A fun trip to the Wisconsin Dells

Last week our family went on a little vacation. We went with my sister Anna and her family to the Wisconsin Dells. We were able to have a place to stay and go to the indoor water parks free courtesy of my brother-in-law's parent's time share. We had a beautiful place to stay and all of it was a very nice blessing.

When traveling to go there we went to the Twin Cities first and had a very fun evening staying with Kent and Christy and their kids. It was a lot of fun to see their newest, Kade Aaron. We also attended church with them and Anna and Travis on Sunday morning. After Church and lunch we headed on to the Dells. When we first arrived we went to the (dry!) play area. It was pretty neat and a lot of fun. Above is Megan in a snake!!

Aaron, resting.

This was a view from a covered walking bridge that we went over to get the water park.

Margaret and Mara in the walkway. (Ready to go swimming.)

Beatrice and Aaron having fun in the kid's play area.

The suite our families stayed in had 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a kitchen, dining and living area and in the living room was a hide-a-bed where these 3 slept. There was also a laundry area which came in handy.

Here are the silly boys: Harrison and Jonathan.

When we went to the Water park the very first time, before I had even touched the water my nephew Gregory fell and got a deep cut. Off to the emergency room went he and his parents to get stitches. (While Ken and I valiantly tried to keep track of 7 kids!) Poor Gregory was not able to be in water any more that week. One afternoon I watched him, Megan and Beatrice while the rest went to the water. Near our suite was an arcade room. We didn't have any tokens but they thought it would be fun to look around. I had a blast watching Megan and Gregory as it didn't seem like they even knew that we weren't using tokens. They had fun playing on them anyway.

The biggest water ride available was the "Hurricane". It was pretty fun and rather intense but I only rode it twice and then payed for it later with my neck being very stiff and sore. The rest of them that rode didn't seem to notice any ill effects however and they rode it over and over again.

In the above picture Anna and the older girls had just come shooting out of the end.

In the master bathroom in the sweet was a whirl pool and they also provided bubble bath. The girls had a lot of fun with that!

We traveled home on Tuesday on snowy roads and in snowy conditions. It took longer than expected and we were very glad to be home but when we got home found our driveway covered in a foot of snow. Ken was very thankful for our snow blower that night when at 11pm he was able to drive in after only 15 minutes work.

Well that is part of our December. What has been going on for you?

Welcome to the last week of "A Homemade Christmas"! If you still are looking for ideas and haven't seen the other 7 weeks of a homemade Christmas you can find that here.

This first picture is one that my friend Venessa e-mailed to me. It is off a neat Country Christmas Garland she made using spools, fabric and it looks like red wooden beads. I can just imagine how cute it would look in lots of different places. Thanks so much Venessa for sending me the picture! I think I will have to work on saving spools this next year.

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One of the gifts that Mara and Jonathan helped me to make this past week was Playdough for the younger two. (Megan is really loving playdough but happens to be a little hard on it so it has a tendency to go bad quickly. I think she will be very excited with this gift.)

Jonathan put stickers and labels on old (and clean) peanut butter jars for storing the playdough in.

The recipe is:

• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 cup salt
• 1 tsp. cream of tarter
• 1 tsp. oil (optional)
• food coloring
• And we had fun adding some mint extract to make it smell good.
• 1 cup hot water.

Mix dry ingredients in a pan. Add wet ingredients (though if you want more than one color of dough wait to add the food coloring until you are kneading it.) and cook and stir the dough until it leaves the sides of the pan and becomes a big ball. Stop cooking and knead it (be careful! It will be hot) until it is nice and smooth and the coloring is all worked in. That's it! Store in a sealed container.

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Another fun gift (and actually one I want to make today, these pictures are from when me sister Anna made it last year) is "Sugar and Spice Nuts". Or you don't have to give them away, they can just make a very nice treat.

Sugar and Spice Nuts

Mix:
2 tablespoons water
1 egg
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1/4 teaspoon pumpkin pie seasoning

Then add:
2 cups nuts of your choice.
(I am planning on trying mixed nuts. My sister used just pecans which was very yummy.)

Spread on ungreased cookie sheet and bake at 250 degrees for 1 hour, stirring every 15 minutes. Store in airtight container.

Do you have anything you would like to share? I would love to hear what you are doing!

10 Happy Years!

This week Ken and I celebrated our 10th anniversary. 10 years finally seems like we are getting somewhere :-). I don't think we are newlyweds any more. Thinking on our marriage makes me so thankful that God designed it so Adam would have "a helper suitable for him". And He didn't stop with just Adam and Eve but He planned it so that throughout the years one man and one woman could join together to make something much stronger than they would have been on their own.

I know I am thankful for Ken for how He completes me in so many, many ways and I think he feels the same way. We enjoy a pretty traditional home life where we each have our different strengths but they work together so that life goes quite smoothly and happily. I am thankful that God lets each couple work things out in a way that best suits their personalities and preferences as long as they follow the guidelines that the husband is to be the leader in the home, loving his wife like Christ loves the church and that the wife is to submit to and respect her husband.

I thought I would list a few of the ways that Ken and I complement each other as I think it displays how wise God was in planning marriage the way he did. Also just because we do things the way we do doesn't mean it is the "Right way", it is just the right way for us- not necessarily anybody else. I know of families where the husband does the majority of the cooking, it always surprises me to hear of it as that is certainly not the way it is in our house, but I think it is cool that some men do like to do that. Anyway, back to what I was saying....

• Ken does a wonderful job of making and keeping up a budget. ~ I love to figure out creative ways to save money.
• Ken works very hard at his job and provides for us very well. ~ I very much enjoying staying home and taking care of our children and managing the house.
• Ken tills the garden. ~ I plant it and care for it.
• Ken takes care of the vehicles, making sure they are maintained properly and getting different ones when needed. ~ I wash and mend our clothes.
• Ken does the building and fixing of things around the house. ~ I cook our food and clean.
• Ken can carry on a very intelligent conversation on many subjects (when I tend to bumble around at times). ~ I take care of the social small talk (which Ken doesn't enjoy to much).

I don't know how to tell all the ways that just work out so much better because we get to work at them together rather than trying to do them all by ourselves. I feel very blessed to be married to my husband and am so very thankful that God designed marriage the way He did!

"For this cause a man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh." Genesis 2:24

A Christmas Tea

Last week I did something that I had never done before which is hosting a Musical Breakfast Tea (With a Christmas Theme). It ended up working out quite well and was quite a bit of fun. It is also a very economical way to have a party. We did all our own baking (A couple friends came over to help) which was also fun.

To start out I made homemade invitations using the computer to print on white paper and then put that on top of black paper and tied with a red ribbon. I also added a stamp on the bottom. On the invitations I invited everyone to dress up and also bring along a musical number to share. ( I was inviting some music students as well as other musical friends.)

I also made name cards using my heart and paisley punches and a button to create a flower on each one.

I pulled out my pretty linens and special luncheon dishes and also used evergreens on the table.

I also made printed menus/programs that listed everything we had to eat and the music that was going to be played.

To drink we had several varieties of tea and hot chocolate with whipped cream.

For eating we had cinnamon rolls, scones, Vanocka braid, pumpkin muffins, Danish puff and raspberries in whipped cream.

These girls seemed to enjoy using the sugar bowl. :-)

After everyone had been served their food then the music began. We enjoyed hearing many Christmas Carols as well as some other songs. At the end we all had fun singing and making music together.

It turned out to be a quite fun morning for me and the others seemed to enjoy it as well. A simple, economical and fun way to celebrate the season.

Christmas Tour of Homes

I thought it would be fun to join in on the Christmas Tour of Homes. I think it is fun to decorate (even though we aren't that elaborate or anything like that) and it is always fun to post about what we have been doing. Decorating has been quite fun this year, the kids have really started enjoying having the house all pretty and ready for Christmas and they get excited about any new decorations that I add and they love to help as well. It is also fun to get something new done while Ken is off to work and see him notice it upon arrival.

So welcome to the Internet tour of my home! :-)

This picture isn't of decorations! It is just me mixing up some Oatmeal Raisin Scones. If you are "coming to visit" we need to have something homemade and yummy to eat.

First before you get to my house you will see the mailbox. I had fun putting greenery and bows on that this year. On our door I hung a wreath and put garland and bows on the bench. On both lights I also put bows. I don't have any night pictures yet but if you come then you will have fun looking at all of Ken's creativity with the outside lights. The kids think it looks like a gingerbread house.

In the entry was we have a container of greenery (with a snowman or so nestled in) sitting on the table. I also had fun giving new life to old dried roses by adding some fresh evergreen.

Upstairs in the living room I had fun filling the top of the piano with real evergreen and all sizes of pine cones along with plants and violins (large and miniature). I also added greens to the wall sconces which have long ribbons as well.

We also hung up stockings and added garland and bows on the windows.

Here is our dining room on just a normal day. The kids are having fun watching the numbers burn off the special Christmas candles given us by a friend.

I already had a copper heart hanging on the wall but I think it looks much prettier now with the addition of evergreen and a burgundy bow.


I had some pretty purple ribbons that I had been given so I decided it would be fun to use purple in the decorating of our bedroom and master bath. I added the evergreen, pine cones and ribbon to the fabric swag above our bed. In the Bathroom I put evergreen and pine cones above the vanity and then tied a purple bow on each of the lights. (I really like the way the bathroom turned out but couldn't get a very good picture.) I also put some woodsy decorations in the windowsill.
Thanks for visiting! Would you like some tea or hot chocolate while we chat some more?

A Homemade Christmas ~ Week 7

This week I thought I would share a few quick ideas.

A friend had asked me about Cracker recipes. We were heading to visit them so I decided to make some up quickly, put them in some jars, photo copy my recipes and then glue fabric and ribbon to the lid.

Finger puppets. These were made for a friend and Aaron and Megan thought they looked like a lot of fun. They don't know that I plan to make some for them as well. Here is a link for some cute ones.

Paper snowflakes are so pretty to have hanging around the house to decorate. One of our friends is really good at making them and she gave me these. This link shows how to fold to get the 6 points.

Have you been working on anything lately? I would love it if you would like to share!

Sorry I didn't get this up on Monday. I had it all ready to go and scheduled to post (while we were out of town) but for some reason it didn't post. So much for my best laid plans! :-)