Better Late Than Never

Well, I finally got a minute to sit down and get some more Christmas pictures up!  I figured if I wanted to blog about the new year I better finish out the last one first!  I have been so busy with my business this holiday season that if I was on-line it was to do that!  

Gabe just went back to school today.  Christmas break has officially ended & we are kicking off Kindergarten with a bang...kind of.  Today he wasn't exactly jumping for joy because he had to go back to school...but who was?  Okay I was but it was just a little jump.  :-)  It's not like I am kidless or anything I still have my little "destroyer" here.  She's the one who reminds me on an hourly basis that it's pointless to clean!  

Gabe finished up his quarter great!  He's still not IN LOVE with school but I hear once he gets there he does fine.  He's still a man of few words about his day.  We make him tell us 3 things he did that day and every day 2 out of the three consist of recess & lunch so that leaves just one thing left.  He has been testing really well & is reading really well!  I am super proud of him!

Now that I have rambled on about Gabe it's time to get back to those Christmas pictures.  I have so many to post!  I kind of thought I was going to be better about this but I wasn't!

I saw these really cute reindeer candies in a magazine so I had to make them with Gabe for his class.  I love that he is old enough now to help with this stuff & he loves doing it.

 As we were getting the chocolates ready Lily came out from Gabe's room dressed like this!

 and the back!  She walked around like this the whole night!

 Then we were putting on mini red m&m's for the rudolph noses.

 A little melted while chocolate & a mini chocolate chip for the eyes.

 broken pretzels for the antlers.  That was the hardest part.  The picture actually showed a whole pretzel but we don't have the TINY twist ones so my fabulous hubby came up with this idea which I actually like better!

 Gabe had his party the very next day!  I brought these reindeer & sugar cookies for them to decorate with icing & sprinkles.  Some of the other parents did pizza, cupcakes, & sprite.

 Gabe made a gingerbread house at school, cute!

 Gabe's good friend Isaiah working on his cookie!

That was the last day of school before Christmas vacation!  We were all so excited for Christmas break & couldn't wait for it to come & well now it's already over!  Can't wait to show you what else we did!

Christmas In The City

Each year our church  hosts a community event where people from all over the area can come & have a fabulous family night for free.  One way our church gives back to the community.  They have a huge fire to stay warm by, and provide hot dogs, hot cocoa, coffee, water and kettle corn to eat.  Who can resist some warm kettle corn?  It's so yummy!   

Then we all pile on these decorated trailers and they drive us through Grassland a nearby development that is CRAZY about Christmas lights!  We get to take in all of the fabulous lighted houses as we snuggle up with family & friends to keep warm! 

It was so much fun!

Cookie Time

The best looking bakers I have!

I told Gabe to take off his long-sleeves and this is how he came out, haha!

I

LOVE

MY

FAMILY

Last weekend we made 5 types of cookies, carmel corn, and several loaves of zucchini bread!

Gingerbread Fun

Our fun thing to do from our advent calendar was to make a gingerbread house on Saturday!  I was planning on getting one in my fabulous bountiful basket but they didn't have any so I bought one at Walmart & it was pretty good!  We had a fun, sticky, time putting it together!

 Except that part way through the roof started to slide off.  I think we had too much weight on it so quickly.  SO.....

 we unassembled it & let the base set up in the fridge, added the roof back on let it set up again & the finished our final touches!

This was our end result!  Not to bad!  Gabe loved doing it & Lily just liked eating all of our candy!

Advent Calendar

Here's a little tutorial on a really easy & cute advent calendar you can use each year.

You will need a mini muffin tin, magnets, double stick tape...

24 2" circles

 24 1 3/4" or 1 1/2"circles

Punch your circles out & tape the 2 layers together then you just need to add a piece of magnet to the back.  I cut the roll of magnets (one side is sticky) into little strips then I cut each little strip in half so they were narrow.

 Just like this!

Then put them in the order you want on your pan!

I added some numbers I cut from vinyl, but you can buy numbers, stamp some, print some off the computer or simply write them on with a sharpie!  

Fill each day with special things to do or have!  

We started ours a little late this year so we jumped right into the fun festivities, we made cookies one day (slice & bake ones), an ornament, family movie night, today we get to make our gingerbread house!  Some days they just got a candy treat or we read a part of the Christmas story from the Bible, or a book.  Super fun!  My kids look forward to it each afternoon when Gabe gets home from school!  The best part is that I can use it every year!  I can change up our ideas & we can keep the focus geared towards Jesus!

Downtown Midland Parade & Tree Lighting

I am a little behind on my blog this week because I have been so busy filling orders for Papercutz!  I finally have a little break to update y'all on what we have been up to.  Last weekend we went to the annual Christmas parade downtown and decided to stay for the tree lighting ceremony.  Our church was singing at it this year which made it extra special to be there!  So, we bundled up our kids & brought like 10 blankets, the wagon, hot cocoa, and Gabe's new cowboy's stadium cushion to sit on!  He bought it with his own money!

 This is out worhship team, warming up!

 Gabe rockin' his new jacket!

 Daddy's famous hot cocoa!

 Me & Jessi

 Sweet Lily

Zach & Gabe keeping warm!

Although we stayed until the very end we didn't win any of the raffles, augh!  But we had a fun, family night!

Don't Miss This Giveaway!

The fabulous people at Oh My! Handmade Goodness are hosting a fabulous giveaway!  Over 30 businesses are represented in this giveaway and it is valued at over $900.  Woah!  

Head on over to be a part of this amazing giveaway!