CtC - Day Four: Have Breakfast for Dinner

Today's activity: breakfast for dinner! This one was a HUGE hit in our house! I don't think the boys have been this quiet and agreeable at dinner in a very long time. :)

When pondering what we should have, Brian came up with the brilliant idea that we should have French toast, scrambled eggs and bacon (well, bacon for the boys anyway :) ). We all worked together to make everything, and it was delicious!!

I think we need to make this a more regular thing in our house. :)

CtC - Day Three: Have a Cup of Hot Chocolate

Day 3's activity was enjoying a cup of hot chocolate! This was a first for Ezra today! Caiden has enjoyed hot chocolate before and specifically requested some marshmallows to go along in his cup. I do confess that I was a teensy bit bummed that this particular activity turned up today - when it was 65 degrees on the third of December!!! But hey - we still enjoyed our treat! :D

CtC - Day Two: Cut Out Snowflakes & Hang Them Up

Day Two's activity is cutting out snowflakes & hanging them up!

I opted to keep this one to just Caiden and me since it would be quite the challenge manning Ezra with scissors.

I also decided to keep this a little on the easy side and limited us to 3 snowflakes each. I helped Caiden with holding the paper while he cut it and gave him some guidance on how to cut some shapes. It was a little tough for him to cut thru the thick folded construction paper, but we did a pretty good job working together! :)

The best part was watching Caiden open up his first snowflake and witnessing his wonderment at the transformation!

CtC - Day One: Make Christmas Cookies

Our first activity is making Christmas cookies! I was a little nervous about undertaking the activity, because well, I'm a perfectionist - especially when it comes to decorating cookies these days!! But I told myself that this is a fun, carefree activity that is about the kids and not decorating skills. :)

Caiden and I started off with making the cookie dough, and then Ezra got to help out with cutting out the shapes. I handled baking the cookies and making the (peppermint) frosting to speed things up a little. We still ran out of time on day one, but no big deal - that just left us the chance to decorate the next day without having to watch the clock for bedtime.

I got the kids set up at the kitchen table for our decorating adventure!

Caiden and Brian worked together on decorating, while I teamed up with Ezra. Caiden did a great job frosting his cookies and deciding how he wanted to decorate them. I was really impressed! :)

Ezra took the "shake vigorously" approach with the sprinkles and often covered more than just the cookie. :) He also figured out that he could decorate a cookie by dragging the frosting side over the scattered sprinkles on his tray. LOL!

 I had just enough frosting for the cookies, and the cookies were a perfect size for little hands to manage. I also kept it simple by having only 3 colors to work with. This was a really fun experience and I'm glad the whole family got to participate!

Countdown to Christmas

This year we are kicking off a new tradition - the Countdown to Christmas! I was inspired to do this from a very similar idea I read about on another blog I follow. Here's how it works: there are 24 numbered envelopes. Each envelope contains a fun activity for either the kids or the whole family to do. That's it! Super simple and a fun way to stay connected to one another as we get thru these hectic days leading up to Christmas.

While I do know what all the activities are, I don't know what is in each specific envelope. Well, I know what a few are because certain things need to happen on or by a specific day, but the rest will be as much a surprise to me as it will be for the rest of the family!

I used my Silhouette cutting machine and my printer to create all the cards and the numbers for the envelope. It only took a couple of hours to print, cut and assemble all of it.

 The final piece was going to Michael's and picking out a cute box to hold the envelopes. :)

I'm really looking forward to seeing how this works out!

New Blog Supplement

Most anyone who knows me, knows I am quite the sentimental pack rat. B has his own similar affliction, and together we have boxes and boxes of stuff that has followed us around the country. Every once in awhile, I get the urge to purge but when set to task, I am often overcome by nostalgia and find it nearly impossible to part with so many precious mementos.

Until now.

Now that we are firmly enmeshed in the digital age, it is becoming less necessary to physically carry around all the trinkets linked to precious memories. Do I really need my Prom ticket? How about that ticket stub to a Gaelic Storm show? Or what about those knick knacks that I've had since I was a child that do little more than collect dust? Yes, it's easy to put those items in boxes and forget about them, only to pull them out from time to time and fondly reminisce over them.  That's why it has been so dang hard for me to let them go.

Until now.

Thanks to that awesomely evil addictive site Pintrest, I came across a brilliant idea for managing our mementos. Take a picture. Load the picture into a blog post. Write about the memory tied to that item. Donate/sell/re-gift the item to someone else. My memories stay intact (which was always the most important part), I can someday turn the blog into a physical book, and I will no longer feel obligated to hold on to the object.

I. LOVE. IT!

This concept instantly resonated with me, and I am ready to put it into action. And what better time to start clearing out than before a big move to what is going to be our long time home! I need to be careful about overwhelming myself with this project. Like I said, I have a lot of stuff I've been hanging onto for a long time. I'm hoping to find a way to take baby steps with the process. Maybe an entry or two a week as time allows. And if I can't get thru them all before we move, then I'll be OK with taking them to the new house and finishing it out there. But they will not find a cozy corner to stay indefinitely. Oh no. No more!

Please message me or leave a comment if you'd like to be added to the email list for that new blog. Part of the fun of keeping memories is to share them with others! :) I will keep the Batavia Duchette blog going, so don't worry about that! I just wanted a new separate space for the other one.

Oh, and the address is: http://ourmementos.blogspot.com/

It's brand new, so there are no posts yet. I'd like to change the look of it too. Stay tuned! :)

Memory Lane

I took a stroll, well drive really, down memory lane today. I had to tend to some business out in Hoffman Estates, and since we had some extra time, I decided to show the boys the house I grew up in. We drove over to Rolling Meadows, and first I toured thru the downtown. Man, was that just a surreal experience. It's been several years since I last did that, and while some things haven't changed, so much has changed! The police station/city hall looks exactly the same. The fire station and the funeral home is still there, as is the gas station on the corner of Kirchoff and Hicks. Fratello's is in the same spot and the Jewel shopping center remains (Altho, it changed quite a bit over the years while was growning up. My mind's eye still shows the 1980s version of it). But the 7-11 is gone, the Barro's Pizza is long gone, the Dunkin' Donuts we used to stop at after church has relocated. And most startlingly of all, the Dominick's is gone. There are lots of new brick condos/apartments that have taken over many of these old places, and it just looks so strange to me. I was almost feeling overwhelmed as I drove thru and tried to take it all in. It was so familiar, but then again so different. I felt so emotional over seeing how different things look compared to how I remember them.

Next we drove over to the old house. Driving down the main neighborhood road felt so strange! I was suddenly flooded with memories of walking/biking/driving that road and all the cul-de-sacs while I still lived there. Again, I felt overwhelmed and emotional while taking in how things have changed/matured. Now that he is getting old enough to understand, I told Caiden this was my old neighborhood and that I used to bike ride all up and down that street when I was younger.

Finally, we pulled up in front of the old homestead. I knew it had changed, but again my mind's eye stubbornly held on to the vision of how the house looked when I last lived there.

Seeing the major transformation it had undertaken really jolted me. I sat there for a few minutes and just stared at it thinking and remembering. Noticing what was gone and what was still there. Seeing how the trees have grown, that the bushes were still there, and the lamp post still lived in the front yard. But the front doors are red now, the house is brown with a strange rock border. The windows are new, and there are some shutters missing.

 We drove around to the back of the house, and I laughed when I saw they put the sliding glass door back in the kitchen and removed the slider from the family room. The patio has been redone, the fence is gone, and while my favorite climbing oak tree is still there, there is no way a kid could get up there today without a very tall ladder. I was startled to see how much the trees had grown that are near the edge of the road. I remember when my dad planted them and that I was taller than they were. Now those trees are 25 years old. The elm is gone and the crab apple too. But the peonies are still there, and that made me smile.

I used to fantasize that maybe we could buy that house back someday, but I discovered today that I don't feel that way anymore. I have my own family now, and I want to build and create new memories with them. Trying to re-live and re-create the old ones just wouldn't feel right. I do wish that house still belonged to Mom, because I would love for my kids to know that house like I did and to play in that yard like I did. But it doesn't, and they won't, and I think I'm OK with that. I can still take them to that neighborhood and say that's where I grew up, and that's the park I played at, and that's the creek we always talked about. It's no longer mine, but it is still accessible and I can always share that part of my life with them in one way or another.

So, I think it is time to properly say: Goodbye, House I Grew Up In. I will always carry so many memories - both joyful and sad -  that were created in and around you. I've had a hard time letting you go, silly as that may sound, but I'm finally ready. It's good to see you now and then to remember what you meant to me. But it's time for me to let go, so I bid you a fond farewell. XOXO, Me.

Shamrockin'

Can you believe this amazing weather we've been having? 80 degrees on St. Patrick's day!!!! It doesn't get much better than that here in Chicago during March. I swear, this has been the best end of winter ever. Heck, an amazing fall, followed by an incredibly mild Seattle-style winter and now launching into the most beautiful spring I can remember has made for a great welcome back home to IL. :)

On Friday, the boys and I hopped in the car and headed out to Aunt Cathy's to spend the day with her. Caiden has been asking to go to "Aunt Caffy's Park," so we made it extra special by enjoying a yummy picnic lunch there. We spent a couple hours at the park and then headed back so the boys could take their naps. Cathy and I chit-chatted while they snoozed, and then when they got up we played some more before heading back home.

On Saturday, Amy and Jerry came up for a long overdue visit. We soaked up the beautiful weather and spent most of our time outside. The boys played exceptionally well together and had lots of fun playing in the yard and in the sandbox.
That night, B graciously stayed home while Amy and I got out for some much needed girl time and went to see local favorite Modern Day Romeos perform at Chord on Blue in St. Charles. I couldn't believe it when I realized the last time I went out for St. Pat's was way back in '07 on the famed party bus! It was also crazy to be walking outside at night in a strapless summer dress in the middle of MARCH and be completely comfortable. :) The band put on a great show, and we were in our usual spots in the front row.

We were also "treated" (ugh) to a couple overtly expressing their love lust right next to us for a good hour. Amy and I both wanted to tell them to "get a room!" I'm generally fine with some "dirty dancing" for a couple of songs, but they were getting downright graphic. *gag*

Annoying couple on the right

Anywho, the holiday weekend wouldn't be complete without some festive cookies to celebrate! The next day I got to teach Amy how to decorate with royal icing, and we both had so much fun with it! I think she is going to be a natural. :) Of course I took a couple of pictures as well.

It was such a FUN and relaxing weekend! Great company and beautiful weather are so good for the soul. :)

Hobie Gras '12 - Mardi Gras Cookies

Our good friend Rob has had a tradition that he has kept alive despite living in Seattle which is his annual Mardi Gras party aptly named "Hobie Gras." The key is that this party happens here in Chicago! We haven't been able to attend the last half dozen or so parties, but this year we finally got to go again! :)

Naturally I wanted to bring along some festive cookies, but I was drawing a blank on what to make. I started searching "Mardi Gras cookies" and came up with some awesome looking masks, but those were way too time intensive for me to attempt. Next I found some cute bikini topped cookies with candy bead necklaces. I thought those were clever, but then I started thinking about how it is you technically earn your beads at Mardi Gras. This lead me to become extra inspired, and knowing the party attendees - they would get a good laugh out of my creation.

Now fair warning - these aren't, uh, kid-friendly cookies, per se, but they do engender the real theme of some of that Mardi Gras craziness. (And this will be the closest I'd ever get to participating in said craziness. :P ) I actually hemmed and hawed over posting these, but I'm pretty proud of how they turned out and heck, this is my blog. :P So I hope you get a laugh or a giggle over these. If not, just pretend you never saw it. ;)

They did indeed go over well, and earned a hearty guffaw from the party host himself. :) And it was SO awesome seeing so many fabulous people we haven't gotten to hang out with in far too long. Rob has such a great group of friends, and I realized how much I'd missed seeing them over the years! Rob, you have to move back now so you can keep throwing fun parties! :)

Wordless Wednesday - Hugging Spree