Gingerbread Festival

Yes, it's that time of year again! My sister, Jeny, and I took the girls to the annual Gingerbread Festival at Thanksgiving Point. Each year it gets bigger and bigger and the houses get more and more amazing. Here are some of the best:I especially liked this temple, because they even made the reflection pond out of melted candy! It was very neat!We all got to decorate a cookie, and Leah loved the frosting. This is her pretending to be shy.They had a stage with Irish Step dancers, and Shannon was enraptured. She wanted so badly to go up on stage with them. There was also a storytelling corner, and Shannon thought that was the best! She sat right down on that girl's lap and made herself at home. I am so glad that she loves books!

Piggies

Leah's hair is finally long enough to put little pigtails in it. She actually looks like a girl now! Aren't those the most kissable cheeks you have ever seen? Shannon saw me get the camera out, so of course she wanted in on the action. They don't even look like sisters!

The other day I found Shannon in her room wearing this outfit. Whenever she finds any kind of stick she calls it a "shock" and uses it to direct music while she sings. This particular song is from the Shirley Temple movie, "Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm."

And just a few other funny things:

Yesterday I put Leah down for a nap. I walked by a few minutes later and saw her door open a crack, so I knew that Shannon had gone in there. I walked in and found Shannon sitting in the rocking chair holding her puppy, singing "Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam" to Leah. Here I was ready to be mad at her for bothering her sister, and she was trying to help her go to sleep. She loves her sister very much.

I was listening to Christmas music on Pandora the other day and I had the volume all the way up on the computer because I was in the other room cleaning. The music stopped, and I heard the sounds of the games on pbskids.org. I went in to the computer room and found Shannon playing games with her left hand over her left ear and her right shoulder shrugged up to her right ear because the volume was so loud. She makes me laugh every day!

Halloween

Here are the girls carving pumpkins. You may remember the hat that Shannon is wearing from previous posts. She still wears it all the time.Here are the finished products. Shannon carved Tinkerbell all by herself! OK, no she didn't. But she loved it! Matt did the witch.Here are the happy trick-or-treaters. Leah looked like a boy, but that's ok. She was still very cute. We walked to the church for the trunk-or-treat there and got the houses on the way. Shannon got into the spirit very quickly. She yelled, "Trick or treat!" to everyone she saw. She even hit up some other kids who were out. They just looked at her like she was crazy.Shannon got oohs and ahhs everywhere we went. This is one of the most fun nights we have ever had as a family, since Shannon is old enough now to really enjoy this stuff. It's going to be such a fun holiday season! This is completely unrelated to Halloween, but I had to post it anyway. Shannon was singing this song all morning and I couldn't figure out what it was. Finally, I figured it out. She is singing the "Little Drummer Boy"! The "wop wop wop" part is "pa rum pum pum pum." I especially love her drum sound effect. She sang a lot more of it, but of course wouldn't do it for the camera. She is such a crack-up!