Christmas Cookies

When I was a kid, I remember baking Christmas cookies as a family every year.  My mom would roll out sugar cookie dough, Brian and I would choose the perfect cookie cutter shapes, and Dad, Brian, and I would decorate them.  I am not a big sugar cookie fan, but I always thought our sugar cookies with the crazy, messy icing and tons of sprinkles were the best.

Wanting to carry forward the tradition of crazy, messy icing and tons of sprinkles, I baked sugar cookies one afternoon so that we could all decorate them.

We had a pretty good assembly line.  Frank and I used the tubes of icing and then gave the cookies to Jacob who had a little bowl of sprinkles.  I made up my mind in advance that if the sprinkles got all over the floor, they got all over the floor, and I wouldn't freak out.

Carter stayed on my lap and in the middle of the action.  Actually, I think I had some icing on my fingers because he was attacking them the whole time.

To my surprise, Jacob did a good job keeping the sprinkles on the cookies.  This is the first year that he seemed to "get" what we were doing.

That's not to say there wasn't some sprinkle-eating going on...

aaaaannd we're done.

Look at his fingers!  It took a full day and lots of scrubbing for the color to wear off his fingers!

Overall, though, cookie decorating went much smoother than in years past.  It makes me excited for the next several years as the kids get old enough to really enjoy and participate in our Christmas traditions.

Mama, I Put Sunglasses on the Cat

So the sun won't be in her eyes, he tells me.

Can't argue with that logic.

Jacob is Three

Last Friday, Jacob turned three.  We didn't really have big birthday plans for him, which was a good thing, since he woke up throwing up!  I'm still not sure what was wrong with him, but he only threw up twice (sorry if that's TMI) early in the morning, so after staying home in the morning, we ended up getting to do some fun stuff by afternoon.

Our elf Kiki kicked off his birthday by showing up with three candles.

We do presents in the morning, so here he is-- with his sippy cup of flat 7-up-- opening his gift.

A hummer!  With a tent!  And a guy and a dog!

After naps that afternoon, we went to the mall, which was insane, by the way, so he could drive one of the little cars.  You know the cars that you can rent for the kid to drive while the mom shops?  The ones that I never rent for him?  He loves those cars, and the one he loves the most is a hot pink car that says, "Princess."

Awesome.

It was his birthday, after all, so I wore Carter in the carrier and pushed Jacob around the super-crowded mall in a pink princess car.

After that, we picked up Frank and went to dinner at Ted's Garage, which is a car-themed diner in Clinton.  Frank came up with the idea of taking him there, and it couldn't have been cuter. The place has antique gas pump, little cars suspended from the ceiling, and oil rags instead of napkins.  They also have a little porch area where they have a real antique car.

We had a very nice waitress who Jacob worked very hard to charm.  (He's taking a picture of her taking a picture of us in the photo below.)

His efforts paid off because once she found out it was his birthday and brought him a huge brownie sundae for free!  He and Frank both ate it and still weren't able to finish it!  Needless to say, we will be going back.  Soon.

Back at home, it was birthday cake time!  (Yes, the kid who was throwing up 12 hours earlier was now eating two desserts.  I kinda felt like I should have my Responsible Adult card revoked.)  For the past month, whenever I asked him what kind of cake he wanted, he unfailingly asked for yellow cake with blue icing, and since it was so simple, I thought I might as well just make it rather than try to get all fancy with a store-bought one.

 He loved all the attention and despite a rough start to the morning, had a great day!

Makeover!

I'm giving my blog a makeover!  Because I really have no idea what I'm doing when it comes to .html code, it might take me a few days- or longer- to get things the way I want them.

I realize some things still look weird, and I'm working on them as time permits.  Please be patient, and soon I will be back with a fresh new look!

A Few of the Baby

Being this cute is hard work!

Cue the Victory Music!!

I'm back!  (And without paying a single extra penny...!)

Feeling pretty genius right now. If you want to know my trick, send me an email.

So without further ado, here are some picture of my kids.  You missed their little faces, I know you did.

 Jacob is having a car wash...

and Carter is chillin' with his puppy.

Take that, Blogger!!