A room revealed!

We are finally getting to a point that I can take some pictures because we have officially moved into and are moving into our new home (4 months later than we actually moved but who is counting?)

Here is the master bathroom.  Well, this is Bob's master bathroom.

It's ours now!!!!

Then...."the incident of the overflow tank"......

Nasty non taken care of shower floor....

Then this happened.....

Then based on this drawing (it is sideways)

This is what happened....

The colors are a little off becaue it was dark outside (will I ever remember to take pictures in the daylight?)

CAN YOU SAY LOVE LOVE LOVE IT?

I'm not at all sure what my favorite part is, is it the new travertine?  is it the new tub surround? is it the new frameless glass (BYE BYE TO THE GOLD)?  is it the new faucets? wow...I just LOVE it all!!! it's all of that.

The before.

And after. 

There will be more pictures to come, we have a few projects to do in here, we are going to paint and also possibly frost the windows and get rid of the blind but we'll see which way the wind blows when we get to it, for now, we are so happy to be beginning to unpack and figure out what is going to go where.  There will be a lot more before/after then after/after... hee hee

I LOVE this house!  I'm so happy to be calling it home.

Dance Recital.

Words can't express my sorrow at what happened at the school in Connecticut.  It makes me sick to my core at the thought of what the individual families are going through.

I can't seem to stop thinking about them, praying for them.

I am so sad at the the thought of all of the Christmas celebrations that were planned for and gifts purchased that will never be opened.

I am so sad at the thought of how those families can pick up the pieces and move on.

I am so sad that all of those kids that were hurt are Mikayla's age.... I can't seem to get past the fact that it would compare to the unimaginable happening to her whole entire class.

It makes all the petty bologna and stress of scheduling conflicts (real or imagined), rushing around and day to day duldrums seem pretty dumb....

It makes the crap really stand out as crap and the important become even more important.

The sadness makes me even more appreciative for her.

I have hugged her a LOT more.

When she needs those last 10 kisses before bed time I don't get exasperated about coming back into the bedroom to give them to her even though I still have a hundred things to do.

We have let her sleep with us the past couple nights.... not because she asked to but because we needed her to.

We were blessed to be able to go see her dance recital on Friday night.  It was amazing!!!  Of course I think she's a super star anyway but it was a little more special than usual.  She was tickled pink to have us all there to see her!!! 

Here is her adorable tap dance routine.

(she is singing in the picture below - of course it's the open mouth picture I capture LOL)

All the girls did a really great job!

Then to ballet - I love watching!!!

Then the super fun and super cute "Grinch" song... this song has been stuck in my head for weeks - she hums it and boom, there it is, stuck in my head again!

Mikayla's School Program

AHHHHHHH  we had such a WONDERFUL time at Mikayla's program.  They had an EXCELLENT variety of songs.

The theme was Love Across the Nations.  The kids all dressed up to represent a different country.  So many neat costumes.  The message was even different nationalities celebrate Christmas.  All but the finale were sung in different languages.  The music director really outdid herself with this program.  Seriously all different languages....dances...groups... moving around the stage... everyone did it....everyone had fun!!!

We had our little German Girl!

 

 

Here she is coming out with the 1st graders.  Her school has 4 first grade classes!!
 

The songs were soooo fun!!!   Two of them were in Spanish and the kids were dancing and singing....the parents were toe tapping and clapping!  It was so cool!
 

 

 

 

Everyone participated!!!  I really think the kids enjoyed themselves too (even the big kids 5th and 6th graders got involved and had fun!!)

 

The grand finale was all the children coming out and singing!!!  I'm telling you it was awesome.
 

 

Everyone left with a smile on their faces, songs on their minds, tapping toes, snappy fingers and the moms had tears in their eyes because their hearts were so full!!!

Sea World Finale.

Well I saved my favorite for last.  I can't even begin to express how COOL these animals are.  I mean WOW!!!  Seriously spellbinding.

The show starts with a video talking about them and then right in time with the music BOOM he jumps out of the water in the middle of the pool.  I know I reacted but I KNOW other people *loudly* gasped and clapped and cheered as loud as I did!

AMAZING!  Simply amazing! 

Look at the waves they make!!!   That was from one swim by!

In the picture below he was waving!!!  *awwwww*

in the picture below everyone was waving back to him *AWWWWWWWW*

I loved the audience participation

I loved the show

I loved seeing these amazing beautiful animals

Below is a mom and her *baby*

SPLASH

Amazing picture catch of the day is below..... what perfect timing... it was a wow in real life and I'm soooo happy to have captured a little bit of the wow in this picture.

It's amazing how such large animals can be so incredibly graceful and then so fierce and giant all at the same time.

We enjoyed the show SO much that we went back for the second show of the day.  We were joking about it after we saw it the first time but we happened to be walking by and decided...hey... lets go check it out!!! 

This time, I was a 100% spectator and not trying to take a million more pictures.  I just enjoyed (again).  In the picture below they were swimming around.... and yes there are 4 of them right there, the two near the top and two underneath.

We let Mikayla pick out one souvenir from her special day and naturally she picked out the whale.  I let her get the bigger one because we had a super sized day and it was a special celebration and well, we just enjoyed the heck out of Sea World!!!

So this is how she sleeps now....

I loved our day more than words can express.  I love how Mikayla was playing the part of the trainer when we got home, this poor stuffed animal was wrapped up with a jump rope and ridden!  I loved taking the time to go!! 

Seriously - it was a WOW kind of day!!!  Have I mentioned I loved it?