One more Advent activity to tell you about

OK, so I've been meaning to post this one for awhile...but I kinda got busy and stuff. The girls and I made this a few days before Christmas. We had so much fun doing it....but I think that they all had more fun eating it later.

More Advent fun...

..the best one yet, so the kids say. The activity was to make a fort and have dinner in it. I wanted an easy dinner that kids could eat in a fort with out making a big mess. I had seen on Pinterest pizzas cut into Christmas shapes, so I thought that would be the perfect thing. We had company, Dan Court and his wife Pam, over for dinner. Yes you read that right, we had  Dan Court and his wife Pam over for dinner. So, to clarify, in attendance at dinner, were Dan Court, his wife Mandy(me) and 4 children; and Dan Court and his wife Pam. Weird...a little bit. Dan and Dan are related some how; first cousin's once removed or something like that. Dan and his wife have recently moved into our ward. They live in Warner. They have bought this old church and are renovating it; it will one day become a B&B....funny because when the church first went up for sale I dreamed of doing just that with it. It is a beautiful building with an amazing yard. They have joked that when they are ready to sell it they'll keep it in the family and sell it to us, perfect, then I won't have to do all the work of renovating it. Any how, as you have discerned, we now have two Dan Courts in our ward...it can make church really interesting, like the Sunday that Dan Court(Milk River) was released as Ward mission leader, and then they called Dan Court(Warner) as Ward mission leader.

So anyways back to the purpose of this post...while the kids and dad made the perfect fort. Pam and I made pizza's.

It was an afternoon of adventure, creativity and good company. And yes, I am the coolest mom ever; at least my kids assigned me that title yesterday...we'll see if they still feel the same way when they get home from school this afternoon and have to clean their bedrooms.

Cookies, oh so good.

Today's advent activity was to make a Christmas treat. Check out what we made today...

  We made these cookies a week or so ago but I never did get around to telling you all about them. They are sinful. It's a cookie in a cookie. Sorry I didn't get a picture of the inside, they just didn't last that long. Each cookies is the equivalent of three cookies. Two chocolate chip cookies with an Oreo cookie sandwiched in between. These cookies are HUGE and so very very yummy.

The cookie idea's came from here and here....once again, Thank you Pinterest.

And because I was taking pictures of the cookies, this boy thought he should have his picture taken too. I love this boy, snotty nose and all.

10 minutes of my life...

Just as I finish putting my makeup on, lookin' all gorgeous and ready to go to the ward Christmas party...my darling Kymberly throws up on the couch downstairs. She comes upstairs crying. I help her get out of her clothes and head down stairs to clean up the couch and throw what I can in the laundry. Daniel calls to tell me he's almost home and to be ready so we can head out the door to the party. I tell him that Kymberly just threw up and that I probably wont be going. I hang up and come back upstairs. James hands me a musical snow globe that he is fascinated with. He wants me to wind it up. I wind it up and put it down on the table. He picks it up and starts to walk away with it. Kathryn tries to help by trying to take it away from him, but he gets mad and throws it on the kitchen floor....water and glass everywhere. Now James is crying because it scared him and Kymberly is crying even more because she loved that snow globe. As I am kneeling on the floor mopping up the water and picking up bits of broken glass, Kymberly gags, I recognize the signs of her about to throw up, so I tell her to go to the bathroom. She doesn't quite make it to the toilet and now we have projectile vomit all over the bathroom. Daniel walks in the door. I help Kymberly out of her clothes again...lucky for me the washer isn't that far into it's cycle, I can just add these clothes along with the bathmat and towel to it. I get that mess cleaned up. Put James' socks, shoes and jacket on and send the kids out the door with Dad. Now I'm stuck at home with a sick kid while everyone else heads off to the party...nothing like wasting perfectly good makeup for a night in...all by my lonesome.

I read a saying on Pinterest that goes like this "I have an irrational fear of wasting a good outfit on an insignificant day". I have to say this is so very true for me. However I fear wasting good, expensive makeup on an insignificant day even more. I don't buy a lot of makeup, but I recently(and by recently I mean in May) bought some good expensive(at least more money than I have EVER spent on makeup...combined...OK, that might be a bit of an exaggeration) eye make up that I love and I want it last forever. Putting make up on at 5:30pm and then sitting around home with nobody, certainly qualifies as an insignificant day. On top of that....I don't even know what I am going to eat for supper.

Playing in the snow

On the first day that we actually had real snow, like enough snow to actually do something with. Kymberly wanted to make snowmen...girls. But the snow was to dry, so instead we created a snow dinosaur.

It has since snowed again, and last night the chinook wind blew, some what lightly compared to what it has been doing these past few weeks. Today the snow was perfect for creating snowmengirls. So that is just what we did.

After we made this snowgirl, in fact it was a Kymberly snowgirl, she wanted to make one of me. So she got started...and somewhere along the way her train of thought changed....here, you can witness it for yourself.

She's a crazy kid. I love her.

Our Advent activities

This year we are doing an activity advent. Each day the kids open up a little match box that I made all pretty and inside is the activity for that day.




Here's some of the fun stuff we've done so far.

On December 1st we made paper snow flakes. Aren't they pretty?

On Dec 3rd we were supposed to make a Christmas craft, but we were in Lethbridge all day watching dad play at our high school alumni  basketball tournament. But we managed to make up for it the on Sunday. We made pretty borax crystal ornaments(you can find the instructions here).

On Dec 4th we decorated our Christmas tree. So pretty.

(I'll try to get a better picture when the sun isn't shining in my window)

I'll keep you posted on the other fun stuff we'll be doing through out the month.

The best thing I have found on Pinterest

OK, this may or may not be an exaggeration...but I believe I just discovered the most amazing thing on Pinterest.

Wait for it....

DIY microwave popcorn! That's right. Popcorn in just minutes with out all the extra crud that is in each microwave popcorn bag. I haven't owned an air popper for....well I haven't ever owned one. We have always made our popcorn in a kettle on the stove, or used microwave popcorn(why, I don't know). But this, this is amazing. All you need is a brown paper bag and 1/4 cup popcorn(Squawkfox.com says to use 1/2 cup, but when I did that my brown paper lunch bag exploded and I had popcorn all over the microwave). You simple put your popcorn kernels in the brown bag, fold it over twice, and put it in your microwave for 3 minute. Just as you would any microwave popcorn, it is done when the popping has slowed to two or three pops per second. There are also suggestions on how to make your own gourmet toppings. Today we added some melted butter and then sprinkled on some cinnamon and sugar, I've never seasoned it this way, and I don't know why. It was delicious.

If you want to make your own microwave popcorn and delicious topping just click right here and you'll be on your way.