The Perfect Chocolate Moose

Kevin bought me the perfect gift! Look!

So Cute! So Delicious!

In which I painted a moose

Christmas 2020

 

Merry Christmas from Santa's Little Elf   



Moose Cookies for Breakfast

 

They want cookies, too!   



This is the only picture I took while we were opening presents on Christmas morning.  

I guess I got distracted by all the fun.

 

This is the bottle of wine I used to make the red wine sauce for the Beef Wellington.

Sometime during the summer, the kids informed me that they wanted to eat Beef Wellington for Christmas Dinner.  They wanted me to use Gordon Ramsay's recipe.  It only took the whole afternoon to make, but it was amazing!   

 

All the ingredients were in grams and ounces instead of pounds and cups, so I followed the recipe and ended up making enough for two full family dinners.  

 

Christmas Dinner was delicious.   

Moose Cookies for Dessert

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Sandy Springs Lantern Parade

This past weekend we did a thing.  It was a really great thing.

We participated in the annual Sandy Springs Lantern Parade!!!

First, we went to Michaels and Party City to buy supplies.  We bought battery powered tea lights (next year we will buy much more powerful and brighter lights), dowel rods and paper lanterns.

Then, we decorated our lanterns:

Grandma Ella made a pink owl.

Connor made a moose.

The moose antlers were a little bit floppy, so Connor named his moose:

Flopsy Wopsy the Moosey Woosey.

It was the perfect name.

I made a couple of Pokemon lanterns.  One was Pikachu.

The other is the purple one: Gastly.  It's a ghost type Pokemon.

Then, one of the boys' friends helped me make a Minecraft creeper lantern (the green one) and a narwhal lantern (the blue one).  Lex had specifically asked me to make him a narwhal.  It took two tries to get the horn right.

Then, on the night of the parade, we all gathered together with the bigger floats and the band and marched down to the river!

Once we got to the river, we got some snacks and watched the rest of the floats and lanterns go by.  We didn't make it down watch the water part of the parade, but apparently all the floats and some of the lanterns continue making their way down the river.  It was a great event, and I'm already looking forward to next year!  Next year our lanterns will be BIGGER and BRIGHTER and BETTER!

Merry Christmas!!

Before we put the kids to bed on Christmas Eve, we held a family meeting to agree upon what would be an acceptable time to wake up and open presents in the morning.

We settled on 6 AM.

This small, very excited child woke up at 3:30 AM.  

Waiting until 6 AM nearly killed him.

No, I didn't get back to sleep, and neither did he. 

He woke Connor up too early, too.

However, time passed, and eventually it was 6 AM and I let them wake everyone else in the house.

And then, finally, they got to open their presents!

Connor asked for a long list of different Nerf Guns this year for Christmas.

The thing that Lex really wanted for Christmas this year was a Nintendo Switch.

This year, Kevin did all the major gift buying and I stuffed the stockings.  One of the things that Connor asked for was a laser pointer, so into his stocking it went.  He wanted to use it as a dog toy.  Sometimes the dogs get it, and sometimes they don't see it.

Nana bought me a Harry Potter tea set, and she bought a coffee mug for my brother.

Lex enjoys his tea with a whole lotta honey.

I honestly think he goes along with the whole tea thing just to get the honey.

Lex bought Poppy a stuffed animal that looks like her best friend, Tik.

Merry Christmas!

God Bless Us, Everyone!

Lex Set Up the Nativity Scene this Year

I'm not sure what is going on with the moose and the angel, but I'm pretty sure that whatever it is, it's epic.  Also, I enjoy the fact that the dog has totally taken Joseph's spot next to the baby Jesus.  What can I say?  Lex loves dogs so much.

Vail

The next stop on our 12th Anniversary Colorado Road Trip was Vail.

We were there between seasons.  Winter skiing season had ended, and the summer season was going to start in just a few days.  However, even though the gondolas weren't running up the mountain and they were still building the climbing wall, there were a good number of people out and about.  The whole village is adorable and reminded us of something European, and we definitely want to go back to go skiing.  Maybe at Christmas.

And now, for a photo essay recounting our time in Vail: