Christmas time is here again...

 Christmas time is here again!!!  Or was here.  Somehow it is past.  Time just keeps flying by.  We had a little bit of a rough start to our December.  By rough start I mean the kids.  I think as soon as they realize Christmas is coming and our wonderful Elf Tootsie arrives they have a really hard time staying nice.  There were reminders everyday to be "good".  My kids are usually such great kids that it doesn't take much to seem like they were being naughty.

But by the end of it all they had figured it out and Santa did deliver.  Not everything they asked for, but some surprises of things they wanted.


Santa was very generous this year.  Both girls got an American Girl Doll.  He did a great job of making them look just like the girls.  They originally named them Jeanette (sydney's doll) and Isabella (Abigail's doll).  But then Abby put Isabella in a fancy red dress and decided she should be called Rose because the dress had a rose on it.  I'm guessing her name will be plum next since she has a purple sweatshirt.

The boys each got an electronic device.  There's a shocker.  Jacob got the new 3DS XL.  I think that's what it's called.  It plays games and takes pictures.  I have no idea how to work it.  Noah got a kindle fire, with a few games on it and books.  He also has his own password that Santa set up so that the brother and sisters can't mess with it.  It's really cute to see him help Abby out to play some games on it.  Such a great brother.

Dave got what he wanted...a GoPro camera that can be mounted to his ski helmet or motorcycle helmet.  I can watch what he is watching.  So now I don't need to learn to ski at all.  :)

I got some beautiful diamond earrings.  Haven't taken them out yet.  :)  It must be true that diamonds are a girls best friend.

Mom and Dad were here with us again this year.  I'm not sure their presents were very exciting, but we were truly glad they chose to spend the Holidays with us.

Here is a shot of our tree with all the presents and stocking laid out.  Love my tree.  It's still up.  I need to take it down, but it makes me sad because then my house feels all bare.  

Here are the stockings from a different angle and the presents Santa left.  Also you can see the the bone wreath he left for Foster.  So nice Santa is.

I hope all of you had a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year!!  Ours couldn't have been any better.  

Getting ready for Christmas!!

It is crazy how fast this year went by.  It was hard to find time to get anything done.  We did get our Christmas put up by the middle of December.  I had to, we had Dave's work Christmas party here on the 17th.  It was a success.  After all the getting ready for the party we decided to do some fun getting ready.  The girls helped me make some Christmas Crack.

What is Christmas crack you ask?  It's that yummy Chex mix that is all gooey and delicious.  You can't eat just a little...you end up eating all of it, because it's so addicting.  

Ours definitely tasted good but the name Christmas CRACK was a bit too literal.  I cooked the syrup too long and it hardened up really good.  It tasted the same, but it was a little crunchy.  All our teeth are still intact, but I did buy a candy thermometer so it doesn't happen again.  

Here is my cute Abby watching me finish.  We made ours simple with chex mix, golden grahams and pretzels.  It was so yummy with the sweet and salty.  

My cutie pies working on breaking up the pretzel sticks.  They were great helpers.  

Here is our big tree and miss Abigail taking a ride in the barbie camper.  I got this when I was a little girl and used to love to ride it.  Abby is my mini me.

About a week after this we made treats to take to friends and the kids did a great job of delivering them.  It's so fun to see them get excited about giving to others.  It was a fight (a good fight) as to who got to carry the treats to the door.