On the 12th Day of Christmas

  
Last night I put together a quick batch of dough for sugar cookies. ((I also made a batch of my own creation. The dough still in bowl in icebox-so we shall see if they are any good.))I threw the sugar cookie dough into a ziplock baggy into the freezer. I later came to regret that.

As soon as we woke up the kids were hyper as all get out. They noticed that each stocking had more inside it and they squilled and squilled.

We got the kitchen tidied up and then we prepared to roll out some dough and cut some shapes. However the damn dough took so darn long to unthaw that I knew I would run out of time for River to stay asleep so I put the bag in some hot water. 
After some time I came back and wouldn’t you know it, there was a hole in the bag. So now we had wet dough. I did what I could and we began. I should have made more but I felt so over it that I didn’t try harder to make it extra special for the kids.

   
 We cut our shapes and cooked them. The. For the first time ever(I’ve never done this) we made a frosting for our Christmas cookies. My friend(shout out to Charity!) who is a mother of three giant boys, gave me a quick recipe she uses, and I modified it to what I had.

I melted one stick of butter, stirred in nearly one pound of powered sugar and about a 4th cup of milk. Stir stir stir. The look was nice and creamy.

I then divided the batch into 4 separate bowls and added food coloring to them.

   
    

Little brother Samwise helped by eating

 We used spoons and mostly our (washed) hands to apply the frosting in an artistic way. 😉

No matter what, kids have a blast making sugar cookies, but this ampt it up like 5 volumes!

We also sprinkled color sugar sprinkles on top. They look almost to beautiful to eat….almost. Santa is going to be super stoked. 😉

   
    
 
 

all our sweet yummys-iphone picture

 
This concludes our Christmas cheer activities. I want to note that though I didn’t have a blog dedicated to it, every year we go and find toys and belongings to donate. This also helps us de-clutter. This year we donated over 200 pounds.

I also want to share that Jesus is so good to me. In honor of his birth our family gives each child 3 gifts each. Just as baby Jesus did. Though on top of it he was blessed by his Heavenly Father abundantly. So we try to stuff our stockings until they overflow. Like our cup of blessings from the Father.

Merry, happy Christmas. I can’t wait until the morning!!!!! xoxoxo

  

Making Mitten Keepsakes

  
Day 11 of our 12 days of Christmas was spent making mitten ornaments!!!

I still had salt dough left over from the very first batch. I kept what we didn’t use in a ziplock in the freezer and I found it very handy to pull out through out this season.

I wanted to make these handprint ornaments I saw online and with just going by the picture I remembered in my head, I took on the challenge.

They didn’t turn out as pretty as I had hoped but I’m thinking i might do better next time.
I found that it was smartest for us to roll a big ball, smooth out a good space with a rolling pin, and to put it on your baking pan after you have sprayed the hand with oil(so you don’t stick). Pressing your kids hand down in the dough anywhere other than the pan is hard because you have to try to transplant the pressed dough without distorting the print.
  All four of my kids got their hands printed. I thought trying to get the little ones to keep their hands open would be tough. However, Samwise was very interested in what we were doing, though he tried to grab a handful of the print right when I was pulling his pressed hand away.

Little man River was also a surprise as you know how babies like to keep their hands in tight fists. Yet, once again I was surprised at how easily he let me press his hand in. It only took the first try with both the boys.

The larger hands were more difficult because of the dough being not as even when I rolled them out, I think. 

   
 We used the colors to make a nice gloss over our mittens. Poor Sparrow used and ugly brown she thought was gold and hers turned out not very pretty, so we tried to fix it by putting a violet color over it. 

Even though the bigger ones weren’t the best, I’m in LOVE with River’s. I made sure to write, “1st Christmas” on the back. 

   

theyre heavy so mack sure you double wrap. the hanging wired

 
   
   
     
 

Ginger Houses and Santa Rings

  

 My sister brought both girls ginger bread houses from Ambleside school, (I think they had a fund raiser or something).
It was a surprise and quite honestly, an answer to prayer because I had yet to go out and buy us ginger bread house kits.

What is so great about having more kids is that when it comes to projects, I’m not as much as a control-all-they-do-so-it-looks-better-mom. I relax(ha!) and just let them handle what they want to do and if they ask for help, I’m there.

The girls did all their decorating themselves and I’m sad to say I forgot to take a picture of their finished product.

  
   
 For this 10th day of Christmas cheer we had to deal with the death of our beloved cat Ophelia, who got hit by a car. We had video messages from Santa for the kids to all watch, but we didn’t know how to continue when we had just discovered what had become of Ophelia. We decided it was best to tell the girls, have a good cry and then distract them with Santa’s messages. It worked for the most part except afterward we could hear poor Apple weeping into her pillow throughout bedtime. Ophelia was after all her baby.

We made a video of the kids watching one of the videos and their adorable excitement, but my husband is so busy he has yet to send me the video from his phone.

Cards for School Friends

  
I’m super behind so I’m just going to make a rush job of this. Day 9b (because I did extra activities) of our 12 days of Christmas!Last Friday both the girls had their school Christmas parties before the end of year break.

  
I’ve learned that as long as I have:brown stock paper, cookie cutters, glue, and glitter, we can make cards for their school parties all year round. I’ll try to put a link in the morning of how we do this process but for now here is a few images. Sparrow girl chose a tree cookie cutter this year. Apple girl chose the star one, but when it came to their teachers card, she decided to switch it up and go with a unicorn.

 We cut little cards for friends and big cards for teachers. Each card came with a fruity flavored candy cane.

Sweater Party

my iphone ‘s glass is broken- hence the weird haze.

Last Sunday we had a (mostly) last minute Christmas sweater party, which was also the last day of Hanukkah. While I can tell you that I ended up laughing my head off, I can’t show much by way of photos. I stayed up til nearly 3am making a hearty lentil and onion beef stew for our guests. My lovely Hunukkah celebrating friend, Sarah-who just moved back home to Texas after living in Germany for the past 3 years-brought me some latkes and delicious challah. She has four kids and as a mom with four kids I knew I could count on her to bring a good amount of yumminess to the party. And boy she did not disappoint! My bread loving husband was in heaven!!

It was brilliant actually as I invited another Hanukkah family, whom I’m just getting to know- but all of our kids got on so wonderfully that is was totally sweet and memorable for me. I don’t think my Samwise has made such a connection with kids his own age before.  
I had extra dough from our salt dough project and thought it would be fun for all the kids to get to do that together at the party.
   
    Not only did the kids get on, but us adults ended up having a fun, laughing time playing Fibbage and Cards against humanity.

Here’s a picture of a few of us Christmas sweater wearing friends at the first McFarlane Sweater Party- our 9th day of Christmas cheer.
  
  
 

Last Saturday’s Drive Through

image taken last year

 Last Saturday we crossed off a Christmas tradition that we’ve done since we had our first baby. A live Christmas journey drive through.
It’s held at a Church in our town and its nice being reminded why we celebrate this season. We opted to drive trough in our car rather than ride in trailer that they provide.
As we waited in our car the kids got excited when we got closer and closer. They started to hear the music and see the lights through the tress. Definitely gave them something to build up on.

Like last year, once we reached a certain point they covered our lights and handed us cookies! The girls remembered about the cookies last year. I told them that they might not do that every year, but when they did end up having some the girls were pretty excited.

By the time we got to the front of the line both boys ended up in our laps in the front. One to nurse and one to ‘drive.’

 

mommy left all cameras at home, daddy took some photos with his phone while we waited in line

  
 For our 8th day(night) of Christmas cheer we enjoyed our annual tradition. We now have fun letting the kids take turns reading the captions along the way. The best part was when the girls recognized their friend up as one of the angels. 

Easy Peasy, Salt Dough Coloring Craft

  
I have two boys under two. Needless to say, I find it more comforting to NEVER leave the house. Getting simple supplies or shopping is total survival mode for me. It’s simply easier to stay home then deal with all the stress of unpredictable babies in an “unknown” environment.That being said, I’m hooked on Christmas crafts that require no shopping, but can be done with what I have around the house.

I’ve made and seen salt dough ornaments and I usually think they’re lame. And they still sort of are, unless they are made by my kids, then they’re art!! 😉

This was SUPER simple and my kids were delighted! Let me tell you!

You simply make the salt dough(recipe at the bottom). Cut into shapes. Use a straw or toothpick to create hole for hanging. 

Bake shapes until they’re a nice and firm. 

This is when all those broken crayons you keep and put in a tub/bucket(maybe that’s just me) comes into play. You can officially give yourself a pat on the back for recycling those dang color pieces you find all over the house! 

After you pull your hot shapes out and place them on some paper or a towel or something, let your kids go to town on them with some color. Coloring, simple basic coloring. The colors melt just right and leave a beautiful glossy finish. So much more fun then I expected.

I also happened to have some festive wire. I cut about two inches off and that’s what we used to hang them up!

   
  

the festive wire we used for our hangers

    
   
And those were just the test ones I took pictures of! The ones we took time and details on are seriously lovely to see on our tree. The kids really liked this one. 

For our 7th day of Christmas cheer we made salt dough ornaments for our tree!

Mix 4 cups flour 
 1 cup salt. 

1 1/2 cups cold water

Mix mix mix

Add more water if needed.

Yala! Look how capable you are!

Edible, Simple Garland Craft

  
Man! This December is in a rush! Once we got the tree the children were thrilled and ready to make it beautiful.

I wanted to think of some fun decorating ideas, but without doing any research my mind hasn’t been much help lately. 

To my rescue though, came a childhood memory. It’s the first memory I have of a Christmas tree being put up in our home-and the last for a few good years. 
I remember us all gathering in the living room/ my brothers room. One half was his and the other half is where our tree and television stood. In this memory we were all watching a classic film(I was raised on both classic and Christian valued movies-we didn’t have broadcast TV) and there were bowls of popcorn. We were eating some and stringing others together.
It’s such a warm feeling and memory I have with my mother and me as a child. My father takes up most a lot of space when it comes to my cherished memories. But this one is mostly of my self sacrificing mother and how she made that Christmas special in general. I remember we made all our Christmas gifts that year and did so many hands on things that it seemed a wonderful Christmas.
I longed to recreate that feeling with my children. It’s a lot harder than it looks.

I wanted to add a little color and I just so happened to have a bag of cranberries in my fridge. 

We put together popcorn and cranberry garland made by our own sweat, tears and blood. No, really, everyone pricked their finger at least once! Getting the kids from bunching up their thread was the tricky part. I gave them to long a string to keep up with. The girls picked different patterns to put their popcorn and cranberries in. 

   
    
 Next time I’m going to give them a more comfortable length. That way they can keep up and instead of having to help them I think I’d be able to get my own bit done while they are able to feel more independent on the craft. 
I hope this can be a thing we do every year.  I think they had fun, but they ate more popcorn than I thought! -haha!

This was our 5th day of Christmas cheer(which actually happened on the 6th day)!

For our 6th day we were to put up all our tree ornaments. This went faster than expected, maybe because daddy was there to help us. 

We make a big deal of putting the angel or star up on the tippy top. However, our rule is that the youngest gets the honors. Since River is so small the duty gets past on to Samwise. He happened to crash out 30 minutes before we got to that point and we still haven’t found time, when all the family is together, to be apart of the memory.
   
 

Tree Hunting

 
Christmas is so magical to me! I love it. I love the feeling. I love the look. I love the meaning and purpose of it all. The only thing I can’t stand about this time of year is that our wee family doesn’t see Peter/Daddy that much. We probably get to see him a solid 6 days. I understand that his work allows us to have the freedom we do, but it still doesn’t make us miss and long for him during this holiday season.

That being said, I really really try hard to create and allow magical moments to happen when he is present so that our children have solid sweet holiday memories with their daddy in them.

Taking note from a family friend from my childhood(Shout out to Shanti!) who now has 5 children(only the youngest is a girl), I decided we would start our own new tradition of tree hunting.
Tree hunting is quite similar to hog hunting, with just a lot less excitement, blood, or meat to take home. Ha!

We found a place really quite close to our home and with all us loading up in the tank we were on our way.

I was a little disappointed that they didn’t have the type of tree I was wanting, the ones they did have were still in the growing stages. I was happy to be out none the less! 

The kids ran from tree to tree convinced that this one was the one! “No, this one!… I mean this one, Mommy!!” Haha Our little Samwise marched around the area like he owned the place. Making sure to be near is daddy as to impress him.

taking daddy for a walk

 
Finally Daddy found the perfect tree and with the help of an extremely dull hand saw, it became our very first tree kill. 😉

helping tie down the tree

For our 4th day of Christmas cheer we went tree hunting. 

 

A boy who helped us took a family shot for us

 
  

Tis the Season

Since I can remember I’ve been wanting to get our family stockings from Pottery Barn. Every year I’d show my husband the ones I’d have picked out for our family. Budget has always come into play. After the birth of our first born son, Samwise, my husband and I agreed that we had enough stretch in the budget to go ahead and get them. However, before I could order the things he comes home with name embroidered stockings that a co-worker made. They were very thoughtful so I put off ordering the ones I had wanted. This year, I took my chance with having a new family member and all, and ordered a special one for each of the children. I was super giddy!
When the parcel arrived I torn into the bag like nothing else. Thrilled that one of my homemaker dreams had come true! Yet, inside wasn’t 4 stockings representing my children, there was only 3. Little man River’s stocking wasn’t present.

I went and looked on my order history and in red letters it informed me that his particular stocking was on back order. Deliver date would be around January 7th. 

I felt depressed and angry. Why would they say it could be ordered if they didn’t have any, knowing the customer would obviously want them for Christmas?!

I gave my mom the information and asked her to do want she does almost better than anything else; get her way(LOL). Seriously, my mom could convince the pope to become a charismatic Christian. 

However, when she got back to me she told me there was no way they could get me his stocking. Thousands of people had ordered the same one and they were all on back order until January 7. So I could wait, or order another pattern.

 I decided to bear River not having a stocking instead of getting a new one as I had ordered the girls stockings to correlate together and the boys to do the same.

That didn’t mean I still wasn’t upset. I prayed and cried about it. As silly as you may deem it, this was a little fancy that I had finale thought came true but as soon as I get the chance things didn’t float like a dream. I was pretty angry and even threw my anger up at God, complaining about it as if the world revolved around that one issue. 

Then, like it often goes, somehow He let me have my hearts desire. A day before his 3rd month birthday,to my delight and surprise, in the mail was River’s stocking. Delivered December 7th. One whole month earlier than it has been estimated for, for weeks, the notification/sign is still up on the website. Somehow,though, someway we got ours[(Thanks Father.)-Every good and perfect thing comes from above-James 1:17]

With the joy the delivery made I was able to get into the spirit of things. We brought out all the kids past decorations and together we spread the memories on display through out the house. Seeing all the objects and art projects from my babies has to be one of the things I love most about this season. I am so absolutely blessed.

Our 3rd day of Christmas cheer was spent decorating our home into a fun wonderland.

iphone photo