It's begining to look like Gingerbread!

Making Gingerbread Cookies

The simple recipe we used...

1/2 c margarine

1/2 c sugar

1/2 c molasses

1 egg yolk

2 cups sifted all purpose flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground cloves

1 tsp ginger

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg

In a large bowl, cream together the margarine and sugar until smooth. Stir in molasses and egg yolk. Combine the flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, ginger and nutmeg. Blend into the molasses until smooth. Cover and chill for at least one hour.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough out to 1/4 inch thickness. Cut into desired shapes with cookie cutters. Place cookies 2" apart on ungreased cookie sheets.

Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven, until firm. Remove from cookie sheets to cool on wire racks. Frost or decorate when cool.

Makes 30 cookies.

I love the smell of gingerbread and I especially love cookies. It's hard for me to pass up the Holiday Season without making a batch of gingerbread cookies. Having so many cooks in the kitchen this year, a batch of gingerbread was all we had time for. We had a pretty comical experience making this batch and consumed most of it at the end of the evening that only a few made it to Santa's plate. The kids had a blast making their own cookies. Emily loved trying the dough. It's definately a tradition we will carry on!

Decorating the Gingerbread House

Isn't decorating a gingerbread house so much fun? It's really hard for me to keep my hands off too but it's really fun to watch the kids. My oldest at 5 really got into decorating this year. He had a plan and knew what he wanted on the house and where. My 3 year old just wanted to sample all the candies and Emily only knew marshmellows were for eating from all the hot cocoa we had this winter. She was constantly pulling off the marshmellows and eating them. She did put a few candies on the house and sat as long as the boys, doing this activity. She's funny and everytime she touched the frosting she wanted to wipe her hands on the wet paper towel. "Towel, mom," she says.

Emily is saying..."cheese".

Emily is reaching for a marshmellow. She would hold each up and say

"Eat, mom".

Celebrating the Holidays Part 2

Here's the 2nd installment...

Meeting Santa

I'm kind of a traditions girl. Every year since Boy Wonder was a baby we have taken the kids to see Santa. The funny thing is that for each boy their second Christmas when they were around 20 months they refused to sit with Santa so I have no photo of them that year. So...I was wondering how would Emily do. Would she too not sit with Santa being that this was her 20 month photo shot? I have photos in frames all over the house of the kids with Santa that I put up every December. We talked a lot about how wonderful Santa was and how he brings presents to the children on X-mas Eve. We have also seen the Polar Express about a million times this season thanks to Bubba which has really helped too. Emily, naturally was really unsure about Santa, but what a trooper. And of course it helped that her brothers were over the moon to see him. After that visit she pointed out Santa everytime she saw his image..in books, ornaments, decorations in the house. And she says it so cute. I've heard it a million times and I still can't figure out which sounds she is adding or substituting in his name. Hubby thinks she is saying SHanta. And it almost always comes out in a long drawn out whisper. The dress Emily is wearing was her X-mas Eve dress and it was one that I bought for her last year. I saw it in the store when I was shopping for the boys last X-mas and just fell in love with it. It was my gift for her under the tree when she couldn't be home with us last Christmas. And I'm so glad it fit!! I almost bought the 18 month but talked myself into the 24 month and thank goodness I did!!

Emily's ornaments

Another tradition I love. I fell in love with clay ornaments when my hubby and I were looking for something special to put on our tree when we celebrated our first children's first Christmas. Our first children were the terrible twins...our furbabies, Mandy and James. This was back when we were just living together long before we married. From that first Christmas every year we got a family ornament that symbolized something we had done that year. When our human babies began to arrive we added to the tradition by giving them an individual ornament for their ornament collection. The idea being that when they are grown they will have a set of ornaments to take with them for their own Christmas trees and with it a set of memories of their years in our family. And since I'm not very good with giving things up, I will get to keep the family ornaments. So in keeping with the tradition this year we got to add Emily to our family ornament and she got her own individual ornaments too. To help catch her up she actually got 3 ornaments this year.

The little horse we bought in St. Petersburg on our first trip to represent her culture and her birth. I loved this ornament because the horse reminds me of the horse used in scandinavian traditions which is present in my boys' backgrounds. The matryoshka doll is wearing the traditional blue russian costume to represent St Petersburg and was purchased the morning we went to court on our 2nd trip. And even though these 2 ornaments are not made of clay they are very dear to me. How I held onto them while we waited for Emily to come home.

This last ornament is because I had so few baby things of Emily. This is her little handprint taken in the first few months she was home. Her hand has already grown so much since this imprint was taken. I also have a larger clay piece that has her hand and foot on it that is framed for her as part of her babyhood collection.

And last her "first Christmas home" ornament with her cute little face on it which looks very similar to Bubba's "Baby's first Christmas" ornament.

Celebrating the Holiday Season Part 1

I've been so busy this month with school and all of the Holidays that I haven't had a chance to post in a long while. I'm going to try and do a series of posts on our holidays.

Here is a little of what we've been upto...

Our version of a white Christmas. It's been so cold here this month that our backyard almost looks like it got a dusting of snow.

Emily's First Christmas Tree

There's a Christmas Tree Farm near us where we have bought our Christmas Tree the last 4 or 5 years. My sister's family joined us and the kids had a blast picking out the trees. Emily quickly learned the word "tree". And for the next few days she would walk by the tree and point to it and say..."tree, mom." I can only imagine what she was thinking. Now we have a tree in the middle of our house. What's next?

My beautiful 21 month old baby!!

My last little baby is growing up so fast!!

We have our tree!! It's a cute one!!

The Kids...

I love this moment... Emily smelling the Christmas tree. Ahh..the smell of a fresh tree!

Decorating the Christmas Tree

Putting on the lights.

Big brother showing little sister how to put on the ornaments.

Finding an ornament..

Having a ball!


Emily's First Christmas Parade

The first Saturday of December brings the childrens' parade. Our preschool participates in it every year. It's a lot of fun. We decorated our bikes, put on our red sweatshirts and headed out early to line up for the parade. The kids had a blast. After we finished walking in the parade we grabbed lunch and then a chocolate chip cookie and milk and watched the rest of the parade from the sidelines. The parade always ends with Santa.

Holding hands with my nephew.

Beautiful girl!

SANTA's coming!!