Odds and Ends of Holiday Fun

These pictures are some odds and ends from Thanksgiving and the few weeks after.

1- TRAINS: Andersen loves trains. So he decided to make a train using my cake pans. He's so creative. Notice how the nut chopper is the "smokestack."

2- Granny Louw bought gingerbread kits for the kids to do after Thanksgiving dinner, but we never got around to doing them. So she gave our family one of the kits to do. We attempted to build our train last Friday night. Andersen soooooo loved the candy and frosting.






3 - Decorating the house and tree. This year I kept most of my decorations in the boxes. This is all I have decorated on the main level. We put our tree in the basement, so that it would remove some of the temptation. It's not a very sturdy tree and we were worried that it would fall over when little hands got a hold of it. We hope to buy a bigger, more sturdy tree for next year for our main family room. I miss looking at the tree and the lights, since we spend more time upstairs than down.


4- Thanksgiving Day. I really didn't take many pictures on this day, but I did get some "dessert" pictures. Gwen got to lick the beaters from the whipped cream and she was sharing with Holly. I got Andersen eating his pie which. by the way, was the only thing he ate that day. I also had to document Granny eating her "killer" pie. It had caramel, macadamia nuts, pumpkin, cream cheese and who know what else. The caramel set up too much and it was too hard to cut or put a fork through it, so you just had to pick it up and eat it.

Granny's "KILLER" pie.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY HOLLY!

Today was Holly's special day...she turned 1. Too bad we all have head colds that have been lingering for over a week. Charl and I went to the doctor to get antibiotics in hopes of speeding up the recovery. Granny Louw came over to sit with the kids while they were napping, but they were mostly awake during the hour that we were gone. Holly and Andersen can't really take any medicine so they just have to deal with me and the tissues! We got Chinese takeout, since I didn't feel up to cooking dinner. We had Crispy Beef and Sesame Chicken. Holly ate some of the rice and maybe a bite of chicken...but preferred her jar of sweet potatoes. Andersen, like usual, didn't eat any dinner. Here are some pictures from the evening.

Holly eating some Chinese food.

Holly posing with her first birthday cake. She could not wait to get her hands on that butterfly. The cake turned out cuter than I thought it would...I'm glad someone told me how make butterflies out of pretzels...they were the most sought after part.

Mommy and Holly.

Blowing out the candles. Anders was a big help with this.

Here we go...DIG IN! (Notice Holly's clothes have been removed.)

That was a YUMMY cake!

Mommy and Daddy gave Holly some jeans and beads. Andersen gave Holly a push toy that plays music, but Andersen thought all the toys were for him.

These are the 2 books that Granny Ann sent. The Gallop book is really cute. The animals "move" when you turn the page. Anders really liked this book. He pretended to be the animals.

Holly sporting her new bead necklace.

I can't believe that a year has passed since you were born. It's been fun reflecting on all the joy you bring us. You are such a sweet little girl. We love you a ton!