Winter Wonderland!

Well, not quite "Winter Wonderland," but we have Christmas decorations in our front yard this year! Whoo hoo! Today Clark said he was going to hang the Christmas lights on our house (and Bailey or I didn't mention a thing!) He even took us to OSH to look for a light up penguin! They didn't have one, but I ran to Home Depot as he and the kids were working on the icicle lights and found one! I also picked up some dancing snow men lights. Just LOVE IT!

Here's Daddy working on the icicle lights

The dancing snow heads! They change colors and "dance" (the lights dance, Gregory couldn't understand why they wouldn't move if they were dancing)

Our fancy penguins

Can't really see in the dark, but we're looking festive!

Happy Turkey Day!

Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! We had a yumola dinner in Stockton. Before dinner we had our usual Thanksgiving service - a little singing, prayer and this year we added "What we are Thankful for" (Bailey is thankful for "Beaches" and Gregory is thankful for "Dinosaurs") After dinner we celebrated Aunty Ruth's 70th birthday. We came home stuffed and ready for bed! (We had to wake the kids up at 8:45a to go to the doctor for their flu shot, but I think they would've slept even longer!)

Bailey trying to give Gregory a great big kiss!

Woulda been a nice Christmas picture if my drawer was closed!

Mr. Spiffy

Our yummy dinner

Aunty Ann's pies

Happy 70th Aunty Ruth!

Salt Dough Ornaments

Today we invited Camryn over to make salt dough ornaments! First we made the ornaments and put them in the oven to bake. The directions said to bake them for 2 hours so we had to be on the ball! Well, I think we left them to bake for an hour or so and they started to get toasty brown so I pulled them out. (They'll just need to air dry a bit...) While they were baking, the kids played inside and out, danced and had a snack! After they cooled a bit, we painted them and had some lunch. It was a fun packed morning and I think they all had a great time.


Big Sister, Camryn! (Baby Luke stayed home)

"Hmmm, what shall I make?"

Gregory deciding he's going to be an ornament

Here's one tray

Dancing while the ornaments bake

We put on painting shirts and painted our ornaments with red and green paint

Bailey's ornaments

Gregory's handiwork

Oh (tiny) Christmas Tree!

Today while shopping the dollar section at Target we found these cute little Christmas tress and tiny ornaments. Of course I look at Clark to see if he's going to make me put them back on the shelf, but he let each of the kids pick one out! Bailey chose the pink one and Gregory, the green. (Both their favorite color) We came home, fluffed them up a bit and wired the ornaments to the branches. The kids found a special spot in their room and now they can enjoy a little Christmas as they doze off each night. :)

Here's Bailey's pink tree and ornaments!

Gregory is holding his Santa baby and ornaments - they got cut off, but he took such a nice picture I had to post.

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year!

Well, at least the setting up the Christmas tree part! I LOVE putting up our Christmas tree and now that it's the week before Thanksgiving and we have a tree we can just pull out of the garage, we decided to set ours up! The kids were so excited to see our tree again. We carefully hung our ornaments and chatted about who gave them to us or when we made certain ones and looked at all our photo ornaments watching the kids grow each year. Ohhhh, I just love our tree!


Here they are staying out of Daddy's way while he sets up our fake tree

Here's Daddy putting our tree in the MIDDLE OF THE FLOOR

Hangin ornaments

Bailey

Daddy giving Gregory a lift so he can reach a little higher

Gregory and his Santa baby (Santa gave it to him last year and he calls him Santa baby)

Bailey getting a lift

Isn't it beautiful?

Even if it's in the middle of the floor

Soup and Song

Today Bailey's class had their "Soup and Song" day. This morning each child was asked to bring in a vegetable to add to a pot of soup. (Bailey brought celery) They each got to cut the veggies and an adult cooked them in a big pot and at 11:30 all the parents were invited to enjoy a bowl of soup and hear the kids sing a few songs and what they were thankful for. (Bailey is thankful for the beach!) After the show, we all went to lunch at Yokohama's! Yumola!

Gregory enjoying the soup.

Here's a close-up.

Bailey and her soup. We made soup a couple of weeks ago and I froze a bowl for her to eat today since we didn't know if it'd be allergy free.

Can you see her there in the middle?

Don't know why it got so dark!

They sang 2 songs in sign language. One of the boy's in her class uses sign, so the class has been learning some sign language too.

Lunch at Yokohama

Look at all this food!

Gregory with a sushi in his mouth. :) (He took out all the cucumbers from his kappa maki and stuffed it with chicken teriyaki instead.)

Cinnamon Applesauce Ornaments

I LOVE the smell of cinnamon! So today while Gregory was at school, Bailey and I went to the Dollar Store to search for some cinnamon to make Cinnamon Applesauce Ornaments! When we got to the store we went to the spice section and NO CINNAMON. So sad, but I decided to ask one of the workers if they had any in the back and he takes me an end cap full of large sized cinnamon!! So crazy me picks up 5 containers thinking I'll probably need a couple to make a cup and we'll probably want to make tons cuz they're going to smell so nice! Okay, if you do this at home - buy only one cinnamon - over a cup in the container and one recipe makes plenty! (especially if you're making them with a 5 yr and 3 yr old kid!)

All you need is a cup of cinnamon, a cup of apple sauce and a tablespoon of glue! Mix, roll and dry on paper towels. (What am I going to do with all this left over cinnamon??)

Gregory mixing

Bailey's turn!

Kneading the dough a bit

Using cooking cutters to cut out ornaments

Here's what one batch made. And I made them thick to get this project done QUICK. I probably should've waiting until they were older. This is a little messy (and we did it outside), but our house does smell WONDERFUL!! (Oh! Don't forget to poke holes for the hanger)