We Wish You a

Holiday Surprise

Once upon a time....

......a nice family had been home from church for about half an hour when the mom heard a nerve shattering bellow from the bowels of the house. It was her nine year old son. He didn't give up with one yell or two. Nope, he kept right on screeching her name with with hysteria. You have heard of the "boy who cried wolf"....Well, this was a similar scenario. The bellowing lad had a tendency to over react and the mom, who felt her spiritual high deflating rapidly, decided she was going to fix him....as soon as she escaped from her toe mangling boots.
The yelling continued as the slightly aggravated mother walked determinedly down the hall toward the offending noise.

The problem with nine year old males is that they don't communicate very descriptively....loudly, yes .

Upon turning the corner that led to the stairs and kitchen the mom glanced down to the floor at the same moment the boy added, "Mmmmooooommmm! DEAD SQUIRREL!!!!" Right there, almost in her kitchen, on her floor, near the paws of two very pleased snow covered dogs was a (shudder) chihuahua sized squirrel. Dead. There are some people who have spider or snake phobias. I, I mean, this poor mom suffered from an irrational repulsion to dead things.........especially in her kitchen. She instantaneously leaped backwards with a superhuman backpedaling motion and joined her son in screeching, "DEAD SQUIRREL", while dancing around with her eyes squished shut into the back of her head. The cacophony of hysterics summoned Big J who, after surveying the situation, escorted the doggies' treasure out to a dumpster. Ugh! The children who had gathered to witness the madness just stared at their mother. They had never seen her behave in such a manner. When the shock wore off they immediately requested an encore performance, but they were out of luck.

Ugh!!!!!

The Perfect Gift OR Friends Such as These

I have been blessed with many delightful,

gifted, and supportive friends. I love their crazy sides,

their wise advice, their spiritual insights, their zest for life....

If you were me-

where would you hang this momento?

Cooking with a Two Year Old

This is not a fantastic new recipe or a brilliantly creative idea...and it's entirely possible it is thoroughly unoriginal, but it was fun.

In my zealous glee to participate in anything Christmas-y I agreed to participate in a cookie exchange. What could be better than reaping the sugary rewards of someone elses hard work? I just didn't factor in time, snow, and a two hour school delay. Yep, I ended up in a bit of a crunch. Big surprise! So this is what happened:

I panicked- and then #5 came to my aid with an idea for super quick and easy snickerdoodles. We miraculously happened to have some store-bought, ready to bake, sugar cookie dough. Whoo! We cut each of the balls in half to make them bite-sized and then rerolled the little guys. This is where #5 took over.

She combined the traditional sugar and cinnamon, but the added colored sugar sprinkles- red in one bowl and green in another. Due to the squish-factor we discovered it was easier for her to bury the balls of dough in the sugar using a spoon rather than roll them with her fingers. They looked something like this when they landed on the pan:

She baked them according to the instructions on the package and voila!

We were done!

(Um, Mom can I eat them now?)

Camera Purge

In preparation for the Christmas season I made a long list of the things I need/want to get done to maximize holiday joy potential. ( I am a Christmas junky.) Big nasty items first -

I jumped into the photo swamp stored on my camera. It was a ghastly mess. Here are some highlights:

A two-year-old playing.....dress-up.

I like to call this one "Brothers; a Contrast"

Notice the bulging muscles. Well, #4 is naturally just a buff dude and the costume made him look like a mighty midget. #3, on the other hand, is one of the longest, lankiest 7 year olds on the planet. The extra padding was his dream come true. After we purchased his costume he took to getting up really early and getting COMPLETELY ready for school- coat and all. It didn't take much observation to notice he had experience a miraculous weight gain. After a bit of research it was determined that beneath his coat, shirt, and t-shirt was a certain buff red costume. It reminded me of that chapter in one of the "Beezus and Ramona" books where Ramona wears her flannel pjs under her clothes to school and ...never mind.

I made these delectable cookies.

I threatened the 12 year old in this picture that if she didn't smile I would tell the boy across the street she wanted a kiss.....apparently that idea did not agree with her.

This was when #3 was put on timeout for throwing stuff on Grandpa's roof. Not really.

I asked a couple of my nephews to show me their most handsome faces. This is what I got.

They take after their mothers.

The traditional after Thanksgiving family exorcist. Gets rid of all of the gilt related to extra helpings of mashed potatoes and banana cream pie.