With the beginning of January we were ushered into soccer season. Katelyn & Brooklyn each played on a team in a Christian league. They both enjoyed practice and Brooklyn also played pretty hard in the games while Katelyn enjoyed being with the other girls on the team and getting to know them.
Brooklyn throwing the ball in.
Katelyn
Here is a video of Brooklyn. If you stick through it, she gets in a kick and a throw-in.
The kindergartners have a bunch of special days at school throughout the year. I went to help out with penguin day for a little while in January. Brooklyn loves doing crafts and these special days.
The girls are teaching Madison the important things in life in this video. Go Packers!
Here are a bunch more random pictures from the month.
Snuggling in bed with Madison.
Katelyn sometimes enjoys writing things on her own.
Kyle's family frequently comes to California for Christmas, but this year we headed out to them. We left on Christmas Eve and flew to the Twin Cities.
All ready to go and waiting for our plane.
We spent the first few days in Twin Cities area at Kyle's sister Kristina's (and brother-in-law Nick) house. We woke up to freezing rain on Christmas morning, so we didn't make it to church, but after the rain stopped, the kids enjoyed some sledding on the hill in the backyard.
Stockings on Christmas morning. Thank you, Grandma!
Brooklyn & Grandpa (all smiles)!
Madison was not a big fan of the sledding, but she liked being in the snow.
Grandpa & Katelyn!
Trying to make snow angels (it was too icy).
On Monday night (26th), Nick's family had tickets to the Timberwolves game, so Kyle & I went with Nick & Kristina. We had two very close tickets and switched off each quarter with the tickets that were a little higher up. It was my first NBA game and was pretty fun (even if it wasn't the Lakers).
The girls were given tickets to the Crayola Experience for Christmas, so we headed to the Mall of America on Tuesday. Kyle and I enjoyed some time without the kids while they had fun with Grandpa & Grandma & Uncle Nick & Aunt Kristina.
After the Mall, we drove down to Kyle's hometown and stayed with his parents for the rest of the trip. Highlights included Kyle's grandparents visiting from Iowa, a wagon ride in the snow to the Christmas lights and of course lots games.
Baking Christmas cookies with Grandma.
Decorating the cookies.
All bundled up for the wagon ride.
The girls with Great Grandpa & Great Grandma De Graaf.
This was technically in November, but I forgot to include it. We measure the girls each November & May around their birthdays. I thought this was fun because we reached the first time when the kids were measured at the same ages. If anyone wants to know how much older Katelyn is than Brooklyn at a certain age, her it is.
Brooklyn fell the first Saturday of December and the next morning her elbow still hurt and she would not bend it, so I took her to urgent care on Sunday and the x-ray was inconclusive about if it was a break or not so they treated as one. When we went to the specialist a couple days later, he did not think it was broken and she was acting totally normal.
I took Brooke for a treat (donuts) after her urgent care appointment.
Decorating for Christmas.
Katelyn got a subscription to Clubhouse for her birthday and everytime she gets a magazine she finds a quiet spot to read for a long time.
We took a family bike ride to a local Little Free Library.
When you are a kid, it is still fun to rake leaves.
Here's a few more randoms.
Katelyn reading a Bible story to Madison. 💗💗
You will need to turn up the volume on this, but it is pretty sweet.
When did she get so big?
Kyle has become a true Californian. Here he is in our bedroom when our heater wasn't working in Dec.
Katelyn had her first soccer practice before Christmas. (Top left)
The girls each got to pick one thing that was important to them over the Christmas season. Katelyn wanted to make a gingerbread house. Brooklyn wanted to do a Christmas tree craft. I picked going to see Christmas lights.
We drove through the lights this year and on our way home stopped at a home that has a display set to music. Here is Madison watching it.
We opened some of our gifts before we headed out of town. Evidently I didn't take too many pics, but here is a pictures of pure joy of Brooklyn.
