Giving Thanks

What a great holiday weekend. Wednesday I was bemoaning my lack of a nice holiday table cloth and suddenly realized how petty that was given the abundant blessings we do have. We have a roof over our heads and food on the table in times when many families are losing even those basics. Sure, money's tight as ever but the kids are happy, healthy, and smart. Hubby's doing well in school trying to further himself and I still have a great part time job that lets me stay home and raise my own kids.

So, no recipes today. My only advice is: stop and take stock in what you do have, especially when you feel you're wanting for something.

Junior in the turkey hat he made at school

Major bed jumping!

All our Fairbanks family over before Thanksgiving dinner.

The feast!

A toast to family.

Mega train construction. The boys are getting really good at playing together.

Halloween!

I love Halloween. I used to spend months designing and constructing costumes. Not so much any more, things are just too busy with the boys. Junior is finally old enough to have an idea about Trick or Treating, and to enjoy wearing a costume. Kiddo's been wound up for it all month!

Kiddo settled on a Bakugan costume. Bakugan is a trading card game with creatures that fold up into balls. Very cool, actually. We don't get the show here but he recognized the main character right off. For Junior I saw this very cool Wubbzy costume (a Nick Jr. show), but Walmart wanted $35 for it. Since Wubbzy is basically a big yellow square, I hit up the remnants bin at JoAnn's and made the costume for less than $7.

We've had a lovely long fall. The snow finally hit this week, and while it's staying above zero there's been a bitter wind. Now, back in my day we Trick or Treated in all kinds of temperatures (the first time I really remember it was -30F), but I'm a wimp now so we're looking for alternatives. Last year we went to the malls, and it was just insane. We just stood in long lines for candy; it was boring and noisy, and No Fun.

Local schools to the rescue! Junior's school had a Fall Carnival last night. Classes and clubs had activity booths that cost 25 cents (or you bought tickets) to raise money for field trips and such. We had a great time! This afternoon my old high school is also having a Halloween Carnival, so we're going to that one too. I really like getting more than one wearing out of the costumes.

Here's some pictures from last night.

Required poses with Storm Troopers!

Kiddo climbing the "web". He got way up there!

The whole family. This is an awesome picture, and my prize for the evening.

Coming soon: A review of the Swifter Wet Jet Automatic Mop, and a re-blog of my fruitcake-haters fruitcake.

The Ice Park

Every year, starting the last weekend in February, the World Ice Art Championship takes place here. Ice Alaska hosts it, and all by itself it'd be worth a winter trip to Fairbanks. Artists from all over the world use chainsaws, chisels, and who knows what to create jaw-dropping sculpture that, for the most part, is temporary. (We actually have an Ice Museum, too!) At night the sculptures are lit up with color, adding an all new dimension. Do browse through those links!

But for this family the best part is the kids park and slides. There are mazes and these phenomenal slides, and out on the river they build a plethora of really, really long ice slides. There's reports you can slide as far as a mile this year!

I would love to go at night and wander this outdoor art gallery, but this trip was for the kids. We spent almost two hours in the kids park.

Kiddo in a set of crawl tunnels.

This was easily Junior's favorite slide.

The entrance to the maze. Very smartly designed - labyrinthine, but almost impossible to get lost in.

Yep, that slide looks like a bear.

This one's an airplane. Not sure what the boys are looking at!

Junior says, "WAHOOOO!"

Family Pictures

I'm one of those who takes lots of pictures and never does anything with them, so I'm trying very hard to share them!

Hubby got me (among other things) a bag of SpecialDark Kisses for Valentine's Day. I made peanut butter cookies and pressed on into each cookie.

I got brave enough to let the boys finger paint! A while back Michael's had washable tempura for $1 a bottle. The sponge shapes were a WalMart special.

Junior wanted a picture of Sebastian, whom he affectionately calls "Hey Cat!"

Kid-in-the-Box! Junior had the tummy yuk this day, and about 15 minutes later lay down right by the boxes and crashed out.

Some bad phone pics.
Playing at the McDonald's Play Place. Kiddo's the one facing the camera.

Slam Dunk!

Playing at Grandpa's.

King of the Mountian! We build a little snow hill every year.

Busy Busy!

Hubby says "You haven't done a blog in forever!" Yeah, I know. It's been busy! Between summer in Alaska (short and sweet, we maximize every minute) and work at Allakhazam it's been a little nuts around here!

I'm gonna cheat and throw up phone pictures from the Fair today. One thing I've learned: my phone takes lousy pictures. Junior (the child formerly known as Baby) decided that Daddy was Da Man and wouldn't even hold my hand, so I mostly got pictures of Kiddo.

First we went to an animal exhibit.



Junior was so enamored by the ducks we almost didn't get to the petting zoo (where there were more ducks). There were some teeny baby goats!

Kiddo and I were done with the petting zoo but Junior was all about ducks (coulda seen that coming!), so Kiddo had a pony ride.


Then we went for some rides. The first one is Kiddo and I on the baby roller coaster. I hate roller coasters! But it's fun when your 5-year old is laughing his head off next to you! In the second I swear all my fellahs are on that merry-go-round!


We played several of the "guaranteed to win something" games with the kids and got them some prizes. Then it was about time to head home.

Pictures!

Nana has threatened my person if I don't post pictures... so here you are! The low-quality ones are phone pics. These go back to mid-March.

Let them eat cake!

The last couple of months I've been taking Wilton cake decorating courses at JoAnn's. Cake decorating is has been on my "That'd be neat to learn" list for a long time. These classes were short and taught in classic hands-on Alaskan style by a lovely woman named Joyce, who has been decorating cakes for 40 years.

If you get a chance to take one of these classes you should, it's fun! I had an absolute blast and the family has been quite cooperative about eating my homework. Be warned that while the class fees are cheap, you can get sucked in buying materials. Required materials aren't terribly expensive, but if you get into it you want to get lots more (join JoAnn's mailing list for coupons)!

Things I learned: grocery store canned icing is no good for decorating, it's just too soft. You need buttercream icing, also called wedding cake icing. And those candy cake decorations you buy in the cake mix aisle? They're made from royal icing! Royal icing, by the way, can single-handedly kill an electric hand mixer. When I finally get a good-sized kitchen, and big Kitchen-Aid style counter mixer is on my list.

Anyway, I though I'd share my final project. The flowers and butterfly are "candy":

Pictures!

Here's some pictures from Kiddo's birthday and winter fun!

Is anything better than a box?

Judging a book by its cover.

Trucks are fun!

Kiddo's 5th birthday.

Birthday cake!

King of the hill!!

Helping Daddy.