Friday, December 25, 2009

Thursday, December 24, 2009

They've been begging and begging...


I don't get what the huge draw is, but Daniel and Hannah have been begging and begging to sleep in the tent that Aunt Sheri gave Daniel last year (2 years ago maybe?) for Christmas. It's intended to be used as a one man sleeping tent outdoors, but it stands up on it's own without being staked down. And the kids LOVE it! It takes up most of the living room floor and drives me crazy, but I put up with it during special times like Christmas break. Daniel and Hannah have both slept in it the last 2 nights, and Sarah has played in it during the day. I guess it's like their own personal playhouse. I'm making them take it down tonight, though, since we'll need the room in the morning to finally be able to open the presents that have been taunting the children for the past week! Sarah wakes up every morning wanting to know if this is the day she gets to open presents. I can't wait to see her reaction when we finally get to tell her "Yes...It's Christmas morning!"

Finally a successful gingerbread house!

The finished product!
Daniel can be such a goofball at times, and this expression definitely shows that!
Sarah doing a great job cleaning up all the extra candy...
No gingerbread house making would be complete without the gingerbread man apron from Aunt Suzie and her guys last Christmas!
What the house looked like before we started decorating it...

We have tried to make gingerbread houses in the past, and they have always been disastrous. We have always purchased the Wilton kits, and no matter how determined I was, they have always failed miserably! I could never get the royal icing to set up hard enough to hold the pieces together. The difference this year is the glue. My friend, Susan Smith--God bless her for this wonderful tip--told me to melt sugar and use that as the glue--and lo, and behold, it actually worked! I had found a wonderful recipe for gingerbread cookies a couple of weeks back so I used that along with the dimensions for a house "form" online. I'm still in shock that it actually worked! It started off as just Hannah and I working on it, but I pulled Daniel and Brent in to help smoosh the marshmallows for the roof shingles. It turned into a great family activity when Sarah joined in. Her main job was "clean up." She went around to every pile of candy and helped clean up that pile! It definitely turned into a fun time--very unlike previous attempts!

Monday, December 21, 2009

Our very first Jammie Drill

We had our first Jammie Drill Monday night. We put the kids in bed rather early for a Christmas break night. Brent went in about 5 minutes later blowing a whistle and yelling "Jammie Drill! Everybody in the car! Go! Go! Go!!!" The kids had no idea what it was all about, and their reactions were quite funny. We found out later that Daniel thought it was a fire drill and even thought there might be a real fire...that's my boy...always creating a catastrophe in his mind if at all possible! We ended up driving to Arby's in town (about a 25 minute drive) and got milkshakes for everyone. We then drove around looking at all the Christmas lights and then it was back home and in bed for the kiddos. What a great time we had...and we definitely plan on doing this "Jammie Drill" thing again. Check out my facebook page for a hysterical video of the start of it all--I couldn't figure out how to get the video to be smaller and couldn't wait for gazillion of hours for it to load both places!
This is what Hannah did for every picture I tried to take...not sure why, but maybe she thought she looked too bad for film being in her jammies and all!

Notice Sarah's Jammies...the zipper split while she was trying to get them off in bed so she ended up running through the house trying to get them done up before she could be part of the jammie drill.
Brent ordering milk shakes from Arby's for everyone.

Sarah realizing that "Jammie Drill" is a synonym for "Milk Shakes at night!"

Tuesday, December 08, 2009

could make for an interesting evening and day tomorrow...

...BLIZZARD WARNING IN EFFECT UNTIL MIDNIGHT CST WEDNESDAY
NIGHT...
...WINTER STORM WARNING IS CANCELLED...

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN GREEN BAY HAS ISSUED A BLIZZARD
WARNING...WHICH IS IN EFFECT UNTIL MIDNIGHT CST WEDNESDAY NIGHT.
THE WINTER STORM WARNING HAS BEEN CANCELLED.

* SNOW WILL GRADUALLY INCREASE IN INTENSITY THIS EVENING BEFORE
BECOMING HEAVY WITH NEAR WHITE OUT CONDITIONS OVERNIGHT AND INTO
WEDNESDAY MORNING BEFORE DIMINISHING WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON. THE
HEAVIEST SNOW SHOULD FALL BETWEEN MIDNIGHT AND NOON ON WEDNESDAY.

* 10 TO 14 INCHES OF ACCUMULATION IS EXPECTED.

* THE COMBINATION OF SNOW...WINDS THAT COULD GUST AS HIGH AS 45
MPH LATE TONIGHT THROUGH WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON...AND NEAR ZERO
VISIBILITIES WILL LEAD TO BLIZZARD CONDITIONS AT TIMES AND MAKE
THIS A DANGEROUS WINTER STORM.

Sarah's been having bad dreams...

Sarah's been obsessing recently over some bad dreams that she's been having. She's quite the imaginative one, so I didn't think much of it until yesterday when I spent the day filling trash bags cleaning the kids' rooms and came across this doll in Sarah's bed that Grandma and Grandpa Griffin gave her for Christmas while they were here over Thanksgiving. It has little plugs that you can push into holes in the doll's head to give her "hair extensions" The extensions have not held up well at all to a 2 year old's playing...as you can see! I looked at the doll and it's actually a bit scary looking to me! She loves it, but I'm wondering if this might be the cause of her bad dreams! I'm not being serious, just wanted to share how scary looking this doll has turned into. Am I the only one thinking it's a bit scary here?!?

Thursday, December 03, 2009

Jammie Drill

here's a fun idea that I hope to try this Christmas Break. It's called a "Jammie Drill." It might prove a bit challenging and will have to be more thought out since we live half an hour from the nearest fast food restaurant and the winter roads can be a bit challenging at times, but should prove fun, nonetheless. The idea is to get the kids tucked into bed in their jammies, wait about 5 minutes, then run into their room and yell, "Jammie Drill!!!" Pile into the car and head out to the nearest fast food place for milkshakes. I'm thinking it could really be a lot of fun...especially the first time since the kids won't know what's going to happen...but after that, it'll be fun since they can look forward to the milkshakes once a jammie drill has begun. I'll be sure to post pictures if I can sell Brent on how fun it could be!