The sun is out!

It's freezing outside, but we've had blue sky all week!  Took the boys to one of the parks in our neighborhood for some energy burning scooter and bike riding.

Christmas Cookies

 

The boys and I made cookies this afternoon for Santa Claus.  I discovered a new super easy recipe:  3 eggs, 1/2 cup oil, one cake box.  Best cookies!  Frost them and even yummier!  I also baked some of the peanut butter cup cookie dough we bought from Carson's school.  This was definitely my kind of baking day.  

Baby Jesus Count

Since Carson didn't have school last Monday, and I was subbing that day, he was able to attend his old Kindergarten, where the twins attend Pre-K.  Last year, when all three were regular attenders, our Baby Jesus Count got up to 12, I believe.  This year, we are at 8, thanks to two crafts done on that Monday.  Here are the crafts from last Monday with our manger scene Baby Jesus.

Builder Boys

This is how we spent much of Saturday morning.  We were all up at 6:45 AM that day, ready to build.

Our "Charlie Brown" Christmas Tree

We didn't have to trek down this hill to find our tree!

An extremely dangerous looking bridge and tree house that Gavin really wanted to test out.

Ahhh.  Somewhere safe and warm, inside the store, operating Lego trains.

So, does it look like any of the boys wanted to pose for this?  Yeah.  They were ready to head home.

We checked out a new Christmas tree farm this year and were very pleasantly surprised.  We even plan to visit again this December, just to check out more of the farm.  Brian found a section posted:  Charlie Brown Christmas Trees- $5.  His eyes sparkled as he told me this and I knew we had to get one of these trees.  I was skeptical as to what we would find.  The first tree he picked up to inspect was bent about 2/3 the way up at a 45 degree angle.  I vetoed that one immediately.  The second tree looked pretty good.  The rest were tiny.  We went with option #2.  This works for me since I don't do well with too many options.  Also, I purchased a cheap fake tree on Saturday, just anxious to get "any" tree up for the kids.  They love both, of course, so that makes us happy.

At this farm, there is a small store selling homemade crafts and goodies with a Lego and remote control train display.  The boys LOVED this.  They pushed buttons to make the trains go around while Brian took care of the tree.

Puddle Walk

Bennett and Gavin were lovin' the rain this week!

Beach, baby

We LOVE the beach! Ben loves running to the water, Gavin loves playing with the sand in his hands, helping me make sandcastles, and I love playing in the tall grass by the boardwalk (in Seaside).

We lucked out and had beautiful weather over President's Day weekend. Grandma Michelle & Grandpa Jack with us, too. Grandma gave us Valentine's gifts with bubbles, so we had fun in the room and on the beach with the bubbles.

We were planning to stay two nights, but Mom and Dad didn't get much sleep due to my brothers' need for crib tents. They kept climbing out of their portacribs, which started to make my parents crazy. (Especially Gavin. Ben was pretty tired and actually wanted to sleep.) I got to stay up with Grandma and Grandpa, watching a movie, while Mom and Dad escaped to the hot tub after my brothers FINALLY fell asleep. Ben, Gavin, and Daddy also started coming down with colds, so that kept them all up much of the night. :(

Celebrate! & Mommy

Mommy used to be a Creative Memories Consultant, but this was her first year going to a large Creative Memories event. There were over 1600 scrapbookers there! She and Heather just had their birthdays, so this was their birthday girlfriend fun with LaSandra, too. Mommy completed 12 pages, did some fun make 'n takes, attended a couple of short classes, looked at idea pages, got a 10 minute massage, and had fun working on our 2008 family album.

Closer to her birthday, Daddy got her roses, came home early from work so Mommy could go get an hour massage, and then they went out to dinner and a movie while Heather babysat us. They saw the movie "Australia" and thought it was really good.

Christmas Day

Where to begin? Christmas was amazing! Our family is so blessed to have our families near by and uncles that enjoy visiting us! We opened lots of gifts from Santa, great grandparents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and good friends. What a blast! Thank you everyone!!