More Christmas

Here we are at the Feast of the Seven Fishes again. This year if was much more cold! After the Feast is over they have the Fairmont Christmas Parade then Mass. This is Jean. She is the lovely women who gave us her beautiful tree and bought a gorgous penguin family ornament to hang on it this year. Here is Lydia trying to stay warm during the parade. She loved the bands. After the parade she kept crying (and I mean literally crying) for "more band" "more parade".

Here are Nonni and Lydia in their matching Santa hats. And yes, just because I am not going to teach my child that Santa is a real live person that sneaks into your house while you are sleeping..does not mean we are not going to keep up with some of the Santa traditions or stories...She will just know they are stories and traditions that honor St. Nicholas.

Here was trial one of cooking making. The dough was still too soft after spending all day in the fridge. So after putting it into the freezer...

We got much better results. The only sad thing was I did not get to make cookies with Lydia, I had to make cookies with Cinderella. Lydia is very much into putting her dress on and dancing. Especially after watching the end scene in Sleeping Beauty her new fave princess. And of course, I only have Cinderella, Belle and Snow White play dresses..so there is a birthday gift idea for those of you that were asking.

and now for the big news..everyone needs to head on over to April and Chris Stowers' blog..Max Stewart Stowers has arrived!!!

Christmas with Friends 2008

Miranda and I wanted to get the kids together again for Christmas. This year they came over our house. Here they were from last year. I found this really yummy cookie recipe that Lydia and I tried out earlier (those pics later) so I made up some dough so the kids could play around
Lydia is trying to decide what shape to make first.

The kids were really good at cutting out the shapes. Here is Lydia doing what she did most of the two times we made the cookies..eating the cookie dough..

Braylon looking handsome as always. He is so good with Lydia. I am still so grateful that Drew got a job up here and they were able to move back so that the kids could be close..that also helps out with Miranda and I being able to hang out more.

The first time around I tried to let Lydia shake the sugar from the containers..and that did not work well. So this time I put all the decoration in little cups and gave the kids spoons. This seemed to work out soooo much better.

Here were the final products. Can you tell which two Lydia decorated..needless to say, I ended up eating those two gingerbread b/c they could not cook all the way through with all the sugar!

Now on to the really fun part..presents!


Here are the kids enjoying their presents to each other.

Braylon has such an imagination. He lined up my penguin collection to be Santa's reindeer and the big penguin he is holding was Santa. He was in the process of putting "Santa" in his "sleigh" aka my dining room chair!

and here is my daughter...don't ask me what she is doing..I have no idea!

Early Christmas..

Well one of the good things about not really pushing Santa in our house I can give Lydia her gifts when I want to! Last night I let Mark open one of his gifts early because we will desperately need to use it soon..yep, I bought him a camera. Well after I wrapped it, it dawned on me that I might need a different size memory card (which we do) so I wanted him to open it so that I can buy one and be ready for Christmas. Well Lydia was really excited about it so I let her open one of her gifts..a digital camera. That way she will leave daddy's new one alone. I felt bad letting Mark open that one since it is his "big" gift but he understood and was glad I did have him open it.

Lydia is cutting all four of her "fang" teeth. We have not had good nights in the Hatten house..but Mark has been a trooper and taking care of her for me at night. I am trying my hardest to rest up and kick these dumb shingles.

I am participating in a cookie exchange at one of my schools. I should have 3 cookies of 24 different kinds of cookies so I am not doing any other baking. I did cutout cookies, rollo cookies and I made extra of the gallettes I did for the exchange.

I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday season!

Annual Christmas Photos

So all of you have heard my rants about Sears. I have no luck with either location around here. So I took a chance with a new professional studio that opened in Fairmont.
Here is our Sears family photo from last year...not horrible but I was not happy with it. She took one shot and was done. I wish she had told me to sit up or something and Mark and I are both in the middle of blinks or something...
and now for this years....
All I could say was wow. I don't know if the different really picks up on the computer screen or not (plus they are scanned in with always makes the quality worse) but when I put them beside each other on the wall.. It was incredible.
Here was Lydia's 21 month photo....

and here is our Christmas Angel.....

Then get this..she asked me if I bought any other outfits! I cannot wait to get some more photo's done this summer outside. I was so happy with her.

Random Snowy Friday

Here is a picture of Lydia fooling around in her room..apparently pulling every book down from the shelf. The reason I put it on here was if you look in the background, you will get a sneak peek of her new wall color. Here is one picture that did survive the camera from Thanksgiving in Kentucky. She loved this horse and would say "whoo-hoo" a line from one of her fave books Elephant and Piggy, My Friend is Sad. If you have never read any of Mo Williams books to you kids you are missing out. It is officially Lydia's first favorite author.

Her is her new robe...(hanging head in shame) I bought it because it matches her room.

I have been home for two days now. I was home yesterday because I had a doctors appointment for a weird painful rash on my hand...that doctor believes it is eczema and carpel tunnel and I just noticed the carpal tunnel more when the rash showed up. I have an appointment for a second opinion Tuesday.

Today was a snow day. We build a huge pillow fort and read books inside. Then we went to lunch with Nonni downtown. Then afternoon of snuggling on the couch and watching Christmas cartoons. This evening we made cut out sugar cookies. It went pretty well, I could not get her to stop eating the cookie dough! (I knew something from me was in her!)

I hope everyone it safe inside out of the snow...

Here is our tree..

Well Mark put up the tree one day last week and here are Lydia and I putting the final touches on it.

This is the most beautiful fake tree I have ever seen. We were so lucky that our family friend Jean gave it to us. She decided to downsize we were the lucky recipients of her old tree. Many folks when it is decorated mistake for a real tree. It reaches to our ceiling. It also is still naked. The three of us have not been home in an evening for about two weeks. I am hoping to decorate it tonight...

Here is my penguin collection..Lydia loves to sit in the middle of them...

Not sure what she did here..she was diving for something...and this picture also shows those wonderful lines I was talking about in the last post...I don't know what is happening to the camera..I loved it so..it took great pictures for a little old point and shoot...

photo's

Well our camera is officially dying a slow painful death..first it was how it read the picture card. Sometimes is would say it was blank, sometimes it would say there was about 50. We did lose a ton of pictures off of it but thankfully Mark had saved them on the computer. Now the LCD screen is fuzzy and having crazy lines in it...so I am sure that is ready to go completely blank soon. I hope to have another camera soon...maybe santa will bring one. So sorry for the lack of picture posts.
Potty training did not go well. She absolutely did not care that she was wet. If I could catch her,she will pee and poop in the potty but she will not/cannot tell us she wants to go. I thought when she felt wet in a panty she would not like it and start coming to tell me but after two days full of accidents..I just don't think she is quite ready. I think it will happen soon...but just not yet. We went to Kentucky to visit Mark's family. Lydia loved playing with her cousins. I wish we could have got some pictures with her playing with them.
I am completely ready for Christmas shopping wise..I got all my deals I was hoping for on Friday. I went shopping with Mark's cousin Jennifer and her daughter Kelci..we had so much fun!
I got the room almost completely painted. Two coats of primer and one coat of color later..it still needs one more coat of color and the wood work needs a new coat of white..but for now it works. I will finish over Christmas. I have the butterfly curtain rods and her curtains up. I am loving it so far..I will post pictures once Kathy finishes the quilt!
I think that is it for now! I hope everyone had a good holiday.