Magic Reindeer Food

Last year, Kyan's teacher gave each of her kids a baggie of reindeer food! He had so much fun on Christmas Eve sprinkling it outside in anticipation for Santa and his reindeer to arrive (click here to see that post)!

As long as they believe, I would like to continue that tradition with my kids and pass it along to a few others as well! Tomorrow is our Third Annual Girls Christmas Party! You see, three of my very close girlfriends all had girls within a year of each other, so we decided that it would be fun to get them together each to do a little gift exchange (read Year ONE and Year TWO by clicking on the number). It is our turn to host the party (which I am over the moon excited about) and I thought it might be fun to share our tradition with the girls, so I made each of them a bag of their own food to scatter outside so that Santa knows for sure to make it to their house!

It is so easy!
Mix together Oatmeal and Glitter
Scoop into Baggie
*If you want to make it a little bit more decorative, use the printable and tie it to the baggie with a piece of ribbon!


Taaa-Daaa!
Ready for all of Santa's reindeer on Christmas Eve!


Have you ever done this with the kiddos?

Let the Fun Begin!

Winter Break has officially started and we have lots of plans! So excited to spend two weeks with the family! I am hoping to bring you more posts than usual with our Winter Break Adventures!

Happy Birthday Dad!

Wish we could be there to sing to you in person! Until that happens, enjoy these two...

Happy Birthday Donna!

Tonight we celebrated Chad's mom's birthday SURPRISE style! Hubby Michael took her out to eat and then swung by our house, where the Durhams and Kristen were waiting patiently to yell, "Surprise!" at her! When Lola answered the door, she was still clueless! It wasn't until everyone popped their heads around the corner before she realized everyone was over (they all parked by the park, so she didn't see them)!

A Grandma and her 6 grand babies! Of course not everyone is looking, but that is just how this crew was rolling tonight! The cousins play so well together (usually it is Lola and Saige that are inseparable and Kyan and Michelle).

The funniest part of the night is when Donna had to blow out all of her candles (without saying her age, lets just say there were a lot) that her daughter, Kristen, insisted she needed on the cake!

We visited and opened presents (she actually got ours last night, we paid for her hair to get done at Beauty Brands...I went there to buy her a gift card and there she was, in the chair, so I snuck them her payment, wrote a note on a ripped piece of paper that they delivered to her once I left the building, and ran out the door before she noticed that I was in there)! We visited for a little over an hour before Grandma Donna called it a night! She thinks she is old or something!

Love you Donna, Happy Birthday!

Homemade Peppermint Vanilla Sugar Scrub

I work with very amazing woman at school! Of course my 8A team is the cream of the crop in my eyes and no one deserves this scrub more than them, but there are a lot of woman behind the scenes that keep me going on a daily basis too and there is no way that I could leave them out when it came time to make Christmas gifts for the girls at work! So tonight I made homemade sugar scrub for all of those wonderful ladies that I work with (and Kyan's teacher to0)!

What I love is that the recipe is large enough to split into several small containers, so if you can't afford to make everyone the full 8oz (I would be broke if I made everyone I work with the large container, remember, I am a teacher after all!), you can fill smaller jars to share between quite a few people!

And because I couldn't make everyone the large container, I included the recipe (you can print it off too) with their mini scrub and card! It is super easy to make and really doesn't take that long at all (unless you make 10 batches of it like I did tonight)!

If you would like to see the recipe broken down step-by-step, click here, this isn't my first time making this scrub! I just switched up the fragrance oil to make it more Christmas-y!

I did make those labels (and the recipe card) using picnik.com for you to use too if you try the scrub and want to give it as Christmas gifts! They fit perfectly on the lock-a-bles from JoAnn's! I haven't ever posted printables online before, so not sure if I am doing this correctly, but you should be able to click on the picture and it will pull it into a new screen where it is bigger, then you just print from there (if someone knows a better way, help a sista out)!



I am excited to play Santa tomorrow!

Family Picture Time

Almost two weeks ago we met up with Rae Lynn to have our family pictures taken! I have been so busy over at Rosie J, but managed to find (really beg, borrow, and steal) a free Friday evening to squeeze ours in! Last year I think I waited until the very last second to get 'em done and it was a rush to get them ordered and I had to pay to have them rushed and then mailed out to our friends and family, but not this year! Happy to say, with the help of Shutterfly and their promise to bloggers everywhere of the 50 free holiday cards (you can find that post here and how might still be able to get yours?!), that my cards went in the mail this morning and should be arriving in mailboxes as soon as tomorrow!

*Little side note, I ordered my pictures on a Sunday night, they were supposed to be on my doorstep 9 days later, however, they arrived in just 3! I was so excited at such a speedy delivery, especially during the holidays and the quality was top notch! I would expect nothing less from Shutterfly though, they always amaze me!

Check 'em out (if I had every followers address I would send you one personally, this digital one will have to do!), along with the rest of the photos from our mini shoot! I love them!

Shimmering Ornaments Christmas Card

Personalize your Christmas cards at Shutterfly.

View the entire collection of cards.

Chad and I attempted to get some shots together and were being silly for some, but these really did turn out to be my favorites, despite the fact that we aren't looking on most of them! It was hilarious and Rae did a great job of catching our candid moments, which happen to be my favorite kind of picture!

My turn! Figured if he jumped on my back, it was only fair that I got to return the favor!

Oh, how he has grown. I loved every picture that this kid took!



And my little diva.
She was NOT having picture taking time and so did not feel good! I was lucky that we got a few with her smiling at the beginning of the shoot because what you see below is pretty much how she looked the rest of the shoot!

Despite her diva-ness...

Our Christmas Tree

On Saturday night we headed out to find the perfect Christmas tree! This is a fun family tradition, as daddy insists on having a real tree, and it was awesome to see how excited the kids got over trying to find "the one"!

After picking our tree, we hopped in the truck and drove through the Arizona Celebration of Lights! It was an unexpected detour, one we didn't plan for, but a wonderful surprise! We listened to Christmas music and ooooh'd and aaaah'd at the beautiful lights!

We had the truck (to get the tree obviously), which has a moon roof, so the kids enjoyed much of the show just like this, standing on the middle console with their heads poking out the top (in fact, Kyan rode the entire way like this)!

We got home pretty late, so we just set the tree up in the water and decorated it this morning when we woke up! The kids were so excited to help!

And here is our finished tree, both day and night views! We love it and it smells so good!

The countdown is on to Christmas now! Just need to start adding the presents underneath! I have been doing lots of online shopping and trying to support my favorite etsy shops! I have also done lots of ordering from Amazon.com, I love them ! No tax and because I am a prime member, I get free 2 day shipping!

So how about you... real or fake tree at your house?