A Holiday Party

This afternoon I made this Peanut Butter Chocolate Trifle to take to our Pokeno group Christmas party. It was one of those recipes that used every dish in the kitchen! I'm a messy cook anyway, so our kitchen was a wreck by the time I got this ready to refrigerate! If you don't mind multi-step desserts, click HERE for a link to the recipe.

The couples' party was hosted by the Sniders, and it was a great evening! Thank you, Scott & Mary, for having us--everything was wonderful! Mary made a wide variety of appetizers--all delicious! We asked Rhett to take our picture in front of the tree before the party:
Mary's table full of delicious food:

Their Christmas tree in the entry way looked like it belonged in a magazine--it was so pretty!
This is (most of) the Pokeno Group. We missed you girls who weren't there for the photo!
Back row: Mindy, Wendy, Jamie & Cameron; Front row: Leigh Ann, Tracie, Mary & Ali.
I'm really thankful for this group of girls--I enjoy spending time with all of them!

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This picture was made yesterday to mark 23 weeks. I think I grew a LOT last week--yikes! My next doctor's visit includes the glucose test, which I'm afraid I'll fail because I think sugar has been the main ingredient in my diet lately. What happens if you fail the test?

Poodle Bow Holder

My college roommate, Nicole, recently asked me to do a bow holder for her niece for Christmas. She e-mailed me this picture of her bedding for guidance in doing the painting. I think this bedding is soooo cute! I loved the poodle, so I used that, along with the little girl's initials.

Thanks, Nicole, it was so fun to do this one! Hope she enjoys it!

Santa Party

After the tree farm trip on Saturday, we went to Rhett's friend Kennedy's annual Santa Party at the Athletic Club. The kids played in the maze, ball pit, jump house, played on the ball court...then had a chance to meet Santa! Our kids, however, did not take advantage of that last part. Alexee's too young to really "get" Santa, and Rhett (Mr. Practical) said that he didn't know what all he wanted so he didn't want to just tell him a few things because Santa would think that was all he wanted. He said he'd just write him a letter and drop it in the mail. So R & A went on playing.

(Most of) the kids running toward Santa:
These next few pictures should make Aunt Kala proud. She played college basketball, and hopes to watch her own kids and her niece and nephews play, too. I e-mailed these to my sister and she replied, "That's my girl!! She'll make a heck of a point guard or a shooting guard and she will be plenty tough after wrestling with two brothers!"
Rhett sliding down out of the jump house:
They both loved the cake and ice cream and candy canes! Alexee was the very last child to leave the table--she ate every bite of hers! Thank you, Kennedy, for inviting us to be part of your fun, annual holiday tradition!P.S. Another fun thing about the party was that I met a girl that reads our blog! She said, "I don't know you, but I read your blog!" We actually go to the same church, too. She said she'd just started blogging recently...so Karen (I hope I'm remembering your name correctly!?), if you're reading this, please leave a comment so I can click over to see your family! Thank you for introducing yourself--it was fun to meet you! :)

Trip to the tree farm

This was our first year to actually go and cut down a Christmas tree as a family, and the kids thought it was really neat. The tree farm that we went to had free hot chocolate and candy canes and a few animals for the kids to look at (pigs, chickens, goats and sheep--I think this was Alexee's favorite part). It was cold of course, but that made it seem more like the holidays, so that was fine. We were all bundled up.

In the distance you can see Lane and Rhett searching for the perfect one:
After we found just the right tree, we took pictures beside it before Lane cut it down. There was no one close by to take a picture of all four of us, so we had to take turns.

I love this one of the kids watching Lane saw.
The man coming by with the trailer invited Rhett to climb up and drive with him, and R didn't hesitate.
Lane loaded the tree on the trailer and we hopped on for a ride back to the main building.


Rhett shook the driver's hand and told him, "Thank you and Merry Christmas"--it was so sweet!

R enjoying his "warm chocolate".
Alexee giving one of the animals a kiss. She loved looking at all of them and would have climbed into their pens if she could have.
Here she's waving "bye!" to all the animals. I thought she'd cry when we had to leave, but instead she yelled, "bye pigs, bye chickens, by sheep...". She also says "miss you" now after telling someone (or something) bye.
It has been a really fun day. From here, we quickly dropped the tree off in our garage then went straight to a friend's Santa party (pictures soon). Then Rhett & I decorated the tree while Lane studied and Alexee took her nap. Rhett was really good help with the decorating--he did a good job! We sorted the ornaments by breakable and non-breakable...non-breakable ones went on the lower portion of the tree for Alexee's sake. I'll post pictures of the tree soon, too.

Hope you've had a fun Saturday!

Thank goodness for digital cameras

This morning was our attempt at a Christmas card photo session. The kids never both cooperate--it's always a fight with one or the other. Today, Rhett was an angel and super helpful. He tried very hard to stand, smile and pose as instructed. Alexee, however, was not in the mood. She was way more interested in the pretty swans at this beautiful location. Thank goodness for digital...107 photos taken and I think I got two to choose from for our cards! I'll admit it was very cold (they had on several layers underneath their Christmas attire). Rhett told me when we got in the car, "See, when I cooperate, everyone is happier." Wonder where he's heard that!?

Happy Holidays!

The Paula Deen Mystery

Yesterday I unexpectedly received a Paula Deen magazine in the mail, and I was so excited! I enjoy looking at her magazine at my friend Ali's house, and I looked through Heather's when we went on our river house trip back in early November. I even asked her to send copies of a few recipes. So, I was trying to figure out the source of the surprise, and I thought Heather might know. I sent her a text to ask, and yes! she is the mystery sender. She subscribed to it for me as a Christmas gift. Thanks so much, H! I know I will enjoy it (and you won't have to mail me any more copies of recipes!) :)

18 AA Batteries Later

How cute are these toes!?! Alexee loves to look through my nail polish and really wanted her toes painted before school this morning. I already had her dressed--socks and shoes too--but she took them off and stuck her sweet little feet out for me to do! So I did. :) She was so proud of them.Well, it took EIGHTEEN AA batteries, but we got all the Hallmark Christmas characters and the bear that reads "Twas the Night Before Christmas" going for the season! Alexee thinks they are the greatest!


My usual meal day was changed to Wednesday for this week. I'm making a new lasagna recipe that I got from my friend Cameron in Pokeno group. It was yummy at her house--hope mine turns out okay! Here's the recipe if you'd like to try it:

LAZY LASAGNA

1 1/2 lb ground beef
1 jar spaghetti sauce
1 lb cottage cheese
8 oz sour cream
8 uncooked lasagna noodles
3 6oz. pkgs. sliced mozzerella cheese (12 slices)
1/2 cup parmasean cheese
1 cup water (I usually use a little less)

After browning and draining meat, add spaghetti sauce. Combine cottage cheese and sour cream in seperate bowl. Mix well. In a 9 x 13" pan, spoon 1 cup meat sauce in bottom. Place 1/2 of the uncooked noodles over sauce, then 1/2 cottage cheese mixture, 4 slices mozzerella, 1/2 of remaining meat sauce, and 1/4 cup parmasean. Repeat layers starting with noodles and continue the order. Top with remaining mozzerella. Pour water around the sides of the pan. Cover tightly with foil. Bake @ 350 for 1 hour. Uncover and bake 20 minutes (or until bubbly). Let stand about 15-20 min. (The standing is important in making it cut well.)

I'm also making Buttermilk Pie. Don't let the word buttermilk turn you away--it's delicious (I don't like the taste of buttermilk at all). It tastes sort of like Vanilla Chess Pie. I think my Mom originally got this recipe from Mrs. Judy a long time ago? Our whole family loves it.

Here's the recipe for it, along with the pie crust recipe of my Mom's that I use. (I cannot seem to make a pretty crust. It makes me so mad. Mom and Grandmother can both make crusts that look like they're from the cover of Southern Living, but mine are always too small or torn or something--I had both problems today! Plus, I somehow manage to get flour everywhere--even if I'm trying to be neat.)

SINGLE CRUST

1 1/3 cup sifted flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup Crisco
3 T water

Combine flour and salt in mixing bowl. Cut in Crisco with pastry blender until mixture is uniform (fairly course). Sprinkle with water, a Tablespoon at a time. Toss lightly with fork, work dough into a ball. Roll out.

BUTTERMILK PIE

1/2 c. butter, softened
2 c. sugar
3 T flour, rounded
3 eggs, beaten
1 c. buttermilk
1 tsp. vanilla
dash of nutmeg

Cream butter & sugar. Beat in flour & eggs. Stir in buttermilk, vanilla and nutmeg. Pour into pie shell and bake 45-50 minutes at 380 degrees (until middle is firm). If it starts to get too brown before the middle is done, gently put a piece of foil over it to help keep it from burning.


I can smell it baking right now--it might not look pretty, but hopefully it will taste good!

Maybe we need a new toy here...

...Does it mean your kids are bored if they find the phone book entertaining??? Rhett asked yesterday if he could borrow the phone book to look up the number for 9-1-1. :) So I got it out and showed it to him in the front cover so he'd know where to look if he ever forgot what to dial. Then I looked up our number and showed it to him and underlined it. I also looked up a friend's number and underlined it. After about the 15th time to look those up, I decided I should teach him about "alphabetical order" and how he could look for the C's and G's himself. I put a star at the top of the specific pages for those two numbers, and this kept him entertained for quite a while. Alexee found excitement in the phone book this morning as well when they stumbled upon the "veterinarian" section of the yellow pages. She squealed with glee when she saw the pictures of dogs--her favorite!I love it when the UPS truck leaves something for us! Today I had a package from my friend Mary Katherine. Here is the note that was inside:
With the note came this cute sleeper and super soft football lovey:
MK told me to let her know what Lane's response was when he got home. Lane said to tell her thanks for thinking of us, but to ask her if that store had any Oklahoma outfits because we'd prefer a "championship" team to just a "winning" team! :) I haven't heard back from her...that might be the last gift she sends us!? Thank you, MK, he will wear it with pride!

This afternoon Rhett and I made spiced tea mix for his and Alexee's teacher gifts. My plan is to package it in clear bags tied with Christmas ribbon, put it down inside the cute mugs I bought and attach a recipe card with the tea recipe. It looks cute in my head, but I'm not sure how they'll turn out in "real life"--we'll see. Here's the recipe we used below. (Do you have a variation that you use? The lady at the Crown Shop was trying to remember something she'd heard once that maybe involved peach Jell-O mix...but she couldn't remember for sure, and I couldn't find it on the internet.)

Spiced Tea

8 oz. Tang
1 cup instant tea
1 pkg. pre-sweetened Kool-aid Lemonade
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. cloves

Add to boiling water.
Then we heated up the hot glue gun and attached ribbon to all the clay ornaments that we made on Sunday so that R could hang them on their playroom Christmas tree. We're having lots of fun with holiday activities around here!

By the chimney with care

It was so fun to hang our stockings today...even though the baby's doesn't have a name embroidered on it yet (still not 100% sure on the name), it made my heart happy to see them all hanging there together. We ordered three stockings back in 2003 when we were expecting Rhett: a Santa for him, an angel for a little girl that we hoped to have one day, and a teddy bear for a third boy or girl. I'm so thankful for our (growing) family! Rhett has made a few suggestions for what the baby might need for Christmas: baby food and new pajamas. :)

Sunday decorating, etc.

Here's a cute girl in Christmas attire, ready for church yesterday. She was still kind-of upset and pouting because I wouldn't let her use my make-up right before time to leave, so she's not really smiling much in these pictures:

The girls are going to be outnumbered in the Garner household! Helping with lunch:to document 22 weeks:While Alexee was napping, Rhett wanted to do some Christmas decorating. We unpacked the nativity scene and he placed all the people and animals just right. Then we made some more clay ornaments like last year. (Recipe here, if you're interested--they're easy and smell great!)

Then we were watching an episode of Scooby-Doo when we got an exciting call! My friend, Darcy, was in labor and on her way to the hospital! I've been "on-call" because their families both live a few hours away, so I'd planned to help with their girls if needed. I hopped in the car and met them at the hospital (this is her third, so she thought he would probably arrive quickly). I brought the girls back to the house with me and they played with Rhett and Alexee and then went to sleep here until their Dad and Grandpa came to get them after their baby brother was born! I got to go by the hospital this morning to see the sweet baby--it's hard to believe we'll be going through that again in a few short months! Rhett was showing Hudson-Lee some "magic trics" in this picture...but she didn't seem too impressed. :) She wanted me to tell her a story about when I was a little girl when I put them to bed last night. It was weird to tell her a story about how her mom and I met and became friends on our first day of Kindergarten...now here she is at my house while her Mom is in the delivery room. How could that many years have gone by? After her bath, she let me French braid her hair which was so fun--I can't wait for Alexee's hair to get long enough to braid!