December Visitors and Other Happenings

I survived the surgery and I'm at home resting. My dearest mother has been here helping with the boys, and she has truly been a blessing. She's stayed up with Silas at night and fed him and changed him when I was basically unconscious from the pain meds. I don't know what I would do without her.

Thank you, Mom!

Now that I'm starting to feel a little better I thought I would try to post a few pictures that I meant to post over the last couple of weeks.

Micah and I had a grand time building and decorating this gingerbread house. Grandma Mavis, Uncle Andy and Tom helped too.



In early December Grandma Mavis came to visit for a week. We loved having her around. She spoiled Silas like every grandma should. At times she was the only one able to soothe and calm him during his nightly fits. Afterall, she has plenty of experience. With a combined total of 29 kids, grand kids, and great-grand kids she has quite an impressive resume. Thanks for all of your help, Mavis. We miss you already!

Uncle Andy flew down from Illinois for a long weekend while Mavis was in town. Micah and Uncle Andy spent lots of time rough-housing and being boys. Andy even wore Micah out enough one day that he actually took an afternoon nap.

Vegan Life Is Not For Me

Vegetarian Vegetable Soup. Yep, that's been the most exciting meal in my diet plan since the weekend after Thanksgiving. Thanks to a 1.5cm gallstone I've been on a vegan diet with just a handful of exceptions. But, after tomorrow's surgery to remove my gallbladder, I'll be just two weeks away from sinking my teeth into that juicy hamburger I've been dreaming of lately.

In case I don't make it back to the blog before next weekend, I just want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and thanks for reading!

Preschool Christmas Program

So, what's cuter than a bunch of 3-year-olds on stage singing Christmas songs? Not much!

Here's a few clips from Micah's school Christmas program. Micah is the 5th child from the left.






I'm kicking myself for not making time to switch to a zoom lens before the program, but I was busy trying to creatively change an explosive diaper in a middle school bathroom that (for obvious reasons) didn't have a changing table. Oh well.

Wordless Wednesday

He Cannot Wait

This little guy cannot wait to play blastball this spring! I think he's almost excited about blastball as much as he's excited about Christmas.






...more to come in March when little league starts.

Micah renewed his membership...

...to the no cavity club.




Thank goodness my child loves going to the dentist!

Thanksgiving

Just to catch up, I have to let everyone know that we had a great Thanksgiving.

My parents came over the weekend before turkey day to help out with the boys and keep me company. Mom was like a super hero around the house. She never lets the dirty laundry pile up and she knows how to tidy up everything. I really miss her this week.

My brother's family came over Wednesday and stayed until the weekend.

We cooked. We ate. We laughed. We shared stories.

...Well, in all fairness to Tom I have to mention this next little story that took place Wednesday night, oh, around 9pm. Keep in mind that I still have pregnancy brain.

I was in the kitchen adding all of the ingredients for a pumpkin pecan cheesecake into the mixer when I realize I read the recipe wrong. Somehow when I was writing my grocery list I only saw "(8 oz) cream cheese". I completely looked over the "4" in front of the 8 oz. So let's just say my dad was gracious enough to go down to Walgreens and pick up the 3 packages of cream cheese I was missing. Everyone in the house got a great big laugh at me because it didn't occur to me that 8 oz of cream cheese wouldn't be enough for an entire cheesecake. It gets better...

When my dad returned I went back to the mixer and the recipe and noticed that it calls for a can of pumpkin. Duh! I didn't get any pumpkin either. Back to the store my loving father went. It gets better...

So after ALL of the ingredients were mixed in, I started to pour my mix into the dish to bake it when it seemed to be overflowing...Yep, the recipe calls for a spring form pan...Didn't have one of those either. Instead of sending my poor dad to the store for a third time we laughed and I found a second dish to use and we had two PUMPKIN pecan CHEESEcakes. I make mistakes too. In mass quantities.

Clarks, We missed you!