Merry Christmas!

We had such a nice time Christmas Eve and Christmas Day- Trevor and Ethan were here as well as Corrina, Trevor's girlfriend. We had dinner together on Christmas Eve and opened gifts, then they came back early this morning and we had a breakfast casserole and homemade sticky buns..then later today we had our traditional ham and twice baked potatoes etc...Good times and great gifts and lots of fun just being together!..Happy Birthday Jesus!

last minute gifts

A COUPLE OF UP CLOSE PICTURES


I wanted to have some small gifts on hand to give to our neighbors and others,so I made these. An easy, inexpensive handmade gift to give! I got this idea off of Ali Edwards blog last year...I think they are pretty!

snow and Odin

We have had the pleasure of dog sitting Trevor's dog while he is in Hawaii..we have grown to love Odin so much, but we are now sure that we do not want the responsibility of owning another dog right now!..the cats are so low maintenance, they fit our lifestyle much better at this stage of our lives..(empty nesters)



He spends alot of time guarding our bird feeders from the voracious squirrels and has also kept the neighborhood cats out of our yard!..




our snowy front yard!

yummy,easy recipe!

EDITED TO ADD- THIS IS NOT A PICTURE OF THE ACTUAL SOUP, THIS IS A STOCK PHOTO! the actual soup is much yummier looking!

We had a very good and easy dinner today..it is Beef Vegetable Soup in the crockpot.

Makes 6-8 servings
Even though it is all canned veggies, it tastes so amazingly good, you'd never know!

1 lb cubed beef stew meat
1 (15oz) can whole kernel corn, undrained
1 (15 oz) can green beans, undrained
1 (15 oz) can carrots with juice
1 (15 oz)can sliced potatoes with juice
1 (28oz) can crushed tomatoes
1 (1.25 oz) pkg beef with onion soup mix (Lipton)
salt and pepper to taste

Place meat and all other ingredients into the slow cooker,stir to combine
Cook on low for at least 6 hrs. Add water if necessary.

critter control

We have been hearing the scampering of little feet in our attic and finally made the call to have someone come out and take a look and see what is going on. Our cat and TRevor's dog have also been staring down at one of our furnace vents in our family room, directly above our crawl space..lovely!!

Anyhow, the guy came out and went in our attic and discovered we have rats!..they had chewed some boxes up there...OMG!!! how gross is that???..also we have squirrels in another attic up by our eaves and cats going in under our deck into our crawl space!!!...EEEKK!! The guy set traps to catch the squirrels (alive) and then set snap traps in our attic for the rats, Roger will seal off the crawl space. They charge by the catches, so this could get expensive!

fun party!

We had such a fun time at our Christmas Party last night!!..we ended up with 13 people. Good food and lots of laughs!..we had a white elephant gift exchange and um, let's suffice it to say- lots of creativity and thought went into the gifts!!..lol..Roger had a theme to his, "Merry Redneck Christmas"..he put alot of time and effort into the gift and it was well received, with much hysteria!..I think this will have to be an annual event!

5 trees!!

Lots of decorating going on!..my friend Chris is an amazing decorator, and since we are having 2 parties this year, I asked her if she would come and decorate the house for Christmas. She has used some of our old stuff, and added her special flair to it as well as buying some new stuff..she does such a good job! We have 5 trees up!..they all look so pretty.Makes us feel so in the mood for Christmas!

taking a time out!

Roger and I spent alot of time this week/weekend getting the house/yard ready for Christmas. We cleaned carpets and ovens in anticipation of our party next weekend..(we are having about 15 of Roger's co-workers over for a get together)...

I got all our gifts bought and wrapped and boxed to mail out today. I finished and mailed our cards too...whew!..so to reward ourselves we took some time yesterday to go see a fun movie "Four Christmases", after having an appetizer and drink at the Keg.
The movie was very cute and a great way to relax and laugh and enjoy getting in the Christmas spirit!

day 1 of journaling my Christmas

Starting today, December first, I will keep a Christmas journal. In it, I will write
something every day to reflect on the holidays of my past, enjoy the holidays of
the present and dream about the holidays of the future. To some, this would be a
stack of papers and trivial scribbles, but not to me. I am taking back my Christmas, I am letting it be something I relish and most importantly I am giving at least fifteen minutes to myself, every day, no matter how crazy this season becomes. This
Christmas I will make something with my own hands, my own words and my own memories.