L.C.P.

Lights. Last night we went to see Holiday Lights at the Beach at the oceanfront. It wasn't as grand as the Botanical Gardens but we're glad we went. Lily sat on my lap while Emma slept through the entire thing. Not sure we'll make this a yearly tradition or not but it was neat to see all of the lights on sand and watching the waves.

Cookies. This was the first opportunity, since Daddy could occupy Emma, that Lily and I could begin some baking. We did peanut butter kiss cookies. Working with a preschooler is definitely a lot of fun but it also makes you adjust your cookie making procedures :).

For example:

1. Had Lily cover pb balls with sugar, pick them up to place them on cookie sheet next to her.

~Lily was completely flattening the balls when transferring to the cookie sheet..Had to adjust~

2. Moved coookie sheet so I would transfer from the bowl of sugar.

~But Lily was still destroying the small pb balls in the bowl..Had to adjust~

3. I made the pb balls, dropped in bowl of sugar and this is when Lily took handfuls (huge handfuls of sugar) to dump on the cookie (and the table, the chair, the floor, her lap...) which then I took to put on the cookie sheet.

While the cookies were in the oven we unwrapped a whole bag of chocolate kisses and she helped push them into the baked cookies when they were done. Can you guess which one she did first??

Peppers. Mike and I have decided to incorporate both of our families traditions to make our own. This of course means food too. There are certain dishes that we have on Thanksgiving, a special meal on New Year's Day, and this year we get to start our Christmas meal tradition.

Today, the 23rd, I made Grammy's (Mike's mom) Stuffed Peppers. I had a recipe but as we all know, recipes are only as good as what you know about them. I knew a little but not enough so we called :). I spent a good amount of time on the phone and she talked me through the whole thing. I also made enough so that we had left overs for Christmas Eve, and both nights they were absolutely delicious!

You can see that Lily and Emma found other activities to keep them busy through the whole thing even if they were ready on time and I did much of it during their nap.

Loving all of our traditions.