From Food Poisoning to Fun

We started our weekend off with a bang. About 9:30pm Friday night, Avery got terribly sick and bless his heart was sick until about 4am Sat. morning. We stayed in all day Saturday to try and catch up on our missed night of sleep and to help Avery recover his strength and for most of the day Sunday. By Sunday mid-morning Avery was as good as new.

My friend Lori came up with a fabulous scheme. :) Several months ago I blogged about what high quality prizes you get for fundraising. Avery got a clown wig, glasses and nose for selling "smart cards". I put a picture of Jim (Harve) on my blog dressed as a clown. I e-mailed it to Lori. She decided how fun it would be to print this picture out and make all of us shirts -- we planned to meet at a restaurant wearing our shirts under our jackets and take our jackets off at one time surprising Jim wearing his clown picture.

Its amazing that between the two of us, Lori and I kept four boys 6 and under from blurting out the secret. It all worked out and Jim was very surprised. I sent him back to the car to get my purse I had conveniently forgotten and when he returned we were all sitting there with our Harvey (Jim) the clown shirts. We had our waitress take our picture to remember the occasion.

Then we were able to go back and visit with our good friends, Lori and her family. The only drawback was that Aidan was not feeling well and we didn't get to spend as much time as we would have liked. We love you guys!

We hope all of you have a very Merry Christmas!

Christmas Ornaments Part 2

Christmas Cookie Ornaments Part I

This is so fun and so easy. This is our first year making Christmas Cookie Ornaments but I think judging by how much fun it was (and we haven't even gotten to the painting part), it will be a Christmas tradition.

Recipe for cookie dough

Mix together 2 cups of flour, 1 cup of salt and 2 tbsp of vegetable oil

Slowly add 3/4 to 1 cup of water and stir and knead until you get the desired consistency.

(I only used 3/4 cup of water)

Roll your dough out thin and use cookie cutters or mold with hands to make shapes.

Bake at 250 degrees for 1 hour. Time may vary depending on how thick your cookies are.

Let cool then paint and decorate as desired.

This recipe made about 24 cookies for us but I guess the size of the batch would depend on how big are your cookie cutters.

Here are our cookie ornaments- I'll try and post the finshed product too.

Christmas Break

Its 2:30 on the first day- well not really even a day- Avery had 1/2 a day of school- of Christmas break. We've already painted wooden snowmen, dipped pretzels in chocolate, and the boys have made a fort. I hope to help them make cookie dough ornaments tomorrow and I bought one of those boxed Make Your Own Gingerbread house kits. My boys have to be occupied or someone ends up doing something that could either cost a lot in home repair or require a visit to the ER.

If you all have planned some crafts or activities for your kiddos during this time, I would love to hear from you. So, what are you going to be doing during Christmas break?

Chocolate Covered Cherries

I think you either love 'em or hate 'em. I have to say I'm on the hate them end of the spectrum. I just can't get over that gooey, gloppy, creamy white stuff that's in the middle. Yuck!

But apparently a lot of people must love 'em. Everywhere I go, WalMart, Target, Kroger, etc there are what seems like thousands of boxes. And they never run out during the holidays. You never hear anyone say, "I went to the store to get a box of chocolate covered cherries and there wasn't one to be found."

I worked at Baskin Robbins all through high school. Baskin Robbins has flavors that are staple ones that remain all the year through but they also have what they call seasonal flavors. At the end of Thanksgiving, beginning of December, we would get Winter White Chocolate Ice Cream in-- and people would go crazy over that stuff. We could never keep it in stock no matter how much we ordered. It was white chocolate ice cream with chunks of chocolate covered cherries and a ribbon of that gooey, gloppy white creamy stuff that's inside chocolate covered cherries.(I think I'm describing this accurately- its been a few years- ha!)

So, back to my question... Chocolate covered cherries-- love 'em or hate 'em?

Mmmmmmmmm!!! Starbucks

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Starbucks. I especially love Starbucks at the holidays. From their scrumptious Pumpkin Spice Latte to their Peppermint Mocha- their holiday coffees are the best-- ok their year round coffees are the best too. :) But there is something about that Starbucks holiday cup-- don't you think? That holiday themed cup just makes your coffee a little better.

Yesterday I had a Peppermint WHITE Chocolate Mocha for the first time. If you like the Peppermint Mocha and haven't tried the white chocolate, definitely try it. It was yummy!

Does it get any better than a great cup of coffee and good conversation with a friend? Maybe next time I can get you to try the Mocha, Lori. :)

An Early Christmas in North Carolina

We packed up the car and made the trek to North Carolina this weekend. Jim's family got together for an early Christmas. It was a fun trip. Merry Christmas Papa and Memaw and the whole NC and SC family.

Aidan had a little singing presentation at his Mothers Day Out Friday. It was so cute. They sang Christmas songs and played rhythm instruments. Here are a few pictures including some of Aidan standing by who has become his favorite friend in the class- Miss Mary.