Advent Time

As a child, I celebrated Advent with my mom and siblings. I can tell you that I have the memory of the candles in the wreath and a peaceful feeling and that the candles were pink and purple.

This year I have made our own Advent wreath. The candles are not colored the same as when I was a child but we are celebrating Advent just the same. We light a candle every Sunday of Advent and read specific verses from the Bible about the Old Testament prophecy and the New Testament fulfillment of that prophecy.

Also, each one of the kids have made an Advent calendar and together we are reading this book: Jotham's Journey.

It is a wonderful and fun book. We truly look forward to reading it each day. The story is very entertaining and exciting even while it teaches us things we did not know and reminds us of things we did know about this awesome time of celebrating Jesus birth.

Celebrating,

Mrs. Cookie

Chocolate Chip Turns 8!

CHOCOLATE CHIP
TURNED

8

!!!

YEAH!!
SHE'S Eight!
SHE'S Eight!
Ain't it GREAT!!
The girl is EIGHT!!!!

She starts horseback riding lessons today too!
It really is great to be eight!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHOCOLATE CHIP!!

Butterscotch Chip's Golden 14th!

We are so excited around here because it is

Butterscotch Chips

Golden 14th Birthday!! 

:-)

Isn't she just BEAUTIFUL!!!

I am very blessed and thankful to have this girl for my daughter!

She is kind and sweet and loving! She is feeling more and more confident and growing smarter and more awesome with each passing year!!

She is simply a wonderful young lady!!

Just in case you don't know, it is her golden birthday because she is the same age as her birthday ~ 14 on the 14th.

We will be celebrating this evening with ice cream cake, gifts, and fun games!

Mr. Cookies parents arrive tonight too!!

:-)

I WIN!!

See this box of chocolates?

My Mom gets one for me every Christmas and this year she even got one for my husband! :-)

Now we don't have to share the maple cream!

Mmmm!

Thanks Mom!!!

I found that box of chocolates when I was cleaning up the Christmas stuff.

And so, I was munching and cleaning, and sorting and munching... mmmm!

And guess what...

I WIN!!!

(Course, it never really had a chance!)

:-) LOL!! :-)

New Year's Day

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

The first day of a brand new year!
It's so exciting!
Oh, the possibilities!!

On the last day of 2010 this is what we did...

See those little tiny orange looking things on the bananas by the little Cuties clementines? Those are kumquats. They are only about the size of the end of my thumb. We used to live on kumquat street and never knew what a kumquat was. So, in honor of all the new things we have experienced in 2010, we tried something new on the last day too. Oreo LOVES them because they are VERY, VERY sour.

Little fella tried something new too. A banana in a contraption. He LOVES bananas and this 'fresh food feeder' by Munchkin lets him chew on one. Pretty cool invention since I do not have to worry about him choking on it. In the short time between babies they have come up with some pretty cool new stuff.

This is our favorite food of 2010 menu that we decided on:

Nachos

Beef tips, carrots, celery, and aus jus

(Resembles pot roast, but it's not really.)

Fruit tray with chocolate fondue

'Don't you want me babies' with whipped cream

(More commonly known as Chips Ahoy cookies, Chocolate Chip has lovingly called them by this name since the commercials sang that song in a car... LOL!)

It seems we had a theme going... something to do with dips... Lol!

Mini Chip is trying to stand all of a sudden! Uh-Oh! Lol!

We played the new games the girls received for Christmas gifts while we waited for the clock to turn to the new year. (We actually toasted twice. Once with Minnesota and once with Arizona. Butterscotch Chip just couldn't keep going to the Arizona celebration, so, she went to bed after the Minnesota one.)

I Spy Eagle Eye was tons of fun and we kept playing for a long time. We will play this one again for sure!

In A Pickle was super fun too, but required more brain power than our overtired brains had. What a great game for school! I look forward to utilizing this one to expand the girls vocabulary and increase their understanding of words and how they can work together. Yeah!!

Sumoku! Oh My! My little math lover and her sister both liked this one. Again, we only played about a half of a game due to our lack of energy and brain power (we are definitely a family that NEEDS our beauty sleep)! LOL! It was great fun though and we will definitely be playing this one lots!

Just look at my beauties!

I am a most blessed woman to have such wonderful, thoughtful, sweet, adorable, smart, creative... children!
I love them soo much!

I am hoping you had a wonderful last day of the year 2010 also!

XOXO
Christina

New Year's Eve

This year is going to be very different for New Year's Eve.

I must admit that I have grown quite tired of the new, new, new.

:-(

Not that I am ready to be done with our adventure, just that I could really use some good old normal. You know, like not having any plans and just hanging out at home with my people and enjoying them.
Soon I am told, soon.

:-))

And so, my little-ish people and I have been planning and planning for our New Year's celebration. Everyone chose a favorite food of the year and we will have those things banquet style tonight. I wanted to try playing every game in the house before midnight, but the kids are a little too intimidated to do that. We will still play some games and make lists of goals for the next year and memories from the past year. We will probably watch a movie and then watch the ball drop, toast with our yummy sparkling cider to a wonderful and adventurous new year, and snuggle til morning in a tent in the living room... :-) Bliss... well, almost... I will miss my honey... but he will be home soon from the sand dunes. He and Peanut Butter are there with my brother and his friends riding quads and sand rails... boy stuff.

Hope you have wonderful plans or a sweet lack thereof.

{{HUGS}}

Christina

HELLO!! :-) It's Me! I'm back!

Hi! I am back from our adventures. I am amazed at how fast time goes. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to visit Minnesota and this morning I find myself both happy and sad. So, I will make a list... that ALWAYS helps me! :-)

I am SAD because:
1. I miss everyone in Minnesota.
2. I feel that I belong in Minnesota and am missing out by not being there.
3. Our trip 'home' is over.
4. Some of you made homemade chicken noodle soup and chili too and I missed it. :-(
5. I miss my husband, and he is at work early this morning
6. The 'return home adjustment period' sucks!
7. I ordered up a WHOLE bunch of snow and had to leave it with you guys.

I am HAPPY because:
1. We had safe travels.
2. We are all home and safe and wonderfully exhausted. (And the children are sleeping all snug in their beds... :-)
3. Mr. Cookie picked us up from the airport and was sooo happy to see us.
4. We are still on our wonderful adventure to Arizona.
5. The 'return home adjustment period' will not last forever, has already begun, and will end soon. :-)
6. God sent all of that SNOW I ordered (Isn't He Awesome!). I LOVE snow!!
7. We get to learn how to build a tumbleweed snowman... hmmm! :-)
8. I started a batch of chicken noodle soup yesterday and a poolish for homemade rustic italian bread to go with it for supper tonight! YUM!!
9. Tonight we get to put up our nativity, decorate our tree, CHRISTmas music, CHRISTmas movies... :-)
10. It is always good to be home no matter what 'state' you are in.

YUP! I do feel better! Going to make some more lists...
Christina

Happy Halloween!

Oreo Cookie made an egg white omelet for breakfast - yum!

She really likes to cook eggs and is trying new stuff with them now. :-)

I was nervous about trick-or-treating here and I am trying to celebrate less Halloween and more Fall Harvest, so, we found a trunk-or-treat at a local church here. Here is our trunk:

We enjoyed walking around and seeing the other trunks and placing our votes for our favorite one.

The girls and I dressed up. Butterscotch Chip was Cleopatra (someone she has studied in school), Oreo was a beautiful princess vampire, Chocolate Chip was a fabulous blue princess (she came up with the costume herself), I was an old time maiden, and Mini Chip was a sugar snap pea!! CUTE!!!

We met lots of wonderful people!

We then went to my brother Nate's for pizza and cheesecake. It was great fun!

Nate and his friend played the girls in pool and in foosball, which they LOVED!

Happy Independence Day!!

We went up north for the weekend to visit and celebrate the Fourth of July... We got to see Mr. Cookies sister and her family...

The girls got dressed up...

It was very hot and humid, but out in the boat on Mille Lacs lake it was perfect.

It was Mini Chips first boat ride! :-)

Captain McNut giving Chocolate Chip some fish finding lessons.

We went to the beach all day! It was wonderful! We had some fun in this place with mustaches and Auntie Cookie and her family. :-)

We went to see the fireworks at the Blaine Sports Center complex. They were awesome and even had music playing while the fireworks were going off. It was a wonderful weekend.
This week we are off to Arizona to figure out where we will live on our adventure...

Father's Day Weekend 2010

Hanging out with our exhausted, hard working Daddy Cookie!

Mini Chip sucks his thumb! Adorable!

Mini Chip's first shower! Thanks Daddy!

Painting Daddy's shed, well priming it took all day Saturday, so the painting will be another weekend.

Big sister cookies are the best!

We went up north and visited with Grandpa Cookie for Father's Day and was able to see Grandma Cookie, Aunts, and Uncles too. It was short but we had a nice time.

Mr. Cookie had to return to Arizona this morning for work. Our week will be full of doctor, chiropractor, dentist, and van appointments. I'm still trying to coax a schedule out of Mini Chip, he likes to keep me guessing. He's soo fun!

Have a happy day!