Breakfast with Santa and Christmas Program 2009

What a FUN week we have had! Last weekend the girls enjoyed Breakfast with Santa at the church! We ate pancakes, sausage, and grits! Then Santa stopped by to talk with all the little children! Lucy Anne couldn't wait to talk to Santa. Of course she told him she wanted a "baby." Ella was surpringly a little more reserved, but made sure Santa knew her "requests." They were so very precious! I can't believe how big they are getting! Next up was our Christmas Program at school! How much I love the girl's school and all their precious teachers! To know my girls are surrounded by so much love when they are away from home is a blessing and comfort! Ella Grace and Lucy Anne have been very excited about their program and have been coming home for a few weeks now singing their songs together! It was very cute to hear them singing. Jay said Ella makes up her own words too! (for those of you who don't know I seem to do this as I jam to tunes!) We were very excited for our family to join us on such a special day! The love that surrounds Ella Grace, Lucy Anne, and our whole family is tremendous! We are very thankful for the love from grandparents and great grandparents! What a blessing! Here are some pictures of their Christmas Play!

The girls were greeted by Doo Dad who brought them each a rose! How special and sweet!

Thank You Doo Dad for our Roses! They are Magical!

Our Paw Paw! We Love You! We can't wait to see Scooby Saturday! We will bring him a Scooby Snack!

Another very special person! Our Daddy! We Love You!

Family Hug!

Where did Lucy Anne Go?? She went to see Santa Again! She needed to make sure he knows to bring her a Baby!

Our Greatmommy! Thank you so much for being here to see us sing! We love you Gran Sandy! We had lots of fun playing with our pink bathtub paint. We painted ourselves and our bathtub pink!

Thank you to all our of family for being with us and making this day extra special! We Love You All!

Tree Day!

We always look forward to putting up our tree! I love a Christmas tree and would leave it up all year if I could! The girls have always enjoyed the lights and now love to open the ornament box and hang the decorations up! It was such a fun family day! Here a few pictures of our day! Daddy Jay preparing the truck for the tree!Hardister Girls!

Didn't the girls do a beautiful job? They had such a fun time decorating the tree! They thought each ornament was absolutley beautiful! Placing the Nativity Scene out is always exciting! Lucy was trying to find Baby Jesus! Lucy found Baby Jesus!The girls were in charge of setting up the Nativity Scene!

After much sister debate this is how the Nativity Scene first ended up. We told the girls they needed to put everyone close together so they could all see Baby Jesus. Ella said that this was beautiful because it looked like a rainbow!!

In the end everyone was placed around Baby Jesus to celebrate his day! Lucy Anne was all by herself playing with the Nativity Scene and she was singing softly to Baby Jesus "Happy Birthday to You!" It was the most precious song to my ears!

Merry Christmas from the Hardister House!

To my girls, thank you for always being my eager little helpers! I always look forward to decorating for the holidays with you girls! Going through boxes and finding treasures is so exciting with you two! I pray that you will never forget the true meaning of Christmas and will celebrate the birth of Jesus everyday!

The Two Dancing Princess!

This past week Ella Grace and Lu had open house at dance! Jay and I were able to come in their dance room and watch them perform all that they have learned! They both did such a great job and they both LOVE dance class! I had to place the Nutcracker song on here being since they love this song. It is on one of their Barbie movies and they will dance right along with all the Barbie Princess! Here are a few pictures of their performance for Mommy and Daddy! Warming Up with some stretches! Beautiful!

Graceful! A hug from little sis to congratulate her big sister! They love each other so much! Lucy was a little upset today wasn't her big day and insisted on wearing her tap shoes to Ella's dance class! You might not can tell by the picture, but Lucy tapped right on into Ella's class!Next up.. Lucy Lu! Just look at her pointing that toe! Lucy is very funny in dance class and will not leave her teachers side!

Arms Up!

Shake it Lu!

Good Job Lucy Anne, I taught you everything you know: Love your Big Sis!

I love my two dancing princess! I hope you girls will always follow your heart and do whatever it may be that makes you happy, whether it be dancing, gymnastics, baseball or basketball. Whatever you do you have already learned a very important lesson in life. You have learned to dance. Dancing can get you through any bad day or good day! I love you girls!

Love Mommy!

Giving Thanks and Counting our Blessings!

What a wonderful Thanksgiving we had! I was so blessed to have the entire Thanksgiving off from work and we had a great time spending this Thanksgiving with our family! Before Thanksgiving the girls and I got in the Christmas spirit and decided to start our decorating! Up to the attic I went to pull down our fashionable and fantastic PINK Christmas trees! Yes, both the girls have lovely pink Christmas trees that they get to decorate all by themselves for their rooms! We had so much fun! Ella Grace wanted to make sure all her "Disney Princess" ornaments were facing "straight" so she could see their faces! Lucy Anne wasn't into the event as much as her sister, but did have fun putting her angels on her tree, with her Mommy's help! Ella Grace decorating! Little Lu decorating! Ho!Ho!Ho! Ella's Pink Princess Tree! She was a little upset here as you can tell because one of her princess ornaments kept spinning around and she couldn't see their "face." I guess it's the little things! After much concentration and hard work to keep the ornament from spinning round and round I think I managed to fix the problem. Lucy loving her tree! Of course the Christmas PJ's had to come out on our fun day of decorating! The girls are huge fans of "sleeping gowns!" Time for Turkey at Grandmommy's House! We are very thankful and blessed for our wonderful, sweet, and loving Grandmommy!

Dinner and of course dessert were delicious! These two turkeys made sure to gobble up their cake!

Off to Ra Ra's for more Turkey! Ella of course found a fashionable apron and enjoyed helping Ra Ra prepare for the family to arrive!The whole gang! I am very thanful for all these little guys! At some point Ella Grace decided to change into more comfortable attire I suppose, her sleeping gown! I found this very funny!

After the Thanksgiving celebration it was time to head back to Blythewood and we were welcomed with our special friend who comes to stay with us around Thanksgiving until Christmas Eve! Skip, our elf!

That is Skip! He is Santa's little helper and lives at the North Pole! He closely watches over the girls to make sure we are being kind and flies back to the North Pole each night to tell Santa everything he saw! The girls love Skip! They anxiously awake every morning to find Skip and make sure he made it back! I have caught Ella several times telling Skip Lucy was not being nice and was not sharing! Hahaha!

Better watch out, better not pout. Santa Clause is coming to town!!

I am so thankful for all my many blessings! God has richly blessed my life with a wonderful family whom I love dearly!

Fall Fun!

Lots of exciting things have been taking place around the Hardisters! We have been enjoying the fall weather and having fun performing in Fall Plays at school!

Jay raked all these leaves you see here and the girls had a ball jumping in them!

Sister Love!

I finally made my first pound cake! I have been trying to master my mom's pound cake for quite some time now, and although I wouldn't say I have mastered it, this is the only cake that has actually not fallen apart! I made two cakes, one for a tester and one for the girls thanksgiving program at school!

It was yummy!

The girls performed in their Thanksgiving program at school and were absolutely precious! I can't help but get teary-eyed when I see them up there singing! They were too cute in their little turkey hats! Ella Grace was singing with her whole heart and was very concentrated on remembering all the words and hand motions! She did GREAT as did Lu! Ella kept waving to Jay and me and blowing us kisses. It is moments like this that are absolutley priceless and I will always hold close to my heart! We were very thankful Ra Ra could come celebrate and share the day with us!

Since we have moved I always miss out on the "Target Trips" with Mom and Kasie and ALL the kids! So, what did we do after our performance? We headed to Target! Lucy Anne was in love with her personalized Turkey hat made out of colorful construction paper so much, she just had to wear it into Target!

No trip to Target is complete without an Icee and My two little turkeys, and my Mom! Of course next time we hope Aunt Kasie, Charlie, Wylie, and Bess will be with us!