A Penn State Christmas

Alyssa

Kristin

Sarah

DiscipleMakers Christmas party

Goofy

Goofier

Goofiest (LOL.)

Sarah's Vera Bradley present from Alyssa

Kristin's Vera Bradley present from Alyssa

What's that look all about?!?!?!?

Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2!

Soft, fuzzy blanket!

Gift card from Vera Bradley (Do we notice a common theme here?!?!?)

Oops...Missed One!

As we were leaving Chris and Fiona's last evening after Colm's party, Fiona commented that Chris hadn't made sure the poinsettia plant pots on the ledge above the front door were placed correctly so the bows were in front. Chris had already put the ladder away, so what better option than to have Adam hoist him up so he could straighten the plants?!!?!? Two successful attempts made to straighten two plants! (This was after Adam did try to reach up there on his tippy-toes, but he was a bit short!!)

Chris standing on Adam's hands

Happy Birthday to Colm!!

Today we celebrated Colm's 4th birthday, his first one in America. Friends and family gathered for food, fun and birthday cake. I'm guessing it was the first of its kind for Colm!! It didn't take him long to figure out how to rip off the wrapping paper on his presents...and he knew what he was supposed to do with those candles on his cake!

Beginning to open presents

Digital camera from Aunt Donnalee, Uncle Jim and Beth

Kieran strangling Colm while trying to figure out how to work that toddler camera!!

Birthday cake from Wegman's (It was yummy!)

Opening present from Bethanie and Pam (Who, I might add, were out to get Chris and Fiona...look below!!)

A DRUM SET

Colm playing his drum set (which may move to Aunt Bethanie's house soon...LOL!!)

The big boy playing the drums

Yum...that's delish!!

Kieran and Conor....loving brothers

Hey, they're cool!

Playing with his party favor

Not quite the two pounder like he had at Fuddrucker's a few weeks ago!

One bite for Adam

Uhhh....not so sure

TIMBERRRRR!

I was upstairs late this morning trying to organize and locate some Christmas presents and heard a chain saw powering up. I assumed it was the neighbor, but it sounded like it was getting closer and closer. I looked out the window and saw Adam walking towards our dead birch tree in the yard. With a bit of trepidation, I went downstairs to confirm that the Mr. was aware this event was taking place outside. He confirmed that he was 'aware' of the plan, but wasn't on board 100%!! Fortunately it wasn't a huge tree, nor was it going to fall anywhere too close to damage anything important! Other than the chain falling off once, which required repair, it was uneventful. Now the hard work....cleaning it all up! (Adam's not so big on hard work...LOL!!)

Proud!

Adam was only one of twelve kids in his junior class of about 450 students to make the distinguished honor roll the first marking period. That means he had straight A's. Northampton changed their grading system this year. It used to be that 92-100 was an A, now it's 90-100....BUT....if you took an honors class, you would add an extra 4 points to your grade and if you took an AP college course, you would add an extra 8 points to your grade (because these classes are much tougher). The way they changed the grading system now, those extra points don't get added, so what you see is what you get. He has AP chemistry, economics and calculus and honors physics and spanish this year.

It's a Keeper!

Roasted Veggie Pasta

We had this wonderful pasta dish this evening for supper. It was delicious! Adam had two big helpings of it. It doesn't have any meat in it; I wasn't sure how Kurt and Adam would react to a meatless meal. I picked up two ham steaks at Wegman's earlier today in case they really wanted some sort of meat with it, but I showed Kurt the casserole and he said he was fine just eating the pasta. I served it with a tossed salad and bread from Wegman's.

Cut up veggies

Ingredients

Veggies on pans about ready to go into oven for roasting

Everything mixed together and ready for final baking

4 small zucchini, halved lengthwise and cut into 1-inch slices
2 large onions, cut into wedges
2 medium yellow summer squash, halved lengthwise and cut into 1-inch slices
2 large sweet yellow peppers, cut into 1-inch pieces
1 cup fresh baby carrots, halved lengthwise
2 tablespoons Crisco® Extra Virgin Olive Oil
3-1/2 cups uncooked fusilli pasta
2 cups (8 ounces) shredded fontina cheese
1-1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
1/2 cup canned diced tomatoes in sauce
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese, divided
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
Directions:
In a large bowl, combine the first six ingredients. Transfer to two greased 15-in. x 10-in. x 1-in. baking pans. Bake at 450° for 20-25 minutes or until crisp-tender; set aside. Reduce heat to 350°.
Cook pasta according to package directions; drain. Add the fontina cheese, cream, tomatoes, 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, garlic, salt and pepper. Stir in vegetable mixture.
Transfer to a greased 13-in. x 9-in. baking dish (dish will be full). Sprinkle with remaining Parmesan cheese. Bake, uncovered, for 25-30 minutes or until bubbly. Yield: 16 servings (3/4 cup each).

I found this banana sour cream cake recipe in the Kraft Food and Family magazine. It was really easy to make and tastes good besides!!

The recipe calls for cutting the cake in half and making it a double layer cake, I opted to just leave it in the pan and put the icing on the whole cake.

Moose on the Loose

Adeste Fideles

Our bell choir was asked to perform at a Lutheran Church in Bethlehem today for their Christmas celebration. We played quite a few songs....O Come All Ye Faithful, Away in a Manger, Silent Night, Infant Holy Infant Lowly, O Little Town of Bethlehem, I Was There To Hear Your Borning Cry, Our God is an Awesome God, As the Deer and finally, Beautiful Savior. As is our custom, we practice prior to any performances we have. And as is our custom, we do terribly at that practice...LOL!! Today was no different! The fortunate thing, however, is that when we do sooo bad at the practice beforehand, we somehow manage to pull it out for the performance and do a stellar job!! We were all a nervous wreck today after we were done practicing with how poorly we did....but you would have never known it when we did the real thing! We actually sounded OK good!!

Alyssa used to be my buddy on my left side when she was on the choir before she so rudely left to go to college; you'll see who my buddy is now on my left side!!! I'm gonna miss her in a few months when she takes a BRIEF sabbatical (got that, Jamie?!?!! brief.....).

I had hoped to have someone take a video or two of our music using my camera, but I didn't want to push it with the gentleman taking the pics for me; it was enough that he needed to figure out how to use the camera for pics, let alone learn how to use it as a video recorder!

What To Do?

What to do on a Saturday night when it's cold and snowing outside,

the kids are watching a movie, Kurt is snoozing in the living room and the Christmas tree is glowing in the corner of the living room??

Make Buckeye Bars!!

Gather all ingredients and follow the directions

Put into pan as directed

Put outside in frigid air to cool

Cut into bars

And enjoy!

(JSYK, they are too peanut buttery for me...LOL!!)

Sad

 

Neat

I served as chaperone this evening for several of our youth from church who were doing gift wrapping at Barnes and Noble to raise money towards their trip next summer to the national youth gathering. The gathering is in New Orleans, LA. As we were leaving, I looked up and saw this: