No more thumb

Annah seems to be all done with thumb-sucking! She hasn't worn a sock on her hand during sleep for the past week! She will get her Chuck E. Cheese's reward trip after Christmas! We are very proud of her and amazed that it was easier than we thought it would be for her to stop. What a big girl!

Walking & Talking

Caeden took four steps on his own tonight!

Caeden's vocabulary has been increasing lately! Some of his latest words are:

Yo!

bath

coat

cold

Mama (finally!!!!)

no

And we have heard him say "Jesus," "Annah," and "Santa" a few times each.

Now zip it!

Tonight when Jeremy was praying with Sylvia at bedtime, she said,

"Now say amen.

Amen.

Now, zip it!"

Family Portraits

Today we had family portraits taken at a new studio in town. It took me 4 1/2 hours to get myself and all three kids ready and "beautified" this morning. How ridiculous! But, I must say the girls really enjoyed having their hair put in hot rollers and all the other primping. I could tell they felt very pretty. Caeden wasn't too thrilled about the portrait session itself, but the photographers got some good smiles out of him. By the time I chose the pictures I wanted and we left the studio, we were there over 2 hours! I felt like we spent the entire day on the process, but at least the kids enjoyed it. Hopefully, the pictures will look good!

This morning the girls climbed in bed with us, and we all made up this:
The Lopshire Family's 12 Days of Christmas
On the twelfth day of Christmas my true love gave to me...
12 trips to Grandma's,
11 DVD's
10 noisy cars
9 singing Barbies
8 Psalty CD's
7 pairs of jeans,
6 NFL jerseys
5 Scrapbooking Things (or more would be nice!),
4 Magic Barbie Pegasus horses
3 noisy drums,
2 Larry Boy pillows,
1 pink Doodle Bear!!

And we sang the whole thing!  We each got to pick things we wanted for Christmas to put in the song. 

Today we were all five having lunch at Olive Garden, when a lady holding a toddler came up to our table as her family was leaving.  She said, "I just want to tell you that you guys are my heros.  Your kids are so good and well-behaved!  And you have one more than we do; I can't even handle two!" and on and on...
Well, we reassured her that it is not always (probably should have said 'not usually') like that, and thanked her.  She wished us a Merry Christmas and I felt like telling her to hang in there because I know how she feels--the way I feel so much of the time, like the kids are mostly out of control and I am a terrible mother because I can't get them to be quiet, sit still, and eat, etcetera, etcetera.  But, I have to say, it made me feel so uplifted when she said all that to us.  Hopefully someday someone will notice her kids behaving and compliment her on them.

Tonight the girls had practice for their toddler/preschool Christmas musical tomorrow at church.  When I went to pick them up, their teacher told me a little story on Sylvia.  Sylvie is usually pretty shy and doesn't want to talk to people, but has been becoming more comfortable lately--especially with her Sunday school teacher Miss Ruth.   Well, apparently after the kids had finished a run-through of their program, Sylvia raised her hand, walked up to a microphone, and said, "Um, Miss Ruth, she wasn't singing O Come Let Us Adore Him!" and pointed to the little girl standing next to her! 
I guess our constant reminders to not tattle aren't having much impact on Sylvia...

Good job party!

Check out emailsanta.com! We just did...we filled out a form letter to Santa with some very specific details, and received an instant reply right at the site. Both Annah's letter to Santa and his to her were printable also! Very cool! She is so excited!!

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Sylvia has been doing such a great job with her potty-training that we decided it was time for her Good Job Party!

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Annah modeling some clothes she received from Gram & Krampa for her birthday

Curler Cutie

Sylvia's first time using curlers

She loves hair, and loves having hers styled, so she was quite content to sit still and let me put the sponge rollers in!

Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with our families in Indiana. We are so thankful for them! We all ate a lot, talked a lot, played a lot, slept a lot, and hugged a lot. We have such fantastic families! Thank God for all of them!

We have recently learned of many new babies coming next year, and we congratulate all of our friends and relatives who are expecting little ones! Praise the Lord for filling homes with little ones to love!

Fall Festival 2005

 Last night our church had its annual Fall Festival. It really is a great event, and brings in a lot of people from the community. We had lots of fun!

This year, Annah is trick-or-treating as a mermaid, Sylvia as a fairy princess, and Caeden as Tigger.

Three Wishes

 Do you watch the show Three Wishes?  If so, you may have seen Episode 8, which featured a woman I went to school with at the Conservatory of Music at Capital University.  Her name is Liz Bausch, and she is a musician and music teacher.  A couple years ago, she suddenly lost 70% of her hearing.  Three Wishes granted some of her wishes.  Check out their website for recaps of Liz's amazing story. 

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Yesterday, Jeremy and I had a nice chance to go on a date--for the first time in 6 months.  (We are too pathetic, aren't we!?!)  Our friends, Tom and Lorrie gave us tickets to see a local production of Sweeney Todd, and they watched the kids for us!  It was so nice to have an afternoon away together!