Happy 15th Valentine’s Day Joshua. I love you and I am so proud of the life we have built together. I can’t wait to see how the next 15 years turn out.
I’m not sure where they got the idea, but the moment we took down the Christmas tree the kids decided that they wanted to ride it. I’m not really sure what they had in mind, but I had a simple solution. We took the tree, tossed it on the wagon and strapped it down. All that was left was for them to climb on. They loved it!
The first night we just walked around the back yard. The next morning we went out front and ran up and down the sidewalk and street. They didn’t want to stop. I hope this doesn’t become a tradition.
Tags: wesley jillian
Take a look at this motley crew and then subtract about 20 years. That picture in your mind is what we’d have look like the last time we all went together on the Santa Train on the Lake Whatcom Railway in Wickersham. We haven’t changed a bit, have we?
Of course, it wasn’t just us. We had the whole family involved: Kathleen, Dave, Amber, Joshua, Adrianne, Cody, Corey, Willow, Wesley, Aidan and Jillian (I think that is roughly by age).
The train heads down the tracks a short ways, stops near a small waterfall and then heads back the other way. While the train is stopped the engine is moved from one end of the train to the other. So our car was the first on the way out and the last on the way back in. The perfect combination if you ask me. The train cars are from the early 1900s and in surprisingly good shape. When we were kids it seems to me that the engine was steam and the cars were more open, but I guess things have changed a little.
Starting at one end Santa comes down the train and sits with each of the kids. He takes their seat and does his usual thing. Wesley was really excited that he got to be the first kid on the train to sit on Santa’s lap. And Jillian didn’t scream at all this year!!
From the opposite end of the train as Santa comes Ben the banjo player. He plays and everyone sings carols.
We had hot chocolate, apple cider and lots of fun. Look at these faces and tell me they didn’t have a great time.
Tags: Amber, Christmas, Jillian, Joshua, Santa, Train, Wesley, Whatcom Railroad
A few years ago for Christmas, Amber got a special NordicWare pan just for making gingerbread house pieces. And for the last few years we’ve been buying our gingerbread kits at Costco and Trader Joes. Why? Because making them at home with the pan was just too much work. But this year, something snapped inside my brain and I made the decision to make the houses from scratch.
More than being really difficult, the trouble with going homemade is just how long it takes. First we made the dough. This was fun and Jillian was a big help. But then you have to bake the shapes three times for each house. The roof and long side get baked twice and the other side of the pan, the small sides and chimney, get baked just once. But you can’t bake them back-to-back because the pan is hot. You have to wait for it to cool and that takes hours. So, for each house it took me three days. I’d make the dough and then bake each side a night. Then repeat the process for the second house. I wanted my own house, but I was too lazy to make any more.
Once all of the pieces were baked I took another day to assemble the houses so they could dry and be sturdy enough for the kids to work with. We used a pretty standard royal icing recipe and it gave us structurally sound little houses.
Finally, a week later, we were ready to decorate these little guys. Amber bought a ton of candy and there was plenty to go around. Interestingly, even though we divvied everything up 50/50 some strange things happened. Some of Wesley’s candy bowls were empty even though hardly any of them were on the house. Where did they go?
To start with we let the kids go there own way. Once they had made good progress Amber and I each started adding little touches and giving the kids some more complicated ideas. They each came up with great ideas of their own and copied from each other when they saw something they liked.
They had fun. Here they are with the finished product. The houses had to be moved to the mantle almost immediately since pieces of candy were being removed even before the frosting was dry.
Tags: Amber, Christmas, Gingerbread, Jillian, Joshua, Wesley