Christmas

I didn't take too many picures of our Christmas festivities...I am realizing I need to be better about taking pictures. You never know when you'll need them.

Anyways...we did our own family Christmas on Christmas eve morning and then after Christmas Eve service at church we headed out to Long Beach to spend the next 5 days with my family! We had a great time visiting aunts, uncles, great-grandma, gramma, grampa, and cousins. Then Jason's parents came to our place and spent the next week! It was so fun to have them!

Gifts

I've been busy making fun gifts for our family and friends around us. Here are a few of them.

Chocolate Walnut Cookie Mix.
I've always wanted to make one of the jar mixes...and it was so much fun! And they are so cute! :) I will for sure do this again. I might just keep some jars in the closet for a quick and easy friend gift.

And then I've been baking biscotti like crazy!! I've make a bunch of batches and the batch I made this morning was "the best batch yet!" according to Jason :) They are Chocolate Chip Bicsotti and have chocolate chips, cranberries and hazelnuts inside! They were so easy, too! They were so easy, and so good that I decided to post the recipe. Thanks to www.bettycrocker.com !

Ingredients:

1 pouch (1lb 1.5 oz) Betty Crocker sugar cookie mix

1/3 cup butter, softened

1 egg

1/4 cup flour

1/2 cup chopped hazelnuts (I also used walnuts)

1/2 cup dried cranberries, coarsely chopped

2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Make cookie dough blending cookie mix, butter, egg, flour, nuts, cranberries and 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips until stiff dough forms. Roll half of dough at a time into 8 x 2 1/2 inch rectangle. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes on ungreased cookie sheet (I used parchment paper). Cool 15 minutes.

2. Cute each rectangle crosswise into 3/4 inch slices. Place slices, cut size down, on cookie sheet. Bake 10-12 minutes, turning once, until crisp. (I baked them 6 min on each side) Cool; place biscotti on cooling racks. Cool completely.

3. Microwave chocolate chips on high 30-60 seconds; stir until smooth. Drizzle chocolate over one side of each biscotti. Let stand until chocolate is set. (I've also used chocolate candy melts)

mmm...I'm eatting on right now! :)

Elijah's program

Part of Elijah's Christmas program was a book exchange. Here he is showing us the books he got!

They also decorated Christmas cookies. He likes frosting :)



Here are all the kids. It was super cute to watch...all the girls sang real loud while the boys sort of just sat there. :) Elijah knew the songs...but didn't sing :) He was real proud anyways. :) And so were we.

Here's grammpa trying to swipe Elijah's cookie! Swiper no swiping!

A little video of Alia's school program...for your viewing enjoyment.

Alia's program

Alia had her kindergarten Christmas program on Wednesday. My parents drove up for the kids' Christmas program so it was a fun day.

Alia and Mrs. Whitson, her teacher. Alia loves her teacher, can't you tell? :)

Here are a few of the crafts that Alia made. The program began with some songs...then there were 5 craft stations that they cycled through and made crafts at. Alia was in heaven! She loves to do projects :)

Gingerbread House!!

Last night we made our gingerbread house from the kit that my parents brought us from Costco. They kiddos have been looking forward to creating it for DAYS!!! :) I spent the day baking and putting together gifts so I passed on the icing job to Jason. He did a great job!
Here was the end result.

This is what Ethan spend the night doing. He figured out how to push the button on the dinosaur and was having a great time with it! He is such a boy...loves playing ball, driving cars and playing with dinosaurs! :)

The creating! They worked well together!




Elijah had the job of decorating the tree.

Fireworks Show

Just watch...and pretend you are at the happiest place on earth. :)

Rainy Day Disney

We went to Disneyland a few weeks ago and the forecast was rain. Well, let me tell you, we got rain!!! We spent a 1/2 day there because mommy was DONE! We were all soaked-shoes, pants, jackets, everything. :) But we had a good time!!! And our friends, the Reeds were there at the same time so we got to hang out with them, too. We ate at Super Mex in Fullerton and at Schooner or Later in Long Beach. Thanks for the memories, Mickey!

Because it was stormy...it made for an iffy drive over the grapevine. Here's what we saw out our window as we drove home. We were the last group of cars to get to drive over the grapvine-they closed it as we were on the top!

Super Daddy, Jason! Can you see how wet he is?? :)

The lights were beautiful throughout the park. In case you don't know, this is It's a Small World.




Little Mr Ethan...figuring out what to do next.

O Christmas Tree

Here's our tree! We always get a Noble Fir-that's what I've had since I was little. :)

At some point in the decorating Ethan was relagated to his chair...it was just too hard to decorate the tree when he was just taking the ornaments off! :) Doesn't he look cute an innocent?




The big kids decorating.


Ethan, admiring the lights.

The finished product! Notice the bottom 1/3 is missing the ornaments? :) I was a bit nervous about Ethan taking everything off but he hasn't been too bad. The first day he took a bunch off...then the excitment wore off. And I've realized that as long as he doesn't see people touching the tree, he doesn't touch it. So we've been replacing the ornaments after he goes to bed. Last night we put presents under the tree...and so far so good!

Silly Elijah

Here's my silly big boy. Teehee. He insisted that I take a picture of him.

Alia's playdate

Alia has ben wanting her friend from school to come over to play. So this past Wednesday was the BIG DAY! :) They played in her room, had lunch and played outside. Then I had them make chocolate covered marshmellows with sprinkles! I thought this would be a fun activity for them. And it was!

My first.

A while ago I saw this rag quilt purse online and thought it was so cute! So cute that I decided to try to make one. Here she is. There is much room for improvement...but I'm pretty proud of her.

The Quayles!

We were blessed to have Faye and the kids come for a little visit with us. As always, the kids had a blast! :) We love you, Quayles!

Ethan's walking!

Here's a little video of Ethan walking. I'm super sorry that it's not the right way...but you get the point. This was taken about a week afer he started walking...it's about 2 week after that and he is booking it! He's walking so fast it's crazy! He's all over! I will try to take a video in the next few days so you can see his progress. I just love the little guy!!!!

Thanksgiving images

Elijah got to say the prayer for our Thanksgiving dinner. It brought tears to many eyes. It was super cute. :)

Great Grandma Malnu watching Alia color.




The meal.

Grammpa and Ethan!

This was our new turkey friend I made this year. Each night we all wrote something we were thankful for on a feather. We'll save him and use him next year, too. The kids loved him! :)

Walk-A-Thon

These pics are long overdue...but in early November Alia had her Walk A Thon at school. Jason and I (and Ethan) went to help out. We marked laps on their sheets and also walked a bit (and I even jogged around) with Alia. They walked for a whole 30 minutes and boy was Alia tired. She had h1n1 earlier in the week so she was already a bit week. She went 16 laps around and was so proud! With all of her donations she got some toys, brought in the most donations in her class, got a free toy..and this Friday she gets to ride a limo to Pizza Hut for lunch! Crazy girl! Thanks to all who donated money to Hurley! :)Alia and her best friend at school, Bailey.

Alia is the one on the far left in the front row.