Christmas Cookies

We had a wonderful Christmas break. We were blessed to have Grandma and Grandpa Yorke join us this year for the big day. Now it is time to catch up on all our Christmas festivities!! :) This year we only got a week and a half off of school. But, the Sunday before Christmas, Brian started to run a fever (which meant that he got 2 full weeks off from school). We were waiting to make the Christmas cookies until everyone was well, but Brian ran a fever for a full 5+ days and just when he was getting over it, Aaron began running a fever. So, we opted to skip making the cookies for our friends, and just make them for ourselves. (And I am sure that our friends are thankful that we didn't spread our germs....this was a nasty bug that we passed around our house!) So, with everyone doped up on ibuprofen, we set out to make our Christmas cookies!! :)
At our house, we do cookies with home made frosting (yum!) and then decorate the cookies with colored sugar. This is a tradition that we did when I was a little girl. I love making Christmas cookies! See Aaron licking his fingers? Yes, that is why we didn't deliver any of them. :D
I helped Evan, but everyone else was able to make their own cookies. Evan was really more interested in licking the frosting and sugar off of his cookies than he was eating them. He helped me make the dough and roll them out too though.
Because we were going to deliver them, we made up 8 dozen cookies. We frosted some this night and ate some. Then we waited till Grandma and Grandpa Yorke were here and frosted some more with them. It was fun to have the cookies last for a little longer. No cookies last very long at my house. Too many little kiddos that love cookies!! :D

Funny

This morning we were cleaning the house. Getting all ready for Christmas and for Grandma and Grandpa Yorke to join us for the big day---they arrive tomorrow. :) I was vacuuming the upstairs hallway and bedrooms and stopped to switch plugs when I hear Amber say to Aaron, "Follow me Aaron. That way you can be the leader." I had a good laugh over that one. But then I got to thinking, I wonder who really had who duped? Was Amber, who was obviously leading Aaron down the stairs and all around, the one who was really in charge, or, had Aaron told Amber at some earlier point, that she could be first, but he was really in charge? (Kind of like when Melissa told Katie Beth that she could be the president of their club, but the VP was the one who made all the decisions! Do you remember that Melissa?) Oh, the dynamics in a family!!! :D I love them!!!

Christmas glitch

This year, all of my Christmas preparations have gone great! Wonderful! On time! According to plan! I have had the time and energy to do lots of things. I got my cards out on time. I baked lots of cookies. I made lots of home made Chex Mix. I got the house decorated in a timely manner. I made stockings. :) This week I was supposed to be delivering goodies, mailing packages, sewing jammies, and getting everything ready for Brian's class party that I am in charge of tomorrow. But, we had a glitch thrown in the system. Brian got sick. He started running a fever Sunday afternoon of 103+. And today, he still has it!! Not to mention that he also has been throwing up. No packages have been mailed. No jammies have been made. No goodies have been delivered. The party is planned, which I will go to tomorrow and run, without Brian. He is totally bummed that he doesn't get to go!! Daddy has planned him a fun party at home while I am away at the class party. It looks like a trip to the doctor is on the agenda for tomorrow. Oh yes, and Weston got pink eye too. He was home from school today as well. (I think he got this at our ward party on Friday night, but who knows!) I just hope that no one else gets sick, or if they do, that they just hurry up and get sick so we can get it over with before Barth's parents come on Friday and before Christmas day.

Weston's Band Concert

We enjoyed listening to Weston's Christmas band concert on Monday night for our FHE. I hope you enjoy one of the songs from his comcert!! :)

Decorating the tree

Last night we went out and got our tree!! That meant that today, right after church, we were able to decorate it! We cranked up the Christmas music and set to work. Decorating the tree is one of my favorite parts of Christmas time. And having a real tree. I love my real tree!! :)
The children's favorite parts of decorating are, of course, finding their special ornaments given to them by Grandma. They have their names on them. They dig through the boxes to find the ones that belong to them!

Even Evan had fun decorating this year. At first he couldn't figure out how to get the ornaments to stay on the branches, but once I showed him how, there was no stopping him!

The tree goes all the way to the ceiling, so the kiddos had fun taking turns using the step ladder (aka: nearly knocking over the tree every 5 seconds) and reaching high to put up their ornaments.

Evan loves his bubby, and Weston is always such a good helper. He would help Evan hang up ornaments when I was busy handing out other ornaments.

Brian giving me a big thumbs up after hanging the bells at the bottom of the tree for Santa when he comes on Christmas Eve.

Aaron letting me know that he was ready to have his picture taken as he was hanging up his ornament. His favorite ornaments were some nutcracker ornaments that we got last year on clearance sale after Christmas. He is a nutcracker fanatic!! :) He loves them!

This year Amber got to put the star of top. Actually, the tree was too tall and so Daddy had to really position it up there, but she had fun and felt like she really did get to put the star up there. :) Poor little girl. She still isn't feeling all that wonderful. Her antibiotic (omnicef) wasn't working for her ear. The small hole from the tube falling out has now torn wide open and her ear is oozing :( If it is still draining in a week, they will make a quick referral to the ENT to see about doing a surgery to patch the ear drum, insert new tubes, and take out her tonsils all at the same time. Doesn't sound like fun to me! We are praying that the new antibiotic does its job and she is better in no time!

I also thought I would include a picture of the stockings! I want to put something on each one still like a snowman, Santa, a gingerbread man, etc, but haven't gotten to it yet. At least they are done this far though and if I don't get to it before Christmas, at least everyone has a stocking with their name on it! :)

And lastly, Amber and Evan were snuggling on the couch this afternoon and looked so sweet that I just had to snap a quick picture of the two of them! Merry almost Christmas!

Lights

So, I moved the camera while I was taking the picture, but I wanted to give you an idea of our lights this year. :) We scored an awesome deal in January on the big lights at Hobby Lobby when they were like 80 or 90% off and so we bought a bunch. In the past we have done the windows and bushes, but this year we added the other lights. I really would have liked to have had them on the roof, but Barth doesn't do heights, and we don't have a ladder tall enough yet, so we did lights on the ground this year. That, and at the beginning on November we happened to pass a garage sale and Barth went up to it. He came back with a huge bag of lights and stuff. There were tons of the lights for the bushes as well as a timer and extension cords. All for $2! :) Thanksgiving weekend was warm here and so while the kids played outside, I put up the lights. As far as the windows go, some of our lights were not working so it looks like I need to get a few more strands to get the look complete. I must say that I love the lights and they make me happy!!!! As a side note, Amber and Evan are both sickies!! Amber got a runny nose Saturday afternoon and by that night could not sleep. It had gone to her ears and her tubes are out. :( She is on an antibiotic and is feeling better. Evan started sounding bad on Friday last week with a cough and a runny nose. Last night he threw up and today has spent the day sitting on my lap. He is running a low grade fever. I am hoping that he gets to feeling better soon. Also- I am almost done with making stockings for all the children!! It is something that I have been wanting to do for a while! When they get done, I will post some pictures!

Christmas Devotional

Last night we all sat down and enjoyed the First Presidency Christmas Devotional. The boys were all snuggled up on the floor! Evan wanted to snuggle up with Weston! It was such an enjoyable evening together. We enjoyed the music and messages that we heard from the Prophet and apostles. It was a wonderful way to start off our Christmas season! :)

Mommy School- making cookies

This morning for our Mommy School, we decided to make Christmas sugar cookies. I had made some cookies and colored frosting yesterday to be used for the children's class at our RS dinner last night that I was in charge of, and all the cookies got eaten, but we had left over frosting. So, this morning, Amber, Evan and I got out all the ingredients and made cookies together. They helped dump in all the ingredients and watched while the cookies baked. Then we played play-doh while the cookies cooled and then they got to frost them! Yummy!
I helped Evan frost his (since he was trying to eat the cookies before they were frosted), but Amber did hers all by herself. When we do these cookies, I usually make home made frosting and use sugar like we always did growing up, but since the colored frosting was already done for the thing last night, we just used that today. We will have another day when all the kids get to help with the sugar cookies, from cutting them out to decorating them. We have to keep with tradition. :) It is one of my favorites at Christmas!
Amber liked the pink frosting best, but wanted a cookie in each color. Evan, he just loved eating the cookies.
Mmmmm......so busy eating those cookies! They were very yummy!
Amber said that it was one of the best mommy schools so far this year!

The frosting on his face tells me that he enjoyed the cookies! Evan enjoys helping me with anything in the kitchen!

I hope your Friday was as fun as ours!! Christmas time is in the air and that makes me happy!

Reading by the fireplace

We woke up to a chilly morning this morning! I came into the family room from making Aaron's lunch for school to find both boys reading by the fireplace which we turned on this morning to help warm the house up!! :)
I am thankful that my children love to read (even if it is a coin book- which is what Aaron is reading!) and that they read well! All three of the older boys are quite good readers!

And, of course, I had to snap one of Evan who was telling me cheese as I took pictures of the other kids. He rarely stays still for a picture, so I took advantage of his posing! :)

I had to take a picture of Evan in his funny Christmas shirt that I just couldn't pass up for him. In case you can't really read it, it says, "I'm on the nice list. (Trust me!) :)" It is totally fitting for my busy little guy!

And Amber, she has been dying to wear again the Christmas outfit that I made for her last year. I made it big in hopes that she could wear it more than one year! We are feeling festive over here at our house! And we even have a chance for snow this evening into tomorrow. It has been too warm and rainy to really make it more than slush, but the kids are very excited about the thought of snow. Since Weston leaves for school at 7am, he didn't get any pictures in on this post. Perhaps I will have to take one of him this afternoon!

Don't you think.......

......that Amber with her new haircut looks kind of like the Mary Engelbreit kids? I thought she did especially so today with her hair like this and this dress on.
It still makes me sad that her hair is all cut off, but it is growing on me and I think that she is still such a cute little girl! Her personality adds so much to her look. She has a fun and spunky personality!

She calls this her Minnie Mouse dress! I think it is cute!

Evan is also a little cutie pie! I love his white, silky hair! He is so busy, that most of his pictures don't really turn out! (kind of like this one with his eyes half closed)

He is getting so big! He talks in complete sentences! He counts! He is always on the go! I am lucky to be able to spend all day, every day with these 2 kiddos!!! :)

Hooray for Aaron!!

Okay, first of all, I had to include this cute picture of Aaron from when he was almost 1 and a half. He had to have a picture for school today of when he was little and I love this one! Just had to share it on here for old time's sake too. :) Today Aaron had another eye appointment. It went sooooo well!!!! His eye sight in his one eye improved so much that he got a new prescription today. Today was the first time ever that he was able to read the 20/20 line with his left eye!! He had his glasses on, of course, because that is how they do it, but he has never been able to do that before! That was great progress. Our opthamologist was very pleased! Because he has made so much progress, he now won't need to be seen again for an entire year!!!!!! Yeah!!! At that time they will dilate his eyes again and see how things are going. :) I am so happy about it!

Oh Boy!

This morning while the kids were playing downstairs, Amber found a pair of scissors that weren't supposed to be down there. The result was cutting her bangs and the hair by her ear on her left (or our right in this picture). It was too short over by her ear, even though it doesn't look too terribly bad in this picture, trust me, it was. The result was that she had to have it cut to fix it!! It made me so sad that it had to be cut all the way up to her ears. :( Nothing I could do about it though.
The back now looks like this. Her hair was finally getting long enough to do more hair styles. Oh well. It is still cute, just not long. It will grow. Her hair grows fast.

And here is the front with a totally fake smile. Once she saw it all gone, she cried and cried and cried. We talked about how she wasn't going to do that again. (No scissors will be allowed anywhere except at the kitchen table from now on!) She really was sad that she had to have all her hair cut off to even it out. And those short bangs, oh well!! Just thought I would share our morning adventure. Happy weekend to all!

Evan's Busy Day

Evan had quite the busy day yesterday!!! It started off first thing in the morning when I was ironing Aaron's shirt for picture re-takes. I heard the sound of a bag of cereal being dumped in the family room followed by Evan singing the clean up song!! He had dumped an entire bag of cereal on the floor. He had already cleaned up half of his mess by the time I got in there and stashed it under his stroller. :) His day continued when he took a bath and proceeded to stuff his toy fish in the spout of my big tub in my bathroom rendering that tub useless until I can figure out how to fix that spout and get those fish out. Barth surprised me by coming home early yesterday so that I could actually attend one of Weston's matches!!! :) I came home to find that while Barth was on a conference call in the piano room, Evan had gotten the 1 lb box of corn starch and had flung it all over the entire kitchen. Barth was trying to get it cleaned up before I got home! :) Evan is one VERY busy little boy!!! At that point I called it a day and we decided to take the coupons that we had gotten for free kids meals at Frish's and go out for dinner!!!! Afterwards, Barth went to mutual and took Weston to scouts while the rest of the kiddos and I came home and had an early bed time!! Thank goodness that today has been slightly more calm!!

Key Biscayne

Last week Barth had a business trip to Key Biscayne just to the east of Miami at the Ritz Carlton hotel. His parents graciously offered to come and watch the kids if I was able to tag along. We got the okay from work and so the 2 of us headed out for our first trip together in 12 years. :) It was a fun and relaxing 3 days (more for me than for Barth since he still had to attend meetings all day long!) Our room was upgraded to a suite. I can't believe that I didn't take a picture of it, but I guess I was too busy enjoying it. There was a huge living room and an equally large bedroom. The room had 2 restrooms. The view was spectacular!! Here is a picture from the balcony of our room. This was on the second day when it was looking a little stormy in the afternoon. We went from fall to summer! :)
While Barth was busy in his meetings, I took every opportunity to enjoy the beach. I walked most of the way up and down the island every day. I took a leisurely pace and walked about 5 to six miles each day. It was nice. For the most part, the sky was clear and the beaches were fairly empty. It was so relaxing. My favorite part of the beach was north of the hotel where there was an enormous city park. The beaches had been cleared and were wider and had these cute yellow life guard stations. There were very few shells to be found, but the water was warm and I loved the smell of the ocean.

Here is looking back down the beach from the same location. The hotels were all together toward the south end of the beach. Our hotel was in the middle of the group. Barth's meetings were all day Tuesday and then we went to his business dinner that evening on the beach. Wednesday his meetings lasted until noon. After that we went on a catamaran cruise around the bay. It was a big kind of a sail boat. The sky was clear and there was a good breeze. We sailed up to see the Miami sky line and then went out by the keys. We learned that the Bahamas were just 40 miles from our island. It was a fun and relaxing way to spend the afternoon. After that we came back to the hotel and headed out to the beach together.

Here is Barth standing in front of the hotel and grounds. They were lovely!!! There were 2 pools. One was for families and one was only for adults. We actually didn't go to either while we were there. I preferred the beach for our short visit. :) Any time you turned around there was someone asking if they could help you or running up to get the door. There was one person on the beach whose job was just to rake the sand all day long so that it looked nice.

Barth and I decided to head south on the key to the very southern tip. There is a state park there and a light house. The tide was coming in fast and we got pretty wet by the time we got there.

It was fun to be with just Barth for a few days. We had a fun time together!!! He can always make me laugh. It was enjoyable to sit and talk together at dinner and enjoy one another's company. I am lucky to have such a great husband who loves me and cares for me!! I have to admit, though, that I still called to check on the kids like 8 times a day. :) They did great! And had a wonderful time with Grandma and Grandpa Yorke!

We started out on our walk at about 5:15 and by the time we made it to the bottom of the key 40 minutes later, it was dark. The night was clear though, and with a full moon, the night on the ocean was beautiful!! We got to see the lighthouse there behind Barth just as the last rays of sunshine were sinking in the sky! Since the waves came all the way up to the dunes, we decided to take the road back to the hotel. In retrospect we should have just walked the beach back because the road took more than twice as long. That was okay though, because it was a nice walk after we left the roads of the very dark state park!!

For the most part, we just did everything at the hotel. There weren't really any other restaurants unless you went into Miami and we liked the hotel restaurant. We could eat outside and the food was good. I loved all the flowers at the hotel. All were fresh. Here was the arrangement in the lobby. This was my favorite!! I am so thankful that I was able to tag along with Barth and have a fun and relaxing few days with him!! I am one lucky girl!!!!

A few days difference

On Wednesday our trees looked like this. :) Yesterday we had a rainy, windy day.
This afternoon our trees looked like this. I am glad I got some pictures when I did. I bet that in a matter of just about a weeks time, the trees will be bare and it will look like Winter has arrived. It will be funny to go from our chilly weather here to the Florida Keys this next week with Barth where it is supposed to be 80. He has a business trip there in a few days and his parents offered to watch all the kids if I wanted to tag along and stay at the Ritz Carlton with him! I jumped at the chance!!!!! :) It will be a fun break. He will have meetings for some of the time that we are there, but I think that I will be able to find something to do while he is away. ;) Perhaps sleep in. Or lay on the beach and read a book. Or, who knows? The possibilities are endless!! :D