January Snow

Since before Christmas, Katie has been asking me when it was going to snow.

My answer to her was this:  "I don't know.  But, I DO know that it better
snow after January 16th because that is when we leave for Disney World."

Mother Nature did not take my hint.

Our first snow of the season was on January 14th.

It was more of a sleet than an actual snow event.  But that didn't stop
Katie and Mikey from gearing up to head outside.

We even had to make a snowman.

Overnight, it snowed even more.

I would say that we ended up with almost 5 inches.

Everyone geared up again for a tromp into the snow.

Katie dove right in to make some snow angels.

While Mikey just sat and smiled.

Now that we had even more snow, Daddy was recruited

to make an even bigger snow man.

When Katie and Mikey look at this picture, they see a snow man.

I see E.T., the Extraterrestrial.

OWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWCH.

Next up, it was shoveling time.

Get to work, mister!

Mikey just wasn't moving fast enough.

So, Big Sister took over.

And then, we were into a full-on case of the whinies.

SUPER POUT POWER!!!!

Did I mention that we were leaving for Florida THE NEXT MORNING?!?!?!

The Seattle area is not known for it's emergency storm clean up efforts.

The jury was out on whether we would actually get onto a plane and fly out in the morning.

Curse you, winter.

Christmas 2011

We had a great holiday break.

It was nice to be able to "hit the reset button" and cast all
the worry and drama from the past few months aside.

Huzbend was off of work from my birthday all the way
through New Years Day.

And because he was off for two weeks, do you know
what else I was able to cast aside - COOKING!!!!

Totally awesome.  That was a gift in itself.

Christmas eve brought with it homemade pizza and
apple dippers.

Yum.

Just looking at this picture makes me drool.

Mikey kept spitting out the apple.  

 I guess there had to be a faster

way to ingest the ooey-gooey caramel......

Whoa.

We had a few presents for the kids to open xmas eve.

New PJ's and a battery powered round-the-tree Thomas set.

Katie hung up the stockings and then it was time for bed.

To say the kids were excited would be an understatement.

The grown-ups were a little excited too.

Ooooooo.  Pretty.
I did A LOT of wrapping.
Jeez louise.

"JUST WHAT I ALWAYS WANTED!!!!!"

Mikey got something like five costumes.  Each time he would

open a new one up, a wardrobe change would occur.

Here is Superhero Mike assessing some Buzz Lightyear socks.

Wardrobe change!!!

I am butterfly.  See me flutter.

Can you say that you have ever had a fire chief,

a monarch butterfly and Woody from Toy Story in your living room?

Ha.  Thought not.

Wardrobe change!

"I have you now!"

Wardr.....need I say it again?

Katie got some slug buddies in her stocking.  They are fake

slugs that stick to anything without leaving slimy slug gunk.

She can even kiss these ones if she wants.

After the present bonanza, it was nap time.

Mikey fell asleep on his brand new

Buzz Lightyear guy.

Katie busied herself coloring her new castle.

And then it was lasagna time.

As you see in the picture below, we tried to make ourselves feel better about  

eating 2,000 calories for dinner by accompanying

it with a salad.

We are so health conscious.

Everyone slept late the next day.

Mikey woke up and wanted to eat breakfast with some of his 

xmas toys.

The next week went by fast and soon it was

New Year's Eve!

Mikey hit the sack at normal time.  Katie stayed up to watch
the ball drop.

She even watched TWO movies - Cats & Dogs and G-Force.
(Unfortunately, not the anime G-Force. It was the guinea pig one)

On New Years Day, the rain quit and it was actually semi-decent out.

Huzbend took the afternoon to build the trampoline
GmaC and GpaC sent for xmas.

Now if there are any fans of America's Funniest 

Videos out there, you will know that a trampoline is

almost a sure-fire way to end up either winning $10,000

or visiting the emergency room.

While the kids were busy jumping and Huzbend was dwelling on

the potential $10,000 windfall from AFV, I couldn't help being

a little nervous about the trampoline thing.

Thank you so much to everyone that sent us gifts.

We love you all!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Story Time

I know, I know.  It's not a big, cute Christmas post.  

Just a place holder until I get on the ball.

Huzbend, Katie and Mikey had story time the other night.  They each took turns coming up with a sentence to complete the story.

This is all verbatim, as recorded by Huzbend.

Enjoy.

Story 1

Daddy: Once upon a time there were two little kids.

Katie: And they wanted to go for a walk.

Mikey: And they jumped in a poo!

Daddy: And the poo was so huge it filled a whole swimming pool. The End.

Story  2

Daddy: There were two little kids that wanted to go swimming.

Mikey: And the pool was filled with a huge poo!

Katie: And the little girl got her foot stuck before so she didn’t want to go in. The End.

Story 3

Katie: There was a little girl that lived in a flower.

Daddy: And a flower fairy that was responsible for the flower decided to take a look.

Mikey: The fireman lived in a big giant poo!

Katie: And the flower fairy left the flower and got stuck in the poo.

Daddy: The little girl went home. The end.

Story 4

Mikey: Fireman Small lived in a giant poo!

Daddy: Which came out of the butt of his dog Chester. It smelled.

Katie: And there was a fairy that flew to the firehouse to help the humans.

Mikey: Fireman Big lived in a humongous poo!

Daddy: And fire alarm went off and the firemen drove out of the poo to put the fire out.

Katie: And the fairy followed them in her leaf car. The End.

Catching Up Before Xmas

Since we were all a little down because of Katie's trip to the hospital,

we thought that we would jump start our holiday mood.

As I'm sure is recommended recovery for all pneumonia patients, we 

decided to stop by the tree farm on the way home from the hospital.  

Do not pass GO.  Do not collect 100 dollars.

After poo-pooing about six trees, Katie decided on the "perfect" tree.

Mikey agreed.

Welcome to the family, little tree.

I have a feeling, although not quite confirmed, that Katie enjoys the

free candy cane offered by the tree farm more than the actual

selecting of the tree itself.

Mike was not as impressed.

He traded in his sticky candy cane for a nice juicy

apple.

The next day, Mikey and Huzbend went off to swim lessons while

Katie and I stayed home and decorated the tree.

When we were done decorating, Katie gave it a hug to welcome it to the house.

Next up, gingerbread city.

Katie had been bugging me for at least two months about

making a gingerbread house.  I promised her that we would do just that.

I mean, how hard could it be?  Plus we had A LOT of extra halloween candy to get rid of.

We whipped up a big batch of gingerbread that actually yielded enough 

dough to make two houses and a bunch of ginger people.

I can't use traditional royal icing because it's made with uncooked eggs.

Katie is allergic to them.

So, I searched the internets and with its help

made an icing with confectioners sugar, lemon juice 

and glycerine.

Here was the first attempt at assembly.

Icing was just a bit too runny, but held

together with the help of some support cans.

What a frustrating process.

Not satisfied with attempt number one, I put together another house.

Icing just right.  Not so bad this time.

A few days later it was decorating time.

I tried making the icing again and again it was too runny.

So, I gave up and used some can frosting to get the job done.

The kids must have ate at least a cup of frosting each.

Katie did a good job decorating and ate her fair share of the candy.

Mikey put one piece of candy on one house and then proceeded to eat 

marshmallows the rest of the time.

They were quite silly by the time decorating was over.

Here are the best two of my many attempts at a posed picture.....

In between the gingerbread chaos was the preschool holiday party.

Here are the kids visiting with Santa and Mrs. Claus.

As if they did not have enough sugar in their little systems, they were

able to decorate their own cookies.

Yes.  There is a cookie buried under those sprinkles.

Katie decided to eat her cookie right then and there.

Mikey decided to pack his away in a ziploc and suck

the frosting off the knife instead.

Mikey also decided that he loved Santa Claus.

He hung out with him most of the evening.

If Mikey wasn't eating, he was with Santa.

They even played party games together!

Next up, it was my birthday.

Yay me.  I'm 38 now.

And as such, I deserve delicious and totally NOT nutritious food.

First up, for breakfast, Huzbend cooked up some Stuffed French Toast.

OMG.  Have you ever heard of the term

"Foodgasm"?

The kids enjoyed opening my presents for me.

They were nice and let me help a bit.

The sun was a-shining and so we

did lunch at Panera and hit a local playground.

More yummies to come for dinner.

Eggplant parm, of course.

And then the piece de resistance.....

APPLE CRISP.

OHHHHH BAYBEE!

A few days later we received a package in the mail from Granma.

To our surprise, there was another gingerbread house inside!!!

This one was soft and gooey and really yummy (unlike my rock hard gingerbread).

Katie and Mikey ate all the trees and extra people that populated the box, leaving just enough

for the house.

It was try number three for gingerbread house assembly.

Icing was perfect this time!

I was able to put together the house with no

help from support cans at all.

Whooopeeeee!

And then it was time for decorating.  UGH.

The whole house smelled like frosting and marshmallows.

Katie and Mikey were literally bouncing off the walls.

I swear, if either of them had gotten a paper cut at the time, they would have 

bled marshmallow fluff.

Shazam!

We now had FOUR gingerbread houses.

Two we made, one that Katie decorated at school and one from across the country.

Welcome to Sugar Heights!

And now, a little video distraction.  Enjoy!