Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Gingerbread houses and Xmas stuff

Since Justin is in school full time I figure it is about time I actually volunteer at the schools. Fall is a tough time because of my business, but since things are quieter I have stepped it up. I volunteered to chaperone a field trip for Jessica and she was over the moon excited. She couldn't stop talking about it for the entire week before. Then last week I signed up to bake 6 dozen cookies for the teachers at her school, help with gingerbread houses for the 3rd grade, and supply the baked good snack for both of their class parties- um oops I think I am going to spread it out a bit more in the future.

The entire 3rd grade does gingerbread houses. Each child was asked to supply a carton, box of graham crackers, can of frosting and $2 to buy the candies. I got their early to help set up. There are 3 classes, so each class was assigned to one long table.

Jessica working hard on her creation. It became clear that when they asked for parent volunteers what they really wanted was help cleaning up- the kids did not need or want help at all.
Jessica's friend Olivia.

Jess with her teacher and some classmates.

Jessica's friend Sara.
The madness in full swing.
The whole class displaying their houses.

Jessica's end result.
For Jessica's class we made Cake Balls- didn't think I could pull off Bakerella's cool creations. So we improvised. I made the balls with a cookie scoop and put a candy cane in it instead of stick. It didn't really matter what they looked like- they were pretty yummy.

and for a little photography fun: the unedited version.
Did quite get this house decorated. We put up our inflatables but because we are at the top of a hill the wind really did them in. We used to live on a street where only 3 people put up lights, now we are on a street where everyone has lights up- we look so dull and boring. Definitely going to up our game next year. Here is a glimpse of a little of what I did. That garland on the railing lights up. I have so many extra stockings that we decided to hang them up and NO they won't be filled by Santa- the kids asked. Jessica has decided to use the Hogwarts stocking that Becky's mom knitted for me a few years ago.

A very cool sunset a few nights ago.

Dave's Party

On December 12th we headed to Allentown, PA to celebrate Dave Haight's 40th birthday. His wife Susan had planned a surprise party for him.

Mimi had agreed to take our kids overnight and she had lots of plans. When we arrived at her house she told the kids that there were gold coins hidden somewhere in her house and they would have to try to find them. After that information came out they didn't even care to say goodbye to us. Then Mimi brought them to Target so they could buy their own Xmas presents- they both chose Pokemon cards. Then they made a beautiful gingerbread house together. On Sunday morning Mimi brought the kids over to Grandmommy's house where they made Xmas cookies together. Needless to say they didn't miss us at all.

We arrived at Dave's in plenty of time and were so excited to see our many friends who travelled from far and wide. Dave is a friend from Frost Valley. Dave is not known for being on time but to his credit it was perfectly on time for his surprise. And yes he was very surprised. He was clearly overwhelmed when he realized how many people had come to wish him happy birthday.

Cindy, she came from Virginia, Dee- from MA, and Krisser from Wisconsin.

Lori came from North Carolina- and we were all so excited to see her, it has been about 5 years since I last saw her, and Sue from CT.

Corrinne, who came from upstate NY and Dave also from CT.

Dave and his father, Dave, were both celebrating birthdays.

The birthday boys!
Dee, tolerating Corinne and her touchy touchy nature.
7 of us got a suite together at a local hotel. We had such a great time and such a nice visit. We all agreed that there is something special about our time at FV. We were completely isolated and had to rely on each other for all social interactions- when we went home at the end of the work day- there they were! When you went into work- there they were! It was just so nice to be with people that I haven't "lived" with in almost 15 years and yet we fell into all our old ways, laughing, talking and joking with one another.

The worst part of the weekend was the drive home- a drive that lasted 3.5 hours to get there took us 7.5 hours to get home- ugh.

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Snow Day!

The kids had a snow day last week. The member of the family that most enjoyed the snow day was Buddy. He is not an outside cat at all in the winter. I set up a bed for Buddy on my desk. He likes to be close by and if there isn't a spot designated for him then he will knock everything off the desk to find himself a spot. He and I have hung out here for hours in the past few weeks. I like to think I have been more productive than he has...

We bought our tree the night before the snow day so we spent the day decorating the tree, a great snow day activity.

Every year Grandma Sara sends the kids a holiday craft- so we pulled that out as well. This year they made some sparkly doves for the tree.

They even added little wings to the side- they look so pretty on the tree.
Here is our tree that night...

Cookie Day

[disclaimer again: absolutely no editing occured on these photos so please ignore the horrible yellow tint that clouds the indoor shots- thank you]

The first weekend in December was Cookie Weekend. We, the cookie club, were planning on getting together on Sunday to share 3 types of cookies- 2 we bake ahead and one we bake together. So I spent Saturday baking cookies. Justin and I made M&M cookies. He was a champ.

Jessica and Marc didn't really have an interest in helping- then when the M&M cookies came out of the oven they suddenly appeared. Justin and I had just read the Little Red Hen story the night before- are you familiar with that story? Who will help me make the bread? Not I said the others. But when it came time to eat the bread they were all willing to help- but the Little Red Hen said no you didn't help make the bread so you don't get to help eat the bread. Justin and I discussed it and we decided we would let them eat some even though they didn't help.

I think that made Jessica a little nervous so she jumped in to help with the next batch of cookies. An oatmeal slice and bake that contains chocolate chips, toffee chips and craisins.
I also decided to make a caramel slice and bake pinwheel cookie. Justin was put on caramel unwrapping duty- he did a great job and only ate a few...

On to Sunday- we met at Dee's apartment around noon. Dee had been baking all morning. She made spritz cookies because it is fun to have different shapes on the plates.

Dee working hard.

Becky's hugs on holiday pretzels waiting to go in the oven.
Robin and Dee- don't we all look so nice on Cookie Day?
Emily stopped by to help out and play Vanna for Dee's almond cookies.
hmmm, no pics of Becky, not sure how that happened.

Here is the end result back at home.
My little elves making up the boxes to share with teachers and friends.

Thanksgiving

Well as I continue to catch up on my blogging we head to Thanksgiving. [I have done no editing on these photos in my desire to just get them on the blog!] The four of us headed down to Grandmommy's house. Grandmommy got the kids these cute aprons and hats- Justin refused to wear his, but doesn't Jessica look super cute?

Jessica and Marc taking their job of making crescent rolls very seriously.


Grandmommy demonstrating how to open the Thanksgiving Crackers...

End of the night Jessica showing off her new dress. Grandmommy took her shopping for the dress and when Jessica went to try it on she said, "I have never been in a dressing room before!"

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

New York City in November

The weekend before Thanksgiving found our whole family in New York City but not together. Marc and Jessica already had plans to go to the city to visit with Josh and his family before they moved to Spain for 6 months. But Josh's family had another obligation during the day on Saturday so Jessica and Marc headed to see the Statue of Liberty. Our point and shoot camera had been missing since we moved out of our house so Marc borrowed the Tuckers. One of Marc's biggest accomplishments on this trip was feeling like he got a good handle on the subway system. Here is Jessica waiting for a train.




uh... not sure what is going on here, but I assume it is Jessica at the gift shop.

Unfortunately since it was the first weekend of a holiday week the crowds were huge and they couldn't get a ticket to see inside the statue- so Jessica lost interest pretty quickly.

Meanwhile.... in Hartford Justin and I went to Legofest with Becky and Jack. Please pardon the absolutely horrible pictures that I took on my Blackberry- yuck.

A huge Lego Hagrid!

ok, pretty sure you can't tell, but this is Justin sitting on a lego horse and Jack pretending like he is getting pulled along.

Unfortunately the crowd was HUGE and our boys do not like waiting in line very much so we left after about 2 hours.

Now earlier in the week I received an email from Katherine that she was heading to NYC that night (she lives in Hong Kong). She is notorious for flying in on a moments notice often making it difficult for us to get together. The exception was when she gave me almost a month's notice in September and I was able to get after school coverage and spend a wonderful 24 hours with her and Bruce and her parents. Well I told her that I could come down on Saturday but I would have to bring Justin with me, and she said no problem.

By the time we reached the city Jessica and Marc were done with their adventure and we all met at Katherine's hotel. Jessica was so excited to take Justin to Nintendo World so we all headed out. Needless to say the Pokemon area was quite a draw.


After going out to dinner at TGIF- yup we were in Manhattan and ate at TGIF. We split up and Marc and Jess headed back to the Tucker's apartment. Justin was still VERY hyped up so Kath and I took him back to Nintendo World where we let him jump around and play Wii for about an hour and we were able to have a nice visit.

We went back to the hotel and I explained that Justin would be sleeping with me or on the floor. Justin, never one to except the limits given to him made up his mind that he would be sharing Katherine's bed with her. They joked about it for awhile and then Katherine went into the bathroom, when she came out Justin was all tucked into her bed and patting the other side- "oh Katherine!". I offered to crawl in with him later but she is a good sport- and sleeps like the dead so she became his bedmate. In the morning we headed to her brother Doug's apartment to see her mom. Doug has 3 boys of his own so adding one more didn't phase anyone there. Sebastian, Doug's youngest, who is 9 took Justin under his wing and hung out with him most of the day. They did things like play video games and fence...

After Marc came by and picked up Justin to bring him home Sebastian said that Justin was one of the most energetic kids he had ever met. This caused us all to giggle because Sebastian is often described this very same way.

oh the good news is we have since located our point and shoot camera- no more pathetic Blackberry pictures for me.

another funny story- we passed a man on the streets of NYC dressed as Santa. As we passed by Santa said, "do you want to take a picture?" and I brush him off saying, "oh we don't have a camera" for which Justin busts me VERY loudly "yes you do! liar liar pants on fire!"