days 8-10

This past weekend was our first weekend without the show! We didn't quite know what to do with ourselves... but in the end we did manage to fill the time :-)

With Saturday afternoons free, Clara was able to rejoin the tap class she had wanted to take with her friend back in November. She was so excited about it that she got her shoes out the night before and had them all ready to go....

Saturday was a bitterly cold day, so while Jeff and I were sitting around staring at our fireplace we got the brilliant idea to actually light it!
We have lived here three years now and finally added the gas logs this fall, yet we had still not actually used the fireplace.... until now.

Sunday after church, Jeff said that he was going to go for a run.... Clara said that she wanted to go too. We tried to talk her out of it given that the temp was in the teens and the windchill was around -2, but she insisted...
Jeff took her around a few blocks and then dropped her back off at home before continuing on with his run.

Well... I should get going so I can gear myself up for our busy week ahead!

snow day/snow night

Here are some more photos from our snow day and snow night yesterday.

Just one of the boy...
The girl was uncooperative, so I have no photos of her (she was upset that Alex had a snow shovel and she did not... sigh).

Then last night, they went over to their friends' house for a night time snow play date.

Here are the girls dining alfresco in January... Chicago style...

It was a pretty funny scene to witness. It is true that the cold really doesn't bother kids as long as they're having fun!

days 6 & 7

Here are my most recent photos for this project...

On Wednesday Clara had a trip to the orthodontist for an evaluation. Here is what they recommended...
Not quite sure how I feel about it but this was our second opinion and the second recommendation for basically the same course of treatment. We might have one more evaluation before we start this journey.

Oh... and yes! That was taken with my phone! I kept feeling the itch the rest of the day to take a photo for my "photo-of-the-day" with my big camera... but I kept reminding myself that this is project is not really as much about the photography as it is about capturing the moments in our lives. This was a big thing for us that day... and a blurry cell phone photo is what captured it best.

Yesterday we had our first real snow storm of the season. Alex and Clara spent quite a bit of time outside playing with their friends and neighbors...
Sadly, this was our last big playday with them as their moving truck is outside now to pack them up and move them down to sunny Florida. We'll definitely miss them.

project{365}

I've attempted the photo-a-day thing before and every time I fail. This track record almost kept me from making yet another attempt this year. I even thought about secretly attempting it and not telling anyone so if I failed again, no one would know. But I decided to put it out there... I OFFICIALLY PLAN TO TAKE A PHOTO A DAY EVERY DAY OF 2010. I am also cutting myself some slack and acknowledging that missing a day or two or taking the photo with my cell phone does not constitute a failure... giving up entirely (like I have in the past), however, does :-)

So... here we go...
day one: we play Alex's new Yahtzee game for the first time and he learns that the dice can be a bit tricky.

day two: the kids have several friends at the show!

day three: the final exit from the stage

day four: the day our poor aging black lab couldn't get up very well or walk (thankfully she was much better today).

day five: STILL looking at toy catalogs.

Let's see if I can make it past January this year! :-)

the final show

... sniff, sniff... it was sad to see it all end this afternoon. Thankfully Jeff and I got to go in to see the final show.

During warm-ups we got the chance to take some group shots.

Here's Karl terrorizing the kids...
the cast...
and a shot of almost everyone...
We were also able to take some photos during the curtain call (provided that I didn't use flash).

Here's Clara...
... and Alex...
Since it was the final show and after New Year's... they sang Auld Lang Syne...
(I'll admit to being a little... okay.. a lot teary at this point)

The final exit from the stage...
I finally made a second attempt to get a good shot of Alex and his "dad" from the show...
... now you can see the reason he had to get his hair dyed.

Just one final shot before we left...
The kids were really sad to see it all end today. They just can't imagine not hanging out with this group every weekend anymore.... but we'll be back into swim meets and playdates again, so maybe they won't mind so much.

Happy New Year!!!

I hope everyone is having a great start to 2010! I know that we are.

New Year's Eve we had our traditional Radtke Family celebration....

board games...
and Shirley Temples...
Alex LOVES his kiddie cocktails...
This year the board game of choice was Monopoly (Chicago Edition)....
It got rather intense at times...
... there were lots of side deals being made. You know you really have a game going when you have to start writing contracts! We would take breaks from the game and fit in a round or two of Mario Party 8 on the wii.

Clara was getting sleepy so we decided to count down with New York just in case she didn't make it to "Chicago midnight"...
the party animals...
once the horns started blowing the crazies came out....

After a deafening celebration at 11pm, we went back to Monopoly and did it all over again at midnight! The east coast celebration was all Clara needed to perk back up and catch her second wind.

Today is our last show. We all have mixed emotions. We're going to be glad to have our weekends back, but they are so going to miss everyone and will miss being on stage. Jeff and I are going in to see this last show and I'm going to hopefully take some photos of the curtain call.

secret santa and scrapbooking

Sunday evening, after the matinee, the kids had a cast Christmas party to attend. This was a big one as it was the night that their Secret Santas would be revealed. They were beside themselves with excitement. Alex's Secret Santa hadn't given him anything yet so he was excited to get his present. Clara's Secret Santa had been giving her little gifts along the way so she wasn't expecting much, but was excited to find out who her Santa was.

Alex's Secret Santa gave him a box of Lego kits which he was absolutely thrilled about! Clara's Santa totally shocked us. He gave her these...
... pointe shoes that had been worn and autographed by a Joffrey Ballet dancer! She was totally in awe!

Given that this was a story I wanted to record, I decided to breakout the digital scrapbooking supplies and scrap a page...
(Kit - all i need collab kit - paislee press and amy wolff @oscraps or the lily pad)

After that I got on a bit of a roll!

Here's a page about Clara's role as Sally...
(Kit - Mistletoe Magic by Dani Mogstad @sweet shoppe)

And finally, a project I'm thinking about taking on... mini 4x6 layouts to document the different ornaments on our tree...
(kit - all aglow by Traci Reed @sweet shoppe)

I'm going to really try to scrap more this next year... I have missed documenting so many stories during this little break I took.

Christmas Cookies

Okay... I'm trying to catch up with some of my unposted photos from the past week or so. Just be prepared for random posts over the next few days... nothing will be in chronological order, at least for a little while.

While Grandpa and Grandma Michigan were in last week, Grandma and the kids made cookies.

Alex apparently thought that wiping your hands on an actual towel was overrated, so he used the backside of his jeans instead...
The most ambitious project of the day was making gingerbread.

Here's Alex with some of his gingerbread people and shapes...
and Clara and Grandma with theirs....
Clara worked hard cutting out gingerbread shapes...
After the gingerbread was baked and cooled, it was time to decorate.

Hmmm.... I wonder which ones Clara decorated....

This was a new recipe that we tried this year.... it had a box of butterscotch pudding in it which I thought sounded a little odd but they tasted very good.

The kids really love to bake... I should let them do it more often!

Merry Christmas!!

(front)
(inside right)
(back)
(inside left)

daddy daughter date night

Tonight Clara and Jeff went out for a daddy daughter date night.

I took a quick pic before they left...
They went out to dinner before going off to see the Joffrey's Nutcracker. Clara was very excited to see it as she has several friends from dance class in tonight's cast.

I can't wait to hear the full report when she gets home!

Nutcracker Recital

Clara lives and breathes Nutcracker during the holiday season (okay... truthfully, it's all year long) but this year she wasn't able to participate in any of the local Nutcracker productions due to her role in the play. Thankfully, one of the places she takes dance has started having a Nutcracker Holiday Recital each December. She loves the music and just loves being a part of it.... especially when she gets to dance with her friends.

Here she is as a snowflake...
That dance was her favorite of the two she performed. This is the second year that she has been in class with almost the exact same group of girls and they have such a good time together. It's amazing to see a group of 6 or 7 girls who all take their class seriously but are still able to have fun together at the same time.

Her second dance was the clown dance...

She didn't enjoy this one as much as it was more acrobatics than dance (in her opinion)... I thought it was fun (but of course I was just watching versus being the one lifting my leg over my head and doing the splits).

It was a really fun evening of dance and cookies. The only glitch in the party was that apparently we left half of our belongings there (thanks for alerting us to this fact Tracy!).

I have some photos to edit from the kids' day of cookie making with grandma.... hopefully I'll have those up soon!

21 down, 6 to go

The kids had their last pre-Christmas show today! It was a pretty exciting weekend... not only were they showered with gifts from the other cast members (they have been spoiled rotten by them) but Grandpa and Grandma Michigan came in and saw the show....

It was fun for the kids to have family in the crowd. After the show, we took a few photos with "Santa" (aka Jim). Also since we've been so busy and not been able to go see Santa this year, Clara and Alex shared their Christmas wishes with Jim since he's acting as Santa's helper this year.

Here's Jim reacting to Clara's request for an iPod...
and Jim listening to Alex's overly detailed description of Lego Mindstorms...
See.... I did take some photos!! Although my December photo total is only up to 5 I think now. Well, it's at least five more than I had taken on Friday!

It's late and I'm tired, so I'm heading to bed! Hopefully there will be more photos to come this week!

and then there's clara...

I seriously have no words.... she's an odd little bird and was really on a roll that day.

leaving on a jet plane...

not really.... but that's the song Alex played and sang at his recital tonight....



honestly, we haven't gone anywhere nor do we plan to any time soon.... no jet planes in our immediate futures (well... maybe Jeff's future, but not ours as a family).

The play is going really, really well but it is monopolizing most of our free time. We're now 17 shows in with just 10 left to go. As excited as I am to have some free time back, we're going to miss this group when it's over. They are such an incredibly fun group of people to hang out with.

Other than the play we haven't done much else. I haven't even taken a single photo yet in December... that's just unheard of for me. I took my camera to Alex's recital tonight but was so tired that I decided to just sit and enjoy his performance instead of mess with my camera. Photo ops will pick up over the next couple of weeks so I hope I get in the mood to get out my camera again.

So, the video is taking forever to upload so I feel compelled to ramble while I wait... otherwise I might fall asleep on my keyboard.

Oh... perhaps I should ramble on with a disclaimer about Alex's recital piece. Alex took guitar all last year but he took a group class. He really enjoyed it and loved his teacher but group class wasn't really for him. So, this year he started private lessons with a new teacher in September. He is really doing well with his private lessons! The one on one attention was just what he needed to work out some of his trouble spots and now he's able to move on. His current teacher also does some voice work with him, so it's fun to see him do some more singing along with his playing.

Okay... still uploading but I think I will spare you any more of my ramblings :-)

Good night!

*** I never got this to upload last night... I think I figured it out this morning! Please forgive the ramblings.

**** Not sure why it's shifted to the right so far.... sigh.