School Snow Day 12/13/10

When we woke up this morning and saw that school was canceled due to a snow day, I was really worried about having the kids cooped up in the house for a 2nd day in a row.........thankfully it actually went pretty well. I had somethings to d to keep the kids busy and occupied.

Last year after Christmas we found a foam gingerbread house kit. I decided that today was a good day to pull it out. The kids took turns putting different stickers on the house to decorate it the way they wanted it. The same time we bought the gingerbread house kit we bought a couple of magnet sets. One of them is a dress-up-Santa and the other is dress-up-a-snowman. That kept the kids occupied for awhile. ;-)
Over the years we have accumulated a lot of Christmas "toys". This year we put all of them in a bucket and the kids can play with them whenever they want to. They found a tic-tac-toe game. Of course Samantha didn't know how to play it correctly but it was fun watching them.
Marc pulled out one of our many play nativity sets to play with. He set up quite to scene.
I saw a picture of a friend making peanut butter cookies with Hershey kissses and they looked yummy. The only problem.....the only kisses we had are some that both kids had gotten from Grandma. Marc saw the recipe and got really excited about making the cookies. When I told him the catch he said "oh". I asked him if he was willing to "sacrifice" his kisses to make the cookies knowing that in a week he was going to be getting a ton of chocolate in his stocking. After a few minutes of pondering, he said he was willing to use them. So, off we went to make more cookies.
My little smarty pants got the recipe, the ingredients, and all of the correct measuring cups and spoons we were going to need.
Since Marc was SO excited to be making these cookies, I out Samantha to work unwrapping all the kisses we needed. (and it is more great fine motor practice)
Both kids helped roll the dough into balls, roll them in the sugar and put them on the cookie sheet to be baked. When it was time, each of them got to out kisses on the cookies.
We were short a few kisses so we tried using some of the flavored one we had from our pretzels.
After Daddy got home and we had dinner it felt like a good night to break out "The Christmas Game". I remember playing this game with my Mom and brother when I was younger. It is a very, very basic form of Monopoly, only Christmas themed. It brought back lots of fun memories from my childhood. I am so tankful that I am able to carry the tradition on with my kiddos. Hopefully they will do the same down the road.
What I thought was going to be a long, bad day turned out to be a very fun, family day. :-)

Church Snow Day!! 12/12/10

We had a feeling as we were driving home Saturday night that the weather on Sunday morning was going to be yucky. So, we stopped at the store and bought the supplies to make a few more things that are on our Christmas goodies list. It's a good thing we did because church was canceled.

We were sorry to miss church, but glad to be able to stay off the roads and glad we could get some more of our Christmas baking done. The first thing on our list were Mrs. Field's chocolate chip cookies. Both kids helped us mix the ingredients.Marc helped me spoon the dough onto the cookie sheets. He really is a good little baker!
This recipe made something like 8 dozen cookies, so we spent a lot of the day baking sheets filled with dough to turn into yummy cookies.
The next thing on the list was chocolate and chocolate mint fudge. Marc helped Daddy make the fudge by pouring in the chocolate when needed.
We also made red & green rice krispie treats. However, as the marshmallows were melting, something went wrong and they didn't turn out. :-(

We enjoyed spending our church snow day together as a family. :-)

December Cuteness Part 1

Here are some random cute pictures of my kiddos from the first half of December.

Santa's Little Helpers

One night we decided it was a good night for some air popped popcorn. Both kids helped me pop it and then of course they both helped me eat it. ;-)

We put our tree up on a Saturday and then the next day the kids looked so cute I had to take their pictures in front of our tree. Samantha looks very grown up and Marc looks really tall!

Marc was looking at one of his magazines that has bloopers in it. He shows me a picture of one of the bloopers. I immediately said, "Sam has that shirt!". I ran upstairs and grabbed the shirt an looked at it. Sure enough, Sam's shirt did have the blooper. She has worn it a ton of times and I never noticed it. Read the alphabet an see if you can find the missing letter.

I love it when I see and don't hear (no arguing) the kids playing nicely together. It doesn't happen as much as you might think so I have to get pictures that prove it can happen. ;-)

As I was unpacking the Christmas toys box I was surprised by how many nativity play sets. One of the was a Little People version that Samantha got for Christmas last year. Since it was a gift last year, it didn't get played with much so it is kinda like a new toy all over again.

After we went and saw Santa we had tickets to take Marc to see Peter Pan at the Civic Theater. My Mom was nice enough to watch Samantha for us. She met us for lunch and then took Samantha home with her. That was the first time she has eaten a corn dog still on the stick. It was a pretty funny sight. She pretty much destroyed it! ;-)

After we picked Samantha up from my Mom's house we drove through a lights display. This is one of favorites.
Like I said above, these are some of the pictures from the first half of December. I will post December Cuteness Part 2 at the end of December. Enjoy my little cuties! :-)

A Visit With Santa 12/11/10

Christmas time means a trip to see Santa Claus. We have, from the beginning, made sure Marc, and now Samantha, understand the true meaning of Christmas. We have told them that Santa is not a "real" person but a symbol of fun an giving. That being said, we are more than willing to have fun and play along with all of the Santa fun, including a trip to see Santa.

I totally thought that Samantha was going to turn and run crying back to us. She doesn't like anything that might be even the slightest bit "different". Much to our surprise she walked right up with Marc and she willing sat on his lap.After some pictures Santa asked the kids what they wanted for Christmas. Marc told him he was a "note pad" and Samantha told him she wants "toys". Well, I guess I need to run to the store and buy Marc a note book. ;-)
Daddy and I decided that we wanted to jump in the picture with the kids for a cute, fun family picture.
On the other side of the aisle from Santa is the carousel. Samantha told us she wanted to ride the carousel. We made a deal with her that if she smiled nice for Santa, she could ride the carousel after we were done with Santa. Since she id great with Santa, she got to ride the carousel. :-)
It was a fun day and another thing that helped get me more into the Christmas spirit.

Saying Good-bye to Miss Morren 12/9/10

Marc had a student teacher in his class again this year. The one last year wasn't anything to write home about, but Mandy Morren this year was awesome!! She is going to make one heck of a teacher!!

The parents organized a surprise party for Miss Morren. All the kids knew about and actually kept it a secret. When Miss Morren and Mr Steinbacher took the kids outside for recess, us parents got to work. One of the other teachers asked Miss Morren to watch her kids on the playground while she "went to the bathroom" (she actually wandered the halls) so the kids could come in, get out of the outside gear and hide.When she came into the room all the kids jumped up and yelled surprise. I think she truly was surprised! :-) Marc loved her, he actually cried in the car on the way home. I heard lots of kids asking her if she could come back for "just one more day?" You know it is a good teacher when the kids don't want you to go.
As Miss Morren was passing out a treat she made for the kids, the kids decided to give her a group hug.
Mandy Morren is going to make one heck of a teacher! She will be sorely missed in Marc's class but whoever gets her, will be very Blessed!

Christmas Baking 12/8/10

Each year for the last 3 we have baked up a storm of Christmas goodies. We exchange goodie plates with neighbors and we share them with our co-workers. I was beginning to feel a little behind schedule due to our trip. Usually by the 2nd weekend after Thanksgiving we already had several things baked. So, when we finally had a free evening, we started our Christmas baking.

One of the things we make are pretzel/Hershey kisses/m&m candies. The kids line the cookie sheets with pretzels......then unwrap the kisses and out a kiss on top of each pretzel. We usually do Hugs, Mint, and Candy Cane flavored kisses......
then we bake them for a few minutes in the oven and top each kiss with an m&m. They then have to cool and harden over night.While the kisses were cooling we decided to use a new "toy" we bought after Christmas last year. I found this tool that cuts the cookies and then presses a picture imprint on the cookie.While the imprint cookies were baking we started making some cut-out cookies from the short bread dough. We had to show Samantha how to do it once, and then she did it like she was a pro. I think cutting out the cookies is Marc's 2nd favorite (only to frosting them) part of making cookies.
My kiddos made some pretty good looking cookies if I do say so myself. ;-)While I was at The Dollar Tree one day the previous week I found these cute aprons. I thought "What the heck, they are only $1 each", so I bought 4 of them. When I asked Daddy Marc if he was going to help us bake I had him put on his apron. His response was "Since when does "Honey, help me bake mean having to wear cute matching aprons?". Silly man! ;-) I think we turned out really cute! :-)
Now that we have round 1 of baking done, I am not feeling quite so behind schedule. The things we made turned out pretty darn yummy if I do say so myself. :-)

Santa Parade 12/4/10

We love going to the Santa parade in downtown Rockford! We have gone most of the last 4 years. It is usually cold, but what a fun way to get into the spirit of Christmas! While we were waiting for it to start I decided the kids looked so cute all bundled up in their snow gear I had to get some pictures of them.
And of course some with us too.
The parade last about 30 minutes. We get to see lots of cute kids from various boy scouts, girl scouts, sports clubs, etc in addition to police/fire, a few companies and businesses, and of course, Santa! All of the "groups" have most of their kids walk the route passing out candy. Most of the time we get candy for 2-4 people from the same group. The amount of candy the kids got is amazing! I think it is almost, if not more than, as much as they got on Halloween!
It is a lot of fun to tell a bunch of strangers Merry Christmas. this year we hadn't gotten much "Christmas" stuff done yet, so this parade was kinda the thing that put me in the Christmas spirit. :-)

Christmas Decorating 12/3/10

We usually put up our Christmas tree the weekend after Thanksgiving but since we weren't home that weekend, we had to wait another weekend. Marc kept nagging us to put up our decorations because "everyone else has theirs up". ;-) I told him that "everyone else didn't just get back from vacation". So we finally out Marc out of his misery and put the tree up. Both kids helped us spread the branches out on each branch of the tree and put them on the tree pole. Marc id a great job, as usual, but Samantha wasn't so sure about the feel of the needles at first, but then got used to them.Daddy and I did the lights while the kids had nap/quiet time. After Marc came upstairs he helped Daddy put the garland on the tree....such a big boy and a big helper!
Love the fact the both kids are old enough to do at least a little bit of the decorating. This year we had the kids hang their own stockings on our stocking holder.
Every year for the last couple of years we have let Marc put the topper on the tree.
It was SO fun watching the kids decorate the tree. Daddy and I didn't do much, just the breakable ones, while the kids put the rest of the ornaments on. After wards I had to go back through and rearrange a few, but for the most part, they did great!
It is always so fun to watch the kids and their excitement over the Christmas decorations! :-)