Who's afraid of Santa?

Not Bobby!

Giving Thanks

I have a lot to be grateful for. I am amazed at all the good I have in my life. I feel like I am pretty good about realizing my daily abundance, but I do like that there is a special day set apart to express thanks. Gratitude has kept me going throughout the hardships in my life.

It is hard not to be grateful for material things when you have lived in Eastern Europe. I have been refelecting on that time a lot recently and I am grateful for that experience.. it change me..made my life lead a better direction.

I am grateful for the man I met less than a month after returning from Lithuania. He took a chance on me and I am amazed at the result of that. My life is more than I ever thought possible. I love his family too.

I enjoyed spending Thanksgiving at the DeKay home. Beverly served a multi-course gourmet Thanksgiving meal. Thank you Beverly. Thank you especially for that French Onion soup.



I don't know how I ended up at the head of the table!



Bobby enjoyed his first Thanksgiving. He was thankful for mashed potatoes.

It's a Webkinz Birthday!

Winnie had a Webkinz Extravaganza birthday party. We had to keep the guest list down to 12 kindergartners. Decorating was easy, I just tied helium balloons around tons of Wenkinz! Every guest brought their favorite Webkinz and was presented with a new LilKinz when they arrived. While everyone came we named their new Webkinz and watched videos on the Webkinz World Website.



The guests with their webkinz. I am sad Hannah and Bobby are not in this shot. Hannah was a huge help to me during this party! She was awarded with Zeke the Zebra for all her hard work.



We played "pin the W on the Lion".



All the webkinz had a checkup from Dr. Quack.

We also played "Hot Webkinz" and had a gem hunt in Bobby's room. I threw a bunch on jewls on the croun and turned off the lights and the kids went in with head lamps and found them to put on their crowns of wonder.



We had a cupcake tree and "Birthday Cake" ice cream. Which was a huge hit.



Bobby really enjoyed the decor.

It was a great party---my six year old was in heaven and that's all that matters.

In case you were wondering.....

Whole Wheat Pumpkin Waffles

We had whole wheat pumpkin waffles for breakfast the last couple of days. From a recipes I got from Marla. These things are tasty and easy to make. I am including two recipes. One for the "Wheat Quick" and then for the waffles. The wheat quick is very easy to put together. I made it Thursday evening in about 20 minutes. Most of the time was spent grinding the wheat.


Wheat Quick

8 c whole wheat flour
2 c white flour
1/4 cup baking powder
4 t salt
1 1/4 c dry milk
you can add 2 cups butter at this point or just add oil to your mix when you make it into waffles.

Waffles
2 c Wheat Quick
1 egg
2 c water
2 T oil if you added 2 c butter to the mix or 1/4 c oil if not
1/4 c pumpkin

P.S. Adding extra pumpkin sounds like a good idea, but it will make the waffles will stick.

Pumpkin Fudge

I made one of my favorite pumpkin treats of the season yesterday. The girls and I made it during the stake priesthood meeting. I am trying to master the art of fudge which can be slightly tricky. This batch turned out perfectly! Here is the recipe. (Oh and I stole this image off the internet, my camera is nowhere to be found).

Pumpkin Fudge

3 cups sugar

¾ cup melted butter

2/3 cups evaporated milk

1 cup canned pumpkin

2 Tbsp corn syrup

1 tsp pumpkin pie spice

1 (12-oz) pkg. white chocolate chips

1 (7-oz) jar marshmallow fluff

1 tsp. vanilla extract

Line 9x12 inch pan with aluminum foil and grease before you begin to cook the fudge.

Mix together the first 6 ingredients in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Cook, stirring constantly, until mixture comes to a full boil. Continue cooking, and stirring until mixture reaches soft ball stage. Remove from heat and stir in white chocolate chips, marshmallow fluff and vanilla. Stir until well blended. Pour into greased aluminum foil lined 9 X 13 inch pan. Let stand 2 hours until completely cool. Cut fudge into squares.

"My mom and dad won the lottery"

Postcard to Hannah's friend Logan:

Dear Logan,

We are in Denali.
My mom and dad won the lottery.

Love,

Hannah


Each year there is a lottery held to distribute a limited number of passes to drive your own vehicle through Denali National Park. They are only available for four days a year.This year we entered and both Robert and I won a pass! It was a gorgeous day! P.S. We saw bears, moose and sheep.




DeNali (Mt. McKinley) is behind us. She was out showing off all day!



How many pictures like this will we ever get?



A little off the road hike uncovered a gorgeous lake not too many people know about. I wish we had a picture with the Low family who were our occasional traveling companions as were the Astles.



Me and the boy.



DeKay Lake....we discovered it right?