Welcome to the new year!

Emily's December went pretty smoothly. There wasn't too much craziness in connection with the school year. They had a winter concert for the parents one day, which was really cute. Then the school always finishes the term with an all-school holiday party in which the kids all dress up for a special lunch.

The girls!

These are just the girls in Emily's class on the day of the lunch (there are also three boys in her class). They are all pretty cute and seem to get along reasonable well. Emily's teacher, who is standing in the background on the left, has been great this year and I get along with her really well. Of course, the moms all had a bit of a laugh about the sweet girl who is second from the left. Her mom said, "Maybe I should have a talk with her about keeping her knees together." LOL. In case you can't tell, Emily is sort of in the middle with the silver dress.

As for Christmas, I think that Emily was pretty happy with how it turned out. She started out asking Santa for a robotic girl that she could have as a permanent playmate, but then she decided that maybe that would be too hard, so she backed off and asked for squigz, a camping set for her American Girl doll, clothes, mythology books, a tree house, a fawn (stuffed animal), and a mermaid tail (for swimming in the pool). I think that Santa delivered on all but the tree house.

After Christmas, we took a three night trip to New Orleans and I think that Emily really enjoyed it. We told her tales of the yummy beignets at Cafe Du Monde and she was NOT disappointed! We walked over from our hotel every morning and loaded up. Emily was in heaven and we frequently had to tell her not to lick the powdered sugar off the plate, table, etc.

Beignets!

Of course, we also had a number of other meals in New Orleans and Emily pretty much subsisted on the bread and butter. In particular, we had a great lunch at Commander's Palace. That place never seems to disappoint and Emily gave their bread and butter her stamp of approval. We even managed to get a decent family photo afterwards.

Family photo

Note that Emily is wearing some lovely necklaces that she finger-weaved for herself during the trip. :)

Emily is back to school now and seems to be enjoying it. Today we attended an American Girl lunch with a few of the other moms/daughters. It was a good event. The girls all brought their dolls and ran around and played while the moms chatted. The food was kid-friendly, but also made me realize how much I love "kid food" - mac and cheese, grilled cheese, chicken fingers, pasta, etc. Yum!

As for the teeth that I have mentioned before, one of the two top baby teeth is gone now, but the other is still there and we have practically begged her to wiggle it out. People are so anxious for it to fall out that even her teacher mentioned it in her weekly correspondence with me. She was shocked that it was still there when Emily returned from the break! Also, every time she arrives at her weekly violin lesson, her teacher immediately checks to see if the tooth is still there. Of course, it is, but any day now, I hope!