Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

We are having a great Christmas break from Mark's school. I am loving all the time we get to spend together! Here are some pictures of things we've been doing.

This is a picture of Cala after she got into my makeup. I thought she was being a little too quiet, but I was so busy making cookies I didn't even give it a second thought. Five minutes later Mark brought Cala to me looking like this...

Gingerbread houses we made with some friends.

Cala and I at the mall on Christmas Eve after a failed attempt to see Santa Claus (who knew that he leaves at 3pm on Christmas Eve!)

Playing games.

Opening presents.

One of Cala's favorite presents...a Sleeping Beauty princess dress.

Mom shoveling snow away from the grill so my brother could grill up some Christmas morning bacon.

What a cute couple!

Cala coloring with Granny.

Cala in her Christmas outfit.

Mark at the rock climbing place.

Mark and Cala playing with her new playdough.

Mark trying his new griddle on New Year's Day.

Our traditional New Year's Day breakfast... Eggs Benedict. They were yum!

O' Christmas Tree

This is the first year in a while that we've had a real Christmas tree. I always swore that I would never buy a fake tree, but then we lived in an apartment where we weren't allowed to have a real one, so fake it was. Anyways, I have been looking forward to this tree for a while, I thought about driving an hour to a cut-your-own tree lot, but then decided that was a bit too ambitious so we got a tree from a place walking distance to our apartment. Perfect, I thought, that way we (Mark) can just carry it home and not have to bother with strapping it on the car. I picked out a tall bushy beautiful tree and Mark hefted it over his shoulder and carried it home. What a stud! Now he says that next year we are driving no matter how close the tree lot is...apparently it was a lot heavier than it looked :)

Then came the joys of decorating the tree with a 2-year-old...what an experience! Surprisingly, no ornaments were broken, although there was glitter everywhere, and the tree ended up looking pretty good.

Thanksgiving

I'm finally posting about Thanksgiving...phew! It was a lot of fun and so nice to get out of town for a bit and be with family. Thanksgiving day started with the traditional Turkey Bowl.

Followed by the inevitable injury...

Thankgiving dinner with the Hipple's.

Celebrating Pap Moustachio's birthday.

Over to the Broady's for more dinner and more birthday celebrations. Cala's birthday was not being celebrated but she got to open all the presents anyways.

Four generations. We've always got to get one of these :)

Picking out the perfect Christmas tree.

Aunt Amanda and my movie star.

Decorating the trees at both grandma's houses!

What fun!

Happy Halloween!

What a fun Halloween! I love that Cala is old enough to understand what is going on and have fun! This is Cala and I at the church Halloween party and Trunk-or-Treat. Some of you might remember that Cala was a butterfly last year too. The costume still fits, so I figured we might as well use it again.

Cala got her face painted with a butterfly to match her costume.

Cala was actually sharing her candy...until Hazel went for the Smarties which are Cala's favorite. So Cala took the Smarties back and gave Hazel the less-interesting Bottle Caps. Apparently, Hazel also has a thing for Smarties though, she was eyeing them up.

Cala and the donut-eating off a string...she obviously doesn't understand that she's not supposed to use her hands :)

Trick-or-treating. She definitely my kid...a candy lover! People would say, "take one" and she would take "one handful", luckily she's cute enough to get away with it.

This was one of my favorite things to do as a kid...categorize, count, and admire my stash. Let's be honest, I still love doing it!

NY in the fall

We've been enjoying the Fall in New York. We've gone apple picking, to a corn maze, and of course we've been admiring the for gorgeous fall foliage (sorry no pictures of that, maybe later).

Cala and her friend checking out the apples.

Check out all these apples! I think it was probably around 25 pounds! Needless to say we didn't run out of apples for a while.

My apple picking friends.

Cala and I at the corn maze in a humongous rocking chair.

Pig races. I only have one word to say about that....hilarious!

Pulling Cala and her friend through the corn maze.

I just had to take a picture of this parking sign! Yeah for veggies!

Making cookies

Cala and I made some Halloween sugar cookies yesterday. Cala had a great time, and I had to remind myself of that especially when she did things like dump 1/2 cup of flour on the floor or shove a golf-ball size piece of cookie dough in her mouth or lick the candy corns before she put them on the cookie. Below are some videos are her cookie-rolling and cookie-decorating skills!

And despite all that they turned out looking great.

Soups' on!

I love soup more and more every year! And this year Mark is joining in my obsession...yeah! We have been having soup for dinner at least 3 times a week lately, so far we've tried Chicken Cilantro Bisque (might sound weird but tastes amazing), Lobster Bisque, Chicken Pot Pie Soup, Zuppa Toscana (those familiar with the Olive Garden will know this soup is yummy!), Tortellini Soup, Finnish Kesakeitto (simple but tasty), Clam Chowder, Italian Wedding Soup, and the latest is Crab and Corn Chowder. Mark was skeptical about this one, but of course it turned out to be delicious. Here's a not so great picture of it.

And here's the recipe for those of you wanting to try it:

1/4 cup butter

1/2 cup chopped onion

3-5 chopped fresh garlic cloves
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
2 cups whole milk
2 cups half-and-half
1 3/4 cups whole kernel corn

1-2 potatoes, cooked and cubed
1 pound fresh crab meat (I used canned crabmeat)
1/2 teaspoon ground white pepper
1/2 teaspoon seasoning salt
1/4 cup chopped parsley

DIRECTIONS
In a heavy-bottomed pot, melt butter. Add onions and garlic, cook for a few minutes. Add flour, and stir gently until blended; do not burn or let it darken. Add milk gradually, stirring all the while, then add half and half, stirring gently while blending. Add corn and cook for a few minutes until tender.
Add potatoes, crabmeat, pepper, and salt, and simmer until very hot and small bubbles form around the edge; do not let boil. Adjust seasonings to taste. Garnish with sprinkles of chopped fresh parsley when serving and serve hot.

*As I was looking at the recipe I kind of followed I noticed that it called for 1 tablespoon of soy sauce that I forgot to add. That might be a nice addition to try if you're going to make this soup.

**The soup is pretty rich made with the whole milk and half and half, so I think next time I will replace the whole milk with 1% milk, and the half and half with evaporated milk.

Enjoy!