Pizza, Popcorn and Penguins.

Jingle and the Advent Calendar have been a lot of fun this Christmas season.  This weekend we had several fun activities brought to us by that crazy elf.

But first, Friday Joel and I had a date day.  We try to save at least 1 vacation day a year to spend with each other.  We started out with a killer breakfast at a local diner.  I pretty much order "one of each" from the menu.  7 hours later, I was still stuffed.  However, that didn't stop me from then eating a Chipotle burrito and re-upping my stuffed-ed-ness.

Besides eating, we also went shopping at the outlet mall and got Joel a few much needed shirts - I was pretty sick of the same 3 t-shirts he always wears so this was mostly for my benefit.  After shopping we headed home and worked on wrapping the kids presents.  We don't have any good hiding spots in the house so this is what we did with the wrapped gifts:

Guessing we won't get away with this half-assed hiding spot for too many more years.  

That night, since Joel and I were stuffed from the eating portions of our date day, we decided to get personal pan pizzas for the kiddos and let them have a special treat of eating dinner in front of the TV.  They had gotten a Christmas movie as the Advent calendar prize.  They thought this was pretty sweet.

Today the Advent Calendar activity had the kids pick out 3 toys each that they no longer play with to donate to the kids who don't have any many toys as we do.  I can not believe how well this over.  The kids were very cooperative and willing to pick out toys.  I really expected a battle and crying but there was none.  Not a single tear.

So to reward the kids for being so good and willing to give up toys they no longer play with, we decided to treat them to a trip to the movies.  Lily's only been once and Tyler's never been.  They got so excited.  We boxed up the toys, dropped them off and then had some time to kill before the movie so we ran in to Walmart to kill time.

We wandered through the Christmas department which the kids ALWAYS request to do.  They got a hold of this giant stuffed Santa and told him what they wanted for Christmas.  This is the closest they would willingly get to any Santa this year.

Then off to the movies we went!  We saw The Penguins of Madagascar.  The kids did pretty good at the theater.  I brought lots of snacks and drinks in addition to the popcorn since it was lunch time.  We tore through everything.  Lily loved the movie and was really intent the whole time.  Tyler got super tired about half way through causing him to get a little cranky - but that was short lived cause it didn't take long for him to pass out on his Daddy's lap.

Lily was boogieing down during the credits at the end.  She kept making this goofy face the one of the penguins makes during the show.  It was super funny - unfortunately my camera wasn't snapping the picture fast enough in the dark to really capture it.

Also, going to the movies as a family before noon costs the same as Joel and I going to the movies by ourselves in the evenings!  I foresee many more weekend matinees in our future!

Baking Cookies.

Sunday afternoon, the kids and I baked some cookies to take to the teachers at Kidz First.  It all started out with making some M&Ms cookies - which the kids helped me whip up.  They took turns dumping ingredients in the bowl and even using the hand mixer.  Lily only flung flour all over us once.  Not bad, actually, in terms of mess making. 

But the best part was the kids sampling the cookie dough.  That was definitely my favorite part of baking cookies when I was a kid (who am I kidding - even now that's my favorite part) and clearly they are the same way.  

Even Jason came around to check out the cookie dough action.

I ended up in the kitchen for like 6-7 hours.  I don't know what I thinking.  Actually, I do.  It was a mess of a train wreck of thoughts.  It went something like this:

• I need some ideas for the Advent Calendar.  Ooh baking cookies with the kids is a good one.  I'll wrap up some baking M&Ms and plan that activity for a Sunday.
• Ohh, we could bake the cookies for their teachers at school.  That way, I won't have all these cookies in my house and be tempted to eat them all.
• (at grocery store on Saturday morning):  Ohh, here's some refrigerated sugar cookie dough.  We can bake those too, for the teachers.
• Hmm, two different kinds of cookies, that doesn't really seem very exciting to give to the teachers.  How about peanut butter cookies too - those are Joel's favorite so I'm sure he'd appreciate that.
• Oh, if I'm going to make peanut butter cookies, I need Hershey's kisses on top - back to the store for that Saturday afternoon.
• Hmm, well, the kids will like the M&M and sugar cookies and the peanut butter is to satisfy Joel, but chocolate chip is my favorite and I have those ingredients so I'll just whip up a batch of those too.
• Joel:  "I don't like Hershey's kisses on top of my peanut butter cookies."  Doh, now I have a whole bag of Hershey's kisses I really don't need in the house - we still have a mountain of Halloween candy to eat.
• Ohhh, that toffee that Phyllis made was so good and she said it was just butter and sugar and I have that stuff so maybe I can whip up a batch of that too.  That won't take very long.
• Wow, now my Christmas cookie present to the teachers is really coming together.  This will be so nice.  
• Oh, I can throw those Hershey's kisses in the cookie tin too!  That will look great!
• Ok, let's see, where are we now:
• Peanut butter cookies are baked (phone call number one to Phyllis for recipe).  Snuck Hershey's kisses on top of one cookie sheet full.
• Toffee is made and setting up on the counter (phone call #2 to Phyllis to confirm instructions for melting the chocolate on top of the toffee).  
• Dough is made for the M&Ms and the chocolate chip.  
• Kids are waking up from nap, they can help me bake the M&M cookies now (that was a dumb idea - help me? - they don't understand how to make tablespoon size balls on the cookies sheet - they just understand how to make a mess and lick the spoon).
• Oh, crud, I still haven't done anything with that sugar cookie dough.  I'll get to that in a minute.  Do I have sprinkles or anything for those?  Let me check.
• Ok finished up baking the M&M and Chocolate chip cookies - oh wow this is a lot of cookies.
• Oh man, my back, knees and feet are killing me.  Why did I bake all afternoon barefoot?  I should have put my tennis shoes on. 
• I still haven't done that sugar cookie dough.  What time is it?  Oh it's 5:00.  Dang it.  I wanted to work on knitting those legwarmers for Lily.
• Joel:  "We should get dinner ready soon, right? Are we eating leftovers?"  Me:  "I'm eating lettuce.  I've been licking the spoon all afternoon and sampling fresh cookies to make sure they are good enough to give away to other people."
• Crap.  Speaking of dinner... I didn't get this week's meat prepped.  I was going to clean and trim the chicken breast and brown up that turkey italian sausage.  Oh and there's 3 pounds of grapes in there I was going to wash and put in snack baggies.  
• My back is killing me.
• I still didn't do that sugar cookie dough.  And I need to whip up the icing to put on top. 
• It's bath night.  Crap.  I'm too tired. 
• Oh the toffee is ready to break apart.  Let me just taste a little bite of this.  Crap, this isn't even half as good as Phyllis's.  
• "Joel, taste this.  What do you think?"  
• "Uh, it's fine honey."  
• "But it's not as good as your mom's right?" 
• "Uh, no, I mean, it tastes the same as hers but it's not as crunchy or something.  The flavor is fine, just a different texture.  Really, babe, it's good."  
• Liar.  
• "It was your first time making it.  Now you know you how it goes and maybe next time you can cook it longer." 
• This is a lot of cookies - I think I'm skipping the sugar cookies.  I can't stand here any longer and I still have to assemble the actual cookie tins.  This is going to have to be good enough.
• Oh, wow, I can't fit all these cookies in these tins.  So much for not having a lot of leftover cookies.
• Where is my heating pad?

Christmas in Black and White.

The kids had their Christmas program yesterday at the Church where they go to daycare.  The theme was Christmas in Black and White and they've been practicing everyday at school for months and months.  The kids even had a CD with all the music on it which we played at home multiple times a week - singing and doing our "motions."

This year's program was awesome.  Totally awesome.  It was a little play featuring some penguins (adult members of the church), some big kids (child members of the church) playing students and a teacher and then of course all the precious little daycare kiddos.  They were fully decked out in black and white clothes and let me tell you - that was a freakin' cute bunch of kiddos.  

The only down side was that they didn't bring littlest kids out until about half way through.  So at first, I was like, where's my kids?  I want to see my cute little kiddos standing up there singing.  But turns out that was really the best plan because this little play was long - like an hour (which was totally fine because it was so cute and funny).  And the 30 minutes that the age 4 and under group was out there, was about 10 minutes too long cause they were losing interest. 

I'm happy to report that neither of my kids cried or ran out to the audience to find Joel and I.  Somehow the Christmas versions of these programs almost always go better than the Easter ones.  I think we've had a meltdown every Easter but never at Christmas.  Hmm...

Lily.  Lily, Lily, Lily.  That girl hardly sang a word or did any of her motions.  I have no idea why not.  She wasn't upset.  She didn't act like she had stage fright but she must have had it a little because the motions that she did do, were super reserved.  Like, if you didn't KNOW what she was supposed to be doing, you would have missed that she actually kind of did it.  She sang a few lines in each song, but that's it.  It's like she gets distracted by all the people and forgets she's supposed to be doing something.  Afterwards, she insisted that she sang all the songs and did all her motions and even showing her the videos did not change her perception.  She was, however, beautiful standing up there - a full head taller than her friends.  

Tyler on the other hand....he did a ton of motions and even some singing.  I was so proud of him, I thought I might spontaneously combust.  There was only one minor debate between Tyler and his friend Graydon.  They got in to the "My Mommy!" argument.  This is the one where one of the boys will say "My Mommy" and sometimes point to said Mommy.  And the other one will respond with, "No!  My Mommy!" Sometimes Daddy is substituted for Mommy.  This happened during one of the songs where they should have been singing and signing - but it was a relatively quiet debate and didn't draw too much attention.  Not like earlier in the program, where Graydon had been screaming "HI DADDY!" at the top of his lungs - for like a full 2 minutes.  He had the whole church rollin'.

What a precious morning.  

What the random.

These two were being so sweet and precious, laying together on the couch giggling and whispering.

And then I got the camera out and they got wild.

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We went out to eat a couple weeks ago and Tyler literally fell asleep sitting up in the booth.

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Joel took the kiddos to Josh and Marie's a couple weekends ago while I went in to work for a few hours (boo).  Tyler hung out with his Uncle Josh and helped load some wood in the truck.  Then he was treated to a fourwheeler ride.  

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Auntie Ree spoiled the kiddos with sugar.  And socks from Kjestine's work.  

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We were wrapping presents the other night (non Santa delivered presented) and the kids were cracking us up trying to package themselves up in these diaper boxes.  

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Tyler the bag man.  Not unlike Lily the bag lady that we met a couple years ago.

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Lily and I participated in an Angel Tree activity with my coworkers.  Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures  of that but Lily did a great job helping me pick out some toys and books for a two year old boy in need.  I kept asking her to think about what Tyler might like to have to help her figure out what to pick for another little boy.  She did great.  After the wrapping, we went to my desk and Lily worked on her letters on my dry erase board.  She instructed me not to take a photo...I didn't listen.

Meanwhile, Tyler was devastated that I didn't take him with me too (I had picked Lily up from daycare and Tyler saw me leave with her).  I felt AWFUL so I immediately called Joel and told him he needed to do something special with Tyler as soon as he got off of work.  So they went to Steak and Shake for a happy hour milkshake.  Tyler's devastation was cured.

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Lily as a Salvation Army Bell Ringer.  She thought that was pretty great.  The actual bell ringer INSISTED that I take a picture of this.  So, yeah....

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With the threat of snow a few weeks ago, I took the kids to get new snow boots.  Tyler's are light up Spider-man.  He likes to wear them to bed.

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Lily was flying her baby....

And then her baby took a header....

Luckily this has never happened when Joel or I were flying the kids..... right??

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Joel has a serious, and I mean SERIOUS, aversion to hanging Christmas lights.   Like before we got married, he told me, "I hope you're not someone who likes to hang Christmas lights.  Cause if you are, either you're going to have to do it yourself, or we shouldn't get married, cause I'm not doing it."

Even having kids has not softened him up in this area.  It's not the lights themselves that he doesn't like.  He just doesn't want to hang them.  He'd rather drive around for hours looking at other people's Christmas lights.

So you can imagine Joel's DELIGHT when he pulled in the driveway after work one day to find a giant inflatable penguin in our front yard.  A gift to Lily and Tyler from Meme and Papaw.  It was a hit....with the kids....

Joel on the other hand....I think there's still a little steam coming out of his ears.  As for me?  I'm still laughing (but only on the inside so as not to incite a riot in my household).  

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Yeah, I have no words...

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Lily is big time in to "reading" to us.  She loves to hold the book like the teachers do.  Sometimes she tells real stories and sometimes it's complete and total gibberish and made up words.  Pretty funny.

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Dance class is going well.  Joel took her the last time and he had a minor brain fart and thought the class started at 4, but it doesn't start til 4:30.  So they were there really early.  The kids ended up running around and playing and dancing in the class room.  Joel shot a few videos of Lily bossing all the other kids around.  It. Was. HYS-STER-RI-CAL.  Hysterical.

She was telling them to glide.  And then MARCH!  MARCH!  MARCH!  And then crawl and slide on the ground.  Most of the kids were doing whatever she told them to.  I was dying.  Bossy McBossFace - do not ask me how we invent some of these nicknames, I don't know - but that was her nickname that day, for sure.

Meanwhile, during the class, Joel and Tyler wandered the building a little.  Tyler was caught spying on the older ladies....