Christmas Lights and Mal turns 21

We are just coming off of another wonderful weekend.

Courtney, Paul, Lis, and Nathan took Mal out for her 21st birthday.

They went to Milwaukee and took her to some of their favorite places.

By all accounts they had a wonderful time.

While they were doing that, John and I took Soli and Tizita to Marty's for pizza and then to see the Christmas lights at Country Springs.

It was magical as it always is.

Of course, the best part for the girls is that they can get out of their car seats and sit on our laps.  This year, Tiz got to steer the car.

On Saturday we headed over to Kev and Vikki's to celebrate Mallory's birthday with her.

I made her cake, well, actually Walmart made the cake, I just added the drunken Barbie.

Santa also came and filled stockings that morning and we decorated cookies.

It was all fun.

Today John and I went up to Oshkosh to see Tizita perform in her Christmas service.  After that we went to Red Robin for a birthday lunch with her and then took her to Toys R Us where she picked out a telescope, microscope and solar system model.

It was another fun day.

This week will be very stressful for me and my kids as we practice for our Christmas service.  I am praying for a speedy week and lots of patience.

In one week, my family will all be here again and we will celebrate Christmas together.

Lots of excitement ahead.

Of glue guns and self rising flour

It's been a productive weekend.

I started my baking on Friday night.

Made the usual No Names, Seven Layer Bars, and then tried some new m and m bars and some Christmas crack.

All turned out great.

On Saturday I decided to attempt to make an ornament wreath which I have seen on both FB and pinterest.

Since it involved hot glue, I was a bit worried because I am not very good with glue.

I usually have it everywhere, but I wanted to give this wreath a try.

Here are my supplies before I started:

 I bought a bunch of ornaments and this green wreath ring from Walmart.

And here is the final product

I am so happy with how it turned out.

I made two more of them already.

I am going to give one to Vikki and Kev and one to Courtney and Paul.

I really did not think I had it in me to do a project that actually turned out this well especially when it involved the hot glue gun.

On Saturday afternoon John and I went to Hobby Lobby in Oshkosh and then took Tizita out to Cherry Berry for some yogurt.

It was a short visit, but we had fun as we always do when we spend time with her or Soli.

There were some wreaths at Hobby Lobby that were not anywhere as cute as mine and they were priced at $120.00.

Who knew?

Today it is snowing outside.

I baked a few more things today, congo bars and kiss cookies.

I was attempting to make spritz, but noticed that the dough tasted so salty.

After some thinking, I realized that I had used self rising flour which has salt added to it.

I just threw the whole batch of dough away and called it a day.

It was indeed a productive, fun weekend.

I cannot believe that there are only two weeks of school left before Christmas.

These next two weeks will be filled with practice for our service.

I hope to keep the stress level low for both  me and the kids.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

I am sure I have used this title for other posts at this time of the year, but it says it all.

The trees are up and decorated, the village is brightly lit, and other decorations are up, so it is indeed looking a lot like Christmas around these parts.

Here are a few photos:

 We have two trees again this year.

This tree is in the dining room.

It does not have any ornaments on it this year since it is primarily a light source in the corner and I like it to be visible to the outside.

 Here is my village which all fit on the buffet this year without the need to add an extra table.

 I found these candles and red candle holders at Bethesda Thrift shop.  The candles were ten cents each and yes, they are a bit crooked, but that just adds to their beauty, I think.  The red candle holders were 29 cents.  I just added a little green garland and I think it looks very festive.

 I bought these at Hobby Lobby.  I like how cute and quirky they are.

 This is the half tree which is in the living room.

It has all of our special ornaments on it.

 There are lots of picture ornaments on this tree.

I love the picture of Alissa which was taken when she was four years old. 

Her name is spelled like this, Assila on the ornament.

And of course, I have a few photos of Tizita on the tree.

Here's Soliana on her first birthday.

 This sweet ornament is in memory of my grandson Natnael who never made it home from Ethiopia.

 Every year my mom buys us a new ornament.

This year she bought us this moustache ornament in honor of John's moustache.

 We love the movie Christmas story, so these two ornaments are fun.  They light up and talk about the major prize of a leg lamp.

 Here are Courtney and Alissa from age 5 and 3.

 This was a gift from one of my Preschool students many years ago.

Later in High School, Courtney became very good friends with the girl who had given me this ornament years before when she was little.

I love the picture of my girls in this ornament.

This is just how I remember my sweet little girls.

 These are the first ornaments that John and I bought for our first tree.

 Lots of our ornaments are from vacations especially from St. George.  Nice to remember those warm places during our cold winter.

 Here's Noah's ark.

 And this one is just because I love my Diet Coke.

 Here are my girls when they were cheerleaders back in 5th and 7th grade at St. John's

And this last one is the only ornament that John has from his childhood.

That little pipe cleaner man is attached to the ornament.

I love putting the ornaments on the tree, each one has such a story to tell.

Now if only I could find someone who would listen to the stories!

Merry Christmas to all.



So much to be Thankful for on Thanksgiving 2013

Today is Sunday.

All is quiet around our house again.

The girls and their families have returned to their homes after spending the last four days with us.

It was a most perfect Thanksgiving.

So much for which to be thankful.

Alissa arrived first on Wednesday afternoon followed by Courtney, Paul, and the girls.

Nathan stayed in Bloomington to spend Thanksgiving with his dad.

We missed him, but we did use his recipe for the turkey again so he was here in spirit.

On Wednesday night we all went out to On the Rock for dinner.

After dinner, Courtney, Paul and Alissa went out with Nathan Suhr.

A good time was had by all or so we heard.

On Thanksgiving day, Tizita helped me with lots of the prep.

She wasn't too interested in helping with the turkey, but she created a dessert of her own and made the relish tray.

Soli happily did dishes.

We all enjoyed our Thanksgiving dinner followed by a dance show performed by the girls.

On Friday, Lissa, Courtney, the girls, and I shopped at Bethesda Thrift shop.  We all found some awesome bargains.

We had lunch at Pizza Hut and then Alissa left for Bloomington.

Her Thanksgiving was over for another year.

When we returned home from our shopping trip, John, Tizita and I went to the cemetery to decorate my dad's grave for Christmas.

Tiz was such a big help, cutting the wire and arranging the decorations.

 Tiz chose the snowflake for the middle of the heart, too.

 We visited Tiz's great, great ohma and ohpa as well as

 her great, great, great grandparents, Emma and Hugo,

 and her other set of great, great grandparents, Erv and Leona.

After the cemetery we headed to Tivoli Island to take a hike.

The weather was beautiful and we had a wonderful time exploring the Island.

Friday night we had a game night and a fire in the basement.

On Saturday, we put up our two trees.

The girls were great helpers with the decorations.

We took another walk in the afternoon ending with an ice cream treat at Mullen's.

That night we enjoyed the Christmas parade followed by dinner at La Finca.

Today the Van Aukens left for home.

It was a great long weekend.

Next year, Courtney and her family will travel to Iowa for Thanksgiving and our day will take on a different plan, but it will not change the fact that we much for which to be thankful!