Sunday, December 20, 2009

Christmas Fun!

COOKIES


One of the best things to do at Christmas time is decorate sugar cookies!













Kendra showed us how to put on LOTS of frosting.






Look at all those sprinkles!



















Kendra brought me this cookie. "I made you a cookie, mamma," she says as she hands it to me. "I just ate some of it first."






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GENEROSITY
Kent and I thought it would be good to try to teach Camryn and Kendra about giving at Christmas time. For family home evening, we read a story about one family that helped out another family in need. The kids in the story said that they would be willing to get fewer presents in order to give to this family. After this story, Kent asked Camryn if she would be willing to give one of her presents to another child that would not get a present otherwise. Camryn looked at her wrapped presents and, with fear in her eyes, shook her head no. He didn't give up. He tried to explain that these children would not get any toys and compared that to our girls and all their toys. Camryn still said no. All of the sudden, Kendra bursts out crying. We ask her what's wrong. "I don't want to give away my presents," she sobs.
So this is going to be hard one to teach.
We try a different approach to giving. "Would you be willing to use the money in your piggy bank to buy someone a present, someone that wouldn't get a present otherwise?" Kent asks. The girls enthusiastically agree. In their piggy banks are quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies, about 2 to 3 dollars each. They earn it by doing extra chores to help us out. They happily empty their piggy banks before we head to the store. They both pick out a Barbie (we had to lead them away from all the $35 toys they kept trying to pick). Each paid individually and proudly handed all their money to the cashier (I made up the difference, after they gave all they had).

Here are our girls, proudly showing the toys they bought for someone else that might have otherwise gone without.
We are very proud of them.
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ANNIE

Remember this cute little puppy at 4 weeks old?



Look at her now! Annie is now 13 weeks old. She is getting BIG!!
Puppies are a lot of work. If you think you want one, make sure you know what you're getting yourself into. Cleaning up puppy accidents is not fun, especially when you are pregnant. All puppies like chewing. Besides the kids toys that are left out, she loves chewing on wood. She has chewed many of the girls pencils. She also tries to chew our baseboards. Still, she is a sweet girl and we love her.
Here are a couple in-between pictures.




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We want to wish EVERYONE a

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!