family-style christmas.

this year's christmas was extra special because the kim clan was able to all be together for the weekend at the grandparents' house.  this is the first year we've been able to do that and hopefully not the last.  christmas day was packed with a lot of fun stuff and a whole lotta spending good times together.

there was the opening of presents after a big breakfast.

there was the "awww yeah!" reaction at a new race car toy.

there was grandpa's lap to sit on in the midst of the present opening flurry.

there were big decisions to be made, like whether the new toy or the wrapping paper is the most fun after all.

there was also the showing off of new gadgets for the dads.

there was the making of chocolate cake by a lovely auntie, along with the help of one small assistant who happens to love chocolate.  and mixing.

and when that lovely auntie let the small assistant mix all by herself...

well, there was there was happiness and joy to behold.  the aforementioned lovely auntie was also going to let the small assistant crack an egg by herself too.  but the mean mommy pulled the plug on that idea in two blinks.  just goes to show you who's the fun one around here.  and here's a hint, it's not me.  : p

then there was the group effort to decorate a gingerbread village.

there was a different approach by each decorator.  this one was very meticulous in the placement of each tiny candy.  the headlight proved instrumental in such detailed work.  i'm sure michelangelo would have appreciated just such an accessory when painting the sistine chapel.

there was a more free-form approach by this little artist.

and there was the more-is-more approach by this who is still my baby.  just look at those teeny baby hands who think they're all grown up!

of course, it just wouldn't be the same without a bit of silliness thrown in, too.

and there was the mommy-daughter team approach, too.

there were daddies/uncles on hand to apply some more glue-i-mean-icing when needed.

and to generally keep the morale up in order to see the project through.

and when all was said and done, there was the smiley satisfaction of a job well done.

there was the finished village and the proud decorators.

which lasted only a moment before the village pillage commenced to start.

and don't let this sweet little baby face fool you for a second.

cuz she was the most ferocious of all!

then there was the "happy birthday, Jesus" song and cake time (thanks to uncle j and auntie j!).

then the blowing out of candles which was another group effort.

and then a moment to pray and thank Jesus for coming, for this fun day we enjoyed, and for the love and blessings of family.

(sidenote- anyone related to the gray-haired gentleman in the picture knows that having a vast wardrobe consisting almost entirely of camo is not such an oddity, and therefore not so random when a certain family decides to don all camo for a certain christmas photo card.  just sayin'.)

and finally, a group effort to say merry christmas and happy new year to you, too!  hope your christmas memories were great this year.  :)

the outtakes.

it all kinda sorta just randomly happened.  while doing a little clothes shopping last summer, phil picked up a camo t-shirt to wear around the house.  and while running errands.  and to church.  our church is very casual, but phil might have taken it to a whole new level with his usual 'uniform' of camo shirt and crocs.

so then mikey wanted a camo shirt to be like daddy.  we found one from an army surplus type store in the mall.

fast forward a month or two later and what do we randomly come across?  a whole dress made out of camo fabric.  at macys, of all places!  phil insisted on buying it for me.  he pitched its major selling point which was that it draped in such a way that i could wear it even with a growing preggo belly.  so now i found myself with camo gear to wear as well.

then, while we were up in seattle, phil suggested we try to find camo gear for the girls to wear as well for this year's christmas photo card.  not exactly sure at which point i actually agreed to the idea, but that's where the idea for the camo-tsai family photo was born.  it was all phil's idea, i tell ya.  i'm just along for the ride here.

oh and we did also find a camo vest for our doggie to wear too, though you can hardly see it in the pictures.  huh.  apparently her camo gear was a bit too good at blending in.  anyhow, we found that at the walmarts.

and so now, i present you with a few of the camo-tsai family photo outtakes.

"make your silliest, crazy face, everyone!"

"ok, now your sad face!"

and this is the one i was leaning toward using for the photo card.  except for stinkin' lauren in a semi-blink right then.  but look how nice everyone else looks (even daisy the dog was smiling!).

so this is the one phil ultimately decided was best and the one we ended up using this year.  i was trying so hard to make sure everyone else wasn't in splotchy light and we definitely should have come out to do it an hour or two later when the sun wasn't so bright, but what can you do when nap-time must be worked around?  just wish someone had been around to tell me that i was standing in the lovely splotchy light.  or tell me that maybe i wouldn't want my behind sticking out like that...  aw well, at least the rest of the family looks good.  : p

and here's a few outtakes of just the kiddos.

"surprised face!"

"mad face!"

and this was taken juuust after lauren got dog-poo on her knees.  which then ended up on my finger.  when then ended up on my camera.  which then kinda muddied up my spirits.

but on we must forward go!  (huh?)

 not perfect, but i still love it.

ok, so for the last few weeks, the kids have LOUDLY been admiring every single house decorated with lights and any other festive stuff as we drive by.  and ever since, mikey's been waiting and waiting for us to get lights up on our house.  the only thing is that required daddy to be home before dark.  unfortunately, daddy's been juggling work at multiple hospitals this month (don't ask, long story), so the home before dark thing hasn't really worked out this month- including weekends.

so there was this ONE day when phil texted he'd be home in the afternoon so i rushed to get everyone ready for the above family pictures and then we shot right back home to get the lights up on the house finally.  but not before a quick stop at our neighborhood 7-eleven for slurpees for all first.  cuz that day happened to be 80+ degree range.  allie was sweating from the head.

so we consulted mikey's diagram, which he drew and left on daddy's desk a couple weeks back.  he wanted two "bokis" (aka "boxes") of lights to put up.

and thanks to a neighbor's ladder, daddy did get those lights up!  while the three supervisors supervised.

in between sips of slurpee.  (this was the small insert pic on the christmas card).

after a while, mikey decided to lend a helping head.

but apparently, the job wasn't going quite fast enough...

and someday, if this rain finally stops, i'll get a picture of our purty lighted up house!  merry christmas, y'all!

my little dreamer.

there's really no way around it.  my allie, my middle baby, my sweet daughter is just about the girliest girl you will ever meet.  this is the one who loves all things pink, loves dressing up in princess costumes, loves shoes and purses, loves putting hairpins on her teddy bears and dolls, loves accessories, and would wear a dress (the frillier the better) every single day if i let her.

and you know what?  i love that about her.  though i don't know where she gets this girlyness from, i love that i get to share it with her.  i love the look of joy on her face when i pull out a new dress for her to wear.  i love how she never objects to my putting ribbons or bows in her long hair.  mostly, i just love watching her enjoy being a little girl.

her latest obsession?  planning her dream wedding.  i had heard of girls who dreamed of their wedding day since they were little.  for whatever reason, i just was never one of them.  wait, i do remember pretending the curtains were a veil on my head, but that's as far as i got.  and now, i have a little wedding planner living in my house.  as allie informed us last night, "i'm going to have a pink barbie cake for my wedding.  and i'm going to get my dress from costco.  and shoes and a necklace, too."  phil seemed rather intrigued with this plan as a wedding planned entirely from costco would not be nearly as expensive as he's been dreading.  when i asked who she was planning on marrying, she matter-of-factly answered, "daddy, of course!"  phil thought this was an odd turn of events, not realizing that every little girl should be so blessed to have a daddy who is her ideal man.  a daddy who tells her she's beautiful and loved just the way she is.  a daddy who loves to hear her stories and see her drawings.  a daddy who is her hero.

and this morning, as i was brushing her hair, i asked her if she liked being a big sister or a little sister (since she is both).  she answered, "a big sister and i can't wait to get married!"  with feigned sadness i said, "but then you'd have to leave us when you get married."  allie cheerfully replied, "no i don't, because daddy's coming with me!  and you'll still have mikey and lauren and my new baby brother to keep you company, too."  and so in her world, all was good to go.

so while my little girl goes on dreaming about her wedding day, i realize i need to be just as intent about praying for her real marriage someday (and for the marriages of each of our children, but this post in particular is for my little dreamer girl).  Lord willing, that He would bring the right young man in to her life in His perfect time.  that he would be a man with a deep and abiding love for the Lord, that he would desire to help her grow in holiness, that he would seek to love and cherish her as Christ loves the church.

in the meantime, i pray that we, her parents, would daily be pointing her to Christ and to help her grow into a beautiful woman with a quiet and gentle spirit who is pleasing in His sight.  and i am deeply humbled by this thought as i realize (especially lately, hoo boy) how much i fall short in this calling.  deeply humbled but also deeply grateful as i remember that Christ is sufficient for all that i lack.  Christ, who loves her infinitely more than i do even on my best day, is sufficient for allie and will never let her down.  and so i cling to this precious truth as we remember again all that Christ is for us this Christmastime when we rejoice in Immanuel, God with us.

but for now, if you'll excuse me, i'm going to go hang on to my girlie's littleness just a while longer.  :)

overheard.

heard this little gem while the kids were eating breakfast this morning.

allie: mommy, how do you recycle?
mikey: i know! it's like when you finish using something, you can use it again. like with this milk bottle. when it's empty, we can fill it back up with milk and use it again, right mommy?
mommy [ever the enlightener]: um, sort of.
allie: but first you have to milk the cow. like this. [motioning the milking of a cow.]
mikey: but do you know what those are called? my teacher told us. they're called tweets!

the expedition.

in recent years, we've gone on our tree hunting expedition at some point during thanksgiving weekend.  the actual day we get it done however, largely depends on whichever day phil is off work.  we like to get it early so we can get it decorated and get a bit of a headstart on enjoying it (read: get our money's worth out of it) for the five weeks until new year's day.  or the week after.  cuz it takes about that long for me to feel any sort of distance between pulling the ornaments and decorations out and putting everything away again.  ok, maybe that makes sense only to me.

in any case, this year we were all set to get our tree last saturday.  right away, we ruled out the idea of driving out to a tree farm and cutting down our own tree.  one, because living in the la metro area means any tree farms would be quite a distance away, and two, because phil's not so keen on the idea of doing manual labor on one of his rare days off.  so this year, we settled on the idea of going to a tree lot to let the kids run around for a bit while we picked out a tree.

nice and simple, right?

wrong.  so very, very wrong.  while the sign proclaimed the lot was OPEN, they didn't actually appear to be ready quite yet.

cuz um, what's a giant jack 'o lantern and haystacks got to do with christmas trees?

so we drove around some more while trying to find a nearby tree lot on the iphone and only kept finding empty lots with no trees to be found anywhere.  really?  did no one get the message that some families like to get their tree while it's still november?  the kids were getting antsy.  we had been driving around for more than an hour.  and they were getting hungry.  it was a couple hours past lunchtime.

we decided to make a pit stop at the grove to eat and regroup.

the troops needed the sustenance.

and not a moment too soon.

once everyone was recharged, we headed back out on the expedition.  and ultimately we got our mission accomplished.  at home depot.  not exactly the scene of the warm, fuzzy memories i was hoping for, but we got the job done.

after phil and i got the tree secured to the top of our van, he gave an end of twine to each of the kids and told them to hold on tight or else our tree would fall off.  they really believed they were holding that tree in place and held on tight all the way home.

we decided to let the girls skip their afternoon nap that day in favor of letting everyone decorate the tree together.  allie got the daddy and daughter bear ornament to hang up first.

and this year, she was able to do it all by herself.

this one still needed help hanging the ornaments.  she was in charge of hanging all the unbreakable ones.

she didn't notice, though.

mikey and daddy managed to get the star put in place using the same method they've used since mikey was three.

and so this year, most of the ornaments are hung on the bottom third of the tree and clumped to the right side.  but i think it's perfect that way.  :)

early merry christmas from our crazy crew!