Accidental Nutella

Last night I was set to make a really nice no bake cookie I found here, and I accidentally made a delicious nutella like spread. 

No one minded to mistake! 

Here's how I botched the recipe:

- use a blender instead of a food processor
-added too much water
-tried to make up for the water by adding extra dates

-gave up and spread concoction onto a graham cracker and called it a night!

I'd show a picture but I'm sure you can guess what this chunky, brown, thick mixture might look like in a photo!

The actual no bake fudgey snowball cookies are excellent too.  I'd suggest making a proper batch next time you have someone coming over for tea!

And here's a picture of my baby.  How does this relate to the recipe?  She'll be eating the chocolate nut spread in just a few moments!

For those interested this is the Plan Dollhouse we bought Corrina for Christmas.  She has alot of fun everyday with this house and all the special people in it!

Another random picture to show the new, way more functional home of our wonderful and free piano, in the dinning room.  Now to learn how to play it :)

Birthday Bash

How to have a fantastic 5th Birthday:
1. Start with a rainbow cake




2. Add a Birthday Tree (to put the presents under of course)


3. Invite a crazy scientist aka Dad!  Forgot to buy smocks for all children, but buy a ton of prizes!






4. Make explosions, gak, and goo, all with lots of colors that inevitably end up on your guests tee shirts.

5. Finish with delicious rainbow cake, homemade pinata and fun presents!

Even with the massive amounts of preparation, and the energy needed it pull it off, I'd do it again.  But only once a year!
Just for fun here is Corrina through the years:

6. Go shopping post party to replace all guests t-shirts

Merry smiles

It would be so nice if we had one picture that featured everyone smiling, but Corrina's the only one trained right now.  But we all like variety, or at least i do, so here's a bunch of pictures with different grins!

So christmas was great!  Lots of time spent with different friends, and so many treats and games.  But its nice to be back to the everyday life too.

Sisters

I have been trying to upload a video for about 4 days and it's not working at all, so here is a link to see a little movie of Corrina entertaining Annika.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q76McYO3H_o

As Christmas draws near we are busy keeping ourselves busy with smiles and giggles.

I made a delicious bread today for Christmas morning.  Right now Corrina is "a cook at a school making orange soup" while Annika sleeps beside her snug in a car seat, ie. the downstairs bed!

For Christmas Eve we will be snacking on some simple appetizers and treats while reading and learning from the story of Christ's birth, amid the glowing lights on the tree.


Wishing everyone a warm, safe, healthy, meaningful Christmas.

We are actually ALIVE!

No smiles here, but this is pretty much what Annika looks like most of the time!

Corrina is "helping" Annika to smile.

We've been doing family activities to engage in waiting for Christ's birth, or Advent.  We started with thinking about the Angels in the story.  We make glitter angels, and painted angel cookies.  Painting cookies rocks!

We are alive, and slowly becoming well again.  This fall/winter season has been riddles with colds, infections, aches and pains.  I'd like to think we are just getting it all out of the way for the year to come.

Life has been busy, and Annika fits right in perfectly.  She is smiley and social, eats amazingly and sleeps great for her age.  She is easy to entertain, cuddly and patient.  You can imagine why I might say patient as you've had a sample picture above of the little "helper". 

I'm not on top of anything at home!  Maybe that's the way it should be.  I am enjoying each day though.  Its nice to focus on caring for my home and family right now.  We've been crafting, baking, building, and as of late Corrina has asked that we teach her to read! 

I've been brainstorming some newish hobbies to focus on in the coming year, as I need to get myself out of the kitchen away from the butter and sugar that's created so many delicious Christmas cookies if I'm ever to be a healthy individual who lives past 30!  Seriously, I've been going a little nuts... After Christmas I'm only baking muffins and biscotti! I'm going to become a master at those two!

Anyway, I think I will take up sewing again.  There are some moments when Corrina is at school or playing happily, the chores are done and the baby is sleeping and I NEED something stimulating to do.
I'm also going to increase my crafting with Corrina.

Anyway, I have nothing important to say, so go look at those cute gals again!

Into October with Family and Pumpkin Butter

We just had a great visit with my mom.  We've been spoiled this fall, with a fantastic visit with Dave's family.  We accomplished so many projects when they came, spent really fun times together watching favorite shows and doing some Winnipeg activities.  We had delicious meals, and lots of laughs while waiting for the baby.  We would not have made it through September without them!

Just after they left we all came down with pretty horrible colds.  Dave and I didn't know how we were going to make it through the nights with a newborn, let alone the next day.  Thankfully we healed, as we knew we would, but in the moment it's rotten to wait for the healing to begin.  Many people from church brought us homemade meals during this time which kept us going and coping!  We are thankful!

And than my mom arrived and cleaned my home top to bottom, caught us up on nutritious meals again, did every bit of laundry, held and rocked Annika every chance to she had.  She brought a nice replenishing zen feeling to our home with a hint of ginger as she constantly brewed rich chai tea to keep her energy up!  During my mom's visit we had phenomenal weather and were out and about in summer clothes most days.  I like having a baby in fall alot more than in bitterly cold January!

Through it all Corrina has been doing well as a sister.  She continues to love helping and holding Annika.  I'm not worried about Annika being dropped when in Corrina's arms, I'm more concerned about her being squished!   

All in all we are doing well.

And just for fun, here is an amazing recipe I found for Pumpkin Butter.

I've been using mine to make Pumpking Lattes, pancakes, and just mixed with our Homemade Granola (I'll post that recipe soon too)!