Christmas Traditions

This Christmas season has been extra special with little Lena.  As she gets older we can introduce her to so many fun experiences.   Last week we had a fun evening together visiting Knott's at night to see the park all lit up at night.  We caught the Christmas Tree Lighting Show, nibbled on french fries, walked around the Christmas craft village, rode the merry-go-round and Lena's new favorite the trucks. 

Mommy & Daughter date to Knott's to see the Christmas tree lightning show!

Wearing her new winter coat from Auntie Kristen and Uncle Sam and savoring a warm french fry.

This Christmas season we have implemented a few new traditions in our household which has been extra fun!  Last year I picked up a Nutcracker advent calendar on clearance.  It has 24 mini books that tell a piece of the Nutcracker story.  Each day you read one of the mini books and then it becomes an ornament.  We put them on this mini tree that came from Dan's mom. 

The Nutcracker Advent Tree

Over the last few years we have accumulated some great Christmas books, most of them gifts from close family and friends.  This year I gathered them all together and put them in a big basket in our living room.  Lena has recently taken a greater interest in books.  She spends lots of time turning the pages and babbling as she points to the pictures.  In the future years it will be fun to read one book each night together as we count down the days till Christmas.

Christmas Book Basket

One of my best thrift store/garage sale finds this year was an entire little people nativity set that I purchased for $3.00!!!  I've been wanting a nativity set for quite a few years and I really love this one because Lena can play with it.  I can see her enjoying it for many Christmases to come acting out the Christmas story on her own as she plays with it.

Little People Nativity

With my coupon from Fisher Price I bought this Little People Nativity Advent Calendar from the Fisher-Price website.  Lena loved putting the cloth pieces on the nativity each night with Daddy.  She would always walk up to it and steal the drummer boy out of the December 24th pocket. 

Little People Nativity Advent Calendar

 I've been wanting to get an advent wreath for awhile so I finally snatched one up on sale at Michael's this year.  It was fun to light one candle each Sunday in December as we counted down to Christmas day and it made a pretty centerpiece.

Advent wreath

While it is not a new tradition we were able to add several new ornaments to our travel ornament Christmas tree.  We love looking at the ornaments and remembering all our fun trips as a family both before Lena and after.  We feel blessed to have been able to travel to so many interesting places together.  I wonder what new ornaments we will add next Christmas?

Family Travel Ornament Tree

This Christmas season has been one of my favorites.  We had lots of family time playing with cousins and visiting festive locations in Southern California.  We feel so blessed and thankful. 

Lena loves Mommy and french fries!

Gift Giving - Simpler is Better I Say!

I LOVE giving presents!  One of my favorite things to do is make little gifts to give our neighbors at Christmas. For years I did the traditional bake-a-bazillion-types-of-cookies-all-day thing and give the neighbors a smorgasbord plate of them.  It took a lot of ingredients (expensive), a lot of time, made a HUGE mess, and to be honest it was difficult to get them to all turn out well and stay fresh by the time I could get them finished, packaged, and delivered.

The traditional "plate of Christmas cookies".

A few years back I watched a revolutionary episode of Martha Stewart in which she declared that often it is better to make one type of high quality cookie and package them simply and beautifully for gift giving.  That year I searched for the perfect recipe and decided upon a simple Scottish Shortbread recipe that I found on a blog.  Taking a cue from Panera (where they charge $2-3 for one of these massive shortbread cookies) I made a giant version of this cookie and packed them in pairs for Christmas gifts.  Here is a picture of something similar I did for a tea later that year.

Large shortbread cookies wrapped in cellophane with raffia and lavender sprigs.

This year I decided upon an awesome gingerbread recipe that I found on Food.com.  I love it because the dough is really easy to roll out, it is super spicy and flavorful which gives it an heirloom quality, and the cookies hold their shape well while staying soft with a nice chew.  I iced them by brushing on a simple vanilla icing (1 cup powder sugar, 2 tbsp milk, 1/2 tsp vanilla) and then sprinkled on some raw sugar crystals for a nice simple sparkle.  I also like how the sugar crystals give the cookie a tiny crunch factor.  (Can you tell by reading this that I watch WAY too much Food Network TV!)  For packaging I used clear cellophane bags with a pretty bow.  I placed a piece of green card stock on the bottom to keep the package nice and flat and tiny squares of wax paper in between each cookie so that they wouldn't stick to each other while stacked.  The entire endeavor only took me an hour and 45 minutes from start to finish for eight half-dozen cookie packages which is two batches of this cookie recipe.  You can find the recipe here on Food.com.  Don't over bake them (unless you want crispy cookies)!  My cookies finished in four minutes.  They will firm up as they cool.  Also make sure you let the dough rest at room temperature for at least two hours like the recipe says and for Pete's sake! don't use margarine - only real butter will do if you want quality cookies!

This is what my neighbors got this year:  Vanilla Iced Gingerbread Rounds with Sugar Crystals

One year my oven wasn't working so instead of baking I made homemade greeting cards out of pictures from our trip to Europe.  I chose all pictures of interesting doors we had photographed on our trip.  I packaged the cards in clear plastic and tied the tops with pretty ribbon much like I packaged the cookies.  It was a nice change from baked goods but I still love to bake!

This was one of the door photos we took in Venice, Italy when we were there.

This was one of my favorite door photos from our trip to Old San Juan, Puerto Rico

So what do you gift your neighbors or special people in your life?  I would love to hear some of your ideas!

Welcome #10 - Riley Michael

My eighth nephew was born on December 3rd!  Mr. Riley Michael is the tenth grandchild in our family but the first for my youngest brother and his wife.  I was able to visit him last weekend and he is the most precious little boy!  Welcome Riley!  We are so glad you are finally here!

Mr. Riley

My brother - the proud papa!

Pigtails and Other Happenings

"Peanut" in pigtails eating pizza.  Perfection.

Lena at Knott's on the trucks with Pop.

Excited to ride the merry-go-round with Mom at Knott's!

Being silly is so fun!

 Sharing a vanilla cone with Mom.

 Using Pop's pick to strum the guitar.