For my girly girl

Amelia isn't exactly a girly girl. She races car, trucks and other machines right along side her brother. She can identify construction equipment at pace with William. So, for Christmas it was a struggle. There aren't any girl characters she recognizes or identifies with. Yet, most of the boy character items don't say "girl" to me. So, I had to do something special for my girl. Here us her slightly girly-ed up Thoma$ pillowcase for her Christmas present. Not available in stores: a flowery Thoma$ pillowcase.

Christmas crafting

An assignment from preschool to make an ornament to decorate the hallway. I have to laugh at myself because it is late and I am stressed out about it. We've been so busy, there hasn't been much time. Also, we haven't had time because I've been waiting for the right crafty idea. I can't just send in a mediocre ornament. There has to be some thought and creativity put in to it. Because I am a nerd. Because I'd like to stay up late and do it by myself. I can totally out craft any average three year old any day. BUT, that is not the point of this assignment. So the multicolored felt creation with paper mâché will have to wait until another day. Here is William painting up our average snowman ornament with me this afternoon. Because, despite all my competitiveness, I do know what this us all about. It is about me sitting down with my kid and creating Christmas magic together. Even if it turns out mediocre.

Christmas is coming...

Aaaaannd of course the technology isn't working! I've posted four different posts that didn't go up. Arg. Technical help will arrive tonight.

Newer does not equal better. But our new cell phones are allowing me to publish to our blog from where ever I am. The pictures and video won't be as nice, but at least there will be a post. The posts will be shorter also because I have to type them on my phone. Much slower going than the standard keyboard. I do promise to write in sentences, use punctuation and vowels.

A conversation

Jesus Price


William and I were baking cookies today. Because I want to share the excitement of the holiday season with our kids early on. Today we had a little time and Christmas cookies were on my list of things to do. Sure, it would have been quicker and cleaner to stir, roll and bake up 300 cut out cookies on my own, but where would the Christmas Spirit be in doing it myself. So, I enlisted William to help.

Let's just say the rosy vision I had of us stirring batter and laughing in a cozy warm kitchen wasn't exactly what happened. It was way messier and took 100 years longer than I was anticipating. I am proud to say in the end William helped me mix, cut, bake, frost and decorate just about every single cookie. He really worked hard. And so did I.

About 2 hours into the process, we had mixed up the batter, rolled out the dough and were in the cutting out/baking step. After filling up the cookie sheet with cut out dough shapes, we turned around to look at the small pile of cookies on the kitchen table.

William: Who are these cookie for?

Mama: Ooohhhh....they are for a lot of people. We are going to bring some to Grandpas and Grandma, to our friends and to church.

William: Will they like our cookies?

Mama: Oh yes! They will love our cookies. Especially since you were such a good helper.

William: Do you know who else will love our cookies?

Mama: [pause, uncertain] Who else will like our cookies?

William: Jesus Price is going to love our cookies when we bring them to church.

Mama: [pause.....processing.....no response seems appropriate....must not laugh...must not laugh....] Hmmmmm....I think you are right baby. He will love our cookies.

Thanksgiving

I just went through every picture we took in November and there wasn't ONE from Thanksgiving. Not even one. I can assure you we had a wonderful time visiting with family on both sides of our families. It is awfully convenient both our families gather in Rochester to celebrate Thanksgiving. This enables us to see everyone while they are in town. The only downside is I sometimes don't feel like we visit with anyone long enough to catch up! You'll have to be satisfied with the fall pictures I took of the kids in the backyard.