The Modern Day Manger Scene

At school Campbell has been busy learning all about Jesus birth and Mary and Joseph.  They have made several manger scenes and she rearranges ours several times a week according to what they have talked about that day. 
She decided to draw a manger scene for me the other day. This is her picture.

Mary is the purple one.  Notice her red high heels?  They are the big bubbles around her feet.  See the heels?  They match her red dress because she is color coordinated.  Jesus is wrapped in the red blanket.  She coordinates her baby to her outfit too.  Mary is giving him a bottle.  I am not sure what the long ties are.  The other two pink bottles are Mary's plastic reusable water bottles (she is green).  The thing on her head is her bow.  The red underneath them is a brick wall to keep them safe.  The flowers are outside the brick wall because Jesus likes flowers.  They are growing in the brown sand. 

I asked her where Joseph was and she looked at me with her Campbell look and said "Mom, he is at work"., with her dropped r and all.  She said it in her super exasperated voice like it was the silliest question in the world and I should know exactly where Joseph was.

I don't know if I should be upset about her interpretation or impressed by how much she learned.  I think she may have missed a few points, but she seems to have gotten the overall pictures.  Perhaps we can focus on the details as Christmas gets closer.

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

We have our tree up and decorated and for the most part it is staying decorated.  Blake likes to ring all the bells and he has pulled a few balls off the throw, but nothing has broken.  I put all the breakable and super sentimental ornaments on the top half of the tree to keep them safe.  The biggest challenge right now is that he has discovered where the plug is and he unplugs the light whenever he decides it is time.
The stocking are up and we have some other non breakable decorations out, but lots of things had to stay in boxes this year and probably for the next couple, as Blake is just to into everything for me to worry about keeping him out of all the decor.
I am staying with the family tree.  I have friends who do two trees, one formal and themed tree and one "kids" tree.  I put everything on one tree.  It has all the ornaments that my grandmothers gave me over the years, ornaments they made, the ornaments I let the kids pick out every year, all the ornaments they make a school, anything goes.  I love watching them unpack their ornaments from prior years and find the perfect place on the tree for them.  They are so excited to show them to their friends when they come over.  I have wedding ornaments from friends and family and Campbell has to hear about everyone of them several times.  I also try to buy ornaments wherever we go on vacation.  It's a crazy, beautiful tree and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Elfie is also back. Elfie is our Elf on the Shelf. He comes to live with us every year before Christmas and he hides throughout the house. During the day he watches the kids and at night he flies back to the North Pole and tells Santa if they were naughty or nice that day. The next morning he hides in a new place and you have to look for him. He doesn't talk and you can't touch him or he looses his magic. On Christmas Eve he will go back to the North Pole and live with Santa and the other elves until next year.

 

This is Elfie

Blake did not get to hang his ornament

Thanksgiving

Boy am I behind!  I keep thinking that I will catch up on my blogging, but it is one more thing that never seems to happen.  We survived Halloween and made it to Thanksgiving.  The kids and I spent the entire week in College Station and we had a blast.  We shopped, painted Christmas ornaments, cooked and baked and spent lots of time with family.  Thanksgiving really is my favorite holiday!
It has become a Thanksgiving tradition for the kids to bake a pie. They both love to help in the kitchen and this year Rachel decided she would make the pie with them.  This year I finally felt ready to get out Nanna's recipes and look through them.  It was tough at first, but then fun to see her notes to herself and all of the  things that she had saved.  Did she really make all of those?  Who was eating the salad made with canned salmon?!?  Rachel and the kids decided on her chocolate pie, which has meringue.  I have never even made meringue so I knew this would be fun to watch.  Rachel did not read the recipe before starting and since I did, we had some pretty good laughs at her expense.  Everyone in our family has a kitchen story they take some grief over.  Mine is the cookies Catie and I made years ago and added milk to.  They turned out sort of like cornbread and even the dog wouldn't eat them.  This one will be Rachel's, but despite everything, the pie turned out great.  It tasted just like Nanna and was all gone by Friday night.
I found her stuffing recipe hidden in the dessert section and modified my recipe to match hers.  I am not sure I ever got the center cooked all the way through, but it turned out really well and finally tasted the way I wanted it too.  Next time I know what to change to make it perfect.  I also used her lemon pie recipe to make lemon meringue pie.  It took forever to bake and she didn't say how long I should bake it, but it turned out pretty well for my first try.  Will ate it anyway. 
We had about 35 people throughout the day and most of the pictures are from Catie's husband Steve.  He is such an amazing photographer. 
We ate, watched the Aggies win and then Rebecca and I braved Toys R Us at 10:00 pm.  It was freezing and the line was wrapped around the building.  We braved it for about 20 minutes and gave up after they told us it would be 45 more minutes just to get inside.  We went to Walmart and shopped instead.  I don't know what was more fun, shopping or watching the people fight over the sales.  Interesting people shop at Walmart at midnight before Black Friday!  I am not sure we will do that again next year!

Brandt and Gunnar playing iPod games

Campbell and Sadie's favorite toy

Yum-Yum!

Tim and Allie

Sadie and Campbell - Still together