Merry Christmas!

Wishing you and your family all of the blessings of the Christmas season.  May you enjoy time with friends and family celebrating the day that Jesus was born!

God Bless and Merry Christmas!

Other Gifts For Kids

Do you struggle during the holiday season to buy the gifts your kids truly want? 

Is your house already "overrun" with "stuff" and you struggle to add more "stuff" to your house?

Do you have friends and family ask what to get your kids and you cannot give a good answer?

Have you considered gifts that aren't necessarily wrapped under the tree yet provide your kids with a fun or educational experience in the coming year? 

Here is a list of gifts that your children may appreciate (or parents) more than the wrapped ones under the tree.  I've provided links that are local to my area (Cleveland, OH), but free feel to research similar ideas in the area you live.

1.  A local zoo membership.
2.  A children's museum membership or history museum membership.
3.  A local botanical gardens membership or science center membership.
4.  A donation to a college fund.  Even if you cannot contribute a lot, if you have one open for your kids others can donate.
5.  A membership to a local recreation center.
6.  A book of the month club.
7.  If you know of an upcoming trip, perhaps offer to buy theme park tickets, airline tickets, etc.
8.  Kiwi Crate - delivers a creative learning box every month.
9.  Local events tickets - sporting events, Circus, theater performance, etc.
10.  Free night of babysitting.

What other creative ideas do you have?

The Big Guy - Santa 2015

Success!  All three kids looking at the camera and smiling at Santa!  Last year we had a crier, this year she was a little hesitant to get too close.  Luckily her brother saved the day and let our Little Miss sit on his lap!

I feel we are entering kind of an "in between" stage with Santa.  My oldest is 9 and quickly I am noticing he is not as excited to take part in some of the Christmas festivities.  On the positive side, he is ALWAYS a good sport, and does as he is asked.  He is an excellent role model for our younger two and he is the perfect oldest child!

I hope you have a good Santa experience too this year!

For those local, we visited Santa at Petitti's Garden Center.  The line was short and you could use your own camera.  Yeah for free and easy!

May God bless you and your family during this Christmas season!

In the "Nick of Time" Santa Pic 2014

You know when you have everything perfectly planned and then it all goes out the window?  Yes that was my weekend.  We had waited until the weekend before Christmas to go visit Santa.  Well Saturday came and my baby came down with the most feared thing in my house.... THE STOMACH BUG.  Well you know how this one goes, Mom went down at 6 pm Sunday night, my 6 year old woke up just before midnight on Sunday and then at 6 am on Monday my oldest was struck! 

Dad was our hero, he took care of us and we were just about convinced ourselves he was spared.  That was just until about 9 pm Monday night.  Luckily he had a quick case of the bug.  By Tuesday night we were all doing well.  As I was laying in bed with my 6 year old, he asked why we hadn't seen Santa yet?  Uggh!!  Why did I wait until the last minute?  Why didn't I think we would all become insanely ill the weekend before Christmas?  Next year I won't procrastinate!

Tuesday night we all went to the mall.  We all waited in line for about an hour.  But finally we got to see the big guy.  Everyone was excited and then this happened, the scream of fear!  Well, kind of describes my weekend, the awful "Christmas Bug of 2014"!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas

Wishing you and your families a very Merry Christmas.  May you enjoy this blessed holiday season with good times, good food, and the wonderful people in your lives.  Remember the blessings you have and be thankful for them!

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Cards

I absolutely love receiving Christmas cards this time of year.  I think it is one of my favorite parts of Christmas.  Now I am one of those gals who LOVES to get the mail.  If I am home and hear the mailman, I dart outside to get it!  You never know what surprises will be in your mailbox!

I personally open each Christmas card and become excited to see what is inside.  My absolute favorite are the photo Christmas cards.  It is so enjoyable to see children grow up, especially ones you do not see a lot.  They have a much more 'personal' feel to them and you know the senders took a lot of time to select the just perfect photo.  I know I do!

This year I received my annual Christmas card from a woman I use to work with when we first graduated college.  We have not seen each other in about 6 years, but we still send our annual Christmas cards.  I guess it had been awhile since I e-mailed here, because here she had another baby girl!  I was so excited and immediately we began chatting on e-mail again! 

We also receive cards from a few of our old neighbors.  We moved a little over 4 years ago and it is amazing how much their children have grown!  I'm sure they say the same thing about our family.  This year for my parents for Christmas, we did portraits with them and the grandchildren.  They used this photo as their card this year!

We display our photos on the door in our kitchen that leads to our basement.  It is so much fun looking at every one's card and it brings extra joy to the house.  After Christmas, I keep all the photo cards in a special box.  This is a fun way to spend a Saturday looking over previous years' cards.  The remaining cards I keep for the boys (as I do with all greeting cards).  We use these for crafts and projects through out the year!

Where do you hang your Christmas cards?

Enjoying a Simple Season

It’s difficult in the world we live in not to become wrapped up in the hustle and bustle of the holiday season. Unfortunately, a lot of this “fast-paced” movement is surrounded around not celebrating the true meaning of the Christmas season. A popular quote, yet it was up on the electronic sign at my son’s school as I drove by yesterday, “Jesus is the Reason for the Season”. This serves as a reminder to me and hopefully others that drive by on that busy road why we celebrate Christmas. It is truly a religious holiday celebrating the birth of Jesus. I try not to be too religious in my views on this blog, but truly Christmas is a celebration of new life and the birth of Christ!

My husband and I strive to celebrate a “simple season” with our children and provide them with the true meaning of Christmas. Yes, they believe in Santa Claus and he brings them gifts on Christmas day, but they also know we celebrate Christmas day with Christ at our church Christmas morning. We celebrate with family on Christmas Eve and Christmas day and we say Grace before our meals. We are thankful for Mary and Joseph and for bringing us God’s only son.

I find myself frustrated this time of the year with the traffic around my house. Yes, it does not help that I live behind a very popular mall, but is all this rushing to get into the mall to buy gifts really worth it? I was appalled on Thanksgiving evening the line of people already gearing up to get into Best Buy to be the first to get the season’s hottest gifts. And even the fact that Best Buy this year had a giant screen in their parking lot to entertain the wary shoppers while they waited. We spent the day after Thanksgiving by sleeping in until 9, enjoying breakfast as a family, staying in our jammies until noon, trimming the Christmas tree and displaying our Christmas decorations, enjoying leftovers from the day before for dinner, and attending a local lighting ceremony in the evening! The best part of the lighting ceremony was the beginning, when the Mayor turned the microphone over to our local Pastor and he said a prayer and blessing over the entire crowd. I was in amazement! Yes, they got it right, even in the world we live in today with people worrying about offending others, they started a public ceremony with prayer. I was truly proud to have my children and attendance and it was a topic of conversation between my husband and I before bed that night. “What an awesome way to start the holiday season”! By the way, the lighting was amazing; compete with fireworks, Santa riding in on a fire truck, and a horse drawn wagon ride!

We were able to enjoy a wonderful Breakfast with Santa complete with food, games, crafts, and pictures with Santa himself. Luckily both of my boys were excited to sit on his lap this year. We have visited many Christmas light displays and the boys enjoy flipping the switch every night to turn on our lights and watch our huge blow up “Frosty” rise from the ground. However, I am a bit concerned on how some people have like 10 of these giant blow up characters in their yard? I just received a December electric bill and “yikes”! You would think we were running the A/C! We have been listening to Alvin & the Chipmunks Christmas songs for weeks now; it is the only thing the boys will listen to in the car. Yes I know the words and yes I catch myself singing the songs often for no reason!

This morning, my husband and I were able to enjoy with the Grandparents a wonderful Christmas Music Show put on by the kindergartners and 1^st graders at my son’s school. My son did warn me ahead of time that I was “not allowed to do any of the motions from my seat”. I behaved and just watched and listened to the beautiful Christian Christmas songs. It even brought a tear to my eye at the beginning, but I am a very emotional person, so that was expected! The boys are geared up for our ride on The Polar Express this weekend. I have to admit I am excited too! We will also be baking some cookies this weekend in preparation of the big day. We need to make sure we leave Santa plenty of cookies and milk to drink!

I hope that everyone has a very joyous holiday season and I wish everyone a Very Merry Christmas!

What We Did on Our Christmas Vacation

This was a great week!  We were able to do some sled riding, thanks to the fresh coating of snow Mother Nature provided for us!

We also got to enjoy a day of ice skating with my aunt and cousins!  Mom was a little sore after we ice skated for over 3 hours!  But hey, we had a great time!

We also got to enjoy some classic games that Santa Claus brought to our house on Christmas morning, like Trouble, Hungry Hungry Hippos, and Sorry!

Finally we got to enjoy some new movies, Toy Story 3 and The Search for Santa Paws! 

Even Mom and Dad got to enjoy some movies after the kids were fast asleep like Date Night, Grown Ups, The Bounty Hunter, and The Back-Up Plan!

All in all it was a great Christmas Vacation and one of the best parts was that everyone slept past 8:30 everyday!  It is going to be rough getting up for work and school next week!

Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas Vacation!

Why This Christmas Was Less Stressful

This Christmas season was a lot less stressful for myself and my family members then ones in the past.  We had a lot of changes this year and so we handled this season a little differently.  The reasons why I thought it was a lot less stressful were:

1. We came up with a Christmas budget per person and stuck to it!
2. We saved money in advance using a Smarty Pig account!
3. I shopped in advance mostly before Thanksgiving!
4. For gifts I still needed I shopped online especially with Amazon which gave free shipping on everything due to my Amazon Mom account!
5. I used Amazon gift cards earned through EBATES and Coinstar!
6. I completed all of my grocery shopping earlier in the Christmas week so I would not have to deal with the crowds!
7. I pre-planned our Christmas meal and used items from our stockpile, like the cheap turkey I scored right before Thanksgiving!
8. We made a point to schedule Christmas dinner with family after 4 pm at our house to allow for nap time.
9. We used December 26th as a "down" day for us so the kids could enjoy their toys and we just relaxed!
10. We were together as a family and celebrated our Lord's birth, because that is what the season is all about!

Merry Christmas

Wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas. 

I hope your holiday is full of family, friends, and lots of fun!

My wish is that everyone takes the time to appreciate the true meaning of CHRISTmas.

I know the hustle and bustle of buying gifts often makes me lose focus,

so I plan on taking some time in the next 2 days to focus on the true meaning.

Our Savior was born on Christmas day!

May God bless you and your families.

Our Christmas Day Menu

So this year my parents are hosting Christmas Eve.  We are going to be hosting Christmas Day at our house for my husband's side of the family.  Since they were away on Thanksgiving, we are making a Thanksgiving meal for everyone on Christmas.  So our menu on Christmas will be:

Shrimp

Sausage Cheese Balls Appetizers

Turkey & Stuffing

Mashed Potatoes & Gravy

Green Bean Casserole

Rolls

Cinnamon Roll Cookies

Pumpkin Pie

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas

Wishing your family a very Merry Christmas. Hoping that you take the time and enjoy the days with your loved ones! God has blessed our family in so many ways and to Him I am eternally grateful. Only He has the master plan of our lives and we much enjoy very minute of it!