspective shot to give you an idea of what we're working with. That tiny little red thing up there at the top is Billy...

We had a fantastic time! I love building memories...

Javalina

Remember these beauties?

It was just time to do something with them...They lasted through Halloween, Thanksgiving and even Christmas. It's New Year's Eve and now even though my precious Big Max had a small puncture wound that I was able to repair thanks to some quick thinking, Megan and New-Skin liquid band-aid I must do something with them. So, we live in the desert surrounded by wildlife and I am all about recycling when I can...

I tossed them out front for the javalina. They love pumpkin maybe as much as me! This was the sight we awoke to New Years Day. They came back a few nights in a row to "finish-up." They actually ate all of them with the exception of the green one. Maybe it was bitter or just plain hard, who knows! A fitting fate though. I thought it was funny!

Tooth Fairy Chronicles

In the latest chapter of the Tooth Fairy Chronicles we will be discussing what a loser the tooth fairy actually is...

Emily lost another tooth. This one the last of the famed first four teeth (unless your Squishy, in which case your teeth came in vampire style). The front right tooth this time. This one wiggled and jiggled for DAYS before it came out and we had to hear about it everyday over and over. So when Emi woke up on Monday morning and it finally fell out we all rejoiced! We placed it in a safe place and off to school she went...No big deal. When she got off the bus that afternoon she was pretty excited to tell me all about her friend Alyssa who had lost her first tooth on Sunday night and came to school Monday morning covered in tooth fairy dust (aka glitter) and wondered why the tooth fairy never left her any dust.... There really should be tooth fairy protocol, but that is a grip I will have to take up with Alyssa's mom on another day. Emi proceeded to tell me about the glitter on Alyssa's eyes and hair and you get the picture...me bad fairy, Mrs. Paoletti great fairy. We talked about it and that seemed to be the end of the story. The afternoon progressed, my darlings made me crazy and Emi ended up getting sent to bed 10 minutes before the others. We still put her tooth out for the fairy and what not, but she was upset and I was frazzled. The tooth fairy forgot to stop by. Not necessarily an unusual event, this particular fairy has been slightly unreliable. Except, Emily did not forget. When I went to wake her up Tuesday morning I noticed a small piece of paper stuffed in the window frame....it read..."Dear Tooth Fairy, please leave duste." It had a place for the tooth fairy to leave her name and included a picture of Emily sleeping in bed and the fairy floating down and sprinkling her with "duste". Dagger in the heart, the first of many complete mothering failures I'm sure. I was crushed. Not only did the fairy forget and not bring "duste," but she sent a sweet innocent little girl to bed sad. There would be some serious make-up on the part of the loser tooth fairy now. She did come Tuesday night even though Emily literally sleeps with her eyes open. It took a few tries, but this time the fairy came and left a note along with $$ and "duste." The note, written in incredibly tiny letters on a small piece of shiny pink paper read, "Dear Emily, Thank you for the picture. It was lovely. I ran out of dust as I am very small and can only carry so much. I can only come to three houses a night because that is all the teeth I can carry. They are very big! I made sure to come to your house first tonight so I would have enough dust for you. I hope it lasts through the night. You are a very special girl, Santa told me so. Be good! Brush your teeth often. I really like the shiny white ones! Trixie, Tooth Fairy." In her mind it seemed to clear the air and tied up some other loose tooth fairy ends. Phew! I will be a better mother, I will be a better mother, I will be a ...

A Christmas Picture by Emily James...

Emi drew this picture and it made me laugh out loud (lol - for you technologically advanced). It, in case you couldn't tell, is a picture of Emily and I in a snow globe. We had just come home from a trip to Prescott to play in the snow and I guess it was still weighing on her mind. You'll notice not everything made it into the snow globe, but my absolute FAVORITE part is the peace sign. Pay close attention to her spelling...She is very gifted and did not ask for any help with this. It cracks me up and I hope I never forget these silly things.

"Mare Chrismis. Pees and Love," Emily.

I love her! LMAO.