The Kassel Family Project Life 365

We woke up on the last day of 2012 to SNOW!  It was really beautiful to watch.  We didn’t get to enjoy it quite as much as we would have liked because we had some errands to run.  We *had* to get to Goodwill to do that final donation today in order to count it on our taxes for 2012!

We spent the afternoon getting ready for our annual New Year’s Eve get together.  Friends came to help us ring in the New Year and we even had one person join us via webcam since she couldn’t get here because of the roads.  We talked and laughed the evening away, ate great snacks, and had some good drinks.  It was a great way to ring in 2013!  Thanks to everyone who came to join us!

One of Laura’s favorite presents came from a friend in her Unit A class.  It’s a make your own bathtub monster!  She and John have been having loads of fun moving the pieces around and making their own monsters.  Tonight’s variety of monster required many, many arms…

I wandered downstairs this morning to find Laura reading to John.  Her book of choice was “There’s a Fly Guy in My Soup.”  It was so fun to watch the two of them.  At the end of the book, John said, “Thank you Laura for reading to me.  I like that book!”

(By the way, I think I *might* be enjoying Laura’s American Girl Doll, Lauren, just a bit…  All these ridiculously cute matching outfits, other clothes, and accessories are too cute!  Just yesterday, I ordered school supplies for Lauren’s backpack.  I think I might be hooked!)

While at dinner at Romano’s Macaroni Grill, I asked John to write his name.  I wanted to see if he would write his name for me, because I know that he can even though I have never seen him do it.  He grabbed a crayon and went right to work.  I watched John write his name and it was even written in the “school way,” meaning the first letter is capitalized followed by lowercase letters.  I was very impressed!  He is doing so well and learning so much at his new preschool!

A couple of minutes later, Laura says, “Mommy and Daddy, look at this!”  Not to be outdone by her little brother, she had written her name in *cursive.*  I think I can safely say that Andy and I are very proud parents tonight!

After a lunch of pizza at our house, Andrea and I decided to take the kids to Going Bonkers! for a couple of hours of fun.  Both Laura and Kathryn were off to climb, play, and slide the minute they got their shoes off.  On the other hand, John was still a little freaked out about climbing all the way up to the top and going down the “big slides.”  I asked him if he wanted me to go with him down the slides.  He was leery, but said he would if I took him, so up we climbed!  On the way to the top, he was actually hurting my hand because he was squeezing so tightly.  John was scared when we got to the top, but he sat down next to me and we slid down the first big slide.  He was laughing by the time we got to the bottom of it and wanted to go again.  As we headed to the next slide, he was much more confident about climbing around so high off the ground.  He loved the second slide as much as the first.  At the bottom of the second slide, we ran into Laura and Kathryn who asked John to join them on their climbing adventures.  He turned to me and said, “I’m going with them, Mommy.  You go back down.”  Once back on the ground, I texted Andy to tell him that John had finally conquered this fear.  He was just as excited as I was.  Another check off of John’s list!