Christmas Bicycles

Christmas morning, the kids woke up to see the things they'd been talking about for weeks in their living room.  Bicycles (and helmets)   Seriously, I cannot even tell you how excited they were.

Because of the layout of our house and the fact that it rained and rained (and was cold) on Christmas and the week after, they rode in the house.  They'd start in the dining room, go through the living room, down the hall and back into the dining room.  

By the time they finally got to ride outside, they were pros.

Daughter, minutes after discovering her new bike

Son, taking a break from the action

 About a week after Christmas, it warmed up enough that I loaded the kids, a picnic and their bikes and helmets in the car and we met Husband at The Railroad Park for a long lunch.  They loved it.  And because it was a weekday, not crowded.  Perfect for a 4 year old and a 2 year old who have only ridden their bikes inside their house.  And they did great.  We went around 3 times and stopped a lot to run and play.

Just starting off.  She turned around and said, "snap my picture, please."

This little boy did GREAT.  I was so proud of how be managed his bike and how fast he could go!

Also, they both have bells on their bikes that they are oh so in love with.

Wordless Wednesday: They like me more than Santa

Daughter's Trip to See The Nutcracker

Before Christmas Daughter and C went on their annual trip to see The Nutcracker. (Last year one or both of them fell asleep before intermission and we had a little higher hopes for this year.)

Daughter was SO excited.  Excited to see C.  Excited to see the ballerinas. And excited to see a story she was more familiar with this year than she was last year.

(mostly) patiently waiting for the show to start

waiting, waiting, waiting (we really had FANTASTIC seats)

reenacting her favorite part - When Clara throws her shoe at the Mice King.  The people behind us  were pretty certain she was actually about to launch the shoe at them.  Luckily, she's an excellent pretender.

The girls (who are 4 and 3.5, btw) did excellent.  Especially considering they aren't 10, but, ya know, 4 and 3.5.   We ended up making it through intermission and almost all of the second half.  It was a fun time.  Next year we're pretty sure they'll make it to the end ... with their dads.

Our Homemade Christmas gifts

For the past two (or three, I don't even remember) Husband and I have made "goodie bags" for our families for Christmas.  This year, since I actually know how to sew, I decided to make a reusable tote for the goodies to go in.  We were giving 6 bags total. One for my parents, my sister's family unit, my bothers's family unit, Husband's parents, his sister's family unit and "Cousin Jessie" as Son loves to call her now, got her own.  That's right, no sharing for her.  Unless she takes pity on her parents. :-)

This might have been my favorite bag.  But really, I liked all the fabric a lot. So, it was hard to pick.  All six bags were different.  Since "tacky sweaters" were all the rage this year, I think there's a bit of tongue and cheek irony to this one.  I think the name of the pattern was "tree and rabbit sweater"  I also got it in blue.

inside the bag: homemade chex mix, homemade fudge, homemade butterfinger bars and homemade gingerbread men

Chex mix:  I mostly follow the directions on the box.  More pretzels, more nuts, more spices ... but mostly the same.

The Fudge: I promised my mom I wouldn't give out this recipe until after the died.

The homemade butterfinger bars:  oh. my.  Mandy told me about these last year and I've been thinking about them ever since.  I used this "recipe"   She recommends waiting a day or two to let the bars "set" before you dip them in chocolate.  I left mine uncut for a day.  Cut them and then let them set for another day.  seriously fabulous and really easy ... except for the whole waiting two days thing.

The gingerbread men:  Husband and the kids made these (gingerbread isn't really my thing).  I'm pretty sure he just used a recipe he found online.  The kids decorated the cookies with milk chocolate.

I wanted to add buttered pecans as a 5th container, but our pecan tree was pitiful this year.  We barely collected enough pecans for 1 pie!  eh, maybe next year.

the 2011 Nativity Scene Additions

This year, I added 3 new nativity scenes to my collection.  I'm to the point where most of the nativity scenes I see look a lot like ones I already have.  I'm always on the lookout for interesting/nontraditional ones.  Maybe even something that would wind up on The list of worst nativity scenes (thanks, KVS) mainly for conversation purposes.

Anyway, here are the 3 newest ones.  In no particular order:

Mom picked up this one for me at a discount store called Garden Ridge.  One of the wise men 's arms fell off and are hot glued back on AND a smurf joined the celebration to present baby Jesus with a wreath.  I really like the "vintage" paint style on these.

This one was a prize from JSS months and months ago.  After Thanksgiving, I pulled it out with big plans that each member of our family would paint 3 pieces of the 12 piece set. I told Husband that I called dibs on baby Jesus.  He was the only one I wanted to paint ...

 (also notice the kids' picture with Santa in the background. Apparently, much like Jesus, Santa is always watching.  ;-))

dibs does not count with 4 year olds.  Daughter pleaded her case that because she loves baby Jesus so much she should be the one who got to paint him.  She won.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I will admit that what I pictured in my head as being a lovely family moment of painting and talking about Jesus's birth and just enjoying each other, turned into me losing my patience and yelling something I don't even remember but I do remember it wasn't Christ-like and it definitely wasn't a shiny example of how to parent toddlers.  (sigh)   I think I let my resentment about having to settle for painting a shepherd, Mary and a sheep cloud my judgement on that one.

this final one I picked up at Jo-ann when I was yarn shopping right before Thanksgiving.

We had a great Christmas.  Lots of fun, food and family time.  We talked a lot about Mr. Scrooge and the Christmas spirit and, of course, about Baby Jesus.

The Kids' Christmas Trees

*I just realized that Christmas has come and gone and I never published this post I started over a month ago!!

After Thanksgiving both kids were excited to get their little trees out and decorate them for their rooms.  Last year I had a problem when ornaments all over the house.  And I was sick of it.  So after we Husband helped Son and I helped Daughter decorate, I had a one on one talk with each child about my expectations.

If I see an ornament on the floor, it goes back in the ornament box and we'll try again next year.  "Keep your hands off your Christmas tree."   

Daughter's tree the day after decorating.

a closeup.  Even the topper got covered in ornaments.

Son's tree the day after.  Completely bare except for the prelit lights.  Notice the wrestlers standing vigil.

Some of Son's ornaments in "the box"

sigh.

Daughter did great.  She loves her tree and did a great job of admiring it from afar AND keeping Son away from it.

Son, well, he's two year's old.  And even after he took all his ornaments off, he still loved his tree.  About every 3 or 4 days he'd ask to look at his ornaments in the box.  That was good enough for him.  And I'm sure next year he'll have a more decorated tree.

Another Dining Room decoration: Borax Snowflakes

The kids LOVE snow. I like snow.  So when I found this borax snowflakes tutorial on pinterest, I was excited to try it with the kids.  Plus, I already had everything I needed to do it.  (hurray for leftover borax when making homemade laundry detergent!!)

What to do:

• boil enough water to fill up enough pint sized mason jars so each snowflake has its own jar
• while the water is heating up, mold your pipe cleaners.  (I used white, but colored pipe cleaners would give you colored snowflakes) I used two pipe cleaners per snow flake.
• put 1/3 cup of borax in each jar
• when water boils, pour water in each jar and stir to dissolve borax.
• put snowflake in the jar and suspend with string and a pencil on the top of the jar.
• wait.  like overnight (or all day if you do what I did and make them before breakfast)
• remove from jars and hang/place where ever.

one of mine in the jar.  I took a lot of "during" pictures in the jar, but it was hard to tell much was going on, so I'll spare you.

after. closeup.

all of the afters, hanging on the light fixture in the dining room.

I made 12 and the kids LOVE them.  Even though most of them look like flowers instead of snowflakes, I like them too.

I have one more dining room decoration idea.  spoiler alert: it's paper cut out snowflakes to go on the wall.  I'm pretty sure my scissor loving kids with love that project!

Decorating glass bottles, thanks again pinterest

I think this was one of my very first pins when I joined pinterest.  I loved the picture and I already had ALL the things I needed to do this project (except the epsom salt.)

glass bottles, adhesive spray, epsom salt, spray paint and some decorative sticks (um, I have no idea what those things are called, but I bought some last year after Christmas in case I wanted a silver wreath this year.)

Our glass recycling bin always take the longest to fill up because I LOVE to save bottles.  Wine bottles, food jars, anything that doesn't look like something I already have.  This has proven worth it, because I just went to my cabinet and picked 6 bottles for the project.

I used 3 wine bottles, a taco bell mild sauce bottle, a jar that peppercorns came in from TJ MAXX and a short little apple juice bottle.

I poured the epsom salt in baking tray, sprayed the bottles with spray adhesive, rolled them in the salt, let them dry, then took them outside and spray painted them silver.  After they dried I brought them back in, stuck some of the no-name sticks in and DONE.

on the buffet in the dining room.   I love the silver/red  contrast.
I thought about putting them on the mantle in the living room, but those walls are beige and  it definitely didn't have the same POP.

a close up of the little apple juice bottle.  

I seriously loved this project.  I love walking through the dining room and seeing the bottles.  The only downside is, you CANNOT touch the salt, period.  It falls right off.  So these will not be able to be used next Christmas.  I have plans to brush off the salt and store them and just redo it again next year on the same bottles.  And probably apply another coat of spray adhesive before I spray paint the bottles to see if that helps.   either way, I'm really happy with the result.

Saturday Sewing in November and homemade Christmas gifts

Jennifer has challenged her blog readers (which include the Second Saturday Sewers) to make as many homemade/handmade Christmas gifts as we can/want to.  I'd been thinking about what I could make for awhile.  Remember the crocheted blankets I made the kids last Christmas?  They are still favorites.  

But besides my immediate family, we don't really give gifts.  Our extended family (parents, siblings and their families) get homemade goodies.  And that's a great tradition I want to continue.  So this year I decided that instead of the store bought paper throwaway gift bags we gave last year, this year I could SEW reusable gift bags.  This way the recipient can use them again and again for whatever they want long after the treats have been eaten.  Working on those bags was my project this month.  And as usual, it's my most productive sewing day of the month BY FAR.

Jennifer made chili.  (and it was great)
She also made a rice bag as one of her homemade gifts.

Mandy completed a match box cars car carrier as one of her gifts.
WOW.  I love and wish I already had one for Son.  He definitely loves his cars.

Marie completed a reversible tote for a birthday gift.
And I'm modeling one of the reversible totes I made that will be filled with Christmas treats galore.

I also decided that besides the 6 totes I'm making for goodie bags, I'm also making two each for the kids.  They have LOTS of plastic food and love playing lots of games with it.  But have never played grocery store anywhere but McWane.  I asked her about it and Daughter said it's because they don't have a cart, grocery bags or a cash register.  Well, I'm making the bags, My mom found these great metal shopping carts that she's giving the kids ... and the jury is still out on the register.

This makes my total of homemade gifts this year: 10 reversible totes, lots of treats and something I have in mind for Husband.  Due to a car wreck last week and the deductible that has to be paid, I've had to abandon my original idea for his gift. But I have something homemade in mind that I think he'll love.

our 2011 calendar

I love Vista Print. Once you start doing business with them, they send you loads and loads of free/discounted offers. That's where I got my postcrossing postcards. Last year I racked up, free totes with our pictures on them, free mouse pad, pens, stationary, note cards, address labels. sure, there's a shipping charge. but it's not much.

Last year, I made 4 2010 calendars. 1 for our house, 1 for Husband to take to work for his office and one for both of our mothers. I think I got those buy one get one free. But I was so excited about them. Mainly because I got to sort through all the year's pictures to find ONE for each month. April is Son's birth month and September is Daughter's so they "got" those months. And the rest, Husband and I narrowed it down as best we could.

It was nice looking at the 2010 calendar all year with last year's memories. So of course I wanted to do it again this year. ESPECIALLY when I saw the deal Vista Print has running on Facebook right now. (click on the Holiday Deals tab and you'll see "new calendar")

I got FIVE photo collage calendars for $19.98 (plus shipping) I panicked and paid for 2 week shipping to get it in time for Christmas and it arrived 4 days after I placed the order. They are always REALLY fast with shipping.

I couldn't narrow it down to just one photo per month so I opted to do the photo collage option and chose 6 pictures per month. And even that was hard!

So here is the tiniest sneak preview of our 2011 calendar:

This is the front of the calendar. It's also our Holiday Card photo.

(I took over 300 pictures with my tripod and camera timer to get this one shot. And it's not even a spectacular shot. insanity)

NOTE: all the pictures below are actually printed in black and white in the calendar, but less the first one, I posted the color shot for the blog. And these were all taken Saturday.

Daughter running around the yard playing chase, about 30 minutes before we went to pick out our Christmas tree.

Son before going outside to play in the yard before going to pick out the Christmas tree. He looks so grown up here. Not like the 21 month old he actually is!

Husband took this one while we were playing around later that night. There were some really silly ones where we're making funny faces but for the calendar, this is it.

Husband and Son playing outside before picking out the Christmas tree.

We definitely don't take very many of these anymore. There's usually a kid in the way!

Husband says he's had this sweater for over a decade and I promise I have ZERO recollection of ever seeing it before Saturday!

The sixth picture is our family picture with Santa and Mrs. Claus at Palisades Park.

the 2010 mantel

This is the half of the mantel that has the stockings on it.

(side note: I find it a little weird that Husband and I still have stockings up. I mean, my parents didn't have stockings when I was growing up.)

Anyway, Husband's is the green one with the pewter nutcracker holder. Mine is the red one with the pewter angels holder. I got our stockings at World Market for our first Christmas (5 years ago)

Daughter's stocking is the red one with a Santa and a reindeer on the Santa holder.

Son's stocking is the green one with a snowman and a polar bear on the snowman holder.

I got their stockings at Wal-mart 3 years ago (yes, I bought Son's before he was ever born. Actually there is another green one just in case. I didn't want a big family with non-matching stockings. oh the horrorz) I found the matching stocking holders on ebay for $2 each. (there is no third stocking holder)

I asked Husband to choose a few nativity scenes to put on the other side of the mantel.

I love the way he put Baby Jesus in the middle but then had no regard for the placement of the other characters.

other than the advent wreath on the buffet and the wreath on the dining room door, that is all the decorating we did. There's another wreath for the front of the house, but it's still not up yet. It's chances are decreasing by the day!

the little trees

I'm not at all picky about the trees for the kids' rooms. fake it is.

I had a little tree in my room when I was little. Smurf ornaments all over it. So, I decided this was the year Daughter and Son got a tree in their rooms. Bad choice? not entirely. But I probably had higher than realistic expectations, that they would, ya know, not pull every ornament off. silly me.

Daughter decorating her tree. She was so meticulous and would often change the placement of ornaments and even a day later was still declaring that her tree wasn't finished quite yet.

Husband helped her put in the ornaments she picked out. including pink butterflies.

Son's tree. He helped too.

He found a thick spot in the branches and that where he put all the silver and red balls. just placed them in like a nest.

hanging a snowflake

Yesterday Daughter and I strung cheerio garland (much faster than the popcorn that I originally thought of) for her tree and Son's tree. She did great with her fat embroidery needle.

Showing off her cheerio garland. She did a fantastic job, but don't be fooled. She only strung about 30 cheerios. I did the rest.

This is Son's tree. Notice that bare shiny spot of yarn? The shiny is spit. Yes, Son has been eating his garland!

"It goo-ddd," he says.

the big tree.

We have 10 feet high ceilings through most of the house. So you would assume that we get a big, full 8 ft tree every year (or we have a prelit artificial 8ft tree). nay.

First, I don't like artificial trees. We have hard wood floors, so the minimal shedding isn't a big deal and I love the smell of fresh. And we don't have to store our fresh tree year round.

Second, we go to Marvin's down the street and pay $17.99 for a perfectly wonderful 6 ft Scotch Pine. Really, my only criteria in choosing a tree is that the trunk is straight. Sure, to an adult, our tree looks like a baby in the big room, but to the kids it is fantastic. And to the cat it is the outdoors she so desperately craves.

Plus, Daughter thinks that for the last 2 years she was the one to choose the tree. That's an important thing to a toddler.

Daughter, at Marvins inspecting the trees

she decided this one was too bare on the bottom and we'd have to cut some of the limbs

THIS IS IT. Our tree. Thanks, Daughter.

At home we put it in the stand and watered it amply. After the kids went to bed, Husband strung the lights and I went through all the ornaments and separated all the breakable ones out. Maybe I'll see them on my tree sometime around 2015. Until then, I'm not taking any chances!

the kids putting up the plastic balls I got at Sam's Club 3 or 4 years ago.

fyi, most of these balls have already been removed and I'm collecting them in a box. I decided I'm dealing with the aggravation of having to keep putting ornaments back on the tree 3 times a day!

This is what it looks like today. (6 days after purchase) The skirt has been pushed to the side. The lights have been pulled from their original position and the bottom 3 feet look ridiculously bare.

And even though the cat has been climbing in it everyday, there's been VERY little cleanup.

no ribbons. no bows. no beautiful color scheme and matching ornaments. HECK, there's not even a tree topper this year.

I love it!

the blankets FINISHED

I finished last night. I was SO close I decided to just get it done.

excitement.

pride.

ready to move on to the next.

Son has already tested and approved his blanket.