Our Trees....

Decorating

Last Saturday, the Christmas trees were lit up at our house!! I took some time and really looked at the ornaments that went on the tree. I soon realized that the ornaments told the story of our life..... For instance....
John made this ornament when he was a little boy...what a blessing that his Mom took the time to spend making these with him!!! Yes, it's made from a clothespin!!!
I saw various school/church ornaments too.....
We've documented the year that we went to Disney World at Christmastime....
I remember the year that my cousin, Bobbi Jo, could actually wear this little bootie!!
Andrew's first ornament.....
and the year that someone was a little obsessed with Dora the Explorer...
and others, well.....I'm really not sure what they are....

An angel?????? Maybe???? But....I LOVE it!!

Long Weekend...

Well, the neighborhood gang was reunited again over break.....they went out on Black Friday and waited in line at Best Buy...and they later came over and played a big (3 hour) game of RISK...
Some things were decorated this weekend....
and John made a delicious pot of his Mom's famous Chili recipe!!! It was the topping for our baked potatoes!!!

MMMMMM...Good.....

A Thankful Celebration!!!

Our Thanksgiving was out of the ordinary, but it was GREAT!! We had dinner at the Copper Dock and they had all of the traditional fixin's and a few extras!! Luke enjoyed the RIBS!!!
This girl loved the chocolate fountain...
I loved the food and the festive buffet decor....
But most of all, I LOVED the company....

We missed you Gma and Gpa Peterson!!!!

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!!!

With this little girlie being sick, I'm not sure what today will bring.....notice her little friend snuggled up behind her legs!!!

But I know for sure, we will have apple pie!!!! Happy Thanksgiving! Counting our blessings today... So much to be thankful for.....

Wordless Wedneday....Buds

Banana Split Bread!!

Banana Split Bread
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup mashed banana (about 2 large bananas)
3 Tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped pecans

In a large mixing bowl, cream sugar, egg and butter with a mixer until mixture is fluffy, about 3 minutes; set aside. In a small bowl, mix bananas, vanilla and milk; set aside. Sift together flour, baking powder and baking soda onto a paper plate. Add dry ingredients to creamed butter mixture alternately with banana mixture, stirring together with a rubber spatula until dry ingredients are blended, about 1 minute. Stir in Chocolate chips and pecans. Spoon batter into a greased loaf pan. Drop pan twice to remove air bubbles. Bake in a preheated oven at 350 for 1 hour. Cool in the pan on a wire rack 10 minutes. Remove bread to wire rack to complete cooling. Makes 1 loaf.
(I double the recipe to make 3 small loaves)

Weekend Highlight...

Our weekend was so calm and enjoyable!!! Friday night, we celebrated Ben's birthday by going to a restaurant of his choice....La Chimenea. Of course he ordered his favorite...Steak Fajitas!!
Later Friday night we packed up the whole family and Gma and Gpa and went to the High School production of "Anything Goes..." It was a GREAT play...we had lots of laughs!! Here's a picture of John and I before the play...

Meal Swap

It's not a very good picture, but I am involved in a meal swap with a bunch of friends and these are all of the goodies that are going to fill our freezers!! I went home with 14 frozen meals.....AWESOME!!

Craziness

Happy Birthday, John!!

Good Food....

So what do you suppose a college boy that eats dorm food all of the time wants the most when he comes home??? Yep, homemade food!! I was more than happy to make a feast!!! There was Grandma's award winning chicken and dumpling casserole, macaroni and corn casserole and roasted asparagus.....it was soooooo good!!! Not to mention Ice Cream Cake for dessert!!
Here's a closer look for your drooling pleasure.....

Highlight of the weekend....

The highlight of our weekend was getting to enjoy Andrew being home for the whole weekend!! As you can imagine, there was a lot of this.....
and some of this......
and even a little of this.....


and these people got to witness it all!!!!! Fun Weekend!!!

Winter Wonderland.....

Yes, this is what it looked like yesterday at about 7am at our house....can you believe it?? As if it was some weird coincidence, a radio station in our area started playing Christmas music yesterday.....Good thing the snow melted and we're back to seeing green grass again....I'm not quite ready for snow......