Greer Presents, Fishing, Reindeer & Lights, and Gingerbread Men

Greer Presents

About a week ago, we received a package in the mail from my parents in California. It contained a cute box my mom put together for the 12 Days of Christmas with scripture quotes and items that went along with each one. It also contained some recipes of the Christmas sweets my mom always made growing up. And then, it had our Christmas presents! The boys got gift cards to Target and Dave and I got some much needed money. The boys were so excited that a few days later they wanted to go to Target and pick out their presents. Cruise got a red Lightsaber, a marble run, and a Hershey's candybar, Jett got a blue Lightsaber, a Batman Lego set, and a Hershey's candybar. With the remaining money on their cards, Miles got a ball. That is really all he was interested in. But it is a pretty cool ball! The boys have had a lot of fun fighting with the Lightsabers. We already had one, so all three of them get to use one. Miles absolutely loves it! Thanks Grandma & Papa Greer!

Fishing

This past Friday, Dave woke Jett up early and the two of them went fishing at Deer Creek. With the weird temperatures lately, there was a thick fog that covered the lake. Jett had a blast, probably because they kept catching fish! They caught 5 and all of them were at least 12 inches long. 

Reindeer & Lights

I like living close to Thanksgiving Point. And I like that we have a family membership. It makes for a pretty inexpensive experience around the holidays. Every year we go to Thanksgiving Point to see the lights and visit the reindeer. However this year, the weather has been uncharacteristically warm. Not very Christmas-y. The kids wore their coats, Dave had just a long sleeve shirt, and I wore a jacket and flip flops. I really hope we get some snow for Christmas. After seeing the reindeer, we hopped in the car and drove through the Christmas lights as we listened to Christmas music. Always a fun time for the kids and a very easy activity for us. 

Gingerbread Men

Finally, the boys wanted to make gingerbread men. Instead of using my incredible recipe, I used a mix that was "good-enough". I'll make the real deal as it gets closer to Christmas. I made some buttercream frosting and pulled out all the Christmas sprinkles and stuff for them to decorate their cookies. The only time it is socially acceptable to eat a stick of butter is when you decorate desserts in buttercream frosting. 

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving break wasn't too painful this year. Although, towards the end of the week, Cruise was ready to go back to school. The day before school got out, Cruise's class did their monthly sing for parents thing. It was pretty cute, especially the awesome turkey drumstick hats they made.

During the break, I tried to plan a few fun things to do with the kids. We made pumpkin bread for our new neighbors across the street, drew turkeys, and made pumpkin pie playdoh! It actually turned out awesome and it smells so good! And surprisingly, Cruise didn't eat it! So that's a bonus. He actually surprised us with his sculpting skills when he sculpted a turkey out of the playdoh. I was pretty impressed. Jett also got into the sculpting action and made a pumpkin pie man. 

Thanksgiving this year was pretty similar to last year: just Abby & I. But since my parents rented out their house in Orem, we did it at my house. I was in charge of the turkey this year, and I'm embarrassed to say that I have somehow gotten away with not having to make a turkey ever. So it was a new experience for me. Abby & I did our shopping a couple days before and got our turkey at Sprouts. I put it in my fridge to thaw for two days and pulled it out Thanksgiving morning to find that it was still pretty frozen. I also quickly learned that I didn't have any foil. I did, however, have some turkey bags. I called up my poor parents at 6:45am their time and had to ask them how on earth I was to make this turkey! My mom told me each step and soon I wasn't freaking out as much. So I filled up our big cooler with cold water and threw my turkey in there for a couple of hours while it thawed. I was able to get it thawed enough to cook; I rubbed it with a bunch of butter, oil and herbs, put it in the bag, and threw it in the oven with a prayer. It actually turned out pretty good and not dry! I also prepared the garlic mashed potatoes, gravy, rolls, and loaded sweet potatoes. Abby was in charge of the stuffing, green bean casserole, and cranberry sauce. We also had sparkling cider to drink. One day I'm going to make pies from scratch, but it just wasn't going to happen this year. We bought a pumpkin and an apple pie from Costco and that was pretty de-lish.

Cruise was adamant about breaking the wishbone. I don't know where he learned about the wishbone because I had completely forgotten about its existence at least 15 years ago. He and Jett broke it and Cruise won, which of course led to many a tear from Jett. I knew from the beginning someone was going to end up crying. 

After stuffing our faces, we all sat down on the couch, had pie, and watched Elf with the kids. Later I took Cruise & Jett to the movies to see the new Penguins of Madagascar movie that they had been begging to see for a few weeks. It was pretty stupid, but the kids liked it.

On Friday, Dave spent the morning fly fishing in Provo River. When he got home, we pulled out the Christmas stuff and got to work on putting up the tree and the limited decorations we own. Not that I want any more, I have no place to put it all and the kids just end up breaking most of it. Which is why all my ornaments are plastic. 

I really didn't think putting up the Christmas stuff was going to be a whole ordeal. Before we put the tree up, Dave wanted to fix our couch that has two reclining seats in it. The things wouldn't stay down, so he wanted to weld them shut, so that required us to take the couch outside for him to do that. As we pulled the couch away from the wall, I found that Jett had practiced writing his name all over the wall. With permanent marker. So I made him scrub it knowing it wouldn't come off just to get the point across that permanent markers are not for writing on walls. Then I had to paint over it all. Once that was done, and the couch was back in the house, I started on the tree. We got this tree last Black Friday for a really good price. It is pre-lit, which was a big selling point. So I set it up and the middle lights no longer worked. So I had to drive to Target in American Fork to get some lights. An hour later I made it home with the lights and a box of candy canes and we continued to put up the Christmas stuff. I was happy to have it finished. 

And that was Thanksgiving break.