By now, our various Christmases are over. We just returned from my cousin's house on the day after Christmas and we are pooped, but super happy.
It all started on the 21st with my husband's parents at our house.
We followed that up with Christmas Eve at Nana and Pops' house...
Christmas morning and Santa came at 3:30am since my husband had to go back to work Christmas day..
And we progressed through Christmas day with celebrating with my mom's side of the family...
Followed by my husband's grandparent's house...and then home to crash.
We finished up with my cousin's house to celebrate with my dad's side of the family today...
Hap, Hap, Happy Holidays everyone!!!
I have been wanting to create something easy out of some leftover wood and this turned out really cute.
Here is our newest addition to the yard for Christmas...
This is what it started out as...
But with some paint, modge podge, and glitter, it became something that I really love. My mom had the brilliant idea to add lights, but time just got away from me this year. Next year I will add to it....maybe do some white highlights around the lettering.
Merry Christmas!
As soon as I got out of school for the semester, I had a list of craft ideas that I wanted to get done. One of my ideas was to create some Houston Texans ornaments as a gift for one of my good friends.
I chose silver glitter because I just really like how silver pops on a dark Christmas tree.
My original plan was to create a vinyl sticker to put on the glass. Well folks, that didn't work out.
So I went with regular stickers. It looks fine, but just not exactly what I would have envisioned.
Here is what I started with...
Clear glass ornaments, floor cleaner, and glitter.
This is super easy and you can modify it with paint, other color glitter, ribbons, whatever you want. Just take the hangers off the ornaments and squeeze a little bit of cleaner in the inside. Roll it around so that the entire inside has a thin coat of cleaner on it. Turn it upside down so that the excess drips out.
Then using a funnel, add glitter to the inside. Roll it around again to get a nice even coat of glitter. Turn it upside down to have the excess glitter fall out and to let it dry. I let each one dry for about 24 hours.
Then I cut stickers out and glued them to the outside of the ornaments. Man, I wish the vinyl had worked, but these were still cute.
I wrapped them up with my new favorite glitter wrapping paper and delivered them today.
Hopefully she likes them and can add them to her Texans Tree!
My husband's company, Dow Chemical, owns some property on the outskirts of our county called Harris reservoir. It's primarily used as a camp ground of sorts for employees and retirees.
Any employee can become a member. So last month, my husband made us members. On top of that, he got on the list to get a permanent camp site for our camper. That way we could store our camper out there and can go camping there, any time. The wait list is about a year, but we are in no hurry.
For right now, we can go out there for the day to let the kids fish and run around and just be crazy boys. Josh and I bought the kiddos their own fishing poles and tackle boxes for Christmas this year, and decided to give them to them early since Josh was supposed to be off this weekend. We planned to take the afternoon to teach them how to fish.
It was a huge success. Even for my texture aversive Autistic child. He learned how to bait his hook with worms, cast, reel in a fish, and release it back into the water. Caleb ended up catching 5 fish this afternoon.
Jansen, who is less than thrilled about many activities, seemed interested in learning. Even though we had been fishing twice before, he had never really wanted to fish. But for some reason, with his own pole, and his own materials, he was ready to go. He ended up catching 4 fish, completely on his own! He was beaming!! He was so proud of himself.
It was the perfect day to go out there and just spend some quiet, quality time as a family. It was partly sunny, breezy, not too hot and not too cold. Just a perfect day!
Since my inlaws have moved away, and my husband's grandmother just passed away, we offered to host Christmas a few days early, for everyone at our house this year. First time ever!
It was pretty much a success. The inlaws came down in their 5th wheel and picked up my husband's grandfather. My sister in law, brother in law, and my nephew came over as well.
I spent two days cleaning, prepping, and worrying if everything would turn out well. Honestly, I can't complain.
I got as much of the house decorated as I could.
We were planning on Josh making chili, and then when we went to the store, there was no chili mix to be purchased in all of Brazoria County!!! Last minute change of plans...I made taco soup. Then I made some Cake Boss Mix cupcakes. They were beautiful and fluffy out of the oven but shrank to half of that size as they cooled. What the heck Buddy Valastro?! Then, as I was piping the frosting on, my piping bag exploded! After all, it was 4 years old. But dang! Things were getting a bit frustrating.
But then everyone came over to eat, spend time together, and open presents and I forgot all about the mishaps that went on literally minutes before everyone arrived.
We had a really good time. There were a few arguments, some tears, lots of laughter, and plenty of good times. Yes, I believe I would call it a success.
As the holidays approach, we were excited to tie up some loose ends at Jansen's school. Unfortunately I had to have some unexpected back procedures done the day before his party, so I was unable to attend.
We did finish up the gifts he was going to give to his classmates. He was so excited to share them with his friends.
He also participated in his school's week of giving. Each day supported a different organization, from Military Moms to the SPCA to Toys for Tots and the Dream Center Food Pantry. He chose a few things he would like to donate, while Caleb took some of his money to donate to the Red Cross at his school.
Jamsen's class also won the box tops competition at school and was awarded 5 pounds of chocolate! Good grief!!!!
We finished up the week with a Christmas light scavenger hunt, which was really successful. We gave the kids a printout, a pen, and some flashlights and we hit the town. It was an adventure to look out for all the different decorations.
We are super ready for the holidays with our family!
Jansen was supposed to sing in a program at Christmas in the Park this year, and wasn't feeling too hot, so he decided not to go.
Honestly, we had a party that same night so I wasn't really going to fight him on it.
About an hour after it started, I asked Caleb if he was for sure that he didn't want to go...to which he acted like I had never asked him and said, "Of course I want to go!"
So he and I walked two blocks to the park so that he could experience some Christmastime joy.
We waited in line for Santa...because if you don't believe, you don't receive.
He roasted marshmallows.
He ate cookies and hot cocoa.
We went home and he was gushing to Jansen about everything he missed and yet Jansen seemed unphased. HRMPH!!!
Oh well. I'm glad we went!
