This year's advent activities

Here's my list of advent activities for this year. Mostly they are the same every year. And this year I kind of started right after Thanksgiving. And there are a few activities that are traditional for after Christmas too. So there are more than 24. But anyway, here's a list.

1. Cut down a Christmas tree.
2. Decorate the tree.
3. Decorate the house.
4. Put up the lights.
5. Make snowflakes,
6. Write new lyrics for Christmas carols. These tend to be really silly. But it's the boys' favorite activity.
7. Isaac's band concert
8. Aspen's band concert
9. Sing Along with the Austin Symphony Orchestra.
10. First Presidency's Christmas Devotional
11. Breakfast with Santa (this is really just for Hazel. The others don't want to go.)
12. Jingle Bell Run. (I may end up doing this in our own neighborhood this year since the races around here are either on Sunday or in towns kind of far away.)
13. Nate's work party
14. Watch A Christmas Story
15. Watch Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.
16. Bake cookies
17. Make Candy
18. Put together goody boxes and deliver to our neighbors.
19. Advent Sundays with friends over to sing carols.
20. Listen to The Best Christmas Pageant Ever as we drive to Utah.
21. See A Christmas Carol at Hale Center Theater
22. Go to visit Grandma and Grandpa Kerksiek at the cemetery
23. See the lights and nativity on Temple Square.
24. Go sledding.
25. Go ice skating.
26. Go skiing.
27. Decorate gingerbread houses.
28. Make cardamom bread and pigs in a blanket for Christmas morning.
29. Visit Nate's family in Utah.
30. Go see movies that come out during Christmas time (not necessarily Christmas themed) this year will be Tron and Voyage of the Dawn Treader.
31. Will probably watch some other Christmas themed movies on our drive to Utah: Grinch, Home Alone, Elf, Miracle on 34th Street, White Christmas.
32. Write thank you cards.
33. Send out holiday cards.
34. Hot chocolate and fires in the fireplace.
35. Read Davey's First Christmas on Christmas Eve.
36. Have a little family talent show.

O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree

We cut down a Christmas tree at the Elgin Christmas Tree Farm on Saturday. I don't usually get our tree up so early in the season. But since we are leaving for Utah in 2 /12 weeks, I figured I'd enjoy it now.

It was a beautiful 60 degrees afternoon.

We rode the hay ride out to the field to find our tree. I love this place, they provide the saws for for cutting your tree, and the twine for tying it to the top of your car. In addition, they'll shake the tree to get rid of any loose stuff, or squirrels, and bag it up for you. They are a full service tree farm.

So we wandered around, up and down the rows of trees looking for just the right one. Unfortunately, the last few years of droughts here in Texas weren't too great for growing trees. Pickins were a little slim.

But we found one. Everyone got their 15 seconds of cutting the tree down.

And rather than wait for the wagon to come around again, we (or mostly Nate) hauled it back to the front of the farm.

We tied it on to the car, and that was that.

Christmas is officially underway!

New Thanksgiving Tradition

I started a new Thanksgiving Day tradition with my family this year. I read about it on some blog somewhere. (I can't remember which one - I follow waaayy to many.) But I really like this idea.

I got a big blank sketch book. Each year I plan to put it out during our gathering and have everyone sign it. Even little kids. Each person can write a line or two to say what they are thankful for. Or just sign it. Then I'll take a group picture of everyone in attendance and place it in the book on the pages signed for the year.

This way, I'll remember who was there every year. And have a record of how things change and/or stay the same each year.

So I started this year. I don't think I got all the kids to sign that were there. But I got most of the adults. And of course my family. The group shot was minus a couple sister missionaries that left before I knew it. As with all new things, it will take me a bit to get the hang of it. But I am excited about this new little memory book for Thanksgiving.

Now I've just got to remember it next year.

The Candy Game

Blue asked about the candy game. So I'll explain a little more. This game was the highlight of Thanksgiving when I was a kid. My Grandpa hosted it every year. Basically, there is a board with numbers between 2 and 12 on it. But there is no number 7. Some of the other numbers appear twice. There are prizes on every square. Mostly they are $1 store prizes with some candy thrown in. Stuff like pencils, beads, glow sticks, handcuffs, tape, coloring books, stickers, etc. But for the end, Grandpa usually had a grand prize he would put out on numbers 2 or 12 (because those are typically the hardest to roll). To play, you roll a pair of dice. Whatever number it lands is the number of the prize you get. If you roll a 7, then you are out of luck. This is so sad for the little kids. They don't get it. And if it keeps getting rolled, there are sometimes tears. But usually it's still fun for everyone. Then you roll until all the prizes are gone. As a kid, the grand prize was a giant Rambo knife for a couple years. And, inevitably, a little girl would win. Then the trading would begin. And the boys would just about trade everything they had for that awesome knife.
The candy game was always a fun distraction between dinner and pie. Try it for your next family get together. I think that sometimes some members of my family play it at Christmas with their families. It's definitely lots of fun with lots of people.

Movie Marathon

The kids decided to watch all the Harry Potter movies in a row. SoFriday they watched the first 4 movies. Saturday they watched the last 2 after cutting down the Christmas tree and doing some Christmas Recital practice, some shopping and some eating. They finished around 9 pm. So Nate packed up the older 3 kids and took them to the late showing of Harry Potter 7. They didn't get home until 1 am. But it's pretty cool to watch the whole story at once. I guess I'll have to go some other time to see it for myself.

Thanks and Feasting

Thanksgiving has come and gone. We have had a wonderful long weekend of feasting and relaxing.

We joined our friends for dinner. We brought this fabulous turkey to deep fry. (Our host roasted one as well so that we would have in-bird stuffing to enjoy.)

I asked Lester at the meat counter at HEB to find me his biggest turkey. This was it. 23 pounds. It barely fit in the fryer.

Right as we got to our friend's house, a cold front blew in and so we had to set up a little lean to in the back corner of the yard to fry the turkey. Of course, all the kids wanted to watch.

It was a beautifully crisp on the outside, moist on the inside turkey. Ready in just over an hour. Beats getting up early to put the bird in the oven. We actually fried two turkeys. I signed up to bring turkey to the ward Christmas party next week. So I just cooked another one at the same time. Just freezing that turkey for the party.

I had planned to do three. But the one that I tried thawing in the refrigerator was still frozen when we left for the party. So we roasted that one today. Nothing like a second Thanksgiving dinner to enjoy again.

Inside, Marie and Johanna were finishing the last preparations for dinner.

Jed was carving the oven roasted turkey. Nate carved the fried one.

Then everyone loaded up.

We had lots of pie. I made 7 pies. Bought 6 more. Marie made 3 more. We didn't come home with much: 3 out of the 16. Those disappeared the next day.

We played the traditional Kerksiek family candy game. All the kids had fun.

This is the group shot. The sister missionaries were there too. But they left before I could snap the picture.

It was a great night. We went and saw Tangled afterward. Kind of late, but the theater was pretty empty.

I missed my family. But I am thankful for good friends to fill their place.

Stuff I've been working on or Why I haven't had time to blog

Nothing exciting to report lately. Just the normal chauffeuring kids, making dinner, and doing laundry routine. I guess that is the way things go. But occassionally there are some other things that happen. So, here is a list (because I love lists) of our life lately:

Two sick kids this week.

I had 7 kids last week all week. Friends were out of town and we took some of their kids. Nearly double our usual 4. But it worked out just fine. The only time I really noticed a difference was at dinnertime and bath time. Our table doesn't fit 9 and bathing 3 little girls at once takes a while longer than one.

I've been sewing a bunch lately. I have a backlog of sewing projects that keep getting ignored. I keep adding new projects before I finish the old ones. Some get done, some get added to the work-in-progress pile. But this last week I finished capes, a dress, a jacket, bunches of mending and altering projects, a baby quilt and some pajamas. Still have more mending and lots more projects. But I love sewing. It is something I really look forward to.

Lots of piano practice with Hazel, percussion practice with Isaac, and flute practice with Aspen. She had a district band audition last weeekend. And now we are practicing Christmas music.

The weather has been beautiful here. 75 to 80 degrees in the day. 40's and 50's at night. One night we almost had a freeze. I wish it was a little colder to actually feel like fall. But this weather is nothing to complain about.

Finished reading Little House in the Big Woods with Hazel. The Little House series are some of my favorite books. I always wished I was a pioneer girl. I wanted to be Laura. Next up is Little House on the Prairie.

Started planning Hester's baby shower with my sisters. So excited for Hester, her baby, and the shower.

Watching Dukes of Hazzard reruns with my kids. Still my favorite show.

Had a movie party with the kids last weekend. We made pizza, a birthday cake (complete with candles) for no reason whatsoever, and popcorn in front of Toy Story 3. Cute and funny movie.

Premade some breakfast foods so that my kids don't just eat cereal every morning. Although they don't mind just cereal. I think they should have something more substantial. So now we are stocked up with veggie sausage biscuits, veggie breakfast tacos, turkey sausage pigs-in-a-blanket, and ham, cheese, and tomato english muffins to eat with our fruit, yogurt and milk in the morning.

We are still getting tomatoes out of our garden, peppers, jalepenos, onions, and basil too. We'll be having stuffed peppers every week for the next month. And lots of salsa. Yum.

Helping Toby with school stuff.

Helping the boys with scout stuff. We are also helping their friends with Eagle projects.

Helping Aspen with Personal Progress stuff. We have the Young Women in Excellence prorgram for our Stake this week. So Aspen is finishing up a cool project to exhibit. I'll have to take pictures of it and post it when she is finished.

Researching appetizer options for the cooking club that Nate and I are in. This month we are doing dishes featuring orange and pomegranate. It is going to be tasty.

Made atwo pumpkin pies. (The big can makes two, I can't help it.) And just about ate them by myself. I got inspired when I started planning our Thanksgiving menu. I like pie :)

Doing stuff for my church callings.

Thinking about Christmas: gifts, activities, vacation plans, food. Listening to Christmas music. I already bought a new CD for the season and have listened to it a couple times. Playing Christmas songs on the piano. We even wrote Santa letters the other day. I know kind of early. But I want to get Christmas shopping done early this year, and help the kids get theirs done too, so we needed some lists of ideas to choose from. Christmas season is so much more relaxing for me when all those things are taken care of early.

Finished reading the The Maze Runner and The Scorch Trials by James Dashner. Very good books. If you liked Hunger Games, you will probably like this series. I think there is one more to come. But it will likely be awhile since Scorch Trials just came out.

Started reading the latest installment in the Wheel of Time Series. I haven't gotten very far due to busyness in the rest of my life. But hope to finish this month.