For the last 4 years I have hosted not one, but two, Gingerbread House Making Parties. I love hosting this party the first weekend of December. It forces me to get all my decorating done and it gets me in the Christmas spirit.
The first party is for the Miller and the Wray families about 30 people in all. The second is for our neighborhood friends, about 30 people too!
This year we hosted the party in the garage. It worked perfectly and was less clean-up!
Here is the set up.
Skye and Izzy are working hard. These two always come up with a masterpieces. Skye is very arcitectural and Izzy is creative. Hers had an outhouse this year.
Dane is just getting started. But he looks like he is already on a sugar rush!
Grandpa Taylor helped Ian with his house.
Cute Abbey and Sam
Everyone is hard at work.
Aunty Jen and her nephew Joseph
Ian is going CrAzY eating all the candy instead of putting it on his house.
Granpa Skip and Riley working hard
Hannah did a great job designing her house very symmetrically.
A good lookin' group here (except Adam's lazy eyes)!
We tried a Miller grandkid picture. Mine didn't work too well.
We also did a Miller sibling picture. I don't know why Dustin is trying to choke me. Who could hurt that angel face?
This is a really fun tradition to start. I can't wait until next year!
If finally feels like winter! We had our first BIG snow storm. We had over 12 inches at our house. Thanks goodness for the bobcat plow. Shoveling sure would have been tough!
Santa dropped off this Elf on the Shelf last week and the kids are totally into it. Our elf "Filbert" watches and listens to the kids behavior every day and then fly's to the North Pole to report to Santa each night. In the morning Filbert is in a different place in the house. One morning Filbert left the kids a little treat in their stockings. It is so fun to see the kids excited about finding Filbert each morning. And it gives me some pull when they have bad behavior!
For Thanksgiving this year we went to Lake Havasu with Matt, Jen and Cuzzy's as well as Jamen, Mandy, Abby and Brady. There were 14 of us in all! We rented a house in the the middle of nowhere and had a great time. We all became very thankful for running water that trip! The house is on a well system and we ran the well dry. We couldn't do dishes or shower and we took water from the pool to flush the toilets. Luckily a house up the street had not been rented and we carted our dirty dishes up there to wash and shower. We didn't let that little problem ruin our fun though!
The house had a pool and we mistakingly heated the hot tub as well as the pool to a wonderful 100 degrees! It was great!
Here are all the kids eating Thanksgiving dinner on the patio. Dane said it was a "weird" Thanksgiving because we had prime rib instead of turkey.
Friday we went boating in Lake Havasu. The water was cold but the air was warm. We had lunch and played on the beach. Brady and Jackson jumped in the water for $1!
Daniel
Dane working hard on his design. He drew his face and cut it out all by himself.
My neighbor, Nancy, and I organize a neighborhood Halloween party each year. This was our 3rd year and it was the biggest yet. We probably had 70 people! She and I have the best time planning this shin-dig. First we meet at Nancy's and load up on the wagons for trick-or-treating. Then we go back to Nancy's for a pot luck dinner and games.
Waiting for the Wagon to pick us up
