'Twas the night before Christmas...

Merry Christmas to all--

and to all a good night!!

So. Much. Snow.

We made it. Luckily our flight was in between major snow storms.
Other than the fact that we sat in the plane on the runway
{before takeoff}
for 3 hours, our flight was uneventful.

Here is what we've been up to so far:

So. Darn. Cute.
{Even if she did periodically scream and announce all 3 times she had to go "peepee"during church}

We got about a foot of snow last night and thought we'd take advantage of it.

A blog rarity.
A picture of --

Thanks for being our photog Jeff.
Wanna move to Boston so this can happen more often?

Cookies anyone?

I just made my last batch of holiday gift treats.

If you're still looking for ideas, make these. They will not disappoint.
And they're cute to boot!

Are the 7 dwarfs brothers?

If so this must be their--

...or at least Mckinlay thinks so.

Every time she reads this book she needs:
Mama Dwarf
"Bank-et"
{which is not a blanket at all--but the sling I made her}
and "Bobo"
{her bear}

When I get around to stuffing Papa Dwarf's feet I wonder if he'll get added on the list too?
Or are 9 dwarfs {or is it dwarves?} too many?

Want the pattern too? Click here.

Tree hugger.

Mckinlay has nothing but love for the Christmas tree. I'm just glad we don't have the same problem as last year. I walked in the room and found her giving the tree a giant hug and smooch.

Every morning we go into the front room and plug in the tree lights together. It's so sweet watching her eyes light up {"woah!"} and her little feet dance her around the tree in excitement.

We love Christmas!

Start 'em young.

Just a little {light} reading before bed.

{for all you Westerners -- DMD is the Eastern equivalent to DDS}

This is Mckinlay's current favorite read.
A 750 page textbook that will keep her occupied for a good 20 mins.

Hey, at least it's a Pediatric Dentistry book.

I'm considering sneaking in to her bedroom at night and repeating:
"drill 'em, fill 'em, bill 'em"
just to keep the dental fire in her alive.

Christmasing has begun!

Day after Thanksgiving = Christmas decor comes out.
{as you may have noticed by the new blog look}

We read Luke 2 and had Mckinlay put out the manger scene.
It brought a tear to my eye for a few reasons:
1) I remember doing this with my family as a kid.
2) I got so excited to teach Mckinlay this story and teach her about our Savior Jesus Christ.
3) I may have had one glistening tear when I put my hands up in the air and said:
"Glory to God in the Highest! And on earth peace, good will toward men."
All because of my memories of the countless times I said that in the Hallstrom nativity play.

{Oh. Did I mention she was playing with a marker before this!?}

That is Mckinlay's new phrase while getting her picture taken. I guess after snapping her photo I always say "cute."
Cute.

The stockings were hung...

And my blessed husband did the unthinkable and made "Clone of Cinnabon" {you're welcome} rolls better than he ever has before. And we thought there was no room for improvement.

I'm not kidding folks.
To. Die. For. Delicious.

And of course there was tree trimming.

And I even sported my tri-holiday shirt.
Appropriate for:
Christmas
Valentines
& Halloween
{Works marvy as Waldo}
Although I wouldn't wear it on election day...
I did. and felt stupid.

Thanksgiving continued.

We had a great dinner at the Christopher's house yesterday complete with:

little smokies

and a talent show.
{Pardon the neck craning. If I flip the video, it gets out of sync.}

Mckinlay and Ty have been practicing their circus tricks for weeks.
Jack recited a turkey poem.
Marcus favored us with the "Egyptian" and crab walk, wheelbarrow and a somersault.
Brooke did some amazing foot-grabbing-shoulder-swinging.
It was awesome.

And did I mention the amazing food?
or the pies?
numm-ers.

And we're thankful for the Christophers and Pughs for being our Thanksgiving "family."
It's so great having friends to share special occasions with.

Thanksgiving.

We thankful for family, friends and most especially the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Happy, Happy Thanksgiving!

little lobster bombs

One of Ty's classmates was given some live lobsters from a patient yesterday (because what says "thank you for the dental work" better than lobster, right?). His classmate isn't a seafood fan, so he offered them to Ty. Lucky us! I don't like seafood either, but by golly it didn't dampen my lobster night excitement!
We thought we were getting 2 lobster friends, but ended up with 4 little lobster friends!

None of us have ever cooked lobster before and Laura read there are 2 ways too "deal with them" before boiling.

#1:
#2
Obviously we didn't have a lot of trust in Laura's hypnosis skills.
(and for the record--this made the grossest cracking-squirming noise.)
Apparently our lobster friends tasted mmm mmm (slurp) good!

And we finished the night with:
This is when I sing:
"Who could ask for anything more--Cha!"

Get the pie recipe here.
It was mmm mmm (no slurping here) good.

Lovely Lady.

It was Grandma Tutu's funeral today. I heard it was beautiful.

As was she.
(Thanks for the picture Mikie.)

Ourselves the Elves

We're getting pretty excited about Christmas around here.

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Can you tell?

Merry Christmas Monkey.

Christmas sewing has begun.

I just finished this little gal for Mckinlay. I think she'll like her.
The pattern was free and I got it here if you want to make one too.

Monkey is supposed to have a beret, but I'm not really feeling it. I'm thinking I'll add a bow or a flower or something. We'll see.

Happy holiday sewing!!

Melted chips and melted hearts.

I have so many fond childhood memories of doing...Not scowling and sitting on the counter pantsless (which, for the record, I swear she owns pants), but memories of sitting on the counter eating cookie dough and brown sugar straight from the bowl. I think I did this just about every time I went to Grandma Hallstrom's house. And sometimes, if I was super lucky, she'd let me have a Maraschino cherry too!

I come from a family of food lovers. We plan vacations around where were going to eat. We make treats all the time. We have food traditions. If we don't have parsely on the Turkey tray at Thanksgiving, we look towards heaven and say "sorry Grandma." We have gallons of hot fudge in our food storage. I didn't know that most people didn't have dessert after dinner every day or that some people consider Jello a dessert and not a side dish with Sunday dinner.

I'm so glad I lived a sheltered life.

However, I didn't know that a rubber scraper wasn't really called a "cheater" until I was in the 9th grade. I blame you mom for my embarrassment that day in cooking class when I asked for someone to pass it to me.

It's so fun making memories like I had with my little dough snitcher. And by golly I'll teach her it's called a "cheater" too.

And I'll tell you another thing that's fun:

(It's the ONE good thing about Ty not being home.)

Mckinlay leaned her forehead against mine and whispered:
"i ove you."
Que heart melt.
I think she likes dinner while Daddy is away too.
Hee hee.

Dancing in heaven.

Grandma Tutu passed away this evening. She was 97 years old.

It makes me smile to imagine her dancing around the spirit world surrounded by her loved ones. I know she is happy to be
dancing again.

Mckinlay and I were able to visit with her while we were in Utah this summer. Tutu loved watching Mckinlay running around her room (and stealing all her M&Ms) and she was so tickled that her name was "Mckinlay."

I took this sweet video of "Tink" and his "Shweet-hart," and thought you might enjoy it too.

I love you Tutu! And I want to join with the rest of the McKinlay family in thanking our Heavenly Father for the blessing she was in our lives and for the blessing it is that she is now on the other side.

A good day.

I've been so frustrated with Mckinlay today. She has this knack for pushing all my buttons at once. And I'm sure my frustration is escalated by that fact that Ty has been out of town for the past three days. Anyway, poor me. Wah wah.

I was pulling some banana bread out of the oven and heard the sound of crackers scattering and crunching all over the kitchen floor. I couldn't, nor did I want to, turn around (I was mid-turn-the-bread-out-of-the-hot-pan), but when I did, I found:
Mckinlay with broom in hand.

(Never mind the fact that her sweeping skills spread the kitchen mess into the living room.)

Then I was hit with a fresh perspective and guilt for all my frustration--
So we put a blanket out in the middle of the mess and ate some "nana bread."

It's been a good day!

And if you feel like making some "nana bread" too. Make this.
You're welcome.

Aren't they darling?

"How I love ya!"
P.S. Brennan turned 29 yesterday. No worries.

B.

Happy birthday big brother!

Gotta love those matching eyes.

No matter how old you get:
"One of these days I'm gonna catch up to you!"
XXXOOO

Halloween highlights.

I did add something to the brownies...just not bugs or quarters.

One word:
Di-vine

Rarrrr!

If I had one wish, we'd all be at Grandma Hallstrom's tonight.

I'm considering baking spiders and quarters into some brownies just for old time sake.

Wanna come over?

Happy Halloween!

Dental Skills.

Not everyone can make themselves a pair of real fangs.

I knew dental school was going to pay off.

Yesterday....

...was a good day for photos. Here are my three favorites:

Mckinlay drew on the couch with a BIC pen yesterday. So she went to time out. After time out, I took her over to her mess to show her what she did...after we were done talking she went in the other room and grabbed a baby wipe.

I love this picture because it shows two things:
A) I truly believe a baby wipe is the best cleaning tool. Ever. Kitchen table dirty? Wipe. Floor needs to be mopped? One wipe under each foot. Haven't used a mop since Mckinlay was born. I could go on and on, but maybe I should stop because I'm not sure if I should be embarrassed about that or not.
B) Mckinlay is really learning! It's so cute seeing her do things that Ty and I do. But we do draw the line when she asks to help "wipe" when we use the bathroom. Silly girl.

We went to Halloween story time at Ginger's and decided to sport last year's costume just for kicks. Remember the sucker/Kit Kat incident last year?

Guess I never washed it. But who is really surprised? This is when I like to throw in "You knew what I was when you picked me up."

After naps, we had the rest of the day with nothing to do. I decided it would be a good time to try this "microwave-cake-in-a-mug" recipe I found. Sounds too good to be true, right?
It was.

MAYBE it would be good if you cooked it a little less. And doused it in cream. And hot fudge. So disappointing. But probably for the best, because if we could make yummy cake any time we had an afternoon with nothing to do:
T-R-O-U-B-L-E.

Happy Halloweek!

When Happy Jo was here, we took Mckinlay to Mt. Auburn for another Halloween photo shoot (Can you believe how much she has changed in the last year? Crazy, I know.). In honor of "Halloweek," I thought I'd post a few of my favorites. I wish I could post them all, but believe me, we took way too many pictures. And since this is her Halloween costume, this is only the beginning of the pictures that will be posted of her in it. Heaven forbid I over do it on the li'l witch photos.

Enjoy!

"Broadway here I come!"