Christmas Goodies YUM

We went to my parents house to make an array of cookies to take people. The day before Cirdan and I went through his family recipe book and looked at a few recipes. We found some yummy recipes and then went to the store to buy the ingredients. My mom also had some ideas that she wanted to make. We made some traditional and non traditional Christmas cookies. All tasted delicious! I am glad that Christmas is over so that I won't be tempted with all the baked goods around the house.
We took plates of cookies over to friends and family later that night on the way to a Christmas party and also the next night. The kids had fun helping us take them to people's houses. This is something I remember my family doing growing up and I am glad that I can also do this with my kids.

Ava and Ella helped decorate the sugar cookies. Kaiya went to her dad's house for a few hours.




Jett was a good baby watching us in his car seat.

Peanut butter balls

Uncle Jim's Double chocolate mint cookies (made with Andes mints)

Oreo truffles

Chocolate pretzels

Truffles (coconut, coco and nut)

Sue's chocolate chip cookies (made with coconut, nuts and oats)

Peanut Brittle (made by my mom)

Sugar cookies

It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year...

This Christmas was busy with 4 kids! Ava came into town on the 22nd and left on the 26th. It was wonderful to spend our first Christmas with her. I think she was a little overwhelmed with all the gifts. Not sure if she has ever seen that many before in her life all at once. Even though her mom is Jewish she still celebrates a little bit of Christmas. This was also our first Christmas with Jett. He is still so small he didn't know what was going on but I think he liked his gifts he got from Santa. :)
Things we did while Ava was here... (not in order)
Went to my parents house to make cookies
Delivered cookies to friends and family
Went to the Nye Christmas party
Ava and Jett met each other and Ava enjoyed holding her new brother
The girls made up dances and wanted to perform them for us all the time
Relaxed and enjoyed our time together
Played with new Christmas toys
The girls played dress up
Went to church
Got pictures with Santa
Spent Christmas Eve with my family and skyped with Cirdan's family that night
Opened gifts
Went to my parents house Christmas morning for breakfast and stayed there most of the day
Girls played with their DS's
Took a bunch of pictures!



It's so much work doing a long blog with a bunch of pictures so I think I will break it up in little blog entries. We hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas!

Twinkle Toes

The girls had their Christmas dance performance a few weeks ago. It was very cute and we loved every minute of it! The themes of each performance were Polar Express, New Years Bash (hip hop) and a Christmas Carol.
When the dance studio opened up a class for 2 1/2 year olds we were so excited! Ella just made the cut off and we signed her up. It's a tap/ballet class. We had no idea that she would be in the Christmas performance! We found out when I went to make a payment and there was a charge for Ella's costume. A 2 1/2 year old dancing on stage! Crazy! That and having her wait backstage with her class without Cirdan or I. Scary. I almost didn't let her perform. I talked to the owner of the studio (who is wonderful) and Cirdan talked to some other parents and they made us (and by us I mean me....Cirdan wanted her to dance regardless, he was excited) feel a lot more comfortable. She ended up doing very well. When it was her turn to go onstage she walked out and started dancing. The crowd started to laugh (because the kids were so cute) and the kids stopped. The audience then started to clap and the kids started dancing again. Ella is the youngest in her class but she did the best! Two of the kids ran off stage even before the dance started. We were so proud! We were able to pick her up at intermission and then she came and sat by us for the rest of the performances.

Kaiya was in 4 dances. Tap, ballet, hip hop and Jazz. It was a busy night for her! She loves to dance and it shows. She doesn't get nervous and she has a smile on her face the whole time. She wants to try out for one of the characters for the end of year recital. I am not sure yet if we will let her because that just means lots more dance practices and mostly every Saturday until June. She will already be in 4 dances again. Plus she starts her competitions for Xtreme this next year....which we are looking forward to!

I took pictures of Kaiya in all her costumes...
Tap...

Jazz...

Ballet...

Hip hop...

Kaiya says...

When I get older and if I have a girl her name will be...
Ethel Jean Bess (and then the last name)

and if its a boy his name will be...
Waly (way-lee) Bo Eric (and then the last name)

I sure hope she changes her mind by then. YIKES

Gingerbread Houses 2010

We got together at my parents house for our Christmas tradition of making gingerbread houses. Just like all the other years we try and come up with the best house. My dad put shredded wheat on his house roof which I thought looked great! Cirdan and I put marshmallows on ours trying to get the snow effect on the roof. Stacey's house was full of colorful candy and I thought it was super cute!
My mom invited some people from her ward to also build a house with us. They were very creative and gave us lots of good ideas for the years to come!

Missionaries were there to help for a little while...

Jett helped us with our house...

Ella in the dog house.....literally

And of course we have to take our group pictures by the houses...

The whole gang

Too bad this picture is blurry