The Puddles

The neighborhood has a great event every year that we love going to.  We love seeing Santa at the Gazebo.  Usually Santa rides around on the firetruck in the morning all through the neighborhood to remind people about the event.  That is our favorite part, but they didn’t do it this time.  As Madie said, “They made it fancy this year!”

There was a horse and sleigh and an orchestra playing Christmas music.  The kids were excited about seeing Santa.  Ainsley asked for a broken laptop so she can play office, Madie asked for a ipod touch for mommy and a violin for her, and Ben asked for a lego table and a nerf gun.

At the end, they all loaded up on cupcakes and hot chocolate!  A great way to end the event!!

“Mommy,  I am really mad at you.  I did not have a good time tonight with you.”

“Really?  Why?”

“We were suppose to do five things tonight.  1. Get my jammies on.  2. Make cookies. 3.  Make dinner.  4. Sit by the fire.  5.  Read a book.  We did everything but number 3.  So I did NOT have a good time.  Only an OK time.”

She says all of this while she is counting on her fingers.  She holds up her hand to prove why she did not have a good time.  Because of number 3.  I just love the way she is proving why she is angry!  That hand cracks me up.

Daddy and the older two decided to go to Movie Night at the school.  Ainsley wanted to stay home and hang out with Mommy.  So we made a night of it.  I had a good time.  We started the night by getting our aprons on.  Then we made a batch of chocolate chip cookies (the kind Papa G likes). After the cookies, we watched a Christmas movie, turned on the fire, made dinner, read a book, and drank hot chocolate.  It was a great evening of girl talk, dancing, snuggling on the couch, and in general having a really good time.

Fuzzy, the elf.  And he is particularly mischievous this year.  I think it is going to be fun this year with the elf.  Today we found him sitting in the corner of the kitchen.  I wonder where he will turn up tomorrow!

Thank goodness.  I only had to go one day without coffee. Chris went to Walmart last night at 11:00pm (it was the only store open) and came home with a coffee maker.  We had looked online and had researched a little.  It was jus too overwhelming.  We finally decided that it didn’t make any sense to research too much if we were just going to be doing then again in six months.  And this one came in red.  That’s fun.  Chris even tore open a pallet in order to get me a red one.  Nice husband!

I saw this really cool idea online about taking 25 Christmas (or Winter books if you don’t have enough) wrapping them up and then every day you go and pick one book to read that night.  So a couple of nights ago, the kids and I started searching through book cases to find all of the Christmas books.  After looking through only half of our book cases we found over 50 Christmas and winter books (I didn’t realize how many duplicates we had.).  So we had to narrow it down (we just stuck to Christmas stories and we still had more than 25).  That was fun!  We finally found our 25 and then we all sat in the living room and wrapped all of the books.  Ainsley insisted that we have a fire and listen to Christmas music.  We settled on a fire and a Christmas movie (Santa Buddies).  We all had a great time!  Even Dad came home and joined us in the wrapping party.

The kids are taking turns picking the books. So tonight was Ben’s turn (he also got to tear off our advent countdown chain that we made at church).  He picked the book and then we sat by the fire to read.  Ben of course decided that there were too many girls at the fire and he joined Dad on the couch (look at the picture.  He’s trying not to smile. I don’t think it is working.)

So far we are having a great time with this.  What a great way to countdown to Christmas!

We have killed off another coffee pot.  This one didn’t even last six months.  We are sad. Chris spent so much time researching it and then it didn’t even make it six months.  He just left to go to the store to buy another coffee pot.  One morning without coffee is enough.

We can only hope that we have more success with the next coffee pot.

While the adults were all in the other car (and we were first off the ferry so we beat them to the meeting spot), the girls took off running towards the beach for one last time.

What a good way to end the day.  My pictures turned out a little blurry, but you can still see the joy in all of their faces.  What a good day it was!

Our dear friends from NE came to visit over Thanksgiving.  The girls had never been to the beach so we all made a trip down to Galveston to Stewart’s Beach.  Can you tell which ones are Cornhuskers?  Well . . . all but Madie and she was born in Ohio so she has thick blood too.  All of the kids were out in the water playing.  I should have had the kids in their bathing suit, but I thought they wouldn’t want to get too wet.  Before I knew it they were all in the water playing and having a good time. Ben and Madie were soaked.  They played in the sand after a while.  Madie was trying to teach Erin how to body surf.  Truth be told . . . our landlocked friends were becoming one with the water.  If only they had more time.  Ainsley had a true side kick in Alexis.  The tallest and the shortest were buddies during their visit.  I’m not sure whether or not Alexis wanted a six year old sidekick the entire time, but Ainsley was quite happy to be any where that Alexis was.

We had a delightful lunch at The Spot in Galveston.  I had never been there. It was a great lunch.  We got to sit out on the deck and watch the gulf while we ate.  Plus  watching the birds steal french fries while the girls got up from the table was funny too!  I couldn’t convince Jill to offer the the “King’s Burger” at her restaurant in Geneva.   For 199.99 you could get a hamburger and a bottle of Don Perone (?). I’m not sure who would buy that kind of a meal, but your typical Midwestern would not.  I am not sure who would buy that.    The entire trip was great and so much fun to spend with friends.