Must Be Santa...

Must Be Santa, Must be Santa, Santa Claus.

We had a knock on our door this evening, right before the 8 pm hour. The boys answered the door and were very surprised to find Santa standing on our porch! We invited Santa in and the boys had a chance to sit on his knee and chat with him. They all reported that they had yes, indeed been very good boys.

Thanks for the visit Santa! What a FUN surprise that was!

December Tradition

It wouldn't be December without decorating sugar cookies. I am the room mom for Garrett's class this year. When I rolled out and cut 75 plus cookies for Garrett's class party, I made sure to make some extra dough  for the boys to roll, cut, bake and decorate. The boys ate their fair share of the dough. They used their fair share of frosting and about 5 lbs. of sprinkles each. Their cookies were beautiful masterpieces. We love December and all of the traditions...and all of the sweets!

The Polar Express Ward Party

We enjoyed a very fun Polar Express Party with our ward(boundaries within our church, makes up the congregation))family. When we got there, there were train tracks leading from the front  door to the party area. The children were asked to come in the jammies and were to bring their ticket to get in. The train conductor(our Bishop) was at the door, collecting those tickets).The hall looked cute and festive. They served yummy quiche, fruit and muffins for breakfast. The story, The Polar Express was read. Our Bishop shared a message and there were beautiful musical numbers. At the end of the party, there was an appearance by the jolly man, himself :-).

December Family Home Evening Tradition

This was our 2nd Annual F.H.E spent  looking at the Christmas lights, with friends. We all met up and walked our favorite neighborhood(for lots of Christmas lights) in Rocklin. We had lots of kids with us in tow this year. They loved it and were a little too excited at times, running too far ahead and some of them even joined other families that were not part of our group.

After walking the neighborhood and taking lots of photos, we met back at our cars and enjoyed lots of yummy treats! Sorry, no photos. The treats were devoured in seconds!

Meet Buster

I finally caved. We have our very own Elf on the Shelf. The boys suggested a bunch of different names. Most of the names suggested were SF Giants players. The only criteria was that they all had to agree on the name for our Elf. After MUCH discussion and maybe a little bantering back and forth, they decided on Buster. Yes, our Elf is named after the one and only, Buster Posey. We are ready for our adventures with Buster and can't wait to see what the month of December holds with Buster visiting our home.

December 1st

The month of December is upon us. We are excited and so ready. We kicked off our December with a few traditions. The boys received their new Christmas jammies and a new ornament. The boys look forward to this yearly tradition.

Here's to a Happy December!

holiday tunes

Instead of making/baking a ton of Christmas candy and cookies this season, we decided to bake a little and listen to lots of Christmas music. While listening to tons of Christmas music, we decided to create a holiday CD. Our family picked out our top 18 favorite holiday songs(not necessarily new ones)and burned them to CD's. John created a cute label and then we tied cute Baker's Twine around them and shared them with family and neighbors.

I thought I'd share our favorite holiday songs in 2011.

We Need a Little Christmas - Glee Cast
The Happy Elf - Harry Connick, Jr.
Sleigh Ride - Johnny Mathis and Percy Faith
Last Christmas - Glee Cast
All I Want For Christmas Is You - Mariah Carey
Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer - Babyface
Santa Claus is Comin' To Town - Faith Hill
Mistletoe - Justin Bieber
This Christmas - Elliot Yamin
Drummer Boy - Justin Bieber
You're A Mean One, Mr. Grinch - Glee Cast
Jingle Bells - Michael Buble
Marshmallow World - Dean Martin
Christmas Lights - Coldplay
My Only Wish - Jessica Simpson
Last Christmas - Taylor Swift
A Baby Changes Everything - Faith Hill
Auld Lang Syne(The Millennial Mix) - Kenny G.

What were you listening to this season?

F.H.E.- December style

Our family enjoys doing a little something together each Monday night. It is called Family Home Evening. We set aside some time each week. On Monday nights, we gather together as a family. Sometimes we have lessons. Sometimes we play games. Sometimes we go to the movies. Sometimes we go out for treats. Sometimes we have a family council meeting. The point is, whatever we do, we do it together. Sometimes we get together with other families to enjoy F.H.E. with them. Tonight, we went to the Christmas light street(s)in Rocklin. This neighborhood is amazing! Each house has a theme(nativity, Cars,Calvin and Hobbs,snowmen, The Polar Express, etc...)set up in their yard. The street is totally decked out. We always check out this neighborhood display, from the comfort and warmth of our car. There is always hot chocolate in every one's hand and the heater is blasting. Each year, we say that we will walk the loop. Well, this year was the year. We met up with some of our favorite friends and walked the loop. We ooooooohed and awwwwwwed at the displays. I think the Christmas Vacation display took the 1st place prize this year. There was an actual RV in the yard with a life sized Chevy Chase cut out. It was funny. Between all of the families, we had 26 children in tow. That's a lot of kids. They sure had a great time.







I think we have a new Christmas tradition.

tacky at its finest

My friend, Amanda hosted her 4th annual Tacky Christmas Sweater party tonight. You had to come dressed in your tackiest Christmas attire. So I don't own tacky Christmas attire. I knew I had to find something good to wear to the party. Can you believe that I didn't have any luck finding anything at Goodwill?? There wsa not a tacky sweater to be found in the entire store so I moved onto Wal*Mart. I scored big time at Wal*Mart. Not only did I find a sweater but I found a turtleneck, earrings, bracelet and socks :-). I think the $2.00 Christmas tree earrings were my favorite.

To add to the tackiness, the party was held at the mall food court. I am not sure what was harder, purchasing my tacky Christmas attire from Wal*Mart or walking through the mall in the above mentioned tacky attire to get to the food court. Our only goal once we hit the inside of the mall was to not make eye contact with anyone :-). It was a hoot to watch each of the tacky party go'ers arrive. Up first, Jurusha!










































We had a fun gift exchange and the packages were even wrapped tacky. Duct tape, packing tape, newspaper...you name it. The gift that you brought had to be one that was re-gifted. We played the stealing game and I lost this Christmas tree to Jane.

























































This was such a fun evening out...once I got over being in public in my Christmas sweater. I am already dreaming of my outfit for next year!

Christmas morning JOY

It is hard to summarize our fabulous Christmas day in one blog post. From start to finish, we really did have an amazing Christmas.

We left cookies and milk out for the big guy. We sprinkled reindeer food on the lawn...I am secretly hoping it will fertilize our dead looking, winter grass :-). The boys also left a plate of carrots on the porch for those hungry reindeer. Garrett carefully counted each carrot to make sure all of the Reindeer had their own...very thoughtful.









{Brody is not pictured. He fell asleep in the car on the way home from our Christmas Eve with the Krupp family}


The boys didn't come into our room until 7:00 am. It was nice to sleep in a teensy bit. We have a Christmas morning tradition. Daddy goes to turn on the Christmas tree lights and checks to see if Santa did indeed visit our house during the wee hours of the morning. While he is doing that, the boys try to wait patiently, lined up from youngest to oldest in our room...waiting for that green light, to run out to the living room.




















I love this shot of everyone checking out their Santa stashes. They were all thrilled and excited to dig on in and play with it all!


Santa did not disappoint this little boy. Brody was all about anything and everything Toy Story this year. Santa brought his the Buzz Lightyear bike.





Garrett loved his long board. He also received the K'Nex roller coaster. He is anxious to start building that one with Dad. Out of all the boys, Garrett was the one who was the most into Christmas this year. He constantly wanted to talk about Santa. He wanted to know what he was doing and how the reindeer were doing. Before going to bed last night, he asked John to open his blinds...hoping to catch a glimpse of Santa and his sleigh. He is at such a fun age. He did not miss a beat this season and we are glad that santa was so good to him.


Watch out Steven Spielberg, Carter is on your tail in the movie making business. After finding the bottle of Ketchup in the backyard (a few times over) and viewing some videos on one of my digital cameras, Santa figured it was time to get this boy a video camera of his own. He received the Flip camera. He and his fried love to make their own videos. He also loved the XBox headset and a year subscription for Xbox Live that Great Grandpa Pung got for the boys. Thanks, GG.



















All Tanner wanted was a 4th Generation iTouch. This boy has been researching this Ipod for months...it is all we heard about :-). He is growing up way too fast. It is a good thing Santa was listening. He was over the moon excited about receiving his ITouch. He also received a $50.00 Itunes card from us. I wrapped that card about 20 times and Tanner got a kick out of opening that gift.




















John and I had so much fun watching the boys open their gifts. We were exhausted. I think the month of December had finally caught up with us. We were impressed and thankful to hear all of the "thank you's" that came out of each one of their mouths as they opened each gift.




I love that Brody insisted that we snuggle up in his new Toy Story blanket. He paused long enough to smile for the camera and then was off and playing with his new toys. This Mama is ready for a long winters nap. Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

merry christmas

we hope your christmas was "picture" perfect.

xoxo
the krupp family

christmas treats

One of our favorite December traditions is to bake treats for our neighbors. We made several different types of treats(I will share those too) this year. One of our favorite treats(super simple and yummy)were the Pretzel Hugs. I am not even sure if that is their official name...but that's what I'm calling them.

Pretzel Hugs
2 bag of Hershey Hugs
1 bag of Pretzels (Butter Snaps)
1 bag of red and green M&M's
(This will make two cookie sheets full)

Preheat your oven to 200 degrees. Unwrap all of your Hershey Hugs. Place Parchment Paper down on your cookie sheet(this will catch the melted chocolate and save you from a messy pan). Line your cookie sheet with Pretzels topped with Hershey Hugs! Place in the oven for 9 minutes. Once the cookie sheet is out of the oven, Start placing M&M's into the melted hugs. Let cool until until chocolate is set. This takes a while. Do not place in fridge to speed the process up. Your M&M's will get that cracked, old looking vibe to them....yes, I am speaking from experience.

Place them in a clear cello bag and tie off with a fun ribbon. Share them with the people you love!

finding joy in the small things.

I can't believe it is really Christmas Eve, Eve! The boys are over the top excited and had trouble falling asleep tonight! I wonder how long it will take them tomorrow night :-).
I have tried REALLY hard to enjoy this Christmas season! I have tried to find the blessings, the opportunities to serve and most of all, to experience December with my family. We enjoyed lots of fun activities this season and are filing many of them away to repeat next year.

Our favorite activity this month was actually something we did as a family when I was a little girl. I will NEVER forget the year we doorbell ditched my Grandma Davis for 12 days. It was her first Christmas without my Grandpa and we wanted to make her December a little brighter. It was an awesome experience. This year, we picked a family to door bell ditch every night...aka Secret Santa. You do it for the 12 days leading up to Christmas. We typed up silly little notes based on the Twelve Days of Christmas song and attached them to little gifts.


We drive over as a family, usually listening to the GLEE Christmas album...a MUST HAVE!!! The boys would bantered back and forth over things like whose turn it was to carry the gift. Whose turn it was to ring the door bell. Brody had the same job each night. He would watch for the boys as they'd run back to the car and then he'd shout "hit it Dad/Mom". That was our cue to get get out of there fast. We will deliver our last gift tomorrow night. The boys are just as excited about the last delivery as they were the first. This little family activity has brought so much love and laughter into our lives. It really is what Christmas has been about this season...finding the joy in the small things.

What are you enjoying this season?

thought for the day

"There is no ideal Christmas; only the one Christmas you decide to make as a reflection of your values, desires, affections, traditions." - Bill McKibben

traditions...old and new

After an entire month of blog posts in November, I seemed to have hit a dry spell. It's more like, happy to be enjoying all that this season beholds. We have been enjoying favorite traditions and have even started a few new ones.

Earlier this week, the boys received their yearly ornaments. I wrap them and we take turns opening them. This year, it was all about the sparkly ones. I tried to get everyone their favorite color (Tanner = blue, Carter = red, Garrett = green and Brody got the gold one because his favorite color changes all of the time). It's fun to watch them pick the perfect spot on the Christmas tree and carefully place them on there.












I was able to go Christmas caroling with the youth from church. We visited the folks at a local nursing home. We hand delivered hand made cards to each resident and then gathered in their rec room to sing Christmas carols. It was a very rewarding evening.













Up next, gingerbread houses. It just wouldn't be December without these candy laden homes. I got to help Garrett's class build their gingerbread houses this week. They all took their time and were very creative when it came to loading their houses with all of the sweets.



















We started a new twist to an old tradition in our home. We have always read a different Christmas book each night in December. After blog hopping a bit, I decided that I wanted to wrap 12 different Christmas books to count down the 12 days until Christmas. We will read the story of Christ's birth on Christmas day. I headed to our local library to pick up a few new stories. Garrett got to pick our first book this evening. We all sat around the Christmas tree and read The Night Before Christmas together as a family. The boys already have the books they want to unwrap/read all picked out.














I am finishing up our Christmas cards. We are spreading Christmas joy. We are enjoying our Christmas decorations throughout the house. We will be baking on Wednesday for our neighbors and friends. Christmas music has been on 24/7. I really do love everything about month of December.














What traditions are you enjoying this month?