Christmas 2011

We went to Grandma and Grandpa's house for Christmas 2011, just like we did for Christmas 2008. Thankfully, we could drive there this time, since we had twice as many kids to bring along as we did back then. We went up on Christmas Eve afternoon and had a Christmas dinner that night.

The next morning, of course, the Muffins were VERY excited for presents. Here we have Amanda and Lydia opening one of Lydia's presents.

Here's Curtis passing presents around.

As fun as presents are, though, the big event was the gingerbread house making. Here's Dad with the elder three Muffins deep into construction. He made the gingerbread from scratch.
Assembling the house . . .
House all together . . .
All ready to be decorated!
The finished product pictures this year are unfortunately non applicable, due to some structural issues. Still fun, though.

On the way home, the family indulged Mom in a little side trip. We went to see the "Up" house, modeled after the house in Pixar's Up. It really stands out from the other (boring brown) houses in the neighborhood. Mom had heard about it back in August, and she was glad to finally see it in person, at least on the outside.

Christmas decorating 2011

Our Christmas decorations this year were nothing fancy, just our favorite trusty traditional display, much of which was made or given by Mom's Grandma Joan when Mom was little. The advent calendar below ended up full of ornaments by Christmas, including a brand new ornament sewn on by Mom to replace one that went missing.

The real decorating event this year came a few days before Christmas when Mom and the Muffins decorated cookies. Mom went for a fairly traditional look:

The rest of the Muffins chose their own styles:




Looks like this should be an annual event. :)

Thanksgiving Time 2011

It all started with a trip to the rest area. Not really, but it did make a nice place for a lunch stop on our way to get Grandmother and Grandfather.

Once we arrived at their house, the kids began enjoying their favorite attraction: dirt. (We're apparently still recovering from having lived somewhere with grass on top of the dirt.)

Not that it was all fun and games. Oh no, Grandfather put Mom and Amanda to work at the museum. They helped churn butter in a nifty table top crank churn. Also, Mom got to give a brief lecture to a tour group. Amanda liked the butter best, and also the old manual typewriter visible in the picture.

Here's a view of the parlor room of the museum where Grandfather works.

Of course the main point of the trip was Thanksgiving. Only this time, instead of going to visit, we were bringing them back with us. Dad's family had a big open Thanksgiving planned, and so Grandmother and Grandfather joined us for the occasion. Sadly, Mom left the camera home on Thanksgiving proper, but rest assured that a good time was had eating and visiting with family. The meal below was from our practice dinner in Grandmother & Grandfather's area. Quite a yummy week, to say the least.

Dinosaurs!

'Twas a couple of days before Christmas, and Grandma and Grandpa invited us on an outing to Thanksgiving Point. So, we hopped in the van and went! (Lydia didn't actually drive, of course)

When we got there, Grandma and Grandpa graciously offered to treat us to a mammoth screen dinosaur movie. Before the show started, we checked out a room with lots of cool motion toys, like this one with all the balls rolling:

Curtis, however, found something he liked much better in the hall outside the motion room: a wall full of dinosaur paintings. That's where he and Mom spent most of their pre-movie time.

Then came movie time. We'd seen 3D movies before, but mammoth screens really do bump it up a notch. We could have sworn those paleontologists were trying to bury us with the dirt they tossed up on their dinosaur digs! Also, Mom decided that Mongolia (home to many fossils) looks a lot like Nevada. All in all, definitely a fun thing to do, and we are now quite educated about dinosaurs. Nevertheless, Mom will hold off from naming these fossils we saw for fear of lapsing into "Land Before Time" nomenclature:



The dinosaurs were a hit, of course, and the kids also enjoyed the hands-on activities, like this "build-a-dinosaur" project. Here's Curtis with a head:

And here's Lydia with a tail:

We also saw a few non-dinosaur sights, like this giant shark head model. One of the funniest other exhibits (for us) was one of human skeletons trying to take down a mammoth skeleton. One of the humans was perched on a hill with a rock over its head ready to throw. Curtis really wanted to try throwing that rock himself.

The last stop was an "excavation room," where the Muffins had fun uncovering "fossils" in the sand. Curtis especially made several visits there.

And, last but not least, we saw these nifty ice sculptures on our way back to the car. Thanks again for a fun outing, Grandma and Grandpa!

Halloween 2011

All right, folks, take a good look at it, because this is as close as it gets to a spectacular kid-in-costume picture this year. Back for an encore this year we have Jared as Batman. He's been Batman for three of his four Halloweens, and that's how he likes it:

It's not that we didn't celebrate Halloween. Why, we had our pumpkin out at the start of October, and we even got it a little buddy later in the month! However, this picture was taken November 1st. It was just one of those years.

 Our neighbors made up for it, though:

Lest you be concerned that the Muffins were deprived of Halloween, rest assured that they did make it out to enjoy the season. Mom even dressed up for the occasion a little.

First stop, the grand Halloween party the Thursday before Halloween. It was like a church party, but on a much larger scale, with lots and lots of yummy soups and goodies and lots of games for the kids. Here are Amanda and Jared getting ready for a sack race.

There was also a ring toss game. Curtis watched Amanda and Jared do it . . .

. . . and then he went and showed them how it's REALLY done. Note that Curtis was a nonconformist this Halloween: he absolutely refused to wear a costume of any kind for any of the events we attended.

The boys' favorite game was the one with all the rubber duckies. Can you blame them?

The next night was our actual church party. Not quite as big as the night before, but still lots of good food, fun costumes, and, most importantly, trunk-or-treating. Here are Amanda and Jared enjoying some spoils.

We took the weekend off to rest up for Halloween proper. Good thing we did, too, because even so both girls needed to go to the doctor that day. Nothing serious, just enough to get Amanda excused from school and warrant a trip to the pharmacy. It was our first time going to our new doctor here, and Mom was glad that the Muffins couldn't see over the counter to notice all the costumes the employees were wearing. Nothing wrong with the costumes, mind you, but it would have been sad trying to explain to them later why Jessie the Cowgirl, the clown, the cave girl, etc. weren't there every time we went back. :) The best part about the pharmacy trip was that it presented another opportunity for trick-or-treating, right in the grocery store while we waited for the medicine. (How convenient is that?) Here's Lydia dressed up in the family dragon/dinosaur suit for the occasion (yes, it's hard to be a girl after two brothers in a slow Halloween year).

And here's Lydia again at the store with the other Muffins, pleased at the treats that kept coming our way.

There's been a lot of talk about it being a slow year for Halloween, but in all fairness, it should be noted that Jared had a pretty busy season. Remember the Batman costume? Too old now. Time to move on to another super hero for the store trick-or-treat:

And yet another for actual official night time trick-or-treating. Dad fashioned the mask, and Jared decorated the cupcake at a party we visited during trick-or-treat time.

Amanda got a late start trick-or-treating for academic reasons. Fortunately, the party Mom and Jared visited was still going strong, and so Amanda went to town decorating goodies:

Mom got into the fun, too, with this "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" inspired cupcake, featuring chocolate cake and chocolate frosting topped with chocolate licorice:

Still, throughout all the festivities, Mom was haunted by the cute, coordinated, gender-appropriate, not leftover or last minute costumes on so many other peoples' children. The solution: a day-after-Halloween shopping trip (quite successful, too). So, stay tuned for Halloween 2012, featuring cooler costumes and hopefully some great pictures of said costumes.