Scrapbook Challenges

I haven't had time to scrapbook for a while but finally found the time during Christmas break and have been loving it! I did my friend, Jena's, scrapbooking challenges this month and have to post them on my blog. So here they are!

Cherish ChallengeAll the hearts are on 3-D foam circles

Reflections Challenge

Click on the pictures to make them bigger and you can see them much better.

Christmas

I hope you all had a great Christmas! Here are a couple pictures from our holiday.

Christmas morning with her stocking

We opened a few gifts at our own house in the morning I surprised Ryan this year! He always figures out his gifts and I can never surprise him. I was so excited this year that he had no idea!! :) We then went to my parents house for breakfast, more gifts, dinner, and to hang out as a family. We actually ended up taking Celeste's stocking over there. So here she is opening her stocking.

Opening more gifts

She enjoyed the handle on the car seat!

The only things I bought Celeste for Christmas was a new car seat, 2 toys, and her stocking stuffers. I think my little sister and my mom had way too much fun at the Park City, UT outlet mall! But thanks a ton, gals, she was in much need of clothes and they are all darling! And a big thanks to all of Ryan's family for the gifts. We had a great Christmas.

Her Loot (a ton, I know!)

Family Pet

This is my familys pet. It is a jackalope. Only in Wyoming will you find jackalopes. It was actually my Grandpas and we inherited it when he passed away. It has created an ongoing joke in my family when my dad and little brother put in on the wall in our living room. My mother insists that it does not go in her living room and it goes back and forth for a few days. On my parents wall she also has all of us children's senior pictures or most recent school picture and under those pictures are our wedding or the grandchildrens pictures. This jackalope has even ended up taking the place of some of those pictures. However, I think my mom got tired of the fights (they are all in fun) so this jackalope is on the wall in my parents living room and the first thing you see when you walk in the front door! (We're a pretty laid back family!) Well, on Christmas Day, my dad decided it was time to introduce Celeste to our pet jackalope.

Getting a good look

Using all senses to examine it (disgusting, I know!)

I think she likes it!

My Favorite Things

These are a few of my (Celeste's) favorite things...

Chair Legs...She tries to pull herself up

(I stuck her binky in to keep her from chewing on the wood)

Celery Sticks...She loves chewing on them!

Bottles...I don't know why?

Smiling and Looking Cute!

Christmas Candy Canes - for Jen W.

This post is mostly for my friend, Jen W. I think I told you I'd take pictures step by step when I made these candy canes again. I didn't get pictures of every step, but here are pictures of me making them.

For everyone else, it is tradition in my family to make these yummy braided bread candy canes and take them to people around Christmas time. This is what I've been doing all day long!

Jen: You make the dough, let it raise, and then roll it out so it looks like this. Then cut your slits, you can kind of see it in them. Then put your cherry pie filling down the center. (I was running out of cherries on that second candy cane!) You can get about 3-4 candy canes per batch. (I made a double batch, so I made a total of 7 today)

Then start braiding! I always start at the bottom and kind of pull the dough up. Does that make sense?
Shape them like a candy cane when you place them on your baking sheet. Cook them and then glaze them. Here they are finished!
My family always puts them in pop flats that has wrapping paper in the bottom with a piece of wax paper over the wrapping paper.

Enjoy!

I'm Thankful for Heat

Heat is something I've always taken for granted. In the last two weeks or so, our furnace has gone out about 5 different times. Ryan figured out if you turn the fan off, then back on, the heat will start up again. My co-workers husband is the repair man for them and we've been talking to him all along. He told us it could be the filter, so we changed that. It worked for a few days. Then on Monday, it went out again. After resetting it four times, we finally got it to stay on. The repairman had to look at it when it was broken, and of course it never broke during the day, only at 5:00 pm or in the middle of the night. Anyway, it really shut down last night at about 5:30. (of course this is all happening on the week when we've had a high temperature of 10 degrees) We reset the thermostat every five minutes until we went to bed without heat. We stuck Celeste in our room and had a space heater going to keep us warm. The rest of the house was chilly this morning! Finally the repairman was able to come over, figure out what was wrong, and of course the part wasn't in! So our furnace will be fixed tomorrow morning. That leaves us without heat for about 40 hours. I'm anxious for our heat to be back on and to get rid of the space heaters. I'm very thankful for heat!

Family Pictures and Christmas Letters

Who takes family pictures outside in the freezing cold when it's snowing? We do! At least we did today. I set up a tripod and my mother came along to take the pictures and help get Celeste to smile. Thanks so much mom for coming with us! We couldn't have done it without you. These pictures are also showing my new hair cut I got this week.

This is the first picture we took. It was starting to snow a little. If you click on the pictures to make them bigger, you can really see the snow.

Less than 10 minutes later, it was really coming down. This isn't a good picture, I just wanted to show you the snow coming down. It's actually kind of cool.

A little while later, the snow let up just long enough to get some good ones with some evergreen trees in the background and the river. I'm not going to post those, though, because they are going in with our Christmas cards.

About Christmas Cards: I NEED YOUR ADDRESS! Please e-mail me your address at melissamikesell@hotmail.com so I can send you a Christmas card. If you sent it to me for our baby announcements, I do still have it. However, if you've moved, please send me your new address. If you're not sure if I have it, send it to me again so I can make sure to get you on our "mailing list." I want you all on the list! And I'd LOVE Christmas cards from all of you, if you do them, so feel free to ask me for my address if you need it.