Peyton's construction birthday

Peyton has been wanting a bulldozer party ever since his last birthday. He is quite obsessed with anything "construction". I had wanted to have his party out at the property so we could grill out and let the kids play in the dirt but decided that with several little ones a park would be better, but contending with the weather in December is tricky! The weather was really cold so we ended up having the here at the house. I racked my brain trying to come up with activities for the kids to do. After talking with mom, we came up with doing sensory bins in the garage. I turned on a couple space heaters to let the garage warm up a bit.

I filled bins with deer corn and drew roads with chalk on the garage floor. The kids LOVED playing in the corn and racing the trucks on the roads around the orange comes.
After playing in the garage for a while we moved into the kitchen where the kids constructed towers, and structures from grapes, toothpicks, and Cheerios!

These pictures are from the day before. We did a trial run to see how the activity would go. 

These are the actual day. Aren’t they cute in their little hats!

The kids had a lot of fun building towers. The older kids especially did well with the activity! We did pizza and cake after the activities.

I decided to try and make Peyton’s cake this year! I had never made a multi-level cake before so I was nervous how it would turn out. But I had SOOO much fun doing it! I think it turned out pretty cute! I looked EVERYWHERE for a #3 instead of a P, but with no luck I used a P.

I used a box cake mix, but made the icing. The rocks on it are chocolate candy rocks. They tasted like M&M’s.

 

Happy Birthday little buddy! You are one of a kind and we love you more than you will ever know.

Sledding

Last Thursday we got a layer of sleet followed with 7" of snow! It usually doesn't snow in December so it was fun to have snow this early in the season. We have a great place to sled by our house, so we have been going everyday for a little while. Temps have been hovering in the teens and single digits so we have only been able to stay out for short burst of time.

















Peyton's first time to sled. He is riding with our neighbor Blake. Poor guy has his sister's pink gloves on. His waterproof ones are too small.





Faith and Taylor taking a spin.











We have such a fun street! I love these kiddos!











After sledding we made snow ice cream!





Day two of sledding! Today it was FREEZING!!!! I think the wind chill was around 5!





I believe that I have a snow baby. She can't get enough of the snow and sledding!





Ian and Lee held down the fort while we were out by indulging in some good ole' egg nog. Ian LOVES it! He squeals when Lee gets it out!

















CHEERS!
MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!!

Baked ornaments

Today we had a snow day so were inside all day. I had been wanting to try and make some baked ornaments so I gave it a whirl. Here's the recipe for salt dough ornaments:

• 2 cups flour
• 1 cup salt
• 3/4 cup water (more or less)

Mix/kneed dough and roll out 3/4" thick. Cut desired shapes, poke a hole in each shape at the top to allow for a hanger or ribbon. I used a straw and it worked perfectly!
Bake for 20 minutes. I flipped them after 10 mins.
Cool and decorate.
My kids painted them and decorated with glitter glue and glitter. I put a coat of modge podge on them to seal the glitter in.
They turned out cute!


















We had plenty or ornaments so our neighbors came over to decorate with us. The kids had a great time painting and adding LOTS of glitz to their creations!!!