Make a Smilebox greeting

Obviously, I am...

bit behind in posting. I hope to have the blog updated by the weekend. Wish me luck!!

Is this really Christmas Eve?

So Christmas Eve arrived and I was still down and out. Emma had been sick Monday night and Tuesday morning. Dana's girls weren't feeling great. So the decision was made to cancel our Christmas Eve celebration. Dana, Amy & I have spent every Christmas Eve together since 10th grade, that would be 1989!! 2001 was the exception and we will all tell you that it was just wrong. We belong together on Christmas Eve. It has been so wonderful to share those nights with my two best friends and their moms and our siblings. As we have gotten older the celebrations included the boyfriends who eventually became our husbands. And now all three of us have beautiful daughters who are along for the ride. We certainly are very blessed to have remained friends and become family. So this year it was, as if, Christmas hadn't really come. But it was for the best. I certainly was in no shape to socialize, I spent 90% of the day asleep. I was awake long enough to get the girls ready to visit Santa in the afternoon(Thanks Grama). And then again later in the evening to watch them open their new Christmas pj's and prepare for Santa's arrival. The girls wrote Santa a note and left him some milk and cookies.

Latkes (well sort of), Dreidels & Gelt...

Hanukkah has arrived and the girls are very excited. It's always a fun night here and I love celebrating Eric's holidays just as much as the one I celebrate. At the very least, we are well rounded.

Now latkes are the traditional food of Hanukkah and while we all like them, I hate frying them. It's always a mess and they're usually cold by the time we are ready to eat. So I make up a pan of "Baba cake" and all is good. When Baba would visit us she taught me how to make her potato knick, it's basically one huge latke baked in the oven. I mix together the shredded potatoes, onions, eggs, flour, salt and pepper and spread it out in a pan that has a layer of oil, the oil after all is a big part of the Hanukkah story, and baked til brown and crispy. So it's a little less traditional but it's much easier to fix and clean up!!

Some of the night's festivities...

Zinnert Family Christmas Breakfast

When I was little every Christmas morning Sara and I would wake around 4:30am and hurriedly open all our presents from Santa and Mom & Dad. We play for a bit and then get ready to leave. Our first stop was our NanNan's where we had breakfast with our aunts and cousins. And more presents, of course! I remember all those Christmas mornings fondly. Breakfast was always delicious, NanNan's special egg omelet, creamed chipped beef and toast, sausage and bacon. And hot tea, I can remember Joe, Wayne and I fixing cup after cup of hot tea with milk and sugar. Now that we're all older we gather the Sunday before Christmas and still enjoy the same traditions just with much less worry about being on time Christmas morning. This year we hosted our 1st breakfast.

Christmas Concerts & Pageants

Emma's Concert
Emma started taking violin lessons in school this year, a rite of passage for most 3rd graders. I was so looking forward to hearing the beautiful music she has learned to play over the past few months. Fast forward to the night of the concert. I drop Emma off early and try and secure seats with a view for all of us, Daddy, Mo, Dada, Grama and I. I failed miserably, apparently you need to arrive at 5pm and not 6:30pm! We were way in the back on the opposite side of Em, we could just barely make out the top of her hair.Anyway, the concert started, fashionably a few minutes late, and all I can say is it was "beautifully awful". I have to say though it brings back such great memories of all the years I spent in band and tortured my parents. I guess it's time for paybacks. I will say that Lucy loved it. She danced and danced, most appreciative of the music her sister made that night.

Molly's Pageant
Molly attends Community Christian Preschool, the same one Emma attended. Every year they have a Christmas Pageant for all the parents. Now this is the hottest ticket in town, the church is jammed packed with parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, brother and sisters. Standing room only, the director even auctioned off front row seats! We did manage awesome seats here, thanks to Papa & Emma. Molly had a lot of fans watching her~ Papa, Grama, Dada, Emma, Aunt Sara, Alyssa, Brenden, Gabe, Daddy and Mommy. Samantha also sang that night so Aunt Peggy, Uncle Terry, Nicholas and Bradley were there too!
The past 3 times we attended them they've all been the same, although good, the same nonetheless. This year the school hired a new Music Director, Faye, who just so happens to be a very good friend of mine. It's evident that Faye loves what she does and is great at it! The kids love her, the proof is in the pictures.
It was a great night, there is something special about seeing those little kids up there singing their hearts out. Great memories are made from nights like these.

Gingerbread Houses...

It was that time of year again to gather the girls and tackle the gingerbread, icing and mountains of candy. For the past few years, at least '06, we have gathered with Aunt Dana, Sydney, Katelyn, Grama, Aunt Sara and Alyssa to decorate our houses. We've learned a few things along the way but the mishaps we inevitably have are half the fun!!
The decorating of...

Showing off their creations...

And you may wonder where Lucy was during all this fun? She was napping but that didn't stop Mom from letting her enjoy some icing and sprinkles!