Daily December: Christmas!

Christmas morning in our own house. Yeah!


































Christmas dinner was:
Herb Crusted Lamb
Roasted Potatoes
Winter Pear Salad
Baked Brie

I thought that menu would cut down on the amount of time I would have to spend in the kitchen on Christmas day (versus the big turkey dinner) but it still felt like I spent most of the day cooking. I'm thinking maybe next year we will have hot dogs and mac and cheese :-)




















Yum!

Christmas Eve

Dear Santa,

Mirielle would like a pair of ice stakes
bunnies that hop and have fur on them
some things to paint with
books, Incredible book
dolls

December Daily: Day 24

Yeah!! It is Christmas Eve today. Jason's parents are here for Christmas and we are planning some fun for today. We started off the morning at a fun little breakfast place here in town. Huckleberry's is a great natural market with a cute little bistro in the store. Not only do they have great food, but it is also an excellent place to do some interesting people watching. They have an awesome bakery, and I'm thinking that maybe we will have to start a new tradition in which we pick out a new dessert to try each Christmas Eve. :-)

After breakfast we drove downtown to do some exploring. We walked through the historic Davenport hotel to look at their beautiful Christmas decorations.



























































We took a drive through the park and decided to get out and see the ducks. Around the pond was nothing but sheer ice. You can see that Grandpa had to try and keep Kellan on his feet!


































And a quick trip to the Falls

December Daily: Day 23

An excuse to do something we don't do every day. We've had extra fun this Christmas season!

December Daily: Day 22

I love red and white together as colors. There are red and white combos all over the house. Christmas time is my favorite because it means more red and white! I am loving this centerpiece on my table. Red and white candles on a white platter surrounded by some fresh pine branches that I pulled off of the tree in our backyard, sprinkled with cranberries. Simple and lovely!

December Daily: Day 21

Today we are enjoying decorating sugar cookies. I've enjoyed having an excuse to bake these last few weeks. I've been trying different sugar cookie recipes this year. My mom's is the BEST, but for some reason I am completely unable to get the recipe to work out. So this year I tried a new recipe and finally had a small measure of success.

I've also done something new this year that I've never done before. We had left over cake frosting from the gingerbread houses, so we used the rest of that frosting up on the cookies instead of making some from scratch. I felt like such a cheater, but no one seemed to mind! The kids LOVED decorating with the sprinkles, which of course were all over the kitchen by the end of day.

There are a couple of cookies that have to be made in order for Christmas to be complete. Sugar cookies are pretty near the top of the list. My favorite are chocolate covered peanut butter bonbons. Mmmm! Jason has to have spritzer cookies in the shape of green Christmas trees and after trying the cookie recipe on the back of the Andes Peppermint Crunch the other day I think I'm adding those to our list of 'must haves'.

Daily December: Day 20

A little craftiness for this post. I saw this idea in a book and thought that my version of it came out pretty cute. All of the materials except for the letters were from the dollar store!

Daily December: Day 19

My dear sweet husband arranged for me to have a new hair cut for Christmas. I thought I would throw my new 'do' into the mix of pictures for December.

I think the last hair cut I had was in June. I had colored it a few times by myself in the last few months, which Jason isn't much a fan of - usually because I end up turning my hair orange (apricot was the perfect color description that Loreal used when I called their help line!)or bleaching it out (in an attempt to get rid of the apricot color) which all end up resulting in tears.

It was so nice to have someone do my hair that knew what they were doing. Amanda (from day 16) was sweet enough to give me a new cut and a much needed color.

NOW, I am ready for Christmas!

Daily December: Day 18

Tonight we were downstairs in the basement. We heard fire trucks in the neighborhood and then down our street. And man, they were really loud. I'm rushing upstairs thinking that surely our neighbor's house is on fire. Instead, we find Santa riding on the back of a firetruck! Ho Ho Ho! Welcome to Spokane :-)

Daily December: Day 17

Millions and millions of letters. At least that is what it seemed like. Today we finished up working on our Christmas newsletter. We hope that you got it in the mail!