Flight of the Dragon

One of my goals as a mother is to provide my kids with high quality toys that encourage independent pretend play. (that is, the kids can have fun without me directing their play).

Vincente loves dress up, and when we lived with my parents in Arkansas for a summer his favorite dress up costume included fairy wings. I had mentioned that I wanted to make him some dragon wings, but I never really got around to it.

Well, my entire immediate family came to Utah for Christmas 2011, so my mom was here to help me put together some dragon wings. Due to all the festivities (and craziness!) of having 15 people and 5 dogs in our house almost all the time, the dragon wings got postponed until Christmas Eve. I was up until about 4am working on the dragon wings, and my mom was up with me working on a gift for my sister.

They are now one of the favorite costumes in the dress up box -

The kids’ favorite thing to do when they were dressing up was having Grandma Pam play “dragon music” and then Vince would chase them around. Then they would say “Play princess music!” Grandma would happily oblige, and the little girls (there were three of them!) would spin happily around the living room. Then there was “bunny music” and “pirate music”. They are so lucky to have such an amazingly talented grandma! Now she just needs to record a CD for them so they have have her “dragon music” and “princess music” even when she’s 2000 miles away.

No Pumpkins

Friday night was the military ball. After several (2-3?) hours of unsuccessful dress hunting that morning, I decided to go with a black stretchy skirt and a pretty comfortable top. Thankfully Jenna is staying with us and offered to do my hair and makeup, and added a flower to my outfit. And convinced me that I shouldn’t wear flats to a ball (although after all that dancing I was wishing I had stashed a pair of flip-flops in my purse).

The dinner was pretty good, the entertainment was John Schmidt(!!), and the dancing was a lot of fun. I think the band being named Article 15 made it ever more fun. They played good music, we had good friends to dance with, and they even gave away prizes (a few gift cards, some iPod shuffles and TWO Kindles! Unfortunately we didn’t win anything, boo – but the fact that they gave away such cool prizes was pretty awesome).

All in all, it was the best night out we’ve had in a while. (Thanks for watching the kiddos, Jenna!!) We got back just before midnight (so no turning into pumpkins!), and then Russ had to go to a 0700 formation the next morning for the parade. He made it, but just barely – and was super tired all day. But I like to think it was worth it!

Doesn’t my Lieber (my Love) look so handsome! Although I have to say I prefer dress blues. But that’s perfect, because if he gets promoted, he can get dress blues! Woohoo! And hopefully soon there will be SGT (sergeant) patches on his sleeves instead of those SPC (specialist) patches. Within the next year he will probably have warrant officer (or officer) ranks on his uniform. I am so proud of my hubby! He is such a good soldier and such a smart man, and I just adore him!

And just because Vincente is so cute: