Friday

What we did this Friday.. Pizza picnic in the den while watching Rudolph.. a little bit of heaven

Blog closed Friday!

I am closing my blog to private on Friday. If you have not sent me your address please do by Friday so you can continue to view the blog. Last chance! My email is haleymushrush@hotmail.com

Our Veterans Day

Thank you to all the men and women who have bravely served our country in the Armed Forces. Yesterday was Veterans Day in the US and Remembrance Day in the UK. In England, every store gives out poppy pens to wear on Remembrance Day in honor of the fallen soldiers. We had the day off yesterday and enjoyed some quality family time. These are some of the pics I took yesterday.

We have had the most horrific weather this week. Wind gusts that have knocked everything over and lots of rain and freezing temperatures. And it really hasn't let up at all. So, this morning, the howling suddenly stopped for an hour or so and we walked outside to this magnificent site. I can just see our Creator's mighty finger drawing this and saying, My beloved children I remember my promise to you.

Part one of the Christmas tree is done! Tree is up, skirt is on, lights are lit!!

This is the first year Molly has really understood what Christmas is about. She is just soaking it in. We have been talking about what happens at Christmas and last night before bed, she said, Mommy, Santa come to bring presents because Baby Jesus is born. Oh yes, I cried at that one.

Daniel, snooping in the goods

Ohhh, look at that one, give it to me!

Winter has arrived

The title of this post is depressing even to me, a person who adores snow and the cold Christmas season. However, in the UK, it is SOOOO expensive to heat your house. We have electric heaters in the kids rooms and the living room, just trying to hold out before turning on heat. Unfortunately, it has dropped below 32F every day this week so we are going to have to turn the heat on. We got this little car seat cover for Daniel which has worked great on the cold rainy days. I think he looks adorable in it! And thanks to my mom for the thermal underwear and new winter gear.. coats, scarves, gloves, hats.. And before I get comments with warm temperatures being rubbed into my face...I don't even want to know the weather in NC or VA, so sisters, keep it to yourselves :)

Frizz

This is the frizz ball hairdo I see every morning. Many mornings it is muchhh worse than this but this is on an average day. I think I'm going to have a time managing these curls when she gets older. I don't want to use any products on it yet because she's so young so I usually end up putting it in a pony tail or sticking a bow in it which works fine for now. Curly haired people, any tips?

New Food for the day.....The food you see in her bowl is a very popular British breakfast "cereal" called Weetabix. I don't think we have anything like them in the States. They are rectangular individually cut portions of a very densly compacted whole grain cereal. You pour milk over it and it soaks the milk up like a sponge and softens the cereal. Then you just break it off with your spoon and eat it. It has very little flavor so sometimes we put honey on it.

When daddy's gone....

Bryon was gone last week to Germany so the kids and I stayed busy.. here are a couple of things we did to amuse ourselves :)

Made Bryon's birthday cake! It is a Victorian Sponge Cake made the old fashioned way with an old English recipe. Turned out yummy! The British people make a great butter cream filling that they use for lots of deserts and I layered that with my homemade strawberry jam.

Oh yes.. we went to mommy's beauty shop. Did our nails, hair, jewelry, clothes and shoes.. Molly is so much fun now that she is getting older. Kinda like having a mini me to hang out with. What was Daniel doing you may ask.. the answer would be jumping in his jumper like a mad man.. his favorite activity.

Tent

We made a tent this past week that we crawl into for story time. It isn't fancy as you can see but Molly loves it. When we pull the door down it hooks to Daniels jumper and he goes crazy being under it. Hours of fun for all.

This box doorway was Bryon's idea. Makes it a little more exciting to crawl into the tent.