Italian Party & Santa

Tonight we had the yearly Italian dinner and visit from Santa with Lance's family. We eat real Italian food (Lance's mom is Italian) and then Santa comes and each grandkid gets to sit on Santa's lap.

Birthday Celebration

Tonight we celebrated Carlie's birthday with both of our families. I think every year I am going to make the cake until I get overwhelmed with the millions of things we have going on and I end up going to Sams Club! They do make great cakes:)

Rockin Around the Christmas Tree

We always try to fit as much into one weekend as we can in December:) After having breakfast with Santa and a Birthday party, Carlie was tired and not so excited to have one more thing besides the fact that she has a major ear infection! Tonight was her first dance recital with Elite Dance Academy. She really does love dancing and once she got out on stage she had her smile and personality that comes out when she performs! She did a great job and remembered the entire dance:) I am just sad that I didn't get any better pictures (it had been a long day at this point and it wasn't worth fighting)!!:) Afterwards we got to go to Carlie's favorite place for dinner, Red Robin.

The parties are just starting!!

Carlie had a few friends over to celebrate her upcoming Birthday! They played games, ate pizza and decorated sugar cookies. I think we will be finding sprinkles for a while but they all had a great time (the best part was getting to eat them)!!:)

Breakfast with Santa

We got to have breakfast with Santa this morning at our local gym we go to. The kids were really excited to see Santa and tell him what they want for Christmas! They even got to see Santa's special key that Mrs. Clause gave him so that he can avoid going down the chimney since he eats too many cookies:)

Cayden is asking for a Thomas the Train that goes through a hole (a tunnel)!!:)

Santa's dog even came (he looked much bigger when he was standing up)

Carlie is asking for Cordoroy the Bear!

Not exactly what the box looked like!

When I do any kind of project I am always disappointed if it does not look exactly like the picture on the package! I thought how could you go wrong buying a gingerbread train kit! Everything is there for you, there is no way it shouldn't turn out like the box. Well, it is kind of hard to make it look like the picture when none of the pieces match up and the frosting won't stick!! The kids had a fun time decorating the train with all of the candy but I think next year I will just stick with old fashioned graham crackers and frosting then I won't be disappointed when it doesn't look perfect:)

Our Christmas visitor.......

We have a visitor at our house this Christmas! His name is Buddy (that is the name our kids picked for him), he is an elf (also known as The Elf on the Shelf). It has been so much fun and he has only been here a couple of days! My kids think he is absolutely the best:) Every night he reports to Santa whether the kids were naughty or nice! He then "magically" moves to a new place in the house. Carlie and Cayden cannot wait to get up in the morning and see where he is!!:) It is fun to see how much the kids "believe" in Buddy the elf and how he magically moves from place to place:) So far he has been in the Christmas Tree, on the fireplace mantle, on a shelf in Carlie's bedroom and flying in the airplane in Cayden's room! If you ask either of the kids he magically flies through our house to get from place to place:) He has even brought up the question of what he eats?? In case you didn't know, Elves don't need to eat, they are "magic":) It is sad to think this might be Carlie's last year of believing in Santa Clause and Buddy our Elf! Someone at school has already told her that there is NO SANTA CLAUSE (she reassured them that there is though) and I don't even want to think about what they are going to say to her when she tells them we have a "magic elf" living at our house!!:) It is fun to see the Christmas magic in there eyes and the excitement when they tell everyone about the elf and seeing just how excited they are about Santa coming:) Don't think that this stops the fighting!!:) My hopes and dreams were shattered (I was thinking that Buddy could become a permanent member of our family if that happened)!!:) So for now he will just be our Christmas visitor:)

Happy Birthday Lance!!

A Special Moment.......

She got a pin to wear on her sweater that says Above and Beyond and a Certificate

Today Carlie received the Builder Award at her school! Once a month a student from each class is nominated for the award by there teacher. Her teacher let us know the other day that she was getting the award but it was a secret to Carlie until this morning at the weekly Wednesday assembly when they called her name! Carlie has worked so hard this year and has learned so much and all of her teachers can never say enough about what an improvement she has made!! The following is what the principal read to all of the students which was written by her wonderful and sweet 1st grade teacher Miss Lilly:

Carlie is constantly showing GRATITUDE by her actions. It is a pleasure to teach Carlie because of the way she listens, follows directions, works diligently, tries her best and sits in learning position. Carlie shows her GRATITUDE in a quiet yet powerful way. She is an amazing new student to American Prep. Thank you for showing your GRATITUDE every day Carlie.

We are so proud of all your hard work Carlie!!

Carlie is so lucky......

To have such a wonderful and sweet teacher this year!! We could not be luckier:) Today her teacher gave each student in the class a card saying why she is thankful for them. The following is what it said:

Dear Carlie,

I am so thankful to have you in my class! You always give your best effort with a smile on your face. I love the way you work so hard as a new student! You are so smart! I love you!

Miss Lilly

Snowman Cookies

I found this recipe for snowman cookies! The kids thought it was so fun to make and decorate. The recipe says to use refrigerated sugar cookie dough but I had this simple recipe that I was excited to try and so I used that instead. Still very easy and simple:)

Easy Sugar Cookies

2 3/4 C. flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. baking powder

1 C. butter, softened

1 1/2 C. white sugar

1 egg

1 tsp. vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In a small bowl stir together flour, baking soda and baking powder, set aside. In large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in egg and vanilla, gradually blend in dry ingredients. Roll rounded tsp. of dough into balls and place on ungreased cookie sheets. Bake 8-10 minutes or until golden brown. Let sit on cookie sheet for 2 minutes before placing on cooling rack. Makes 2-3 dozen.

Decorate with mini chocolate chips (eyes), candy corns (nose) and red hots (mouth).

This recipe is really sweet. I prefer the old fashioned sugar cookie recipe where you cut-out the cookies but this is a fun and quick way to make cookies if you don't have a lot of time:)

Witches, Pumpkins, Lola & Thomas the Train.....

Cayden preschool Halloween party

We took the kids a week ago to see the witches for Halloween at Gardner Village. We did our annual pumpkin carving. Which means Lance does the carving and I take the pictures:) The kids always love deciding what they want there pumpkin to look like. This year Carlie wanted to be Lola from Hannah Montana and of course there was no doubt in Cayden's mind that he was going to be Thomas the Train!! The kids had a fun Halloween thanks to our friend Chelsey who took them Trick or Treating (I just had my tonsils out and everyone who says it is horrible is right, especially when things can't just go normal but that is a whole other story)!!! She made it longer than I would have out there in the cold and the kids have enough candy to last until Valentines Day!:) Thanks Chelsey!! Can't have Halloween without a "pumpkin" pizza from Papa Murphy's:) Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for coming and helping out:) Lance went with our friend Tony to the Utah game (which luckily they won at the very end), so in the end everyone, for the most part had a fun Halloween:)