Just sharing a picture

This picture is a little blury - but I love it anyway. I just had to share my beautiful girl.

Christmas Wrap Up

My blogs have been few and far between lately - the holidays have had us running all over the place! We have been incredibly busy going here and there and are now looking forward to a relaxing New Year's Day. Here is a wrap up:

Our first Christmas Celebration was with Mike's Grandma Lee. She lives in Rochester, but life makes it difficult for us to get together often. Madison rarely sees Grandma Lee, but she remembers her each time she sees her and absolutely adores her.

Next, we celebrated Christmas with the Tigue Family. Madison received a pretty church coat and hat from Grandma and Grandpa. Anytime she opened a package with clothes in it, she had to try them on right away. She adores this coat and has to wear it everywhere! So much for keeping it nice for church.

After gift opening, we took the kids sledding at bridge park. It's been a long time since I have gone sledding and it was so much fun! Madison, Mason, and Riley all enjoyed going down the hill. This is the first Christmas in recent memory that we have had enough snow to go sledding!

After, Uncle Trevor tried to take Madison on the snowmobile, but she would have none of it! Remember, she is still learning to simply tolerate the snow! Mason and Riley, however, loved riding the snowmobile around the house.

Saturday evening, we had Grandma Muldoon's annual Legion Christmas Party. I always laugh about our extended family Christmas being in a bar. It's the only place big enough to hold all of us. I love the Christmas party because it is the only time out of the year that the entire family is together. It is so much fun to see how all of my cousin's kids are growing and there is always a new baby to be held. My Grandma puts a lot of work into the party by preparing the main dish and baking dozens and dozens of bars. She has been sick recently, so my hat is off to her and the wonderful party that was enjoyed by all. My favorite part of the night is when the great grandkids open their gifts from Great Grandma. She always buys them a new pair of warm winter pajamas. All of the kids will immediately take off their nice dress clothes to put on their new jammies. This is our attempt at a picture of all the great grandchildren with Grandma - as you can see, a few are escaping including mine!

Sunday we were delayed by a storm. We tried to go back to Rochester around 3pm but the snow made travel nearly impossible. It took us an hour to get to Albertville (yea, that's about 5 miles!) So, we turned around and waited at Mom and Dad's for the road conditions to improve. We were finally able to leave around 10 pm and made it home at 1am. We're not talking about the Packer game that day. What a disaster!

On Christmas Eve, we attend church services and then hosted Mike's family for our Christmas celebration. We had a simple meal of Minnesota Wild Rice Soup, Meatballs, and various cookies and other snacks. Mike's mom brought a delicious chocolate chip torte for desert! Madison, again tried on all her clothes as she opened the gifts. Mike loves his new Brett Favre jersey - and I received a new necklace. (You're not breaking this one Madison!)

Madison was not quite sure what to think of her gifts from Santa Claus. I'm not sure she gets the whole Santa Claus thing just yet. She was exicted to play with her new kitchen, if you can't tell from the smile on her face. I think, however, the sudden appearance of new toys when she woke up was a bit overwhelming for her.

Mike enjoyed the new 18-mile two way radios. Now when we are camping, we can use the radio's to call him in from the boat since the cell phones usually don't work on the lake. He also got a new weather radio that we can use on the boat. (The old one fell in the lake a few times!) I am enjoying my new iPod Nano (3rd generation, it is so sweet!) and have been reading Deanna Favre's book, Don't Bet Against Me.

Christmas Day was spent with Mike's Grandma Dubbels and the extended family. Again, it was a nice relaxing day! Madison enjoyed playing with cousin Kathy and we all enjoyed the meal that Grandma Shirley made!

So - that is our Christmas wrap up. Today, I spent a lot of time getting the gifts put away. Tomorrow the Holiday decorations will come down and we will begin focusing on goals for 2008!

Madison's latest line

Madison has a new phrase. She uses it all the time. It's cute - but it could drive a mother crazy! It does not matter what I say to her, the response is:

"Yes et iiiissss."

Madison: "Mommy, my brocolli is all gone."
Mommy: "No, Madison, you still have brocolli on your plate."
Madison: "Yes et iiisss."

She has the most perfect little whiney voice to go with the phrase.

Ever hear the song "Hey there Delilah" by the Plain White Ts? (I like to call them the dirty white t's.) Well, Madison loves that song. If I get a chance, I'm going to pull out my video camera the next time I play the song for her. She dances around the room and sings "ooohhh....what you do meeeeeeee." It will either win me $100,000 on AFV or I'll learn how to do a video blog.

It's too stinkin' cute.

The song has a line that I just love. It goes "Times Square couldn't shine as bright as you." Too true, too true.

Miracles ***Updated***

Please join me in welcoming two little miracles to the world.

Kendall Ann 7:56 a.m.; 3 lbs 9 oz; 17 inches
Sydney Lanette 7:57 a.m.; 4 lbs 3 oz; 17 3/4 inches

Born Wednesday December 12, 2007 to our dear friends, Chad and Jodi.

They were born about 7 weeks early, so please pray for their tiny lungs. It sounds like they will be in the hospital for four to six weeks. Sydney is doing very well but Kendall had some issues with her oxygen levels. As I understand it, she is doing better now. Jodi is doing well, recovering from a C-section. (I've been there, sister - it's no fun at all but so worthwhile!!!)

Our love and prayers go out to Chad and Jodi who have hoped and prayed for these two blessings for so long.

Potty Training

I was holding this post until I had the perfect picture of Madison to post with it. However, that picture is impossible and I regret that I did not have my camera ready when this moment occured.

We have been working on using the potty for quite awhile - Madison has been getting used to it and has found the process to be fun. Since I was going to be home the entire weekend of Thanksgiving, I thought it would be a perfect time to do some focused potty training. The plan was to put on big girl pants and set a timer for 20 minutes. Every 20 minutes, we would try to go potty. The process was going okay - it wasn't a success but it wasn't a total bust either.

During this same time, I had a lot of little projects to work on around the house - mostly cleaning and reorganizing cupboards and closets. My tupperware cupboard was out of control. Since I had just cleaned the floors, I emptied the cupboard out on the floor and was in the process of wiping it out and reorganizing everything. Madison was helping. At some point, Mike called me to help with something downstairs. I went down there and came back two minutes later to find Madison standing in the middle of my tupperware on the floor. I asked her if she had to go potty and she said "No, Mommy." I took a step further and quickly learned why.

There was a giant puddle on the floor and amongst the tupperware. Her clothes were soaked. Nice. An accident. They say you aren't supposed to get upset when they have an accident and normally I wouldn't....but she was standing in the middle of all of my clean tupperware! After my initial yelp of shock, I walked away for a minute or two so as not to let Madison see how upset I was. It wasn't her fault.

Since I had no idea what pieces of tupperware she "got" I had to wash it all! It took four loads through the dishwasher. I had laundry baskets of tupperware in my kitchen waiting for their turn through the dishwasher.

I wish I had a picture. I really do. It would be fun blackmail material for later in life. Oh yea - I gave up on potty training for a little while too.

Reindeer Turds?

That's what they look like on the pan - but indeed they are not reindeer turds. They are one of my favorite Christmas Cookies. When I was a kid, my Mom would always make Peanut Butter Blossoms around Christmas time. They were a small peanut butter-ish cookie with a chocolate star in the middle. I loved them because the chocolate star was always so YUMMY.

They take a little bit of time to make and being a mom that works full time and goes to school, I needed a Christmas cookie that was a little less putzy. I found this recipe for Fudge Blossoms and made it for the first time last Christmas. It is a similar cookie with the chocolate star in the middle but by using a cake mix, it is very quick and easy to make! They are also so chocolatey that if you go over board and eat too many, you'll learn to never do it again. (that's good for the waistline!)

On the way to daycare today Madison started talking about "tookies." She must have had a craving. Since she has been a bit of a challenge at daycare lately (lots of time outs and she seems to be a bit of a bossy-bully) I told Madison we could make cookies tonight if she was a good girl at daycare.

It worked. At the end of the day, Dianne said she was a much better girl today. So, Madison and I made Fudge Blossoms.

Judging from this picture, do you think she liked them?

Fudge Blossoms

1 box chocolate fudge cake mix

1/4 cup butter, softened
1 egg, slightly beaten

2 Tbsp water

3/4 to 1 cup finely chopped walnuts (optional - why ruin good chocolate with nuts?)

48 chocolate star candies

1. Preheat oven to 350. Cut butter into cake mix in large bowl until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Stir in egg and water until well blended. It will seem kind of dry.

2. Shape dough into 1/2-inch balls; roll in walnuts, pressing nuts gently into dough. Place about 2-inches apart on ungreased baking sheets.

3. Bake cookies 12 minutes or until puffed and nearly set. Place chocolate star in center of each cookie; bake 1 minute more. Cool 2 minutes on baking sheet. Remove cookies from baking sheet to wire racks to cook completely.

The recipe says it makes 4 dozen cookies but it's a pretty whimpy little cookie. I usually get about 2 dozen.

Welcome Old Man Winter

Old Man Winter finally made his return to Southeastern Minnesota yesterday. A lot of people I know do not like snow and are perfectly happy with a winter of light snow. I, however, love the snow as long as I don't have to shovel it!

In my estimation, we recieved 4 or 5 inches of snow and about an inch of freezing rain. Shortly after the storm began we headed out for a few essentials (a rented DVD and hot dogs!) When the worst of it hit, we were hunkered down watching a movie.

Before the ice and freezing rain hit, Madison and I went out to play in the snow for a few minutes. The wind made it too cold to stay out for long.

Madison had to wear her pink sunglasses with her boots, snowpants, and hat and mittens. Doesn't it just complete the look? If you rememer last winter, Madison was terrified of the snow. She still isn't too sure about it, but she is learning to tolerate it.

This is Madison enjoying her first cup of hot chocolate. Yummy!