happy new year!

we had a wonderful new year's with jonathan and tammy and kids. we love ringing in the new year with our dear friends! and as the kids get older, it gets even more fun. we arrived at their house after dinner, and the kids got right to playing. before long, natalie, joseph, and ethan went crazy on the couch-- i don't even think anyone got hurt!


caroline thrilled on playing with natalie all evening. i told tammy that i need a 7 year old girl at my house!! at one point, the boys headed back to the kids' room, and they came back quite dismayed at what was posted on the door. i am chuckling thinking about joseph explaining the sign in detail: "and there was a picture of a boy on it with a line through him!"


the girls had made a hideout in the bottom bunk. my daughter was loving it! and it looks like natalie didn't mind entertaining a three year old!


so the boys were determined to make their own sign. joseph was so so cute in his striped pjs, writing so intently. ethan stood nearby coaching him on how to spell "no girls allowed", but they of course needed some help after "no"!


tammy and i quickly constructed a hideout for the boys, and ethan and joseph were prepared to defend their camp!


the kids scrapped their hideouts in time for the ball drop. here they are in anticipation as we counted down! (and according to joseph, 2010 is the year of the monkey???) :)



and here's the gang in their pajamas. (sorry, ethan... your cute pjs were in the washer. and my girls' pjs have owls on them, which i thought was fitting since they were night owls this night!)

ethan- 4 1/2, joseph- 5, claire-2, natalie-7, amelia-11 mos., caroline- 3


"check it out mom! weeee're smiling!"


natalie has obviously let her guard down in the whole baby's-gonna-pull-my-hair department (and she'd better brush up on her skills because there will be a new baby at her house this summer!). as you can see, caroline has become an expert in fleeing amelia's hair-pulling grip!


here we are in 2010! man, i was really slacking with my "0" this year. i have been a "0" every year... you'd think i'd have it down by now!


i still laugh every time i see this picture! jonathan didn't get the memo that we were doing the kiss shot. :) maybe this will be the next "mac vs. pc" commercial!


jonathan goes and goes all day, and when he crashes... he crashes hard and fast. here he is after the inevitable hit. i think i have a picture like this for every new year's! his daughter was not too far behind him!


before i go, look at these cute glasses that natalie and joseph made on new year's day. we were all going to make them on new year's eve, but with all the hiding out and the ball dropping, we just never got around to it. i am hoping to make them with my kids before january is over, but just in case we never do.... here is my precious flower girl in her 2010 glasses!


hope your 2010 has gotten off to a wonderful start!

cozy cousins!

i've been meaning to share this picture for over a month... this is one of my favorite shots of 2009! i snapped it one day with kristie's camera when we were all playing in her yard. i just couldn't resist the three girls in their cutesy hats!

ok, i have to include this one. this isn't even the full-sized picture, but it's too funny not to share. the girls were talking to amelia, and i knew i wanted to get a closeup of the three of them... but i didn't want the stroller in the picture. (this was before i took the above picture). we told them, "get close to amelia! touch your cheek to amelia's cheek!" and this is what the girls did.


caroline looks as if she's thinking, "ok, mom, but this looks really silly!" oh, yes it does!

encouragement for today

as january rolls on, i find myself with a list a mile long of things to do around the house and with the kids. blogging seems to fall further and further down that list as each day passes! i know i will be back before too long to share amelia's birthday this weekend, but until then, i thought i'd share an article that was incredibly encouraging to me. here's a snippet (emphasis mine):

Our children at very young ages have learned to go to God whenever they can't gain self-control on their own. They stop what they are doing and pray. It has been amazing to watch our now 2 yr old daughter do this at 18 months old - then walk away from praying with a smile on her face. It has been my saving grace with her because she tends to get wound up really fast and her temper is quick to take action - I give her the cue - "please stop and pray - you need God." Down she drops, hands folded, head bowed and her sweet words that we can't understand all of the time come out and up to Jesus. We all benefit from watching her do this and has taught our other children to do the same thing when they are hurt, angry, frustrated, sick or not being nice to their siblings.
wow. was that ever convicting to me! sure, we are teaching ethan and caroline to pray... but jill's example pretty much knocked my socks off. i hope you'll take time to read the entire post. it will be a blessing!

quick christmas recap

so christmas is long gone, i know. well, at least it's supposed to be by now! my decorations are still piled up in my foyer just waiting to be packed back into their boxes that are sitting in my frigid garage. and every time i find a stray christmas thing-a-ma-bob lying around the house (usually in the kids' room), i say to myself, "see!? it's a good thing that christmas wasn't all packed up yet!" i love to rationalize procrastination when at all possible. :) anyway... i have a truckload of christmas pictures that are so near and dear to my heart. we had a wonderful, low-key christmas this year. we got together with lots of family, loved our church's christmas eve service, and ate way too much as always. we celebrated jesus' birth and we hung our last ornament on our jesse tree. the kids racked up with 5,478 legos and several other varieties of blocks this year (last year was the year of the train. this year was the year of the blocks.), amelia celebrated her first christmas, and our tree did not fall over again. it was a good, good christmas weekend.

i could spend the next month sharing my favorite pictures from christmas, but considering it's already january 13, let's just get on with 2010, shall we?! here are my favorite favorites. if these leave you wanting to see more, by all means, click on over to my flickr page. there are two sets of christmas pictures: christmas 2009 and christmas day 2009.



amelia had enough of all those kisses...


the kids went shopping for presents for each other again this year. just another effort in our "think of others rather than yourself" campaign. when our kids hit the toy aisles, they are naturally drawn to toys they would like. (i know i'm not alone on that one!) so it took a few reminders to stay focused on their sibling's gift... but they got the point by the time we were finished shopping. ethan and caroline ended up being thrilled about the gifts they chose for each other and for amelia... though caroline really had her heart set on a few $40+ items for amelia! sorry kiddo! and ethan and caroline both amazed me by not even talking to the other one about the presents they'd bought! here they are wrapping their gifts...ethan's to amelia, and caroline's to ethan.



ok, my kids look super old in this picture. PLEASE STOP GROWING! and look how excited ethan was for caroline to open his gift!


we celebrated with my grandma, dad, and joy the weekend before christmas. ethan was overjoyed with his bat, ball, and glove. he and papa headed out to the front yard for some batting practice, and he did pretty well!


papa and grandma joy with our christmas baby!


the kids got these amazing magnet blocks. we laughed when caroline had them all stuck together at the top like this...


it did not take ethan long to figure out that a box of legos has a distinct sound. here he is with gram's present to him, and he has just discovered they they're legos.


after the year of blocks and legos, brian and i need a year of massage therapy. spending hours of quality time on the floor playing legos with your kids is a killer on your back!


God bless the trio blocks because they are not a choking hazard! caroline was not thrilled about amelia getting into her stash...


and it was finally christmas morning!

here is evidence that santa claus is not real: my laundry was still on my love seat when i woke up christmas morning!


as soon as caroline woke up on christmas morning, she was talking about baby Jesus. i loved it. we sang happy birthday to Jesus and blew out the candles.


ethan and caroline could not wait to dig into their stockings.... but they were incredibly patient for a little photo shoot first. (by now, they have given up even fighting it! ha!) this one may be my very favorite from christmas this year.


caroline either peeking into her stocking or hiding from paparazzi mama...


the face every parent wants to see on christmas morning! (and that face only cost me $1 from the target dollar spot!) :)


we headed over to nana and pappy's later that morning. the kids had more stockings to dig into.

the girls' stockings both have a little bear in a pocket, and every year the girls are excited to see these little bears!


caroline received the cutest little beauty shop set from nana, complete with a blowing hairdryer.


ethan and his long-awaited lego camper!


what a gift my sister-in-law is to me....


we could not resist giving pappy this duck hunter game... the duck flies around the room, and you have to shoot it down with the gun. the guys almost lost the duck a few times outside. it was pretty funny to watch the guys play with this.


mrs. brenda bought the girls pink converse hightops! caroline loves them.


karina was so proud of herself curling caroline's hair. she asked me how the curling iron worked, so i showed her how to use it--and then i exclaimed, "and LOOK! her hair is CURLY now!" :)


amelia with nana and mommy


the day after christmas, we traveled over to see brian's extended family. it is always a blessing and a blast!

uncle tom helped ethan with batting practice (the kids all went to the park with everyone while kristie and i had some sister-shopping time!!!!!). isn't this picture so precious?


four generations. priceless.


amelia finally met aunt pam and uncle tom. she didn't realize how nutty they are. but she'll learn soon enough!


the whole family. praise the Lord for family.


so that is our christmas in a very big nutshell. it took a little while to get used to the fact that christmas was over--maybe that was because we still had our decorations up! caroline kept asking to move baby Jesus, and until a couple of days ago, she was still wishing people a merry christmas. :) we had a wonderful new year's with dear friends... i hope i can blog about that soon. we're slowly getting back into our routine, though ethan was convinced we "weren't doing school anymore". amelia's birthday is next friday (!!), so that's the next thing we're getting ready for around here. we hope your christmas was a blessed one!

making more than cookies

this was the first year that the kids and i have made christmas cookies. yes, you read that right. until this year, i, the icing and cookie lover, had yet to share the joy of decorating christmas cookies with my children... but have no fear. we have shared the joy of eating christmas cookies in the past. oh, yes we have. but this year, i thought that the kids were old enough to really have fun with the cutting out and the icing. we all had a ball. my mom came over to help out, which was a good thing. (she kept us all from eating all the dough! and you think i'm kidding...)

here are two excited kiddos ready to get started!


gram enjoyed taking some time off work to spend the morning with us. ethan loved having her help us cut out the cookies. (this picture is one of my favorites from this christmas!)


caroline got the hang of cutting out the cookies, too.


but before long, caroline could be found doing a little clean-up work...


and here is that child again, sneaking some dough!


caroline was not the only one who wanted a taste...


he knows he's caught!


this picture is one of my favorites from the day.... that bowl of dough was so tempting. (wonder where my kids get it from!)


before long, we'd finished cutting out all the cookies....


and caroline was complaining that her hands were dirty. i guess it did not occur to her that what was on her hands was the same dough that she was chowing down on just 10 minutes prior to this...


the cooling cookies looked yummy... and they were. i had to do a taste test on just one. for the record, it was a broken snowman.


oh what fun we had icing these cookies! i may have had more fun than the kids. my sprinkle of choice is the nonpareil.


both of them actually did pretty well icing the cookies. caroline had no problem cleaning up her mess as she worked, if you know what i mean. (and keep an eye out for ethan's yellow star in another picture.)


gram helped ethan make a super cute snowman.


caroline's favorite task of the day was applying these little rainbow chips to her cookies. she used them for ornaments on christmas trees, and here, she is making one colorful snowflake! speaking of colorful, look at this girl's tongue. who even knows how many pink rainbow chips she ate!


the fruits of our labor! ok, see if you can find ethan's yellow star now....


it's the RED star on the top right. it was yellow until a little mishap with the red sugar. :)

it was a true test of patience for ethan and caroline to wait until after naptime to enjoy a cookie. and then of course, i made them take pictures first! here they are with their cute snowmen. caroline wants you to please notice that her snow-girl has a flower on her hat (just like hers). and lemme tell you, these snowmen were some tough cookies (literally!). the kids dropped them more than a few times as i tried to get this picture, and they never broke! whew!


picking their cookie to eat.... such a tough choice!


and here is the moment they'd been waiting for all day.... eating that cookie! i laughed because they both chose the swirly ones that i quickly made at the end, trying to use up the rest of the (delicious) icing. i thought for sure they'd choose a cookie that they had made!


and caroline could not wait to show daddy all the cookies that they had made when he got home that evening.


confession: i could not stop eating these cookies. they were so so good. i'm not saying that to brag. i didn't come up with the recipe. they were just so darn good. and sadly, i have very little willpower when it comes to treats like these. the only thing that stopped me from eating them all was that i did not like some of the sprinkles that we used. i know, it's pathetic. isn't the dad supposed to be the one that eats all the kids' cookies!??!?!? well, brian is not a big sweets guy, so i guess i have to play that role in our house.


so these were some good little cookies. here is the recipe from my friend who is probably tired of hearing me talk about these cookies. :) haha!

sugar cookies

1C butter, softened
1C sugar
1t vanilla
1 large egg
2t baking powder
3C all-purpose flour

preheat oven to 400 degrees.
cream butter and sugar in mixer.
beat in egg and vanilla.
mix baking powder and flour, add one cup at a time, mixing after each addition.
DO NOT CHILL DOUGH.
divide into 2 balls. (eat some.)
on a floured surface, roll dough into 12-inch circle 1/8th of an inch thick.
cut into desired shapes. (eat what's left.)
bake cookies on un-greased cookie sheet on top rack of oven 6-7 minutes or until lightly browned.
do not resist the urge to try one. they're delicious even without icing.

sugar cookie glaze

stir these ingredients together:
1 cup powdered sugar
1 tablespoon corn syrup
2 tablespoons water
a splash {1/2 teaspoon, maybe} of almond extract, or whatever flavoring you desire. (we used almond.... my absolute favorite!)

divide the mixture into smaller containers and stir in 2-3 drops of food coloring per container making each a different color. (you may need to add more sugar or water to get it to the consistency you like it.)
use paintbrushes or a spoon to apply icing to the cookies. (my friend used paintbrushes, and we used spoons.)

this makes around 3 dozen cookies. (just an estimate, based on how much dough you actually bake!)

we didn't just make cookies this day. we made lots of memories that will last long after i've finally burned off those cookie calories! my mom and i are determined to make this a yearly tradition from now on. i'm sure the kids won't mind one bit! and i'm gonna find my heart cookie cutter because valentine's day isn't too far away!