Hope

With the help of my mom, I have been collecting Willow Tree figurines that represent my relationship with each of my daughters.

Hannah

Rachel

Abbie

This Christmas, Mom gave me a fourth figurine, to represent our Sarah...

Crafty Christmas

The girls and I gave a few homemade gifts this year. In addition to some knitted gifts, here's what we made....

Rachel made these craft foam snowflake ornaments for her classmates (I'm reminded of a blizzard).

Hannah made these little jingle bell ornaments for her classmates. Note to self: hot gluing 20+ bows and hanging ribbons results in a few blisters!

Here are all their gifts bagged up, tied with wire garland and labled. I won't tell you how long it took. And then, school was canceled because of snow on the last day before vacation, so they sat around our house for an additional two weeks!

I made some strawberry/cranberry and peach jams for teacher and bus driver gifts this year. It was fun to decorate the jars with homespun fabric and jute twine! The cotton batting puffed up the fabric just a bit.

The girls made these gifts for the Grandmothers in our family. Abbie made the candle holder (tissue paper adhered to a glass jar with liquid starch), Rachel made the snowman ornament (his head is a little mirror with white paint sponged on it), and Hannah made the picture frame decorated with Christmas-y buttons. That's this year's Christmas card picture in the frame.

I really enjoyed all this crafty-ness, but next year, I'm starting earlier!

Broadway Baby!

Too bad Abbie wasn't all that fond of dance, because she does the whole costume-and-makeup thing so well!

Sorry, I just couldn't choose just two or three pictures because they all turned out cute. So you get to see all of them!

(Big finish!)

The scary thing is that, in addition to totally understanding how to play the game, she tried to teach me! (It didn't go so well...)

White Chocolate Chewies

I made these yummy cookies for a couple of different events this Christmas, and they were a hit. I got the recipe from the book "The Cake Mix Doctor" by Anne Byrn. I like to use the red and green swirled white chocolate morsels for a pretty holiday cookie!

White Chocolate Chewies

Solid vegetable shortening for greasing the pans
1 package plain devil's food cake mix (NO pudding in the mix)
1/3 cup water
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) butter, melted
1 large egg
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup white chocolate chips

1. Preheat the oven to 350F. Lightly grease 2 cookie sheets with solid vegetable shortening.

2. Place the cake mix, water, melted butter, egg, and vanilla in a large mixing bowl. Blend with an electric mixer on low speed for 1 minute. Stop the machine and scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula. Increase the speed to medium and beat for 1 minute more. The cookie dough will be thick. Fold in the chips until well distributed.

3. Drop heaping teaspoons of the dough 2 inches apart on the prepared cookie sheets. Bake the cookies until they have set but are still a little soft in the center, 10 to 12 minutes. Remove the pans from the oven. Let the cookies rest on the cookie sheets for 1 minute more. Cool completely on wire racks, 20 minutes.

Cheesy Spinach Dip

My friend Betty shared this yummy appetizer recipe with me. I brought it to Rachel's China Group's Christmas party last night and it disappeared! A few folks asked for the recipe, so here it is...

Cheesy Spinach Dip

1. Cut 1 lb. (16 oz.) Velveeta into 1/2-inch cubes; place in large microwaveable bowl. Add 1 pkg. (10 oz.) frozen chopped spinach, thawed and drained; 4 oz. (1/2 of 8-oz. pkg.) cream cheese, cut up; 1 can (10 oz.) Ro*Tel diced tomatoes & green chiles, undrained; and 8 slices bacon, crisply cooked, drained and crumbled.

2. Microwave on high 5 minutes or until Velveeta is completely melted and mixture is well blended, stirring after 3 minutes.

3. Serve hot with tortilla chips or assorted cut-up fresh vegetables.

Makes 4 cups.

Enjoy!

Hannah's Self Portrait

Anyone Remember This Movie?

"The House Without A Christmas Tree" was made for TV in 1972 when I was 9 (OK, go ahead and do the math - I'll wait...). I watched it every year for several years. The story takes place in 1946. Addie, the main character in the movie, is 10 years old. She lives with her grandmother and her widowed father, who refuses to have a Christmas tree because it reminds him of his wife who died when Addie was a baby. It's a wonderful story, and I just love Addie's spunky personality.

I found this movie on VHS several years ago, and just last week, discovered it in the $5 DVD bin at WalMart. Our family watched it last night, and the girls really enjoyed it. It is now one of our Christmas Classics, along with "It's A Wonderful Life" and "A Christmas Story".

Now I need to find "The Homecoming" (the Waltons' Christmas movie) on DVD...

Cookies With Santa!

Every year, our adoption agency hosts a "Cookies With Santa" event. We always try to bring the girls for this - it's a wonderful way for the girls to visit with Santa in a much more personal environment than the mall. And I get to take a whole bunch of pictures!

They wore the matching sweaters that Daddy bought for them at LL Bean when he was in Maine last month.

The girls are eyeing the yummy cookies and punch!


They had a nice long visit with Santa.


The girls really put Santa to work, peppering him with dozens of questions!


He gave them each a little gift (art supplies)!

Funny story: The first thing Abbie did when she walked up to Santa was to start tugging on his beard. Santa was very good natured about it! After a sufficient amount of tugging, she pronounced, "Yup, he's the real one!"

On our way out to the car, Rachel looked up at me and said, "Mama, now I know he's real!"

You betcha, Sweetie!

Our Little Star

Abbie's dance recital was this afternoon. The theme of the program was Dancing Through the Holidays, and her tap class danced to the VeggieTales' rendition of the 1971 song "I Just Want to Celebrate" by Rare Earth (they were celebrating New Year's Day). It was incredibly cute, and Abbie had lots of fun performing!

On stage at the dress rehearsal the night before the performance.


All dressed up and ready for the show!

We had a little fun with the makeup. I even managed to get some mascara on her lashes!


After the performance. She loved getting flowers!

And of course, Hannah and Rachel were there to support their sister!