Although I was initially a little sad for it to end, I am glad to be getting on with our 'normal' lives and looking forward to the new year.
It was a really great Christmas (minus a few 'hiccups' with hubby). All in all, my kids had a wonderful day and I had a wonderful holiday; shopping, decorating, planning, wrapping, baking, more shopping, more planning, and just enjoying the season. I will miss it once January rolls around, so I will take the rest of December to enjoy what is left of Christmas and soak it in so it can last me until next year. But boy oh boy, am I excited for the new year and all the good (hopefully) it will bring.
So... Christmas prep started in September for me... but the final preparations started Christmas eve, when I did most of my wrapping and baking.
Mixing up the butter for my butter cookies. Recipe: http://www.oprah.com/recipe/omagazine/recipes/food_200305_cookies
All done... light and buttery (ignore the really dark brown one). Since mother in law and I were using the same oven and she was baking her empanadas, the temps got too high for some of my poor cookies... still delish though. I topped a few with chocolate chips and the rest with some peanuts and walnuts.
Mother in law's pineapple jelly filled empanadas
Mixing up the ingredients for my banana bread.. I don't use a recipe, just mash 3-5 medium sized bananas. Mix with melted butter, an egg, a pinch of salt, sugar and flour.. I added chocolate chips and raisins this time around for something a little more special for the holidays. You can add nuts too. Bake and voila!
Banana bread with chocolate chips and raisins.
Rustic apple pie... since the success of my apple pies on Thanksgiving, I have been wanting to make another one. Mother in law was nice enough again to prepare the dough for me (I have to learn how she does it) and all that was left for me to do was mix up the filling, roll out the dough, fill and bake. It was, like, so good; even better than Thanksgiving. The only negative aspect: I only made one. This recipe is so simple... it's practically fool proof.
Pastry crust for 9-inch pie (can use store bought)
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 tbsp flour
1/2 tsp cinnamon
4 cups (about 5) sliced and peeled apples
confectioners sugar (optional)
Heat over to 425 F. Roll dough to fit pan in a 2 in circle-transfer to foil lined cookie sheet (the round pie plate)
Mix sugar, flour, cinnamon. Add apples (I put a little lemon juice on the apples first). Toss, coat well. Spoon apples in center of crust, leave 2 in edge, fold pastry up to apples unto them, pinch edges at 2 inch intervals. Bake 15 minutes. Reduce heat to 375 F, bake 30 minutes or until apples are tender
Getting ready for the big day!
Princess and Fatty all snug in their bed with visions of sugar plums dancing in their heads (well, not really). But we did read The Night Before Christmas, the night before Christmas (get it), just to get them in the spirit.
Boobie came home from brother in law's house and opened his new Nintendo DS game from father in law. No surprise here, Boobie picked this game out himself.
The new pants from brother in law and family... nice!
Ok, so around 11, I decided to get down to business and wrap all the presents. Geesh... my bed looked like a toy store threw up on it.
Fatty's stuff (yes I separated gifts into piles and wrapped them in that order...all Fatty's first since he had some HUGE boxes, then Princess's, then Boobie's). I prayed I would not run out of wrapping paper... and as luck would have it, I did not. I even stuck to my goal of wrapping each kid's gift in their own paper.... Boobie got Christmas trees wrapping paper (fancy), Princess got the real looking Santa in red, Fatty got the cartoon looking Santa in green.
All Princess's gifts.
All Boobie's gifts.
After maybe 2 hours (or so) of wrapping pretty much non-stop, my tree was ready and I was ready for Christmas morning.
I worked hard on the set up (yeah sure LOL).
Hubby brought in the big items and we placed them by the tree... ready to go.
And one last Christmas eve picture of the tree (with the stockings added) before bed... at almost 2 am.
A picture of the gifts Christmas morning before the kids got to them.
Boobie came home (he slept next door at my in-laws) and was so happy to see his bike and all the gifts. I fooled him good... : )
Presents time!
A new Barbie laptop!
Ben 10 stuff...cool!
Blocks... YES!
Books... awesome!
X-men action figures!
A new laptop!
A telescope and microscope!
Cool telescope!
A magnadoodle!
Draw to your heart's content Princess.
More books!
A play and learn walker!
Checking out his sister's Barbie power wheels jeep!
Movies!
More gifts... geeesh!!!
And even more gifts... man!!!
Princess's loot!
The ballet flats I got Princess for her stocking... she is in love.
Each kid's movies in their own cases.
On toy overload... it took them a while to unwind from all the excitement. Too many gifts; they actually got tired of opening presents. Will have to cut back for next year, but I enjoyed watching them open and play with their toys.
Say cheese in your Christmas pj's mother in law made ...
Loving the baby doll bassinet (more like a bunk bed though). Lucky baby dolls! Fatty liked this so much he tried to get IN it! Poor kid doesn't know it's just a toy.
Fatty's piano... playing some tunes.
Princess wants to play too. Notice the Hello Kitty bag she refused to put down all day.
Playing with their toys... ok, so Princess wanted to check out Fatty's 'ride'. I think she likes it. She rides it better than him (he can't push hard enough on the 'pedal' to make it ride yet).
My Princess. I can always count on my little girl to give me a nice picture.
So Fatty loves to push 'things', hence the walker (I know he can walk but it has music and he can push it around all day if he chooses). What does he decide to push around instead? His cousin's baby doll stroller we got her. Kids!
Fatty finally gets to ride with his big sister. It is a one seater but they both fit... a tight fit, but a fit none the less.
Riding off into the sunset...
Beep Beep!
Testing out her tricycle father in law got her... she can ride it just a little bit. It is so cute. Father in law did good, again.
Ride baby.
The battery FINALLY died on the jeep... she rode the thing pretty much ALL DAY!
And a last pic of the tree with some of the gifts, all opened and ready to be played with another day. My living room looks like a toy store. I could open a daycare with all the toys now.
It was a great Christmas, like I said. Now I know Christmas isn't about the gifts, and I know I kinda sorta went a little overboard this year (even though I said I wouldn't... my kids got so much stuff I can't even list it all here... see my list on a previous blog). But in the end, they know what's it all about. And that is what makes the season so special to me.
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