The other day, I was making crab dip and Madeline was loving the smell of the lemons. "Do you want some?" I asked. "Yes!".... Here's how it went with Madeline's first lemon wedge

In this world which seems to be spinning out of control, a very special event is about to take place. The celebration of the birth of our Savior. CHRISTmas...What does it mean to you? Have you lost the meaning? Have you never known the real meaning? Do you share the greatest gift our amazing Lord has given to us the same way I do? Why do you celebrate Christmas? Is it about Christ? If it's not, then I pray for all of you who do not, or don't want to know.

We went to see Jolly Ole Saint Nick yesterday. He brought along Blitzen too. The girlies cousins were there, Scarlett and her baby sister Tessa. It was a magical time for them. Both of my girls had made pictures for Santa. They told Santa what they wanted and got even to pet Blitzen.  A little boy asked the reindeer handler how old Blitzen was.  His response?..."Oh a couple hundered years or so...."  I thought that was priceless! 

Don't forget to click play on both of the slide shows in this post

After seeing St. Nicholas, we were off to the Christmas tree farm to pick out our tree. A hay ride took us out to the trees and it didn't take too long to pick out one that I wanted.  Don't panic when you see the scary masked guy in the Carhartts with the girlies.  It's just daddy.  The girlies helped him to trim the tree too.  Oh..and there's a picture in there of me too.  It's been a long time since I've been photographed.  I had gained weight, but recently lost 15 lbs.  Yay me!!!

It was a VERY cold day, but with all of us dressed for the elements, it was very enjoyable.

When Tara was 2 months old, we became involved in the "PAT" program in our school district. It stands for "Parents As Teachers". It's a great program which I have been able to benefit from since it's conception in our district. They have playgroups, special events, family fun nights and picnics. A parent educator comes to your house monthly to test, play with and do crafts with your child. We've had the same parent educator since Tara was 2 months old...Miss. Heather. I personally LOVE her. She's a great woman and my kids both love her too. Today was one of our playgroups at school and the theme was "Red, White and Blue-I Love You". There were several crafts all of which Madeline is displaying here. They also had plenty of activities, a parade and even some yummy fresh fruit for snack. Madeline had a really good time.

Her head looks like a firework.  I love it!!

Sweetness  

I told the girlies that I had a "really, really special surprise for them today". They kept trying to guess what it was. When I made them close their eyes and then open them after I had put the boxes in front of each child, I can not tell you how totally excited they were. Since I don't have the book Hansel and Grettel (in all of the hundreds of kids books I own!!), we went on line to "Storynory" to listen to the story. It's a great website for anyone with kids. It's filled with audio classic stories and more http://storynory.com/archives/. Here is how we spent our morning...

Here are the final products.  Can you see the pride?? They really had a great time! I bought the kits at Wal Mart.