Thursday, December 31, 2009

Blessings in the New Year!



I'm wishing you all many Blessings in the New Year! It's been a pleasure getting to know each and every one of you through your beautiful blogs. I love how you all share your lives and your Faith. You have been a Blessing to me and I look forward to learning more about each of you in the coming year!




HAPPY NEW YEAR!




Monday, December 28, 2009

Christmas 2009 Favorites

Christmas Eve

Jayden loves sitting in the balcony at Church so that's where we usually go. We got there very early because every Christmas Mass is usually...


...standing room only!
Early Christmas morning...



...so happy to see that Santa had come!

And later that day...



HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JESUS!

Jayden usually doesn't like playing with "boring girl stuff!" as he puts it, but he couldn't resist playing with Mia's new Princess Castle.

The next day we got together to open our 'Secret Santa' gifts!




And before, and after, and in-between, LOTS of Christmas fun!



Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Let Us Love The Child of Bethlehem



"Let us love the Child of Bethlehem. Come souls and love a God Who has become a Child, poor and so lovable, in need of our tender love, Who has come down from Heaven to give Himself entirely to you." ~ St. Francis of Assisi


Blessed Christmas to all.

Monday, December 21, 2009

Rudolph Cupcakes

Well, plans for another weekend were brought to a halt because of the weather. But all was not lost. We did most of our shopping for Christmas entertaining early on Saturday morning knowing that a snowstorm was on it's way, of course some things have to wait until 'last minute' but the bulk of it is done, and then we hunkered down at home (a benefit of the weather is that I was able to post and visit other blogs!). We were supposed to make a gingerbread house with Mia and Jayden but that had to be canceled (much to Jayden and Mia's disappointment). Our son called to say that Mia had been looking forward to it, so we told him to assure her that we would wait until she could help, even if that means waiting until after Christmas.


My blogger friend Jill @ Grandma Honey had a great idea for making Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer cupcakes that she posted on her wonderful blog. She had her granddaughter do a video tutorial, and that sweet little girl did a super job! I was impressed! You can see it HERE.

I had planned on doing this with Jayden later in the week but since we were snowed in yesterday morning I decided to bake and ice some cupcakes, and then I started to assemble the things we would need to make our cupcakes look like Rudolph, unfortunately I was missing the Teddy Grahams for the antlers and I didn't have the nice big red candies for the nose. And, I also had no chocolate chips for the eyes!


But we did have white chocolate chips as I had them on hand because they were one of the ingredients in making white hot chocolate which I had made the day before:




So we did all right, white eyes would have to do for Rudolph, and instead of Teddy Grahams we used little gingerbread men for the antlers, and we used red gumdrops for the nose.





"Does it look good, Umma?"

"Yes!"




Then Jayden decided to decorate the cupcakes with his Cheerios!



And he quickly became much more interested in eating the cupcakes rather than decorating!



It was fun, Jill, thanks for sharing this wonderful idea!

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Winter Wonderland? I Don't Know About That

Well, I think I would view any one of these as a beautiful Winter Wonderland:



But I don't think this is very pretty at all:

The house looks cold and the awning looks like it is straining under all that snow (and look at our tiny oak tree refusing to let go of it's leaves)!


It looks like lots of work:
Shoveling out the cars in the driveway...



...and shoveling the sidewalks and paths to the house...



...along with shoveling the paths of many neighbors!

And putting down lots of salt.



And our front porch which at one time looked like this...



...now looks like this:





But the Christmas decorations look pretty dressed in snow!



And I'm sure if I had thought to take pictures last night during the snowfall or first thing this morning before the shoveler's work was done I might think it was indeed a Winter Wonderland for a little while.
I always said I love the snow for a moment or two, but I hate the work and the mess that follows!

And walking up the block...


...or walking down the block...




...does not make me feel like I am walking in a Winter Wonderland!

Well, pretty or not ~ here's someone that enjoys the snow!