A Little Bit of Heaven

That is what we received today... A little bit of Heaven... in a HUGE box. If you know my boys at all you would totally understand. They love to color, paint, cut, glue, tape, and fold just about everything. They see every piece of paper, cardboard, soup can, etc. as potential for some kind of project... I can hardly keep the trash in the trash around here! And printer paper... well, we go thru that faster than toilet paper (seriously!).

So imagine the joy when we received this huge box in the mail today. It was filled to the brim with adorable girlie clothes and shoes, but nestled in the middle was the mother load of art supplies... JACKPOT! My boys went nuts! We had markers, window crayons, regular crayons, paint, books, sticky foam, etc. flying all over the place. Needless to say we were quite occupied all afternoon (and will be for several afternoons to come). Thank you, Christa, for this big box of goodies!

Todays Activity

While Sam and Seth were watching Frosty the Snowman this morning (for about the 20th time this month!) Aaron and I decided to tackle our own little project.... RECYCLED CRAYONS!

He had a great time helping me unwrap little crayon bits... unfortunately, he's a pro at that. My kids are not so anal as I was as a kid. I hated to break a crayon and when the time came to peel one, I did so very carefully so as to peel it nice and straight and only as much as needed. Nope, my kids didn't inherit an ounce of my perfectionist ways and are quickly ridding me of mine. I am learning that things like this really don't matter in the long run... but I definitely struggle with this every day. My boys are constantly breaking things. Anyway, enough about that....

I found this Wilton baking thing at Goodwill the other day and just knew I needed it for this very purpose... I have had this project in the back of my mind for a few months now. We just put several bits into each star, trying to follow a color theme somewhat, and put them in the oven at 225 for 15 to 20 minutes. How easy is that? I was worried they wouldn't come out of the pan well, but they just popped out very easily. It was a perfect craft project to do with Aaron. It was so cute to watch him run to the oven every few minutes to peek at his stars... he was thrilled!

And here's my little girlie modeling her Christmas clothes... I am a sucker for stripes I guess. Note the little hair barrette as well. So cute!

6 months!

My little girlie is 6 months old today! She has brought so much joy to our family in those 6 months... I really can't even imagine life without her. I love having another girl in the house. I was never really a "girl-e girl", but it is so much fun dressing her up and making girl-e things for her.

Her personality is starting to come out and it is just so sweet. She is a crack up, and she smiles and laughs constantly. Her newest thing is a fake cough that she thinks is pretty clever. I caught her and Aaron in a coughing battle yesterday and it was so adorable.... my kids are so stinkin' cute!

I love all this personality!

A Handmade Christmas

So, just in case you were wondering where I've been the last several weeks... I've been busy!

3 little dollies for 3 adorable little girlies... I hope they are loved.

4 capes for my 4 little superkids... matching jammies were totally unplanned but AWESOME!

8 little fishies for my little man... who now says fish. Who knew the word "fish" could sound so cute :)
Side note: my awesome hubby whipped up this fishing pole for me on Christmas Eve... such talent!

1 big fort building kit... which has already been made into tunnels, houses, puppet theatres, etc.

Yep, we've been busy around here... and seeing my little people enjoying their gifts was so worth every late night. Anyways, Christmas is over and I'm back!

Christmas Baking

Normally, I do a little bit of baking with the boys before Christmas each year. We usually make some sort of candy, sugar cookies and all kinds of good (not very healthy) stuff... (my favorite is peanut brittle - Mmmm!) But this year I was occupied with other things so my poor kids were out of luck. I mentioned one night that Ad should make some cookies with the boys, not really thinking he would. He surprised me and jumped right in. They turned out so cute! Now, I guess Sam will have to teach me how to use the spritzer-thingy as I have yet to try it out.

The cookies were yummy, the boys had a great time, and I got a lot done in the process... woohoo!

Merry Christmas to all...

and to all a Good Night!

Hope you all had a wonderful day celebrating Jesus' birthday... we definitely did! There's so much to show ya, but I'll wait for another day... Merry Christmas!

It's beginning to look a lot like...

CHRISTMAS!!!

We've been very busy around here... as you can probably guess due to my lack of posting much of anything lately. Sam and I have been in the Christmas making mood. He has been cutting snowflakes, snowflakes and, yes, more snowflakes. I diverted him away from the snowflakes for a while to make this cute wreath. I love how it turned out. He was basically able to do it by himself too... which is a good thing for Mr. Independent. He did get a little bored toward the end and asked for some help. I have found that this kid is much happier when he is creating something, so I do try my hardest to keep him busy. Thank goodness for Google and all the awesome ideas I can get there....

We went out to cut our tree last week too... typically my favorite Christmas tradition. It's such a different experience here than back home. You go to a farm and pick your tree from rows and rows of trees... I miss hiking up the mountains and searching for that magical, glowing tree. But, it's probably for the best because we ended up carrying two and practically dragging the other two through the lot. I was so sore the next day. It wasn't really the funnest experience to be honest, but in the end we did find a beautiful tree, and the boys really enjoyed decorating it.

I just love all these pictures of my rosy cheeked kiddos (well... except for Seth who was already in the car trying to get warmed up. It was FREEZING!). And Adalie totally reminds me of the little brother in the Christmas Story... cracks me up!

Welp, back to work for me! I have so many Christmas projects to finish before the big day.