Advent 2014

Advent is one of my favorite Christmas traditions.  Forcing myself and my kids and sometimes my husband when he isn't working to all spend non-screen time together.  Golden.

But this year didn't work out like I planned.  I've gotten better over the years at picking activities that actually fit into our schedule without feeling rushed.

But this year, I have three kids and school (curse you kindergartner!  It's surprisingly difficult--more on that later...if I get around to it) and I'm drowning.  So we did an activity every but I didn't take a ton of pictures and I didn't blog about it every day.  Instead I folded laundry and washed dishes and folded more laundry and unloaded the dish washer and looked for Henry and took whatever he'd stuck in his mouth out and most importantly counted down the days to when my mother would arrive and do the chores and I would sleep/do all the other chores.  And now she's gone and it's a week and a half after the end of advent and I'm just now posting about it. But you take what you can get.

As per Greg tradition/request, we put the tree up the day after Thanksgiving.  Or more correctly, 2/3 of the tree--Honey badger don't care.  Honey badger do what he wants.

We painted ceramic figuriens one night.  The older kids loved it.  Rex was very careful with his and made sure to stay in the lines.  Alice was careful as first, then got a little carried away.

 Henry crawled around on the floor.

We made hot chocolate from scratch one night, watched the LDS church's new Christmas video and posted our #sharethegift on Instagram.

This next one took 3 days.  Day 1 we made the candy ornaments.  Day two we baked the cookies--all day long.  I think I made 7 dozen cookies that day.  Day 3 we delivered treat boxes to our neighbors and I think they turned out really cute and I'm mastering cookie making so the cookies even tasted good.  Pinterest win!

 Then, after Grandma got here, we did our favorite thing: Speedway lights!  Worth it every year.  We

 Henry didn't like the goat nibbling his toes.

 One night Greg got out his HAM radio and called Santa.  The kids got to make special requests over the radio--so cool (and super nerdy at the same time).  Did I mention Alice asked for something different than she had asked for when we got pictures taken with Santa the previous day.  KIDS!  Luckily she didn't really care when Christmas rolled around.

 And then this year, for the first year in...well ever, I bought matchy matchy Christmas Sunday clothes.  Ok, not matchy matchy, but coordinating.  I think they look so adorable.

 Until I tried to get a picture of all three.  And Hank was done.

 So Grandpa came to the rescue and I think this picture turned out quite well.

 We also made snowflakes, studied the Christmas story in-depth (or as in-depth as a 5 and 3 year-old can handle), bought a new Christmas book, made service stars to pass around our house (the services usually ended up being Rex making room in his bed for me so I could sit by him while he feel asleep...not sure if that counts), and a few other things that I can't remember right now.

Thanksgiving!

 Thursday was Thanksgiving.  In case you didn't know.  We went to Greg's sister's house in Greensboro.

I spent all day Wednesday in the kitchen--as is necessary for Thanksgiving.  Because I spent so much time cooking, and because Thanksgiving is really all about the food.  I will start this post with pictures of the food.

I made this cheesecake, which I had been planning for months.  It's pumpkin with a chocolate swirl on top.  And it was delicious.  I still have some and I eat a piece every night. I have two nights worth of cheesecake left and it makes me sad just to think about.

 I started this rainbow jello on Wednesday morning and finished at 9:30 Wednesday night.  I didn't eat any because I don't really like jello, but it was gone by that night, so I'll say it was a success.

 And then I made these turkey cupcakes, to use the last bit of some orange frosting that I had.  I would put these as a Pinterest fail--actually the ones on Pinterest weren't even that cute.  But! I got rid of the frosting.  And the kids didn't care that they were ugly.

We ate just after arrival and then just hung out and played for the rest of the day.

I have almost an almost identical picture of Rex.  

Rex played outside with the cousins.

 Greg and Allen played with the quad-copter/drone Greg built this month--until Allen crashed it and broke the legs off and they spent the rest of the day trying to fabricate new legs.

 Greg did manage to make one complete flight around the house.

 Rex found our Settlers of Catan Game and insisted on playing.

 And then Sahar and Allen took some cute family pictures for us--which turned out way better than the ones with our matchy-matchy outfits.

We got home around 9 and went to bed.  It was a long two days of cooking and eating and eating and eating.

Halloween + Mom Shaming

I recently wasted my time reading an article on Facebook about how moms shouldn't shame each other by posting pictures of the cool stuff they do with their children.  I disagree.  I don't get a paycheck or even a thank you to validate what I do, so I like to toot my own horn when I do something rad/super time consuming to justifiy all the time I put into said thing.  Besides, I just think Halloween is fun.  I like making matchy-matchy Halloween costumes despite the fact that I have boxes full of costumes that my kids have never worn.  I don't expect other moms to go to the extent that I do, because other moms don't care and that's cool  and it's kind of a waste of time.  Like I don't care about Elf on the Shelf but if you do and you want to pat yourself on the back for all the clever ways you hid that elf for a month, go for it.  Post is all over your blog, and Facebook, and Instagram, and whatever other social media outlet I'm not cool enough to be a part of.  You deserve all the praise you can give yourself.

Having said that, I will now praise myself for our Halloween costumes this year.

Alice was Heromine.  She wore hand-me down tights with consignment sale Target shoes.  Grandma Pattie made the skirt.  The tie I ordered from China and had to pray real hard that it would arrive on time.  The scarf is made from fleece and the robe is a re-purposed, over-sized t-shirt I made using this tutorial.  I bought an additional t-shirt to add a hood.  I also made a Gryffindor patch for the robe using felt--cost less than $0.50 to make 2--take that $5 plus shipping for one on Etsy.  Her wand is a stick she found in the back yard.  Alice especially like not having to brush her hair for a day.

 Rex was Harry Potter.  He wore consignment sale pants; thrift store vest; China tie; dollar store glasses with the lenses removed; t-shirt robe with felt patch; fleece scarf; black eyeliner scare that actually hurt once I drew it on--Voldemort was near (we haven't gotten to the 7th book yet ok)--he was mad that the scar wasn't pink but the dollar store didn't have any lip liner and I wasn't going to pay more than $1 for lip liner I'll never use again; he completed the look with black hair spray.  He also had a real wood stick wand that we were later told wasn't good enough because it didn't light up like the other Harry Potter wands we saw that night--popular costume.  There were more Hogwarts students than Elsa's at our 4 ward trunk-or-treat.  For real Halloween, Greg fixed the wand problem by taping a glow stick to the end.

 Rex's favorite spell: Expellimarius.  Alice's: Crucio!  (Just kidding, I'm not sure what she's saying)

 Henry was the house elf Doby.   He wore some thrift-store, hand-me-down pajamas from Rex with a modified pillowcase from a holey sheet set I've kept around for these exact reasons.  His ears turned out a little big but considering I can only sew when the kids are in bed...I used felt for the ears and the waist band of an old pair of Alice's tights for the skull cap.  Notice also, his mismatched socks.

 Greg was Hagrid: he wore shoes left over from his mission, thrift store pants and shirt with the Indian vest from his Halloween costume when Rex was 18 months.  He was super excited about his mismatched beard and wig and said that maybe next year I could just make him a t-shirt with the picture of the person he's supposed to be on it.  I was Professor McGonagall.  I bought a real skirt with a thrift store turtle neck, dollar section hat from Target which I embellished with pheasant feathers, dollar store glasses, Dustin's middle school graduation robe, and a Greg Baker Original necklace.

 Then I did a mini Great Hall in our van for the trunk or treat--complete with floating candles (white card stock taped to battery operated tea lights) and enchanted ceiling (twinkle lights with a shear black curtain over them.  Man I am clever.

Wow, in addition to giving myself a giant pat on the back for our costumes and coordinating van, apparently, I also like to hear myself type.  You did not need a play-by-play on how I made all of our costumes.  And that was just the trunk-or-treat.

For real Halloween, we went with a group of young families from several wards.  We meet at the Wilson's house (one of my friesins--friend + cousin).  Rex had a blast running from house to house with the other 5 year old boys.  Alice got tired after house number two so Greg and I took turns walking a little more slowly with her.  Henry--he chilled in the stroller and refused to fall asleep.

After trick-or-treating, we went back to the Wilsons for a bon fire and hot chocolate and were settling down for a nice long PAR-TAY--I was even putting Henry to bed at their house so we could party longer (we're such party animals), when a giant thunder storm named Responsibility rolled in and ended the party.  We left, soaking wet, and put the kids to bed only 2 hours past their normal bed time.  It was fun and I'm sad to see it go, but I broke my Thanksgiving only in November rule and played some Christmas music today, so I'm ok.  You don't need to worry about me.

Pumpkins!

The Friday before the best date ever and the same day as the Fun Run at Rex's school, we took a family trip back to Riverbend Farm, the location of Rex's field trip earlier in the week.

I like it.  

1. they grow their own pumpkins--unlike other pumpkin patches in the area that do not.

2. They have these awesome slides.  The biggest is about 2 stories high.

 Greg, Rex and Alice enjoyed the slides while I fed this kid--he eats a lot.

 3. They have other farm animals to play on and didn't kick us out when they closed at 6:00.  They let us stay and play until every one except Henry was super hungry.

 The next Monday, we carved our finds.  And this year without the huge fight/temper tantrum between Rex and Greg.  This year it was Alice and Rex fighting over the official pumpkin carving knife--the knives from the kitchen weren't good enough.

Rex remained in character most of October

Rex carved a scary face.  Alice carved a princes.  

We tried a Pinterest tip and dunked the pumpkins in bleach--they lasted almost until Halloween, so almost 2 weeks.  Our neighbors only lasted 2 days.  Pinterest win!