Good morning ladies.  Okay I have to admit, yesterday was rough.  I was so tired from all of the running that we had done over the weekend that I was beat.  But in the morning, after my time with the Lord, I knew it was going to be a good day.  It was a busy day, but one that I didn’t feel drained as I had felt from the weekend.

We had gotten up and Monday is my clean my floors day.  I sweep and hand wash my floors upstairs and down.  This allows me to get under the couch and into all of those corners and cracks where dust bunnies live.  We do a good vacuum and this forces a pick up to put things away from the weekend.  That got done early.  Then we pulled out school and got some done.  Yes, we could have just not done any but it didn’t take any time away from our visiting and the children got it done quickly and now we won’t be behind this year!

We then started doing our chocolates for the holidays.

Up first is my personal favorite.  At Starbucks one day I bought this tiny bag of dark chocolate, coconut, and sea salted almonds.  It was so good.  But for $4 a bag–just a treat.  So I decided to recreate my own and I can tell you that this is my GOTO for chocolate fixes.  I keep them in my freezer and pull one out when I want one.  I purposely put the cranberries in them to keep “others” from eating it:) 

I have no name so I call them chocolate, coconut, pretzel,almond, cranberry candy.  So original:)

We made biscotti.  I am hooked on this stuff.  Tammy made it last year and it is now part of my traditional cookies.  

I tried a chocolate one with cake mix, just to spice it up a bit.  The homemade chocolate version is just as good as this cake mix one.

We also did some peanut butter M&M chocolate covered balls.  I think they are called Buckeyes, depending upon where you live.  Another staple treat for us each year.

We did this for an easy popcorn treat.  Pop some popcorn and melt chocolate and we did caramel apple discs as well, drizzle on top.  We added candy corns.  Good treat–more fall like, but we had to use up the ingredients:)

Then, thank goodness for Twitter life hacks!!! I found this great idea for doing chocolate covered pretzels.  You put the melting chocolate in jars and place them in a crockpot with some water.  Hello???  Genius!!! 

BUT, we didn’t do an entire jar of chocolate so we had to tip them on their sides to get the chocolate out.  Still WAY neater than using a bowl.  If I had some maybe Starbucks glass coffee jars I might save those for next year to do it, but this worked.  Clean up was easy as well.  We did peanut butter chips, dark chocolate, light chocolate, and white.

We then put them on Freezer paper and sprinkled some toppings.

Then I think I found the easiest way.  We had some chocolate in a plastic bag for doing molds, I just put the pretzel in the bag and coated it that way.  To me that was easiest.  You can wipe it off easier too.  I’m sure someone did a Life hack for that!

We had a “special” tray for the little ones because their chocolate involved licking the sprinkles.  Chocolate, sprinkles, and children!!!  A good combination?!?!?

Jadyn did some candy molds, we just squeezed them in from a plastic bag.  She had fun. I would like to get her more molds to do this for other times as well.

My friend Marie gave us some peanut brittle last year and it was sooooooo good. I asked her for the recipe and I am so glad I made it.  It takes patience to sit and stir it for the 20 minutes or so that you are at the stove, but it is good.        

We then ended the day with Jentzen losing his first tooth. He was so excited!  He attributes a lost tooth to Dad taking him to the store.  Dad is such a softie:)  It is good.

Then my night consisted of hand washing the floor again due to sprinkles.  But I am finished with sprinkles for now.  Then we watched Mom’s Night Out and Parental Guidance, two of my favorite movies.  I had to hand paint some letters for Greg’s business so that was a good thing to watch while we did that.  I packaged up some orders to ship today and called it a night.  I woke up today feeling much better and ready for my day.  I already started doing my Tuesday chores which consist of deep cleaning all the bathrooms.  I got one down, two more to go.  I love separating my chores, because I know I will eventually get to everything in a week’s time instead of worrying about getting them done in one day.

I pray you have a wonderful day today.  Get out an easy recipe or try one of these to do with your children. I know mess is not my favorite either, but the children remember doing this every year and it is all about making memories.  You won’t remember hand washing the floors trying to get every sprinkle that you find, but you will remember making cookies with your babies.  Enjoy and see you tomorrow!

Good Monday morning!  I hope you are all up and well rested from your weekend.  I’d love to say that I have woken up all well rested and feeling on “fire” for my Monday, but in reality I am tired.  We have had a busy weekend.  It has been an enjoyable weekend, but a busy one.  Of course, I could lament how tired I am and how much I have had to do, but then it would just feed into negativity.  Negativity is not something I want a part of my life.  It brings you down.  It makes you feel worn, exhausted, and not very motivated to do good things in this life.  So I stop. I focus on the positives and ignore the tiredness:)

Some foods we made for this weekend for the first time were sausage balls.  I had never had them before and two people had told me about them.  I decided to try them.  Tasted like a sausage biscuit with cheese.

We also made some blueberry scones.  They were both good treats to keep and reheat and serve as needed.  Thanks Alice for the ideas!

This weekend we went to the Shadrachs Christmas Lights Show.  It is a drive through light display that we attend every year.  You tune your radio to the music and then enjoy the many wonderful light displays that blink according to the music.  It takes about 45 minutes to drive through it.  We love it!

Saturday we did our local parade. Another tradition we do and it is a good memory for the children.  This year was cold.  My toes and fingers were numb!  Normally we start by wearing our coats and then can take them off, but not this year.  The local groups always provide plenty of Santa hats and candy for the children.

Then we went home to decorate our trees.  My daughter bought two trees this year for us to decorate.  One for upstairs and one for downstairs.  We let each child take a turn putting the star up.

This year was Madelyn and  since we had two trees, Stephen got to do one as well. 

I tell my children after they put the star up that it is going to be another 10 years before you put the star up again:)  Unless someone forfeits their turn:)  Now that we have two we can get through the line much quicker. 

It took about 15 minutes to put on the ornaments.  Big group………goes fast!

Then at night time, we went down to our local Tuxedo park for the annual tree lighting ceremony.  The temperatures warmed up and some of my children took their coats off. We sang Christmas songs around the tree and enjoyed our friends.  We then walked over to the church and saw a live nativity.  We ended it with hot cocoa and popcorn.  They also did mule drawn wagon rides for the children.  Like Little House on the Prairie.  It was fun.

Sunday we had church and home for just a few hours and then back at night for the children’s Christmas drama.  I am going to put a little compilation together of them, but I don’t have the time right now:)  They did so great. Love hearing all my girls sing.  Such beautiful voices.  Afterwards we had a fellowship meal that we got to share in with our friends and church family.

I made ranch veggie pizza and took some salted caramel cheesecake.

I came home and climbed into bed.  I was exhausted.  Slept all night and here I am.

Today will be a day of  chocolates and candy, Monday chores, laundry, and school.  I pray you have a blessed day today.  Remember when that tiredness  or frustration kicks in, keep focusing on the positives of your day.  Ask God what is the most important things you are to do and do it!    Love you ladies, see you tomorrow!