December rundown

We were so busy over the holidays I thought I'd just do a little summary of our pre-Christmas activities....

Shopping
Christmas shopping is so interesting with a child, isn't it? I never really got much done but we had fun. And one day I treated us to a peppermint chocolate chip shake from Chick-Fil-A.
(Truth be told, the shake was for me. But I'm lactose intolerant and couldn't have a whole one so I needed someone to share it with. It'll be our little secret)

Baking

Took the kids to see my dad and step-mom at their church Christmas play

I took Jordis to a party with my step-dad's family

(Before we went)

(With my mom)

(Learning to line dance with my step-dad)

I also went to a Christmas brunch at my mom's, lunch with my mom and shopping at The Morgan House, Jason's work party, and a progressive dinner in our neighborhood, none of which I have pictures of. Tis the season!

Aaacckk!

It's Christmas Eve. As usual, I'm not prepared. I still have a few things to wrap, I need to make the muffins we eat every Christmas morning, and the cutout cookies I so proudly made in advance are probably not going to get frosted. But last night at the nursing home we had the cutest angel and shepherd ever who both participated in a (somewhat) live nativity. They make all the craziness worthwhile.

What we've been doing

So I hear it's December. Yikes! November just flew by and we were so busy I didn't take many pictures. Or we weren't busy at all and had nothing to take pictures of. Not sure which is correct, but here is a small run down.

Cooking

Cleaning

(Isn't her little broom cute? Jason's aunt and uncle own a broom factory and brought this up for her when they came to visit in October. )

Thanksgiving

(Like how we have on no coats and are sitting in a pile of leaves? Yep, the Christmas parade here is before Thanksgiving. Just like Oktoberfest is in September and The Memorial Tournament is in June. We do things a little weird here in Ohio.)

Christmas lights at the zoo

Running errands

Yep, that pretty much sums it up.

So behind!

Getting ready to put up Christmas decorations this weekend and still haven't posted any Halloween photos. So here you are.....

Wasn't in the mood to carve this year, so we painted our pumpkins instead. I'm such a good mom that I took a picture of my own pumpkin, and not of my kids'. (I'm an only child, remember. Sometimes I forget about other people.) And no, I had no idea there was a dried stream of liquid on my wall. I'm sure someone did that when we weren't looking.

These were the cat cookies we made for Xander's teachers (and for us, too).

Here are the trick-or-treaters

Jordis and her friend Megan

The kids are big enough now that we have this down to a science, so it was a quick night. And they're already talking about costumes for next year.

Hayride

Two Fridays ago both of the kids had the opportunity to go on a hayride. Xander's was his first field trip that I desperately wanted to attend, but they won't let you chaperone if you have other children with you, so I wasn't able to go. However, my bible study had a hayride scheduled at a local farm, so Jordis and I went to that.

When I went to get Jordis out of the car I saw that she was wearing flip flops after I had told her to put on socks and shoes. The mom in me thought I should just let her stay that way so she'd learn a lesson about following directions, but the police wife in me figured someone would probably call Children's Services on me if they saw my 4-year-old out in flip flops when it was 42 degrees. Luckily we got there early enough that I had time to run home and grab her some socks and shoes.

I know, right, you're still not believing I was early somewhere.

We each got to pick two Indian corns and one pumpkin.

Someone was pretty feisty most of the time.

Then we had a potluck.

Junk food makes everything better, doesn't it?

Jason's Birthday

I don't have any pictures from my birthday (which was fabulous, if I do say so myself), but I do have a few to share from Jason's. His aunt and uncle were here visiting from Louisiana and we had a fried turkey dinner, so I made his birthday cake a little early for our gathering. Square cakes are much more difficult than round ones, and I didn' have the high quality ingredients that I wanted for the frosting, but all in all it turned out okay. Luckily, Jason isn't too picky when it comes to dessert.

Jason took the day off on his actual birthday and was nice enough to keep the kids and send me on a women's retreat with my bible study gals. It was lots of fun and nice to be out of the city.

When I came home we got pizza for dinner and gave Jason his presents. This year the kids have taken to finding things we already have around the house and then wrapping them to give us as presents. Hence the Bass Pro Shop brochure.

I also like how kids are fascinated with ages. As if you don't know how old you are, it's always nice to be reminded. Our kids are currently enjoying that they are half-ages. Instead of being 6 and 4 they are 6 1/2 and 4 1/2.

Isn't getting older great?

Fall!!!

This is my favorite time of year and we've been able to do so much fun stuff! Jason took the kids to the lawnmower races at the fairgrounds.

Jason also took Jordis to the zoo one day while Xander was at school because he hadn't been to see the polar bears yet.

He also stopped to let her look at motorcycles one day.

We had a neighborhood block party. One of our neighbors is the fire chief and he arranged for a fire truck to come so all the kids could play on it.

Here's Jordis and her "boyfriend," Xav, at the apple orchard that had no apples. Since my friend and I took the time to get them there we still walked around since we promised we'd take them.

Jordis and her friend Alexis participated in exercises with the residents of the nursing home where we go for story time.

Jordis has also been sporting some serious fashion lately. Here is one of her outfits.....tie dyed shirt, capri pants with checks and neon green Halloween socks with black and silver spiders.

Now if Mother Nature could just decide what season it is.

Fun at the fair

Last month was the Delaware County Fair. We have yet to attend since moving here five years ago, mostly to the kids being so small and last year because every time we had a chance to go it seemed to be raining. So this year we decided to bite the bullet, and empty our bank account, so we could take them.

Of course they had to go on all of the rides. Jason and I went on a few with them as well.

And what trip to the fair wouldn't be complete without some corn dogs?

This little guy was a hit, too. If you gave him a quarter he would put it in his pocket.

Can't wait to go back next year!