The Farrells Full House: Fall/Christmas

Wow, it's been a while since I have updated our blog!! So, what have we been up to? Oh, just about EVERYTHING!! Fall-Christmas is my favorite time of year, and I get so excited about all of the fun activities, food, and crafts that come along with this time of year. The girls, Ryan, and I have been staying super busy and having a blast!

Our biggest event over these last few weeks, was packing up and heading to North Carolina for Thanksgiving. Ryan's sister Katie and her family live out there as well as several of Alona's dear friends from Ukraine. We wanted Alona to be reunited with these sweet friends, and thought Thanksgiving would be the perfect time to go! What is typically a 13 hour road trip (not factoring in stops) ended up being a 17 hour road trip (not including stops) for our crew!! Our little ones were huge troopers and did an AMAZING job on the LOOONG drive. We planned in advance, and packed a busy bag for each of them to keep them occupied, along with lots of snacks, and a whole bag of dum dums to resort to when all other things failed:)

One of the many things in the girls busy bags...pom poms and containers to sort them!

Road trippin!!

The girls were slightly excited about getting to stay in a hotel:)

Precious cargo

Snow through the NC mountains!

We had such a wonderful time being with our friends and family in NC, and it was totally worth the long drive. Getting to witness Alona's sweet reunions with her friends was priceless. When you think about all of these sweet kids, and where they came from, and where they are now...it is truly remarkable. Who would have thought that they would see each other again...much less with new families and in the US!! Truly, miraculous.

Alona and her BFF Liza

Alona with her dear friends (siblings!) Vitalik and Lera

Cousins!! (We brought the girls, the Williams have the boys:))

Back at home, we have been busy, busy with all the holiday parties and school activities for my Kindergartener and Preschooler. Alona has stayed busy going to the dentist:) Last week-end, we headed to Branson, MO for a week-end getaway. We stayed in a cozy 2 bedroom cabin and treated the girls to a ride on the Polar Express. We got our girls, Alona included, matching Christmas pjs this year, as we do every year. As I was getting the little ones ready in their jammies for the Polar Express, Alona excitedly asked me if she was to put on her Christmas PJ's. I just loved seeing how excited she was about it! All of our girls loved the Polar Express, and Alona said that her favorite part of the trip was seeing Santa:) It has been so neat seeing her reactions to all of our holiday events and traditions. To think that just this time last year, we had no clue that we had another daughter in this world, and that Alona thought she would never have a family, just makes me wanna cry like a baby!! How awesome our God is, that He had such an incredible plan for our family that we could never, ever have imagined.

Avalea's preschool Thaksgiving Feast

Alona filling and Operation Christmas Child box for an orphan....so sweet!!

Round 2 of getting cavities filled

Aislynn was Pocahontas for Book Character Day at school...and won 3rd place overall in K for her costume!

My Little Pilgrims

Getting ready to see the off Broadway production of Beauty and the Beast!

Avalea with her gingerbread house

The big girls with their dough art creations

Sledding on a very icy week-end!

Pajama Day in prek!

Arabella in her Christmas gear

My little Adalaise posing in her Christmas attire as well:)

Welcome basket at our Branson cabin

Lots of snow in Branson!

Lincoln Logs!!

Farrell girls ready for the Polar Express

Our family all ready for the train ride:)

Santa!!

Candy cane treats for Avalea's prek Christmas party

Avalea's class!

Girls working hard on painting our wrapping paper

Aislynn wearing her Grinch dress at school

Pretty wrapped presents with the girls handiwork:)

Aislynn's class party!!

Sweet keepsakes from Aislynn and Avalea

PJ day in K!

My 3 princesses....life's a ball in the Farrell House!!

One other new and exciting that we are about to embark on, is Alona starting school! We feel incredibly blessed that we are going to be able to ease her into full time school, by starting her out taking 2 classes this coming semester. She is going to audit and ESL and an art/computer class starting in January to hopefully prepare her for full time school starting this fall. We feel that she will benefit greatly from being around kids her own age and that she will flourish in this small school setting. To be honest with you, I am totally not a teacher!! It has been a huge struggle to find the balance of home schooling Alona with giving my 4 little ones the time and energy they need through out the day. We will still home school Alona this coming semester as she audits her 2 classes, but look forward to her being in school next fall. She is nervous about starting school, and understandably so. But she is also excited. We cannot wait to see how she grows through this process.

As we gear up for Christmas next week, we want to wish each and everyone of you a very Merry Christmas!