My favorite part

The best part of holiday celebrations, traditions, food, gifts, and decorations has to be that it brings people together - especially family. I feel so grateful to have had everyone home for a couple of days. I love these memory-making moments.

The big day, Christmas!

They let some of us sleep until 6am.




We do believe in joy, family time, fun, and God's love.




Some of the favorite gifts of the day.

I can't even tell you how much fun guns are at Christmas. They may be plastic, they may have many little parts know scattered throughout the house but for a small investment we have had a lot of fun family time, shoot outs for all ages, and improved marksmenship (?).

More plastic. Legos have to be one of the greatest toys ever. My boys will play every day if I would let them. This big lego box entertained much of the family. It was our 3D puzzle and the creations were amazing.

Our tradition for Christmas includes waiting until everyone is awake and lined up on the stairs. We go to the family room together to check the stockings. We then watch the story of the first Christmas and move on to present unwrapping. We unwrap slowly with each taking turns so we can properly ohh and ahh and express thanks. We enjoyed a breakfast casserole, sweet rolls, and fruit. Then we snack through the day on lots of yummy junk and ended our day with a Christmas dinner. It was a beautiful day and we like the way we keep Christmas.

I haven't figured out why my pictures are long or often blurry. Any help would be appreciated.

The night before Christmas

Christmas Eve began with opening one gift. . . a gift to be used immediately, pajamas. We then heaaded off to Bridgets for family celebrating.

We enjoyed soup, breadsticks, pie,

cute pajamas and our ever fun grandparents.

The nativity took on knew dimensions as we added to our cast plenty of great participants.

Mary is visited by the angel Gabriel.

Heavy with child she rides the donkey to Bethlehem.

The angels proclaim to the shepherds (and sheep) the Saviors birth.

The wise men visit the babe

with reverent awe with the star that guided them there.

My favorite shepherd.

the case of the cookie thief

and a new member of our family. This is Jarle from Norway. He is 17 and is a junior at our high school. His host family situation changed and he needed a new home so we get to have one more boy at our house. He wrestles, likes to draw and is friendly and fun.



Now on to the mystery. I was wondering why we have red ribbon circles on the floor. No one did it. Then I remember that Emily did tie red ribbon on our gingerbread cookies to hang on the tree . . .




They look cute and spice up our kitchen tree.





but wait! Why are there are no gingerbread men on the bottom half of the tree? (No, Jarle didn't do it either)




Through great Sherlock Holmes style deductive reasoning the culprit was found -

GUILTY, that is. How could such a sweet face help herself to our Christmas ornaments. Did she really think we would believe the gingerbread men had run away as fast as they can? The kids want to give her leniency and try again but I am not feeding that dog any more of our decorations. She has lost my trust in that department. It's dog food and water for Chloe!

big kid/little kid fun

We made gingerbread cookies/ornaments, snitched some dough, and cleaned house cuz we had people coming to celebrate with us. (Doodle kept sitting on the counter, Sunshine kept reminder her to keep her bum off. She decided to change the subject and said, "Don't talk about bums." ;))

Christmas stories by the fire.

drawing pictures

and playing dressups.

Our efforts to take Christmas pictures.  Some enjoyed it more than others but they all turned out well

CHRISTmas

May these next busy weeks bring joy and gladness as we come to Christ and seek his spirit.

Buffalo anyone?

 . . . style, chicken pizza that is.  Although the men in my family are going hunting buffalo for Christmas we are able to enjoy this yummy pizza any time.  I use my canned chicken so all the ingredients are on hand and quick.  It is rather spicey but we love it.  Doodle has also learned to love bleu cheese dressing

Buffalo-Style Chicken Pizza

2 cups shredded, cooked chicken

½ cup hot cayenne pepper sauce

2 T melted butter

One unbaked pizza crust, I like to half bake the crust before topping it.

1 cup pizza sauce

2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

½ cup diced celery

½ cup ranch or bleu cheese salad dressing

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

Combine chicken, hot cayenne sauce and butter. Spread pizza crust with pizza sauce (I have used just tomato sauce and it still works.) and top with chicken mixture, cheese, and celery (I love the celery, it stays crisp and adds that cool with the hot chicken).

Bake 15 to 18 minutes or until crust is golden brown. Drizzle with dressing.  Sometimes we just dip the pizza in the dressing.

ps Sunshine is done with the pox but Doddle is due next week.  Oh well.

Chicken Pox

Doodle asked Ike to draw a truck for her.  She is driving, Ike is in the back seat and the sad boy with red spots is my sunshine.  He has been amazingly brave and patient as we battle the chicken pox.  He has a good enough case that I don't believe he will ever be in danger of shingles or anything else.  We are almost half way through.  The guess is Doodle will look just like this in 2 weeks. 

PS  Check out the new button on the side for great ideas about keeping Christmas. (Thanks, Amber)

Thanksgiving remembered

Thanksgiving for us involves sweet dreams coming true.  We begin our day with pie.  Life is short, eat dessert first (or at least while you still have room).

We had fruit pies, cream pies, pumpkin, and quiche as well as whip cream or homemade ice cream.  Plenty for everyone, even Peter.

Some don't even bother to wake up to eat the pies, just smile through it all.

This guy definitely likes his pie.  He is my current bottomless pit.

These were the willing family members who enjoyed pie first.  It was great fun to be able to share part of the day with some many great people.

And then it turned into a snowball fight.  There wasn't much snow but it was still icey and cold.

This was our dinner crew.  We felt very grateful for great food, family, country, conveniences of modern living, and the gospel of Jesus Christ restored to the earth and the power of the atonement in our lives.

A few more pictures of people I love.

Uncle, aunt, and nephew fun.