We made it through Christmas!

Aww...it's over.  Not sure how I feel about that, it's such a build-up of excitement and activity and that's it over in the blink of an eye.  We had a wonderful day yesterday filled with family time, lots of yummy food, and a fun round of gift opening.  Jacob says his favorite gift was the "Rock'em Sock'em punching game."  Ella's says her favorite was all of them, the princess stuff, pony, kitchen...everytime I ask her, I get a new answer!  My favorite part was all of us being together.

As always, I took way more than enough pictures but here's a few showing our day....

Christmas Eve

Almost time for the big day!  We had an event filled Christmas Eve and I'm just winding down getting ready for Santa to make his/her appearance.  We spent the afternoon at our great friend's, (more like family!) house making gingerbread houses and all around fun.  We then headed over to my Mom's house for the traditional crab dinner.  After that we stopped by the fire station to hang out with Aaron and do our annual PJ exchange.  As soon as we got to the station however, they were heading out on a call.  They left us alone in the station for about an hour, unsupervised and with a camera! 

Check out this crazy gang!


Our masterpieces...



Goofing off at the firehouse...



Us in all our new jammies....


Superman's here to save the day!

I think I hear Santa coming so I'd better get to bed!
Merry Christmas!

Bend Recap

Finally got a chance to take a breather and post a recap of our trip to Bend, Oregon.  We seriously love that area so much that we already have plans to go back 3 times in the next year.

Saturday - We headed out Saturday morning.  The weather was beautiful but cold.  We had a bit of drama on the way up because of icy roads on Highway 97, a rent-a-truck crossed over into our lane and flipped off the side of the road right in front of us.  We immediately pulled over and while I called 911, Aaron ran over to help the person inside.  She was not hurt, just understandably quite hysterical.  Pretty darn scary for all involved and we definitely went slower after witnessing that.  After getting to Bend and checking into our hotel (Riverhouse), we headed out to get something to eat.  We found an excellent Mexican restaurant called the Ranchero.  It was only about 4pm but already it was getting dark which was kinda weird.  We then hit the outlets across town to find Aaron a new ski jacket and some boots.   That evening we took our first of a couple dips in the hotel pool.   Unfortunately to get to the pool we had to head out of our section of the hotel, outside, across a snow covered bridge, across an icy parking lot and into the pool house....it was C-O-L-D!

Sunday - We cruised around the Old Mill District, which is actually a newer area of town and really beautiful.  It was really, really cold but we managed to get some fun pictures along the Deschutes River.  We then headed over to the shopping area where there was an interactive children's museum we wanted to check out.  It's called Working Wonders and the kids loved it so much that we ended up staying there all day with a break in the middle for lunch at Red Robin.  It's like a miniature town inside with grocery store, construction area, post office, pizza parlor, pet hospital, simulated outdoors, etc.  The kids can then pretend to live in that town and become the different professions or people involved complete with outfits and all the props.   For dinner we hit a Food-4-Less for a take and bake pizza to take back to our hotel.  As a special treat we also consumed about 4,000 calories and $20 worth of Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory treats after dinner!  Ooo...but it was good!

Monday - We headed to Mt. Bachelor and the kids got to try out snowboarding.  Jacob is a natural!  His short time skiing is now over and he wants to only snowboard now.  Look out world, he might be in a future Olympics!  Again the kids ended up loving hanging out on the mountain so much, that we ended up staying up there all day.   That evening we had dinner at one of our favorite places up there, Izzy's Pizza, ....lots of food and for cheap! 

Tuesday - We cruised around the town for a bit and then walked around the Downtown area before heading home.  All in all the trip was perfect and so nice to have a relaxing carefree few days in the midst of the December holiday craziness.

Check out just some (and there's still a lot!) of the pictures we took....Photos from Bend, Oregon

Hehehe

Aaron said I should post this so I think I will.  :-)  Rob says he loves me....awwww.  Well it's not just only me, but I'll take it....hehehehe!

(Click it to read the whole thing.)

We love Oregon!

Just got back from an INCREDIBLE 4 days in Bend, Oregon...we love it there so much.  To say we'd move there in a heartbeat is not an exaggeration.  So much to share and so many pictures to upload but that'll have to wait a bit...too many other things to do right now.

Can't believe Christmas is just 5 days away! 

We're off to the snow!

We're heading off to Bend, Oregon for a few nights vacation in the snow.  A time to relax and be together as a family without obligations.  So looking forward to it! 

I leave you with some fun videos to check out from my pals at Jib Jab....

http://www.jibjab.com/watch/331620

Nuckin' Futs! The JibJab Year in Review | Send To Friends | Funny Animations at JibJab

http://www.jibjab.com/watch/331576

Deck The Halls | Send To Friends | Funny Animations at JibJab

Holidays Lights

Thursday evening we went out to do a city tour of different holiday displays and lights.  We started out at Turtle Bay's Winter in the Woods.  There were lots of holiday fun and crafts for the kids including a Polar Express train exhibit. 

We then headed out for....ice cream!  You'd think hot chocolate would be more appropriate but no, ice cream won out.  With ice cream in hand, we visited a drive through nativity and holiday traditions show at one of the local churches.  It was really well done and they even handed out CD's so you could follow along the story with words and music.  Really cool.  We finished off our tour by hitting up some of our favorite household light displays. 

The elves were really busy too...check out the photo album to the right! 

Holiday fun

Yesterday we made a couple of gingerbread houses from kits.  Those Costco kits are getting better and better each year.  We only had one minor collapse this year.

Here's Jacob and I's creation....

And here is Ella and Aaron's....

We are still having lots of fun with our adopted elves, Izzy and Rose.  This afternoon we made them sleeping bags and pillows out of scrap pieces of fabric.  This evening after they were fed and tucked into bed, Jacob suggested we make their reindeer pal a sleeping bag too.  Uh, no.


Jacob also said that now they might decide to get into a pillow fight now that they have pillows.  We shall see!!

I also added a clickable photo album to the right so you can keep up with the nightly adventures of our little friends. 

Blast from the past

On Sunday when we went to Aaron's Mom's place, she gave us a
bunch of boxes of photos and memorabilia from when he was younger.  Been having a kick going through those! 

As much as I'd like to post some nice embarrasing photos (and there are a lot!), I will refrain and just share this one that's perfect for the season...

Lot's of stuff

Tis the season...we've had a busy few days.  Sunday we drove over to Willow Creek to visit with Grandma Lee.  The kids love her Chihuahua pups.  Their names...Taco and Bell.  We celebrated her birthday a couple days early and took her out for pizza and pasta. 

At this morning's playgroup we went to Alicia's house and made graham cracker houses and playgroup ornaments.  Lots of fun, we love all the Christmas activities!  Click here for more pictures from playgroup.

ELF ADVENTURES

So we've had Rose and Izzy, our adopted elves for a few days now and they are just getting into so much trouble.  The other morning we woke up to this scene....

Jacob's response was a bit 'annoyed,' "Aw man, they got into the cereal and made a mess." 

Then this morning we found them here....

When the kids woke up the elves weren't in front of the fireplace where they had been put to sleep and Jacob was convinced that they just left.  He looked around and couldn't find them anywhere.  About 30 minutes later they went to take a bath and Whoa! the elves were taking a popcorn bath! 

This evening after feeding them their crackers and water then sprinkling on their magic snow, he said, "They better not get into mis-cha-vous again tonight!"  Let's hope not...we'll keep y'all posted.  :-) 

Now I'll leave you with this recipe.  I'm in the process of making my 3rd batch so that tells you how good they are! 

 

OREO BALLS

1 package Oreo cookies, crushed

8 ounces cream cheese, softened

1 package white almond bark

 

1 package chocolate almond bark

Using a hand held mixer, mix Oreos and cream cheese together.  Roll into walnut size balls.  Chill for an hour.  Melt approximately 3/4 package of chocolate almond bark.  Dip balls into the melted bark.  Allow to harden on wax paper.  Melt about 1/4 package of white almond bark.  Decorate with drizzles of the white almond bark. 

ENJOY!

 

Aaron's got a problem....

He seems to like to show his butt on TV! 

This is no where near the first time he's been on camera in this *position* and I'm sure it won't be the last either!  The name across his back is really quite helpful for accuracy too.  We'll always know it's him....LOL!  (Thanks Mom, for the reminder to TIVO the news tonight!) 

Jacob's elf arrives!

This morning Jacob's elf arrived on a reindeer!  His name is Izzy and Jacob is so excited to have his very own elf for the season. 

Ella adopts an elf!!

The other day Ella (with my help) wrote a letter to Santa asking if she could have an elf come live with us between now and Christmas.  We mailed the letter and this morning when we woke up there was an elf name Rose in our house!  The letter from Santa that came with her elf said that she is here to watch over Ella and to make sure that she continues to stay a good girl between now and Christmas. 
She is to put Rose to bed every night after feeding her crackers and water and sprinkling magic snow from the North Pole on her.  The magic snow  also came with her in a little tin.  The letter also says something about Rose possibly getting into mischief some nights as well....Uh oh, wonder what that means! 

Jacob had the opportunity to write Santa as well but he got very upset by the prospect of an elf coming to live with us.  I believe that he thought Will Ferrell from the movie Elf was going to show up...think I'd be upset by that thought as well!  When he saw Ella's elf this morning his first words were, "Santa was here!"  He was extremely excited by that thought and wanted to immediately write Santa a letter asking for his own elf.  When I asked him what he wanted to write to Santa he said to tell him that, "I will take very good care of my elf."  So sweet.  So we shall see if Jacob one day receives an elf as well! 

Santa 2006

Last night we headed to the mall for the annual meeting of Santa.  Never quite sure how the kids will handle it but they seemed to be all set and knew what they were going to say and do.  That is...until Santa was up close and personal!!  Jacob was on a mission to tell Santa what he wanted so he bucked up but Ella was having no part of the big man!  We managed to get this picture of Jacob holding Ella to keep her from running off...at least their smiling! 

So sad :-(

I attempted to knit a teddy bear.  This is my sad attempt.


Made even sadder by the fact I ran out of yarn to complete his arms!  I think he looks like an old worn out used bear, rather than something I just made less than 15 hours ago.  Kinda like the Velveteen Rabbit.  LOL! 

My elfamorphosis!

Me as an elf!!

Jacob got into the act too....

Jacob as an elf

Santa hats everywhere!!

I've been a crazy kniting fool!!

Who knew this thing could be so much fun?