Moroccan Sister

My younger sister lives in Morocco.  She moved there last spring with her husband.  They have been blessed to live in  a lot of amazing places over the past few years.  I get pretty jealous sometimes, but she spoils me with wonderful international gifts.  I have tree ornaments from Jerusalem, beautiful scarfs from Jordan, and this year we all got awesome homemade leather Moroccan slippers, called "babouches".  They are actually really comfortable.  Shawn already decided if he could, he would wear them to work.

Love you Brookie!!

Done

Interviews

Christmas 2011

Christmas came and went.  We are slowly resurfacing.  We have pretty much done nothing for a week straight, other than play games and hang out in our pjs.  I haven't even taken any pictures other than these two (which is a first for me).

We started out our Christmas break by heading to Lake Geneva Thursday after the kids got out of school.  Lake Geneva is a cute resort-like town (kind of like Park City for those in Utah).  We stayed here...

It was a beautiful hotel and we had a nice suite overlooking the lake.  We went and saw Tin-Tin (which the boys loved), went to a beautiful breakfast cafe, and went out to an amazing pizza place.  The boys spent lots of time in the pool swimming, while Shawn and I relaxed in the hot tub.  We came back from our vacation just in time to bake Christmas cookies for Santa and do our family nativity and Tapas party.

Santa came on Christmas Eve.  He did really good this year and got all that the kids wanted.  Ethan got a PS3 and some games, Cole got a new transformer and huge army jet with army guys, and Liv got a new princess doll, and make-up kit.  Shawn got some new clothes, shoes, and weights, and I got a new coat, clothes, and shoes.  The kids have been so happy this week and it was really been fun to have everyone home for a while.  We've played lots of games, watched movies, and ate good food all week long.

I also celebrated another birthday over this week.  The kids were really sweet and Ethan took me out for an ice cream cone (with his very own money), Cole took me out for a donut (also, with his very own money), and Liv spent hours brushing my hair (which is my favorite).  Shawn got me some new shoes and took me out to lunch.  He also made me my very own birthday cake with candles and a beautiful happy birthday song.

Merry Christmas!

naps, dates, and a special gift

Christmas naps under the tree are the best.

This past weekend Shawn and I were able to go out on a nice fancy date.  We got dressed up and went to the Bartolotta ristorante, located just a few miles from our house  It is small and quaint, but has an amazing menu.  We decided this is our new Christmas tradition.  Every year we are going to go out for a fancy dinner date around Christmas.  This is what we had for dinner:

Appetizer:
Saute di Vongole/ Sauteed clams, cannelini beans leeks, tomatoes, and grilled bread
Insalata di Zucca/Roasted butternut squash, arugula, goat cheese, almonds, balsamico

Main Course:
Gnocchetti di Semola/Semolina gnocchi, scallops, shrimp, brandy-tarragon sauce
Tortellini alla Panna/Meat-filled pasta, cream, Grana Padana

Dessert:
Tiramisu/classic whipped mascarpone cake
Pistachio Gelati/house made gelato

I didn't take any pictures because I was having so much fun, but the food looked and tasted as good as it sounds.  The restaurant makes their pasta fresh every morning and it was delicious.  Looking forward to our fancy Christmas date next year :)

Last night for FHE we also started another new tradition.  We talked about how even though we are celebrating Jesus's birthday, he doesn't want an actual present from us, but that he wants us to try our best to serve others, obey the commandments, and share his gospel. Then everyone chose a goal that they are going to work on this year and wrote it down.  We put the goals in a fancy gift box and placed them under the tree.  The kids all wrote their owns goals so I am excited Christmas morning when they get to read them out loud to the family.  It will be the first gift we open and hopefully it will help everyone remember the reason we are celebrating.  I'm also hoping to save these goals in the stockings when we put all the Christmas decorations away, and next year we can read the goals and reflect whether we truly gave a gift to Jesus the past year.

Airplane Museum

We spent the afternoon at the EAA AirVenture Museum in Oshkosk, WI.  We weren't really sure what to expect, but as soon as we walked in and Ethan started asking the tour guide about the X15, and the St. Louis, we knew it would be a good time.  Shawn and I were both surprised at the historical facts Ethan knew about airplanes.  He kind of has a nack for picking up and remembering random things.  Here he is talking with our tour guide.

The museum was amazing.  We even got to go inside a plane that flew in the D-day invasion.  The kids got to ride in flight simulators, hot air ballon simulators, and hang gliding simulators.  Lots of fun activities and games for the kids and amazing pieces of history, as far as the aircraft is concerned.  We even saw an atomic bomb.

Here is the only picture of me in the reflection.

Diving

I've been meaning to record Ethan diving for a while because he is getting so good at it. I finally remembered tonight during swim team.  At the end of each practice they get 5 minutes of free time.  This is what Ethan does and he LOVES it.
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(don't mind the funny backward diving edit.  The kids thought it was funny so I put it in.)

Art work

Ethan has been working on a poster over the past few days for a contest at school.  He is obsessed with pirates, so it was only right that his poster be centered around pirates.  Here is the finished result.

And, here is another work of art that I found posted to his door last night.

I can't believe we've already entered the NO GIRLS phase.  When Liv saw this note she started to cry so Ethan went back and wrote ONLY LIV :)

Gingerbread Houses

We finished our gingerbread house this evening.

Snow

We finally had our first taste of snow this morning.  It didn't stick around, but it was fun for a few minutes. I'm not sure that I am ready for the cold and below zero temps coming soon.

Each year for Christmas Santa sends the kids a personal video.  I didn't even think to record it until Ethan and Cole already listened to theirs, but here is Liv's reaction to the first few seconds.

We also get to celebrate St. Nick's day with the kids tonight.  They are very excited.  It's a new tradition we started after moving to Milwaukee last year.  There is a lot of German influence here and St. Nicks is a very recognized holiday in Milwaukee.  We put our shoes under the tree and get a surprise in the morning.

Also, we welcomed our elf, Jimmy, to the family last week.  He gets to report to Santa each night what we are up to and if we were naught or nice that day.

Thanksgiving Weekend

We had a nice Thanksgiving Weekend.  The kids were out of school for three days.

The first day we went to Discovery World.

The second day we celebrated Thanksgiving.  My favorite part was the homemade place cards Ethan made.

The third day we went rock climbing as a family.

And then we went and got our annual christmas ornaments, and Shawn always picks out a new christmas Yankee Candle so that our home has that wonderful christmas smell.

2011 Ornament picks:  Shawn-When Ralph drops the "grand daddy of them all" on the Christmas Story, Jenn-smurfett, Ethan-Jack Sparrow (he has a little pirate obsession), Cole-football player (I'm still clueless why he chose this one), and Liv-barbie princess.

We set up the tree and we are officially in the Christmas Spirit.  The kids drew names and spent their hard earned money buying each other gifts.  It was a fun weekend, until we decided to pass around the stomach bug.  We also went to see Arthur's Christmas to help get us in the holiday spirit, ate 1/2 gallon of custard, and went for a drive through candy cane lane (a large group of houses that gets all decked out in lights and decorations for the holidays).

We did have one weird/scary experience this weekend.  On Thanksgiving day, while Shawn and I were in the kitchen cooking and the kids playing games in the family room, we heard the front door open.    Shawn peaked around the corner and saw a man standing in our living room.  He was a total stranger with a laptop in his hands that was open.  As soon as he saw Shawn he took off running.  Shawn's protective daddy instincts kicked in and he chased him down.  After getting him to stop he tried to figure out who he was and why he just walked in our house.  The man just mumbled a few things and ran away.  The weird thing about it is that our front door is a key code.  It is always locked and you have to enter the code to open it.  And it also was a little weird to see someone walking around with their laptops open in their arms.  Nothing ended up happening and we are all safe, but it was a little weird.  After talking to the police and our landlord we agreed that we should change the keypad code.  Other than that, we had a nice relaxing weekend!