Merry Christmas!

The kiddos talked us into opening gifts on Christmas Eve.  We had a great time opening gifts and enjoying all of the toys, games, books, and goodies.

The next morning brought us a white Christmas and a stomach bug.  The bug wasn't too bad, but we all stayed home.  We played, plowed and just enjoyed the day.

Treats and the zoo!

After our gingerbread day we got to work making other treats for Christmas.  Some of the little girls wanted to make Christmas Mice.  They didn't end up turning out so great, but they sure had a great time putting them together.

Mr. R made "muddy buddies" one of his favorites and daddy's too.

Miss E made up some sugar cookies and we had fun decorating them in the evening.

We took advantage of the zoo pass that great-grandma gave the kids this year and went up to see the zoo lights.

Gingerbread day

Today was our gingerbread day.  Miss E spent the day mixing up, rolling out, cutting out, and baking gingerbread men.  I did most of the icing, but I had plenty of little helpers too.

Mr. R and Mr. S spent the morning building gingerbread houses for everyone as well as themselves.  Miss E took a bit of a break from her gingerbread men to build her own "house."

Mr. M had a blacksmithing class to go to in the morning.

In the late afternoon everyone got to decorate their houses.

We even kept the gingerbread theme with gingersnap chicken for dinner.  YUM!

*We know that God is sovereign and that He directs our paths each day, but today He showed us that very clearly in the course he set for us.  We had dinner plans to go to friends' home for this evening.  In the morning they let me know that something came up and needed to reschedule.  We easily adjusted our plans and went about our day.  Around the time we would have been getting ready to go I got a call.  It was my neighbor.  Her husband had fell from a ladder and was injured, he needed help and she wasn't home.  Rob was out the door in a minute followed quickly by Miss E.  I quickly gave instructions, here at home to the older boys, and then ran over there too.  His wife was home shortly and took him to the ER while we took their boys to our house to play for the evening.  The boys had made extra gingerbread houses, so we had plenty to go around.  These little boys that had just seen their daddy get hurt got to spend a happy evening playing with their friends and decorating gingerbread houses reassured that their daddy was in good hands and being well cared for.

I'm super proud of my kids.  Everyone did just what they needed to in this emergency.  Miss E didn't bat an eye at being sent over to help daddy with the situation.  She helped with the little kids over there and also helped me get things cleaned up.  At home Mr. R did great taking over watching little ones (who also did great by staying calm and playing nicely), Mr. M and Mr. S took over my dinner prep and got it all in the oven.  We were thankful that God gave us this opportunity to serve our sweet friends and neighbors.

Christmas School Days!

This past week we've slowly eased into our Christmas break.  We're not quite off yet, but we're also not doing school as usual.  There's been a field trip (Just Miss E and Mr. M...to a castle).  We've been reading Christmas books and watching Christmas movies.  We've even started pulling out yummy treats.

Miss F decided that this was yummy and finished off my mug.

We've been doing a fair bit of de cluttering and organizing.  We can get quite a bit done if each of us puts in 15 minutes a day.  Closets and drawers are cleaned out and organized!

The nursery closet was quite a mess.  We pulled all of their "treasures" from the floor of their closet and got it all cleaned out and put away where it belongs.

We've enjoyed playing some games too.

And there's also just plain old silly happening.

Operation Christmas Child Boxes

My kids look forward to this all year.  They save all year.  They plan all year.  This last Friday was the packing day!  The kids sorted and organized.

They cut up wrapping paper to line their clear plastic shoe boxes.

All but Miss A packed up their boxes.  Each child did 3 for their age group/gender (I helped Miss A with hers).

The boxes waiting to be delivered.

*Yes, THEY saved.  They have a big jar that they put their $$$ in all year.  They work for this money.  They even put Christmas and birthday money in here, on their own, no prompting from us!

Thanks Great Gram!

The kids got Starbucks cards from my Grandma, their Great Gram, for Christmas.  Everyone was excited to go use them.  We caused quite the back up in the store while ordering, but the kids had so much fun getting to pick and order their own drinks/foods.

Wow, thats alota kids!

Miss A even cooperated by falling asleep soon after I got my peppermint mocha.

Thank you Great Gram for the fun treat!  We love you!

Christmas camping

We went camping for Christmas this year!  Even though it was a bit of work to put it together I think it reduced the general stress and expectations for the season/day.

Almost as soon as we arrived a tent was built using fabric and rope the kids had brought for just such an activity.

 

Miss A learned about the joy of pacifiers.  We had tried them earlier and she had rejected them.  We decided to try a different type since she does have her moments and has so far been generally unsuccessful with her thumb. *Note to babysitter J....The suspected stinkerness is starting to show itself.

 

Miss J had requested hot dogs for our Christmas Eve meal.  At first I turned my nose up at that idea. Then I remembered that simple and easy was the point of this trip.  What could be easier than daddy cooking hot dogs and baked beans outside?  Every one was happy and I didn't have to cook!

We spent Christmas Eve playing games with the kids.

 

Then we put them to bed.

Yea, we're really roughing it.  Everyone got to put in their requests for treats, mine was peppermint mochas/hot chocolate.

 

On Christmas Day the big kids went on a hike with Daddy while I stayed behind and napped with the little kids.

*Mr. R lost a tooth.  That's what you get when snacking on an MRE.

 

*When little ones got up they climbed into bed with me for a nice snuggle.  Then we had snacks.  Then they requested a movie.

Miss C enjoyed many mini-hikes with Daddy.  She also had an MRE set aside to share with Daddy.

The big kids enjoyed bike riding, reading and some short hikes.  We had fun playing with the little kids at the camp site.

 

Dessert after our Christmas dinner was s'mores!

The tent got a wall on one end and kids made use of the structure the entire time we were there.

 

We all took a walk down to the Discovery Center.

Lots of snacking and playing of games.

Cuddle bugs in the morning.  I love this kind of camping; a heater and a bed!  I was still happy to get home though.  Miss A didn't seem too thrilled about being away from home (translation- I spent most of the trip holding her).

We had a great, mellow Christmas enjoying the great outdoors and some quiet family time.