Friends

This weekend we went to see Stella perform little Elsa in Frozen junior at the Chandler Youth Theater. She did such a great job! We are very proud of her. Max just loved watching her and asked when her next play is so we can see that too. He's also hoping she will be in Aladdin because he thinks that would be cool. Following the show, we went to get dinner with our friends.




Monday was a holiday for me at work, so that also meant it was a mommy and Max day. To start the day, I scheduled a playdate with his buddy Caleb from school. I picked Caleb up and took the boys to Uptown Jungle. Max was beyond excited for this. He could not wait to play with Caleb. He thanked me and told me that I am the best mommy ever because I scheduled a play date with Caleb. That was very sweet of him. Caleb is such a sweet boy and I enjoyed hanging out with the two of the. The boys were wore out after playing for a couple hours and it was time to take Caleb home.

Max and I went to lunch together at his favorite place, picked up king crab legs for our Christmas Eve dinner, wrapped all of daddy's presents and we made homemade gluten free cinnamon rolls. We had a great day together.

The Pride Award

Each quarter Max's school hands out awards for perfect attendance and pride awards for excellent behavior. Just like in quarter one, Max received another pride award. This doesn't shock either of us because he is a really good kid. He was upset with us because it's our fault he did not receive the perfect attendance award. Well, we did take him out of school for four days to go to Disney World and on a Disney cruise. How mean of us? I reminded him of this and his was response was that we could have taken him when he's not in school. That way he didn't have to miss any. He also asked me why he has to take a winter break because he loves to learn and how can he learn when he's out of school for two weeks. He also wanted to know why we have weekends. Can't he go to school seen days a week? Andy said he definitely did not get his love of school from him. I know that I absolutely loved school and was sad the day I graduated, so he probably got that from me.

On Wednesday I went to Max's assembly to watch him get his pride award. He was so happy to see me in the audience.


At the end of the awards, they had a teacher wrapping contest. Three kids from each grade were chosen to come up in front of the school and wrap a teacher. I was thinking "please don't pick Max, this would be his nightmare to be in front of the school like that." Of course they picked Max and he ran right up there and was super excited to participate. It was him and two other kindergarteners from the other K classes. They wrapped up his K teacher. He gave it 100% and I was very shocked at how comfortable he was being in front of his school. I am also very proud of him since he has come along way over the past couple years with his social anxiety. I was so proud to see him participate in front of the school that I will admit I got a little teary. I did take video of this, but here are some photos since videos never post well for me.

More Christmas Cookies

Last weekend we made grandma L's famous Dove cookies, but I made them gluten free so I could eat them because they are my favorite. Of course Max was a big helper.




Max also got a big boy haircut at Sports Clips. Before we went, Max picked out the haircut he wanted by finding a picture online. My baby is growing up.


We also went to the Elf party at Alamo. This was fun! We all got hats, snowballs (white balloons), bubbles to blow and a cotton ball. We had a great time while we watched the movie.




Somehow Cookie (our elf) knew we went to the Elf party so he celebrated that night too by decorating the dining room just like in the movie. Max thought this was awesome!

Christmas Cookies

I was recently at Sprout's and came across dye-free food coloring and dye-free sprinkles. I was pretty excited so I bought them because now we can make cut-out cookies that Max can eat. He was also pretty excited about it when I got home. We spent Sunday afternoon baking and decorating cookies. This was also my first time making homemade buttercream frosting. I am not a baker and never have been because I am not a sweets person, but I wanted to give Max color options for frosting that could be piped on because my Ziploc baggies needed to be put to good use. Because the dye is colored with food ingredients versus chemicals the colors were dull, but that's ok nobody cared. It was a lot of fun to make and Max enjoyed eating a lot of them.










With all the dye-free food coloring excitement I forgot about making the beloved Dove cookies. I want to tackle that recipe this weekend, but of course the gluten free version.

Happy Thanksgiving

For Thanksgiving Grandpa J, Grandma V, Grandpa T and Grandma S were all in town to celebrate the holiday. One of the days we did a ladies afternoon doing a project at one of the board places in town. We had a lot of fun with this and Grandma S wants to make it a tradition.


Thanksgiving Eve Max helped Grandma V make the famous grandma's buns.




On Thanksgiving Day, Max helped daddy get the turkey ready. He was pretty excited to inject the turkey as he says it's his job.






Cousin Stephanie popped the champaign for us and Max thought that was pretty cool when the cork flew over the fence and into the neighbor's yard. Ever since this day, Max keeps asking when we can pop more bottles. Ha Ha!


Max helped me set the table and wanted a wine glass too just like everyone else so he could put his apple cider in it. Of course he gave himself the Christmas wine glass.


The traditional group selfie.


Max had a great time with his grandparents while they were here.




We realized after everyone left that we never took a family Thanksgiving photo like we normally do, so we turned it into a selfie.


The morning after Thanksgiving, Max woke to the arrival of Cookie.


We then decorated the house inside and out for Christmas. We added a new addition to our outdoor blow up decorations. Doesn't everyone need an 11 foot Olaf?


We ended the weekend making a gingerbread train.


Now we are focused on prepping for Christmas because you know that will be here super quick!

November Update

Somehow we are 19 days into November and I haven't blogged once. Life is just flying by so fast that sometimes I don't feel like I have time to take a breath. To get you caught up, this is what we have been doing all month.

The Home Depot kids workshop. We went the first Saturday in November and met Max's friend (and her brother) from preschool there. They made eagles for Veteran's Day.


Max had a birthday party for one of his classmates. This little boy also lives in our neighborhood and is turning out to be a good friend of Max's.




Max had his last baseball game of the season. His team made the playoffs, but only the first round. Max played his heart out and got two hits.


The coach had an end of season party at a park where he handed out trophy's for all the boys. He said a few words about each kid and Max really liked that.




We attended my work picnic and Max had a blast.






Max's school had their Fall Festival and it ended up being a late night. Max had so much fun playing with his buddies from school. I also enjoyed getting to know the moms some more.












This past weekend was spent trying to get everyone healthy since we all have had a pretty bad cold. I started to clean out Max's toy room while he was selecting his 10 toys to donate to children in need. Because of that we put together Max's Christmas wish list. We signed Max up for winter flag football and that starts in January. His friend's dad is coaching so he's looking forward to it. And we ended the weekend with a face painting party.