This Past Week....

This past week in the Kim Home:

Monday- Angela had gymnastics. She was asked to join the 5280 Team 3! Huge deal! I thought she wouldn't get that invite for at least another year. Clearly, she is a hard worker and very talented! We have been trying it out this past week. The concern in the time it takes. So we have been checking in with ourselves as a family and with Angela if even with A LOT of time at the gym, we are still able to get all the essential things in (taken from Elder Oaks "Good, Better, Best" talk - personal scripture study, family scripture study, One-on-one time with mom and dad, Family home evening, family council, dinner together as a family, missionary work, service, etc - all those great essentials that truly make life BEST :)). Anyways,Angela has been working hard and it has been an amazing month. We seem to have done better than any other month on something - such as Angela's personal scripture study and one-on-one time with mom, and her reading has been better than ever!! Anyways, I am so happy that Angela has been SUCH a hard worker. And I love her love for gymnastics. I am BLOWN away that when I pick her up after THREE HOURS of gymnastics, she tells me she wants more gymnastics and goes home to do hours more of gymnastics around the house :) We love our gymnast!

Monday was also FHE. Some highlights: we played "Pie Face" with a wet sponge for the first time (big hit. Mom won, by the way :) Angela gave a great FHE lesson (idea from her Faith in God) about staying faithful after being baptized. She came up with it all by herself. When she was done excitement filled her sweet face as we talked about how the Holy Ghost helped her prepare her lesson! It was so wonderful! She played a game with us where we stood or sat with different good/bad choices she shared, she read a story from the "Friend," and she sang "I'll Seek the Lord Early" where we would find things we can do to stay faithful. How true it is that if we pray, listen and do what the prophets say, search the scriptures that we will be close to our Heavenly Father and be faithful. Thank you, Angela!! :)

Also, Monday was AMAZING because Andrew had no work!!!! He took me out on a date with Tommy to the Original Pancake House (yummy and Tommy loved pancakes with syrup). He picked the Emily Bemily up from Kindergarten. And Emily was pretty much in heaven with Daddy at home. They snuggled and watched "The Bee Movie" together and played "Sleeping Queens" together. Emily was a happy girl. We sure have the best dad ever.

Tuesday: Carolyn had an orchestra concert. I don't have a picture of it (silly me - I guess I was enjoying it too much :) She moved up a size in her violin recently and she is sounding beautifully!! Her violin teacher (Michelle Davis) is working with her to use her whole bow when playing and it is sounding just beautiful!!! Good job, Carolyn!! I love when you play!

Wednesday: New Beginnings in Young Womens for mom and Activity days for Angela and Carolyn. Emily also planned her big SIX year old PAR-TAY!!! She wants a Moana party and it's going to basically be awesome! It's in a couple of weeks! Lots of pictures and videos to come!! Can't wait to celebrate Emy's life!!! 

Thursday: Carolyn had drama club. Did I mention she is AREIL?!?!? She is working hard in her part (already has 1/4 of the play memorized) and she is such a talented actress! She started play practice at the beginning of the month and will have play practice SIX HOURS (isn't that an INSANE amount of time for an elementary school play practice?!?!! Or any sorta of school play practice?!?!) until their May performance!!! We love our Ariel!! One thing I also love about Carolyn is her sincere love for life. When I pick her up from school she is genuinely happy and so excited to share about her day at school.

Also, on Thursday we had the Halls over. We have had them over just about every week this month to have discussions with the missionaries. They are such a sweet family (Justin, Sarah, and two really cute boys) and Justin is getting baptized on February 4th!!!! We are so happy. It was been amazing having them in the home and feeling the Holy Ghost during the discussions. Justin is such an example to me. While the missionaries teach him I can't help but think of my ancestors like James Ross and Thomas Evans who first found and accepted the gospel of Jesus Christ and now I am so blessed because of it! Justin's descendants will revere his name.

Friday: Emily wrote her Primary talk about making good choices. Carolyn went to her good friend, Madeleine's house, Angela had gymnastics. Emily brought home a really funny book from the library that we have been loving ("Elephant is allergic to pigs") we went to watch one of my Mia Maids play volleyball (love my Mia Maid). When we all got home from our activities, we ate dinner together and ended the day with a good family game of "YAHTZEE" - Emily and Daddy's team won.

Saturday: Saturdays are my favorite!! Let's see....we went and watched my YW play basketball (Carolyn, Angela, Emily are obsessed with her babysitter, Charli. Charli's dad called them "Charli's Fan Club" - perfect name for them). We worked on homework together (see picture below of Carolyn working on her Science program :) Angela got her Market Day all done (pictures to come!! :) Emily Bemy and Angela did gymnastics together A LOT. They made some cute sister movies. We played "SORRY" (Mom win again :) with Emily in second, Angela in third and Carolyn in last), we had a work party (the girls room was OUT OF CONTROL. They got it in control and that was amazing. The girls are now ending their day with a "sister Show"

 I loved the paper Carolyn brought home about her winter break. My favorite part of the paper was when she wrote that she got a whole bunch of games for Christmas and we spent every day off of school playing them. Such good times. Only like 330 days until it comes again, right?!

A WONDERFUL 2 months!!

The past 2 months have been so fun!! The hightlight for me: NO SCHOOL for 2.5 weeks!!! It was so fun! And Andrew was off of that for over a week! It was so fun! Here are some highlights!:

We got A LOT of games for Christmas and we played A LOT of games over the past few months :) Here Daddy and Angela are celebrating winning first place during one of the games:

Emily celebrating me and her getting in 2nd place during that same game:

And Carolyn lost during that game :( Good sad face, Carolyn. Haha:)

Angela got a mini-ish trampoline for Christmas. Lots of fun jumping!

Tommy got a race track. The race track and the magna tiles (from Nana, Ponka, and Andrea) are the most played with Christmas toys.

MORE GAMES!!! Aunt Chantal gave us a really fun pie in the face game :)

Tommy LOVED to read. He will follow you around holding books in his hand asking for you to read to him :) He esp loves books with animals in it.

We love Daddy!

Emily got more parts to go with her marble set! We have been creating lots of awesomeness with it!

Emily and I read her first chapter book together during break!!! And we are on our second now! She loved it!

The girls got to go on the basketball court and hold a huge flag while the star spangle banner was sung. They were very close to the basketball players on the court. What a fun experience!

Tommy watching his sisters on the court:

During the break, Carolyn took it upon herself to go shovel 6 driveways for the neighbors. Emily and Angela joined her for some of it, too. So happy that the girls fill their lives with things that bring happiness.

We love living next to a huge field. And love that we can head out sledding at any point. They spend lots of time when it snows sledding!

For one of our FHE lessons, we talked about a few examples our our Savior showing love. We then began a heart wall where everything we catch someone in the family doing something that shows love, we write on a heart and put it on the wall (or if we do something ourselves). Emily especially is inlove with filling out hearts. Sometimes she'll do something sweet and say to me, "Mom, that was a heart, right?" I love it! So grateful for our Savior's example and the gospel of Jesus Christ that we have.

I was trying to capture a picture of Tommy bringing a book to me since he loves grabbing a book and bringing it to people.

One of his FAVORITE FAVORITE series is the "Brown Bear" series. And he loves the snakes in the books. He loves saying "sssss" when he finds the snake in the book. I love this boy! He also is really good at "moo"ing, "Bark"ing, "Growl"ing, etc

One of the girls took pictures of me and Tommy snuggling one day.

Emily and me after we read Emily's first chapter book together :) She loved it! We are now reading a Polar Bear Magic Tree House Book together.

Angela and I do a lot of reading together too. One awesome quality about Angela is she works hard - she is working really hard at her reading right now and reads with me just about every day!

Tommy and I reading together:

Carolyn working hard on her science experiment!

Carolyn gave an FHE lesson we loved. We talked about being thankful and she read a story from the "friend" magazine. Then we all wrote "thank you" notes to each other.

We also played a very fun kim family trivial game made by Andrew for our FHE activity! It was so fun!

Emily helped me make a Family Home Evening board ....

Emily and I were happy with how it turned out. We got an old frame from a thrift store and painted the glass with chalkboard paint.

Our Family Home Evening Wall! We have the FHE assignment board and then we hang up pictures/scriptures to help us remember all week what we talked about during FHE.

Puzzles! We love doing puzzles together!

More science experiment:

For our ward Christmas Party, it was the Polar Express Theme. Andrew grew a mustage for it :) I have never seen him grow facial hair before :) He's pretty awesome and was the best conductor ever. Along with the best husband and dad ever!

Carolyn took the picture. But this is us heading to an Ugly Sweater party!

For our Family Christmas Eve Program, Angela and Emily did a gymnastics performance for us!

Christmas Eve: Acting out the Christmas story

Tommy didn't want to be a sheep.

So Tommy ended up being Joseph. And Carolyn was Mary. And Daddy of course was the donkey (what he is every year :)

Shepard and wise man:

Cookies for Santa

Daddy's traditional pepperment shake:

This year we did "Homemade" gifts. It touched my heart that they girls opened cards they made for each other for their Christmas Eve gift. The next day on Christmas they told me they wanted to do homemade gifts again next year. It was the best. Lots of sweet cards and sweet gifts!

Those glasses were the only thing Emily asked for Christmas. Love. that. girl.

Angela got to have her best friend, Emily Hood over to play

Emily had a playdate with Violet, her friend.

In November, Angela had a Rec Show. We got to go see her show off her amazing amazing moves!!!

We made a THANKFUL poster for November. WE traced our hands and thought of 5 things we are thankful for each day (we remembered).

FALL FUN!

What Angela is using doing around the house.

Putting up the tree!

For the month of December, we did the 25 days of Service from lds.org. It was so amazing to focus on our Savior and trying to follow His example. Some of the highlights: getting food and bringing it too a food donation, donating coats, inviting people over to our home, calling people and sending out letters, sharing the gospel with our neighbors and friends, etc.

We had fun putting together a package for our sweet Great Grandma (Grandma Della Hansen). We did the 12 days of Christmas for her so she could have a gift to open every day. We are so grateful to have AMAZING people like Della Hansen who sets such an amazing example for us of living a life full of service and love towards others and being faithful.

More pictures from the Polar Express Party :)

Carolyn had a GREAT session of Basketball! She was aggressive!!!! And the fun part was Andrew was the coach this year! I thought it was the best coach ever. They wanted to stay together as a team and him to be the coach again!! It was fun!

Andrew gave fun awards to all the kids that played. Carolyn did so awesome!!!

Angela was in choir and we loved hearing her sing!