Merry Christmas

....and many blessings, from our family to yours.....

December has been the month of programs.....

Here are a few pics and video clips from the various events. 

The video clips will probably be most appreciated by the grandparents and aunties....

not the best quality, but a little touch of the programs the girls participated in,

for those of you that couldn't be here and wanted to be!

Little Miss Mae so excited about her first grade Christmas program.

K-Rae getting ready for very first preschool program.

Practicing one last time....

And our church did a ceremony similar to the one in the movie Courageous...

 If you haven't seen the movie, you should....

on DVD Jan. 17th.

I feel so blessed to have such a godly husband and father for our girls....

Thank you for your Resolution baby! You truly are courageous!

Handcrafted Christmas

I always feel crafty around Christmastime....

I convinced K-Rae to help me make some of these Christmas tree villages for gifts...

First, I masking taped all of the edges of the trays (painters tape would probably be easier to remove...we didn't have any on hand).  As you can see...this part of the process wasn't overly exciting to K-Rae as she mostly had to watch!

Painting with glossy Modge Podge was much more fun for K-Rae than watching Mom tape!

The glittery Buffalo Snow Flakes really intrigued her (and are still all over our house)!

After the tray was well covered with flakes, we let it dry completely for a few hours, dusted off loose flakes and then painted/glopped as smoothly as possible Modge Podge over the flakes again and let the tray dry completely overnight.  Once it was completely dry, I carefully removed the tape.

In the meantime, K-Rae helped trace and cut the trees from various pieces of Christmas themed scrapbook paper.  Tracing and cutting the first couple of trees was fun for her, after that, I had to bribe her with one piece of candy for each tree.....it worked!  I folded, glued, and painted Modge Podge over the trees. We called ourselves "Team Christmas Tree!"

This is how our dining room looked for several days while creating these!  Yes, I'll be honest it was quite the mess in the process!

Little Miss Mae joined in for the final product assembling.  I hot glued the trees to the tray and the embellishments (small ornaments, gifts, angels, starts, etc.) where the girls indicated.  In the end, three beautiful gifts.  

If interested in the tree pattern, go to: Better Homes and Gardents Holiday Workbook

(you will probably have to sign up as a "member" to access site; it's free and I really haven't received any junk email yet from them) and then scroll down through the various directions for projects until instruction number 5, where is says "get the cone patterns."  Download the patterns with Adobe Reader; there are three pages of patterns, the third page is the tree pattern and we adjusted the the size to make three sizes of trees for our project. 

These projects cost us around $12 each to make....the trays were $5 each, so you could cut the cost there quite a bit by using a cheaper tray.  Supply list to buy would include:Tray, masking/painters tape, 5 pieces of assorted scrapbook paper, miniature Christmas ornaments, embellishments for trees (stars, angels, sticky jewels, etc.), miniature gifts (I found ours at Pier One Imports a couple of years ago and we've used them for various projects since then), Buffalo glitter snow, glossy Modge Podge, sponge brush for painting.

Happy Christmas Crafting!

Operation Christmas Child

Several years ago, 

Sampa and Meemaw asked us to start giving them 

the gift of giving to others 

for Christmas instead of a gift for themselves.....

I think Meemaw had received about all the Mary Engelbreit trinkets she had room for at that point

and Sampa didn't have room for anymore outdoor sports equipment to be stored under the house.

Anyhow, our Samaritan's Purse Shoebox project 

is now our standard Christmas gift for Sampa and Meemaw.

   It's a project the girls really get into, 

and are beginning to understand more and more about each year.  

This year Little Miss Mae was especially interested 

in the details of all the photos we included in our PowerPoint, 

and wondered why the children live in houses made out of blue tarps, 

why they don't have any clothes, 

why they are opening presents in the jungle, 

why their clothes are torn......

Her new word is "why" and she vocalizes it quite liberally!  

It was a good venue 

to share some eye opening topics with her. 

It really ends up being more like

we are the ones that are blessed by doing this project, 

and we are humbled by realizing how little it takes 

to make children across the world so excited!

Thank you for letting us share this blessing with you  

Sampa and Meemaw----and Merry Christmas!

(and Sampa---please be impressed by the fact that I was able to get this PowerPoint with sound onto our blog----that was definitely a learning curve, and thank you for help getting the audio into the PowerPoint to begin with RyDaddy!)

Join us for a snapshot of our Thanksgiving week activities

K-Rae has been entertaining us by singing Thanksgiving Songs....

here are a couple of clips I managed to capture with some coaxing.....

We celebrated my birthday (yes, 29 again!)

RyDaddy made me this yummy chocolate caramel trifle 

(all from scratch!!!).

 

We pulled out the Christmas books and decorations. 

Creamie, Grandpa, and Great-Grandma came to visit.

The girls coaxed all of the grandparents into reading them lots of stories.

And tried on their Christmas dresses to make sure they are all ready for their upcoming programs. 

Building end tables was probably Kelsie's favorite activity....so much so that she didn't even have time to get dressed first!

Indian princess!

"Where's the food....or am I supposed to eat this cornucopia?"

Much to be thankful for!

...especially thankful for my family and big helper girls!

Simply Thanksgiving

I like the simple decorations.....

This butternut squash has been a decoration for our kitchen all fall....

moved more recently to the dining room table.

It will probably soon be made into a yummy soup, 

but for now it's accompanied by gourds, fall foliage, mini cornucopia place settings,

and today the gum drop turkeys were added.

It's not everyday you see a four-legged turkey,

but these make pretty cute Thanksgiving table decorations.  

 I can remember making these little gumdrop gobblers as a child myself!

Unfortunately, I don't think ours will last that long---

their "feathers" keep disappearing!

To make these, simply have your kids stick toothpicks in an apple for the legs and feathers, add gumdrops and a card stock or thin cardboard head.  (An adult should cut the slit for the head with a knife.)  

I had the appetizer style toothpicks on hand, and thought they made cute feet.

K-Rae had fun helping with these...

For the cornucopia place settings, make a cone shape out of half of a piece of 8 1/2" x 11" scrapbook paper, 

or even plain brown card stock or a sturdy piece of brown paper bag for a cheap alternative!  

Trim the cone shape as desired.Tape the cone shut along the back side.  Fill with artificial fall foliage....

we stapled the leaves to the cornucopia to keep them from falling out, 

and used craft glue to hold in some of the other items.  Miniature pumpkins & gourds look cute in these too.

Grace with a ribbon, add a name.....make one for each person at the Thanksgiving table!  

These make great favors for guests to take home after the holiday feast.  

Happy Decorating & Happy Thanksgiving!

Kelsie's proposal....

As we were getting ready to leave for trick-or-treating, 

K-Rae asked RyDaddy, 

"Dadda, how about you weddin' me?"

I think that's a four-year-old's way of asking her daddy to marry her.....

Since Daddy is already taken---

K-Rae is now hoping to have a little brother, 

so she "can have a wedding."

Sharing a recipe....yum!

Dinner tonight was yummy, even if I do say so myself....

 and pretty easy (don't tell that part to RyDaddy)

and as a bonus...even the girls like this dish!

I haven't shared a recipe in awhile....here is a simple standard wintertime favorite of mine that you really can't go wrong with.....Prep time is only 15 minutes, you use only a 1/2tsp. & 1/2c. measuring utensils and this yummy dish bakes in the crock pot.  Crock pot meals are my absolute favorite!  It turns out looking pretty fancy too...like you surely must have slaved over it!

Cornish Game Hens:

Prep Time: 15 min.

Bake Time (in crock pot): 4 hrs. & 30 min.

Ingredients:

·         1/2 tsp. salt

·         1/2 tsp. pepper

·         1/2 tsp. onion powder

·         1/2 tsp. garlic salt

·         1/2 tsp. dill weed

·         1/2 tsp. dried oregano 

·         1/4 tsp. paprika 

·         2 Cornish game hens (thawed and rinsed inside and out)

·         1/2 c. chicken broth

·         1/4 c. juice any flavor (I've used orange, pineapple, or apple.......and today fruit punch from the girls' juice boxes, as that's all we had on hand....it all turns out good--the juice just adds a tinge of flavor and mostly moisture).

Mix first seven ingredients in small bowl.  Mix liquids in separate small bowl.  Place hens in crock pot.  Pour liquids over hens inside and out.  Sprinkle other mixture generously over hens inside and out.  Cook on low in crock pot 4 hrs. & 30 min., or until 170 degrees F. 

As sides, we (yes we, RyDaddy jumped in and helped finish up this meal....such a good hubby......who is now finishing dishes while I blog; I must be spoiled!) made mashed potatoes, gravy from the game hens' drippings, and steamed carrots with butter.  We also had apples in the fridge that were needing used up quickly, so I found and adapted new recipe that's now a favorite for dessert....

Spiced Baked Apples: 

(Prep Time: 15 min./Bake Time 30ish min.)

Ingredients:

·            4 Tbsp. chopped walnuts 

·         1 tsp. grated orange peel 

·         6 Tbsp. chopped dried plums (raisins would work too)

·         1/4 cup packed brown sugar 

·         1/4 cup water 

·         1 Tbsp. butter

·         1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon

·         1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg

·         orange slices as garnish

·         4 large apples 

Combine nuts, orange peel and dried plums; set aside. In a saucepan, bring brown sugar, water, butter, cinnamon and nutmeg to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer, uncovered, 2 minutes, stirring occasionally. Core apples and place in an ungreased 8" baking dish; fill with nut mixture. Pour sugar mixture over and around apples. Bake, uncovered, at 350 degrees F for 30-35 minutes or until apples are tender. Pierce with fork to check if done.  Garnish with orange slices.  Firm apples, or standard baking apples will probably need more baking time. This dessert smells so yummy and tastes wonderful.....certain to please!