Christmas (and a little extra)

 Earlier in December, Erin had a speaking part in the 4th grade musical. She was a reindeer!

Waiting to sing.

 Just a little bit of her performance. She did great, as well as everyone else (for 9 and 10 year olds).

Christmas

 Christmas Eve after Santa dropped off the presents.

 This was about 2 hours after we finished opening presents - around 8:30am

Jack was very interested in Luke's new tool set, while Luke was happy to watch Howie play a new Wii game. Erin was thrilled to get a doll bed for her American Girl doll. There is a large Hot Wheels Race Track behind the couch and it gets daily use from all of the children.

 Howie played his new Wii game while Howard was in my bedroom setting up Howie's new PS3. Howie freaked out big time when he saw the PS3 Santa brought him. Apparently Howie thinks it's the best present ever. The upside for Howard and I  is that we can now watch Netflix in our bedroom.

 By far, Erin's favorite gift is her iPod touch. It never leaves her side.

 Jack and Luke both love their Lego sets that we got them. I love how they can play for hours, especially Jack. I have a feeling I will be buying him Legos for a LONG time.

Luke showing off his new blue Ninjago minifig.

Overall, we had a successful Christmas season. We finished shopping on Black Friday, so we were able to relax and have fun in December. We looked at Christmas lights twice, made sugar cookies, helped at the City Rescue Mission a couple of times, make gingerbread house, did Advent activities each day, and watched our favorite Christmas movies. I'm a little sad to take down the Christmas decorations this year, normally I can't wait to put it all away. I have one more week to enjoy the Christmas season.

Christmas Snow

We had a small snow storm on Christmas day. Only about an inch of snow, but the wind was brutal. It was so pretty!

Holiday Spirit

December has treated us well. We've been able to do some fun activities without being overwhelmed. Fortunately we finished Christmas shopping shortly after Black Friday.

 

A couple of weeks ago we went downtown to visit the Reindeer after church. Luke and Jack enjoyed it the most. Luke was especially excited.

 This is Blitzen.

 Howie and Erin were a little bored.

 

We also had fun playing near the giant ornament at the base of the Devon Tower.

 

 Luke was able to demonstrate a somersault for us successfully.

We've had some exceptionally nice weather lately and we were able to decorate the house a little more than usual this year. Thanks to Howard and my brother-in-law at Thanksgiving, the job was able to be finished quickly.

 

 Unfortunately the wind knocked down some of their hard work, so the kids "helped" Howard fix it a few days later.

 

Last Friday Howard and I were able to attend his squadron Christmas party. It was the same day as the Connecticut shooting. Despite our smiles, we were pretty sad all day. The party was a nice little break from the horrors of the day. It still breaks my heart just thinking about it and that there are so many parents hurting this Christmas season.

Festival of Lights

Last Saturday evening we went to Chickasha, a small town about 40 minutes southwest of our home. It is home to the Festival of Lights and the nearest Dairy Queen. We hit up both places since we don't make it down there very often. We attempted to view it about 2 years ago, but the car line was miles long (literally) and moving at a snails pace. This time is was about 75F and we decided to arrive early and walk through it. We only wore sweaters because of the wind, but we overheated the more we walked around. In all it was a perfect night. By perfect I mean - no kids threw up (like last time), no complaining, or misbehaving. I like it when my kids behave - it's just makes everything go smoothly.

I didn't pose them in height order, but they just happened to be standing this way for both pictures. It's just a coincidence. 

 

 
 

I snuck in a shot of myself since no one else ever wants to take pictures.

There was a live nativity, but no people that evening. It was just the animals.

There were several little "chapels" on the grounds, so Erin decided she wanted to pretend marry Jack.

Happy Halloween

Our time at the City Rescue Mission on Sunday was cut short (due to an overabundance of volunteers), so we headed home early and took the opportunity to carve our pumpkins.

 We were able to get about 5 cups of seeds for me to roast. Yum!

 We capped the night off with The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown. We watch it every year. In fact, we have the boxed set of holiday classics, so every holiday is celebrated with Charlie.

 Wednesday evening was spent in our neighborhood and the neighborhood across from ours. The second neighborhood brought in a much larger haul of candy than our smaller neighborhood. I think next year we'll stick to the other neighborhood. 

Lucas - Buzz Lightyear

Erin - Black cat

Howie - Headless horseman

Jackson - Ninja

Howard- The Scarecrow (from the Wizard of Oz)

Tina - I didn't dress up since I was too busy getting everyone else ready, and I have a growth on both sides of my head, so it's difficult to dress up with that in my way. ;)

Q: Can you guess which pumpkin is Howard's and which one is mine?

Hint: I am a recovered Angry Birds addict and Howard spent his adolescence in Wisconsin

The day after Halloween we organized our candy and I let the kids each fill a quart size bag of their favorites. We sold the rest (about 7 pounds) back to the dentist. The kids earned some money and the candy is being sent to troops overseas. It's a win win for everyone.  And just so everyone knows, my kids are happy with this arrangement. I did not force them to sell their candy back.

October 25th

 Jackson turned 6 on Thursday, October 25th. We had a very full day scheduled, so we started the birthday festivities early - 6am.

 We began our morning with presents

Had angel food cake with green "slime" frosting for breakfast

Made a wish

After Jack got out of school (at lunch time), his friend came over for a special play date.

 We went out for an early dinner of sushi (Jack's choice) and enjoyed a fun filled evening at the skating rink. It just so happened to be the school sponsored skate night ($3 admission, skates included - can't beat that!). Jack received roller skates for his birthday and was anxious to try them out. Since they were brand new, the skating rink allowed him to skate with them.

Overall, I think he had a great time. I know I sure did!!!

As a side note, Howard has missed Jack's last two birthdays, so we were grateful that we could all be together.

Our Meal Schedule

Last week I attended a craft day at church and we made menu boards for the kitchen. I already had a monthly menu posted on the refrigerator, but this was a lot cuter. I had posted a picture to Facebook and several of my friends mentioned how hard it is for them to plan out menus that far in advance. They asked me to post my monthly menu. Which I have, although it is tailored for our family's needs (which I will explain in a minute), but it gives us a basic idea of what we are eating.

 

This is my new and improved menu board. "Menu" and the letters of the week are made in vinyl and placed on the backside of the glass. The meals are written in dry erase marker and the backing is simple fabric.

Here is my rotating dinner menu. 

 

If you notice, I do not have the days of the week at the top, but it starts on Monday (to the left) and ends on Saturday (to the right). I have 5 weeks and we just started our first repeat this week. I have each meal on a certain night of the week because of our schedule. None of it is random.

For starters, we are not home every other Sunday night. We serve at the Rescue Mission and eat there. On the Sunday nights we are home, we use that night for leftovers or to try a new recipe or a simple meal that I keep on hand for when I'm being lazy (such as Viola or frozen lasagna).

Monday -Thursday night I try to have a meal with leftovers so that Howard will have lunch for the next day.

Tuesday night has to be either a casserole I can make ahead, crock pot, or super simple. Jack has dance class (hip hop) at 5pm and we like to eat as soon as we get home at 6pm. Howard usually shows up right after I have left for dance, so he can watch the casserole in the oven or fix sandwiches pretty easily. When Howard and I met, Howard was a better cook than I was. Through the years there has been a negative correlation between my cooking skills and his. The better I get, the worse Howard gets.  Sometimes I think he feigns ignorance just so he doesn't have to cook.

Wednesday meals need to be on the table by 5:15pm, so the boys can leave by 5:45pm to get to scouts on time.  If Howard is gone or working late, then dinner has to also be a fast clean-up since Wednesday is our late night and we don't go to bed with dirty dishes.

Thursday is when I cook dinners that usually take more time to make and/or clean up, since we're all home and generally don't have anything planned.

Friday was pizza night every week for a while, but my waist line didn't like that too much, so we cut back to every other week. Friday does not require us to have leftovers the next day for Howard, so you will see food items that won't have leftovers in our house, or in the case of Salmon, the cost is prohibitive to have leftovers (especially since we all love salmon).

I tried to separate the meals into categories - beef, chicken, seafood, noodles, grilled, crock-pot, etc.

I tried to space them out for variety in texture, flavor, and heartiness.  I also have not listed all of the side dished we eat, but it's usually some form of fresh or frozen vegetable to compliment our dinner. On "breakfast" nights we usually pair our meal with fruit and bacon or sausage.

I will likely revise this menu in the next few months to give us some new choices. In the past I couldn't commit to a certain dinner on a given night, but would plan about 12 meals for a two week period, go shopping, and post the list on the fridge. I would choose my meals from that list depending on what I was in the mood for.  Now that I am in school and the kids have activities, we don't have to luxury to go on a whim. I like this schedule because I can look ahead to the next day so that I can put my frozen meat in the refrigerator the day before to defrost instead of having to do it in the microwave.

Some nights we have not stayed on schedule and that's okay. It's not written in stone, but for the most part we have stayed on track. This week is a prime example. Howard was away for two days and we skipped a meal last week since we went to the State Fair, so I switched some of the items around. We are currently on the 2nd week, but you will see the modifications to this.  

One added benefit is that grocery shopping is a lot easier, the hard part of thinking only had to be done once, and we go out to eat less because we don't have the excuse of not knowing what to eat for dinner.

I hope this has helped some of you. Good luck meal planning!!!!