Merry Christmas!

Gingerbread Expanded

My friend, Laura, taught our family the tradition of making gingerbread houses and we have loved it, so this year, now that I live close to most of little nieces and nephews, I decided to have a gingerbread house party as my Christmas gift to my nieces and nephews also giving three hours of children free time to my brothers, sister and their spouses. It was so much fun!!!
Busy at work. Thanks to Grandma and Aunt M. who came to help.

Is that Uncle Dave trying to steal some candy?!?

We ended up with 11 cute mini gingerbread houses. When their parents came back, it was fun to see if they could guess which house belonged to their child. A new tradition has arrived. Maybe next year, we'll try bigger houses and a night for mom's to make a house.

My Santa Days are Numbered

We went to the Festival of Trees and saw that Santa was there, so I asked the kids if they wanted to talk to him.

Nicole, "Uh, No!"

Beka, "Not"

Davy, "No, Thanks"

Darci, "What? Santa? Nah"

Elisabeth, "YES"

Mom, "The line is really long."

Elisabeth, "That's okay."

So Elisabeth and I stood in line for 45 minutes for her to sit on Santa's lap and tell him her wish list. It was worth it though, because she told me he is the real Santa. She could tell because his beard was real and there was real fur on his coat. And it was worth it for me because this might be the last year any of my children will want to talk to Santa. :(

Wheelin' Jazz

David took me to watch my brother-in-law, Jason, play basketball on Friday night. Woo Hoo! A date! Jason plays for the Wheelin’ Jazz basketball team. We don't get to watch him very often because they play in tournaments all over the country, but they hosted one here in Salt Lake this weekend. We watched them play the #1 team from Dallas and then a team from LA. The Jazz are 3rd in the nation out of about 200 teams. It is fun to watch, but also pretty brutal. It’s amazing how physical they are with their chairs crashing into each other all the time. Can you imagine shooting baskets sitting down? Jason is on the left in the picture above. Here is a link to his team profile. Check it out and help Jason get most popular page on their site. :)
http://www.wheelinjazz.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=24:jason-hokansons-profile&catid=47&Itemid=16

Best Food Storage Site

If you're interested in food storage, check-out this website. It has great tips and ideas for planning, storing and eating food storage. I used their 7-day challenge scenarios at a Relief Society activity and we had a fun time realizing where we're prepared and where we could use a little more work.
http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net/

This week in our Life

Liberty Girls at the Hutchings Museum where we participated in a Molly mystery.


Nicole's Birthday
Two of her friends came and "decorated" her room before she got home from school.

Her favorite meal: chicken alfredo on angel hair pasta with sundried tomato baguettes, salad and broccoli. Okay, the broccoli was my idea.

Pretty dress from Grandma. She loves it. Wore it to church today.

Silly, happy children. Tip of the day: if your cake falls apart when you're taking it out of the pans, just cut it into cubes and layer it with ganache in a trifle bowl. I used evaporated milk and it turned out delicious!

David thought Darci's ice-cream antics were picture worthy.

October Pictures