HAPPY NEW YEAR

Happy new year everyone! We had a great "party" We started with Apples to Apples and make your own pizza. And ended with " Scene it" and the ball drop. We also had a Rousing game of fear factor "food edition" including ALL our favorites, like spinach, oysters, grapefruit, beets, and more...

Love ya!!!!!

Christmas

Hope you all had a Merry Christmas. We did. Christmas Eve we went to the home of friends, they were having a "stable gathering" there were 10 of us, we had a devotion, prayed together and sang Christmas carols, of course we sang silent night candle light and all. It was really nice! We came home and had oyster stew, try it with hot sauce, it's really pretty good that way. In the morning we opened presents. Friends invited us to breakfast, their tradition is biscuts and gravy, so we took our cinnamon rolls along and shared. It was really yummy! Then we went to see Sherlock Holmes, came home and napped, then off to Justin and Kellies house for turkey dinner and games. Sooo much fun!

We planted a Christmas tree! Jon thinks it's funny because of course we will never live in one place long enough to enjoy it. He's right, so we planted it in a really big pot. It's sitting at our new house. We are off t0 KS Thursday to go to Great Wolf Lodge with the whole family, next blog will be all about that. Have a Happy New Year!!!!!!!!!!

Uncle Phil and Aunt Tami

MERRY CHRISTMAS, EVERYONE!

Christmas Jiggs

I cant turn them the right way

5 days to Christmas

Were having a very quiet relaxing weekend. Yesterday morning I woke up about 7 and laid in bed just listening to the little boys. They were getting all the paper they could find and writting books. They were saying things like"You be the illustrator and ill be the author, and how do you spell prepare, and challenge, and , no, the alliens dont come in until the 3rd episode..." it was so cute and they worked on their books most of the day yesterday and vowed to wake each other up early this morning to continue work on their books. which they are doing.

The girls and whipped up some great last minute gift items on friday night . Candy cane body scrub, "candy" soaps and a furry little hampster. The candy cane body scrub is great , we had enough to save some for ourselves and weve been using it , We love it. heres the recipe:

1 cup sugar

6 candy canes (crushed fine)

1/2 c olive oil

a few drops peppermint extract

1/8 c vitamin e oil (optional)

mix and put in small glass or plastic containers with nice homemade labels.

the soap candies were made by grating bars of soap and adding hot water to form a dough and roll into balls and dry overnight, wrap in squares made from grocery bags or net from orange bags.

the hampster is made from 3 football shapes sewn together stuffed, with ears, tail and eyes.

Have a great weekend!

love Sandi

long night

Last night me and amy had our friends over to watch a movie and amy said she wasn't feeling well and went to bed at around 730......from 9 till around 1130 she wasn't feeling so well leaning over the toilet.....me worried and not knowing what i could really do to help took her to the ER.......(apparently the "E" somehow stands for "waiting") We finally got seen and they hooked her up to some fluids and gave her some stuff for nausea....came back later took some blood.....more meds for nausea.....more meds for nausea.......then told us she had to go see her own doctor asap to find out what was wrong........if i'd known that i would've just waited......anyways stayed up all night then took her back to hosptial for ultrasound then she had to go see her doctor to tell her the results........

long story short

amy has a bug and some gull stones......they aren't going to do anything about the gull stones unless they bother her again......once is not enough


on the bright side

we got our christmas tree up i can't believe christmas is less then a week away....

'cuse still undefeated so is UK

i found out how to watch sabres highlights on my tv..pretty sweet

and i think the bills got a good chance to beat the pats

we shall see

love you all

j

Holiday Fun

I've had to learn the past couple of years how to have fun without having children. It isn't as easy as you might think. Maybe it's harder for me because I've had children since I was a child. Regardless, this week my fun was making gingerbread men out of cupcakes. I learned that you have to "glue" the cupcakes to the pan or your gingerbread man my loose a limb or two. Phil took one to a cake walk at work, it fell apart before it even made out of the kitchen. I took another to a friends daughter, by the time we got it to her house, the only thing still attached was the left leg. Oh well, I was distraught about the first one falling apart, but laughing hysterically about it later! Great Fun!

Address

This is my address, I guess a few people are looking for it. By the way what is J and Amy's?

6556 W 91st St.
Apt 133
Overland Park KS 66212

Aunt Sandi if you see this can you please share with Grandma. I tried calling her and I think her phone is disconnected. It said temporarily out of service. I ll keep trying. Love you all
Brandi

Making Christmas

All the little elves in NY are very busy making gifts. Were making bird feeders, braceletts, soap, candles, stationary, bookmarks, ornaments, bean bag chairs, candy , cookies, and more...

We are ready for XMAS

We got the tree, the lights, and the Hello Dollies.

We had fun setting up the tree, Gwen and Addi are having fun taking it down slowly. Tonite we are relaxing and eating a quick meal, I think we are going to say hi to MOm and Dad take a bath and head to bed. We had a long day.

Christmas in Wilmore

Saturday was Christmas in Wilmore. It started with snow, just a little dusting, but it was snow. (by the way, I did go out in my barefeet), I passed on the pancake breakfast at the school and headed to the seminary for the craft show. I didn't find anything that I had to have, so I moved into the dining hall. Every year the international students sell lunch, so I had Korean beef and rice and some soup. All day there are horse and buggy rides and at night Main Street shuts down and all the stores have music and treats. It was really cold, but really fun, it's been part of our Christmas for the past 4 years, one of the things I really love about Wilmore. I'm sure we'll miss it next year.

Its here, its finally here!!!

Well,the Santa dance must have worked, it snowed last night! Were so excited! The first thing you have to do when its snows is to run outside and grab a big snow ball to throw on the wood stove so you can watch it melt? Then when you've brought in several snow balls and they have all melted, then the second thing you do when it snows is: have a competition to see who can run the farthest across the snowy yard in their bare feet?? Fun!!!
Sandi

Rockin Santa

Lyle got picked to be the rockin santa in the 4th grade Christmas concert, He had to wear a santa hat , sun glasses, a santa coat, and play an "electric" guitar. He was so excited he was bouncing off the walls for 2 days. I didnt get to get a good video of him ,but this isnt too bad. He was so cute.

Relax

Well we have been busy for those of you who dont know I got a second job. I work at the Dollar Tree here, but no discount as Gwen would say: "Awwwww Man" But I have found some really great stocking stuffers for our X-Mas and I am getting some good exercise while making alittle bit of money. Ruben has been home with the kids in the evening hopefully he gets the hang of it soon because coming home at 11 and then putting the kids to bed is not fun. Today we had to do McDonalds for lunch because my wonderful mother in law came last night and made dinner for the kids and Ruben and cleaned my kitchen I did not want to mess it up. I out dinner inthe crock pot and am making some bisucits, quick clean up. I have a week and a half left of school and then we are on break. Yea!!! Addi is walking like a pro she can even run with her hands above her head. Gwen has a little hive like rash so she is not feeling too good today and Ruben left a little while ago to spend the day with his grandma.
LOve you all the tree is going up tommorow so I hope to get some pictures, hey mom can you e-mail me the recipe for the hello dollies i want to make some tommorow. Love you
Brandi

Peanut Butter Blossoms

Ingredients:
48 HERSHEY'S KISSES Brand Milk Chocolates
1/2 cup shortening
3/4 cup REESE'S Creamy Peanut Butter
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup packed light brown sugar
1 egg
2 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
Granulated sugar

Directions:1. Heat oven to 375°F. Remove wrappers from chocolates.

2. Beat shortening and peanut butter in large bowl until well blended. Add 1/3 cup granulated sugar and brown sugar; beat until fluffy. Add egg, milk and vanilla; beat well. Stir together flour, baking soda and salt; gradually beat into peanut butter mixture.

3. Shape dough into 1-inch balls. Roll in granulated sugar; place on ungreased cookie sheet.

4. Bake 8 to 10 minutes or until lightly browned. Immediately press a chocolate into center of each cookie; cookie will crack around edges. Remove from cookie sheet to wire rack. Cool completely. About 4 dozen cookies.

lay off

What carpentars do to "relax" when they are laid off of work.