Christmas with the Girls

Getting ready for Christmas can be so exhausting. Good think Caroline has such good sisters, like Autumn who love to take care of her. Autumn is seriously the "baby-whisperer."

Going on a shopping trip, and your are that parent with the screaming child. I don't even know what she was screaming about. Seriously. But it was pretty funny. I'm sure the people in Lowe's didn't think so. haha

But then we turned the corner and found a 2-foot Minnie mouse to match our 2-foot Mickey. As soon as she got her hands on her, it was the classic B smile that I love so much. How can you say no to that? I mean, we needed a Minnie to go with Mickey anyway, right? ha!

At home we're baking more cookies every day it seems.  One day it was the Reindeer Treat cookies.  This day, it was a fun twist on Sugar Cookies. The kids especially like doing these because they get to roll out the dough like snakes. Well, Autumn does. 

B? I don't know what she does. haha

Caroline was involved too... although she slept most of the time.

When we were putting them on the pan, Autumn goes "Mommy, how will we know whose cookies are whose??"

Umm... kid. I hope you can tell which ones are yours.

She sure was proud of her candy cane cookies!!

This is a recipe from Sandra Lee on the Food Network...one of my favorite ladies!

And I finally had time to get a picture with the girls in all of their new Christmas PJs in front of the tree. I love this picture every year. 

And of course they're wearing all of their new bows they just got from my favorite lady to get bows from. Check out her FB page {HERE}

I may have gone a little crazy getting bows last time I ordered. haha  I have to order in sets of 2 or 3 now. I even got some bows for B's birthday in a few weeks. (ahh - I really need to get going on that!)  C got some cute little headbands to clip all her bows too (as you can see in the PJs picture above)

I mean, seriously, how could I say no to this cuteness?!

AND our stockings finally came back!  I had to get a whole new set of stockings this year because the set we had with the 4 of us, I couldn't find any that would match them. So I had to go on a hun for stockings that I liked, I found a set at Kohls, but they didn't have an R...ugh! But I finally found these at Lowe's and we took them to get embroidered at a local shop. I really do like them. And when we get our white fire place, they'll look even better! 

Yes, this is a fake fire place. We got it at an estate sale many years ago and the ONLY time I use it (since it's not a heating fire place) is during Christmas to hang our stockings. But I LOVE having a fire place...for looks and for Christmas.

Moms' Christmas Party

Our annual Mom's group Christmas "party" was last night.   We all draw kids' names to get the kids presents, and then we all bring presents for the moms to do a "White Elephant" gift exchange.  I usually never bring a mom gift. So I'm always left out of that one. But this year, I was determined to bring one! lol.  I had a great idea, which is why I actually participated.   I printed up these cards and got the red EOS lip balm...

See the PIN HERE.

Then, on the back, I taped a gift card.

The cookies I brought were Reindeer Treat cookies... I actually call them reindeer poop, but whichever you like best.

To make these, all you need is chocolate chips, butterscotch chips, and chow mein noodles.

• Melt 6 oz of each of the chips in a pot, stirring constantly. 
• Then add in a can of chow mein noodles.  
• Scoop them out and put them on a sheet pan that is covered with wax paper.  
• Put them in the fridge to harden, and done!

We got all the kids to sit and open their presents... it lasted for all of 30 seconds. lol Isn't that how Christmas morning goes, anyway?? 

Autumn had to sit down right away and play with her Legos. She loves Legos. 

Autumn's Christmas Performance

Tuesday was supposed to be a nice, calm, relaxing, pedicure getting kind of day. 

Well, it did not turn out that way.

I was supposed to drop off A at school (leave B at home with Daddy) and met up with my friend to get pedicures.  Well, the plan was to hit the mall for some Starbucks and then get our pedicures... but apparently, our mall hasn't started it's holiday hours yet?! So I shopped around Dick's for a while. Let me tell you. That place could be very dangerous.  I was trying on the Fit Bit and the Garmin to see the difference. Do any of you have either one of these? Which one do you prefer? I have the Polar Watch already, but I was thinking about getting one of these for like every day wear.

And THEN , I was looking at this beautiful thing (the P90X pull up bar). When Wendy lived here and came over to do personal training, she had a pull up bar that she used with me, and it did NOT leave any marks on the walls or door frames.  I almost wanted to get it. And the Fit Bit. And some shoes. And some workout clothes.  But I did not.  I was good. I walked away from it all. 

And since any of the pedicure places we wanted to go to still weren't open, we opted for a YUM breakfast. Let me just say, that plate of fruit just makes my mouth water!

Then it was off to C's 2 week appointment...which of course she was rudely woken up when they asked me to get her undressed and then we had to wait a very long time for the doctor to come in...and of course she was hungry, hungry, hungry.  As you can tell by her face she is not a happy camper. lol. And she only takes the paci when I'm trying to buy some time when she's hungry. Poor girl. She just wanted to eat!  She was 8 lbs and 4 oz and now 21.5 inches. How dare she grow!! She's not allowed to grow. My little peanut.

We finally all got home and then the girls decided to play in the water hose.  In December. Yes, it's Florida, but it just so happen to be cold. lol This video just CRACKS me up!

A video posted by Teacher by the Beach (@teacherbythebeach) on Dec 12, 2014 at 1:03pm PST

Taking showers after that was a MUST.  Then I made the mistake of opening one of the packages that I got in the mail. Mistake? Um. yes.... because of the THOUSANDS of pink peanuts that soon filled my house because B was WILD over them!

 Then it was time to get dressed and head to Autumn's first Christmas performance!! I was so excited to see her perform!! Here are the picture I got from her performance.

That's it.  Yep. the only ones. Why you ask? Because the VPK students just stood in the aisles. Um. What?! I'm a little confused. I didn't even get to see her. Or hear her. Or anything. 

Then we got the the "VPK wishes you a Merry Christmas!" and then they started walking out. 

That's all they're doing? That's it for the VPK? Are we really done?

Yes.

Um... ok...

Well, girls, go stand next to the tree so I can get your pictures at least.

The next day was the whole VPK performance with JUST the VPK.  They were on stage for this one. Now I'm going to come out and say it. I would have been so mad if I was still working and would not have been able to make the day time performance and was only able to see the night time one.  Seriously.

 But here she is on the top riser with the big white bow on her head.

And then we headed back to her class from some Cookies and Milk. Thankfully, my girls barely even ate one cookie...and B just licked a few licks of the icing...she didn't even finish the icing.   Whew! Sugar rush crisis at 9 am was adverted. lol!

Whew! December is so hectic! I have no idea how I have time to get it all done in a normal year when I'm still working.  For real.

Letters to Santa!

The other day, I got to spend some one-on-one time with my little B.  Autumn was still in school and Caroline was taking a nice long nap. It was nice to just spend some time with B.  There's just no way to tell you what a ham this girl is. When she's not with her sister, causing all kinds of ruckus and rough-housing.  She is one of the silliest, goofiest, fun little girls. Ever. Hands down. And her laugh is enough to make anyone come out of a deep depression.

After I went to get A from school, we decided it was time for us to write our letters to Santa. She got out her Resource Folder (that I made for her) and I made her a little diddy for writing a letter to Santa. She started drawing and then I told her how to spell each word.

What's so sweet to me is that she said she wanted a Minnie. 

"But Autumn, you and Brooklynn both have a Minnie, why do you want another one? "

"No, Mommy, Caroline needs one like us!"  ohhhh!!  

My sweet girl. She just loves her little Caroline!

If you want this "letter" you can get in on my Teacher by the Beach blog {HERE}. This is actually just the planning page, there are actual letter writing pages included in the download too. 

Of course you have to put it in an envelope and address it.

And put it in the mail!

B said she wrote her letter too. I'm not quite sure about that, but I let her "mail out" her "letter" too. lol Everything Sissy does, B has to do too.

And don't forget the flag!

What's funny is that even though this was on a Sunday, the USPS still delivers packages and I got THIS badboy delivered. (I can't wait to start working out again!!)

As soon as I opened the door and saw a delivery I kind of freaked out because I didn't know if he took their letters so I chased after the mailman to make sure he didn't take the letters. Whew! Saved.

Kitchen Remodel

So, the pool project is a very slow project! We are waiting on SO. MANY. aspects to come together.

We have to wait for the "architect" to finish the plans on the pool/shed, and he has to give the plans to the survey guy so he can to do the "improvement" survey for us to take the city to get our permits.

This is ALL taking WAY. TOO. LONG for me.

So in the mean time, we are moving ahead on our kitchen remodel.  I think we've gotten what we want...kind of. It keeps changing, of course.  But this is what my "color" vision is;

We're doing dark floors, so I want white cabinets to "calm" the room and then dark counter tops to tie all together. I love this look. It's a perfect mix of Ron and me...


My dad came over and kind of did a redesign of the kitchen and he went with us to Lowes to get a price quote. Ron and I have been tweaking it and we met with another company (which I think we like better than Lowes!)

The reason we're redoing the kitchen is because I have NO counter space. My counters next to the stove are so small, I can't even "chop and drop" next to the stove. And my counter space on the "island" is very minimal... I have more counter space on the side of the kitchen, but that's pointless and it just becomes a drop-off spot where TONS of clutter accummulates. And if you know me, then you know that clutter STRESSES. ME. OUT.

So here is kind of what we have in mind...

We're going to drop the high-top bar and extend the counter to make it a sitting bar...and have more counter space. We're also putting more cabinets UNDER the bar.

This view is pretty much staying the same.

NOW this is the area that is the drop-off counter, which will be NO MORE!  We're moving the fridge over to this side, giving me more room next to the stove and then moving the pantry over to the actual wall instead of the corner and doing a pull-out pantry. I am still having a little counter space there, mainly for when I'm getting stuff out of the fridge.

Here is my new view of the stove. No more fridge. Bigger counters next to the stove and more cabinets.

There is actually more that we are going to be doing on the other side of the breakfast bar, but we haven't quite figured that out yet... we have some GIGANTIC windows that we have to figure out what to do with.. We have some ideas, but we'll see what actually happens!

Christmas Pictures...for the Girls

I did my own version of newborn pictures with Caroline, with an outfit that one of my friends got her. It was too cute not to use! Even better that it's Christmas colors...swoon

Adding more Christmas Cheer... the other day when we were running errands after A's school, Santa came riding up on a motorcycle. He saw the girls were looking at him, so he stopped in front of us to talk to us. The girls were a little on the bewildered side....Santa on a motorcycle?!

And then he took it a step further and let them sit on his motorcycle!

And then today, we went and saw Santa.  Autumn said she wants more paints and arts and crafts stuff (could have guessed that one) and an airplane. Brooklynn said she wanted some paints. I'm guessing because Autumn does, but whatever. makes life easy for me! ha!

Caroline was sleeping soundly. Perfect for letting me put that giant bow on her head! lol

This might be one of my favorite pictures!