The Barnes Family Blog

Adrian finally got me to go to golf lessons today! I was surprised that it wasn’t too hard. Granted I am no where near ready to go golfing on a course, but am am confident enough to at least go to the diving range with Adrian. After our lessons we went out for a great sushi dinner, then headed to the park where Adrian proposed and we watched the sunset. It was  a fantastic date day!

It’s a good thing New Year’s comes so soon after Christmas, Jillian was having holiday withdrawals. The end of the Christmas season can seem a bit abrupt to a little kid! There was so much building up to the 25th and then it just stops!

We had a fun day playing in the backyard! I had gone to the store earlier for lunch supplies and came home with some party hats and noise makers. The girls had a lot of fun with them… I got a little tired of the noise makers but I couldn’t complain because I brought them home.

In the evening, Adrian and I took Olivia to see the Disney movie Frozen. We decided not to take Jillian because she has a really hard time with movies that could be scary or have socially emotional parts. I think we made the right decision on this one… the wolves and the snow monster were a bit scary,  Olivia had to sit on Adrian’s lap. I think she would have had a harder time with the sisters fighting. Jillian has high levels of empathy and things like this really bother her.  I LOVED the movie. I thought the writers did a great job making the princesses strong and independent. I love that they poke fun of  the princess for  (Spoiler Alert) getting engaged after just meeting the guy!

After the movie we met up with my parents who had Jillian and Claire. The daughter of my mom’s friend has a beach house (an on the sand beach house) so we went their for the rest of the night. We were really hesitant to go, we thought we might just grab the girls and go home and spend New Year’s quietly at our house, but when we arrived Jillian was having too much fun! She was playing hide and go seek with the other kids who were about her age. Olivia had already fallen asleep by the time we arrived so she was out. When the ball dropped at midnight, only Jillian was awake to celebrate with me and Adrian (and the others at the party of course) .  We left the party by 12:15 haha we were tired and Jillian was done and ready to sleep. It only took her 2 minutes in the ride home to fall asleep. Overall it was a nice way to send off 2013 and welcome 2014.

This was such a fun Christmas! Both of the girls were at such a fun age! They were so excited in the morning. I was shocked how good they were, waiting  for all of us to wake up to go downstairs. They were both dressed in their party dresses when we woke up! Talk about being there and ready! haha ! They were so thrilled to see what Santa had brought them! They really liked the stocking stuffer portion… tons of small My Little Pony toys. Claire enjoyed her new toys as well.

We were so efficient this year when cleaning up paper and ribbons because Claire is a magnet to all things dangerous. Everything, and I mean EVERYTHING goes into her mouth! We have to be so diligent, we even sectioned off the living room to corral her in to keep her safe. She now has a wonderful area to crawl around and play without fear of eating small things. You’ll notice in the photos it is a nice fluffy white rug, we call it the “cloud”.

We had a yummy breakfast of sausage/egg casserole, french toast casserole, and bacon. After breakfast the Barnes Crew traveled to Grandma and Grandpa Barnes’ house for more Christmas fun. They really splurged on the girls! The girls most likely own every My Little Pony toy out there… including large Build A Bear Ponies. I was really bad about taking photos this year. I think it may have something to do with having 3 little ones to run around after! haha I have to get Adrian to start taking more photos… or have people just send me theirs!!

We ended Christmas day back at our house with my parents , brothers and my aunt and uncle. It was a very casual and relaxed Christmas Dinner this year.  Even still, we were exhausted by the end of the night!

At work I participated in the Secret Snowman activity, where we exchange gifts with other teachers. My final gift came in this AMAZING basket! When I saw it I knew I just had to get a picture of Claire in the basket in front of the tree. This was a bit tricky but after 100 shots on rapid fire, I am thrilled with the results!

Christmas Eve was really nice. We stayed home and prepared treats for Christmas day. They girls played around the house, full of anticipation. That evening we went to the big Longo Family Christmas Party! It gets bigger every year! Jillian and Olivia had a great time because there were a bunch of other kids near their age running around, and of course cousin Gianna was there! They absolutely adore her!

I thought for sure they would fall asleep in the car, but nope, they waited until they were tucked in their beds to fall asleep! Adrian and I enjoyed a no-set-up Christmas Eve 😉