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Well, I didn't keep up with Christmas, but Keira is getting a Wish from Make a Wish!!

First, I did my best to keep up with blogging through Christmas, but it didn't work.  LOL!  Between activities and Keira's last round of chemo, I just couple keep up.  But I will try to post some pictures or scrapbook pages of Skippy for anyone looking for ideas.

Second, back in August Keira was referred for a Wish from the Make a Wish foundation.  We've been working through the process and we got the word yesterday that our trip dates had been confirmed.  

We will be spending 7 days & 6 nights at Give Kids the World in Orlando.  Keira's wish was to go to Disney World and meet the princesses, and that's just what we're doing.  If you're wondering what Give Kids the World is, visit their site, it looks like a pretty amazing place.  Non profit, for families like ours that have a had child facing a life threatening disorder.  (FYI, it doesn't not have to be terminal, which was always my belief)  

We'll be visiting Disney World (all 4 parks), as well as Universal Studios, Islands of Adventure and Sea World.  Sean & I are pretty excited about the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at IOA, but the kids won't care, they're too young.  

And I had to make a countdown calendar for the kids to keep track of how many days until our trip.  

This was super simple, craft wood, scrapbook paper, ribbon, little chalk board tag, and a sticker letters & the Disney Vacation Sticker, oh and Modge Podge. 

I actually was going to do it hybrid, because digital scrapbooking is my strong point, but my printer isn't working at the moment.  It's not perfect, but it serves its purpose.  

Day 7, 8, 9 plus Skippy

Skippy was taking a little nap in Keira's barbie doll bed yesterday morning. The kids thought it was so funny.  Keira talked about it all day.  

This morning Skippy had made some pretty pictures on the kids pictures.

 

Our activity on day 7 was Elf Ornaments.

Yesterday we had a Gingerbread House Decorating Party at my friend's house.  It was so great, we had 15 kids there.  I think it'll be an annual event.

And today we went to the Family Dollar and the kids picked out some toys for toys for tots to donate.  They really enjoyed it.  And then I went to my mother-in-law's for our 3rd Annual Cookie exchange, so much fun!  

 

Day 6 Activity & Skippy

Yesterday we found Skippy trying to get in the cereal.  

And we made Snow Globes last night after we got home from chemo.

that one is Cooper's.

And Keira's

I bought Christmas village characters to go inside, white glitter & the snow globes came from Michael's.  We also added Liquid Glycerin to the water, it helps the glitter fall slower.  But, keep in mind if you get it at the pharmacy, its a suppository.  LOL!  Sean was not happy with me when he figured it out.  :)  But I have seen online that they sell it at craft stores too.

This morning Skippy was reading Christmas books. 

Finger Puppets

Tonight we made finger puppets, well, I made them & the kids put faces on them. 

Keira di the faces on the pink elf & santa, Coop did the green elf & the reindeer, and I took care of frosty.  I think they turned out pretty cute, I didn't have a pattern to follow, just tried my best to match them to the picture I found.  

December 1st Advent Activity

Today is December 1st and we started our advent activities.  Today the kids made Reindeer Candy Canes and I made "santa" pancakes, I'm not sure if they really look like Santa, but the kids thought they were awesome.

For these Reindeer we used,

Brown Yarn

Googly Eyes

Glittery Pom Poms

Little Jingle Bells

And Candy Canes of course.

I helped the kids wrap the 2 candy canes with yarn and they glued everything else on.  We tied a ribbon on Keira's to make it look like a girl.

When I make these pancakes again I'll use pie filling instead of frozen strawberries because they start to slide and it was hard to really make his hat.

Good Week

We didn't have to spend the night at the hospital at all. LOL! Keira was discharged on Monday, she still has her drain in, but all seems to be going well & it will come out Tuesday morning & she'll start chemo Tuesday was well. She'll have 3 rounds left after next week, and if we stay on track she'll finished chemo the week before Christmas. What a fantastic present for all of us. We've been kind of lazy this week, I did take time for the kids to do a few halloween related crafts, they also decorated the Halloween Tree, which is one of their favorite traditions. Tonight we all painted little terra cotta pots & made them look like a family of jack-o-lanterns. That was a big hit.

the jack-o-lantern family, left to right-Cooper, (the big one), Sean, Keira (front right) & mine.

Keira having fun painting.

And here's Coop last Thursday on his field trip, I didn't have any this cute from tonight.

Our Bucket of Fun Summer Activities

Since this summer is not what we expected again, I tried to come up with some ideas, mainly thanks to Pinterest.com I'm totally addicted to that site.  I came up with a pretty good list of things for the kids to do, weeks that Keira will be having chemo 5 days a week I decided to keep our activity to 1 craft that week.  Other weeks I've got it broken down into 5 categories, Crafts Fun, Food Fun, Fun @ Home, Local Fun and Travel Fun.  

For example our first week is Homemade Playdough, Colorful Flavored Popcorn, Movie Night, Go to the Splash Pad in town and go to the Imagination Station.  Keira and Cooper both loved the advent activities for Christmas, I bet they'll love this. If they start feeling better, Coop is working through a cold or something, he sounds terrible and Keira has woke up feel sick to her stomach the last 2 days.  Thankfully Zofran works.

And here is my bucket, if you want to see it.  I put each week in a different color and wrote the week number on the back, since I have to plan everything almost exactly based on Keira's chemo treatments.  

I got the Paint Bucket from Joann's for $4.99, Self Adhesive Ribbon, each for a $1 and the yellow ribbon was a $1.  I used card stock to print the label on of Dani's old kits, that I think is retired now and those are Lauren Grier word snips, that are also retired.  

Badge Album

For my 365 photo today its a  picture of the badge album I made for Cooper.  Keira has several little books that I've made her.

My speech went well today, got work on not looking at the screen when I use visual aids.  LOL!  But I came in at exactly 3 minutes and we had between 2 and 3 minutes.  LOL!  SO, perfect on time.

 

Where have I been

I swear I don't know why I feel so busy all the time, I really don't do much. 

This past week Sean and I were both out of school for the week, so that was really nice.  Thursday was Thanksgiving of course, we went to my inlaws for dinner and it was really yummy!  I made several things, I couldn't help it, I have to cook on holidays or I feel lost. 

I made these little Turkey hats for the kids to wear on Thanksgiving.  Construction paper, eyes & a paper bag.  A little glue and there you have it.

 
We celebrated with my Inlaws, Sean's Grandparents on his dad's side, my sister-in-law & new brother-in-law and us of course.  It was a lot of fun until Keira hit Cooper in the face with a box.

Friday was Black Friday and I was suppose to go shopping with Pat & Jessi, but Trouble, our cat got bit by something and his face was all swelled up, so I had to stay home so Sean could take him to the vet.

I did get a chance to go shopping in the afternoon.  When to the mall, mainly to get the kids Christmas pictures, but I got a couple shirts, stopped at the Disney store and got the kids gifts from their Great Grandma & Grandpa Korte. Stopped at Target and got a dual screen DVD player for the car so our trip to Florida will be a little quieter.  LOL! 

Then we went to the inlaws for leftovers, came home, got the tree up and I got the rest of the decorations up after Keira went to bed way past her bedtime at 10pm. 

And yesterday I spent the evening watching Florida beat up on FSU. 

And if you don't know who this man is, well, that's Tim Tebow, Florida's Quarterback, he's a Senior and that was his last home game in Florida.  Aside from how hot he is, he's an awesome player and pretty awesome person too.  He's going to be missed!  Hopefully 2 more games before he's gone though. 

And that sums up my weekend.  I'll try to get back in the blogging spirt.
 
  
 
 
 
 

Recipes and a little recap

First, I'll start with a couple yummy recipes.  Since we had our Thanksgiving Dinner on Saturday, I wanted to share the Chocolate Pecan Pie Recipe I got from Paula Deen's Cookbook.

 

Chocolate Pecan Pie

Ingredients
1 (9-inch) unbaked pie shell
2 cups pecan halves
3 large eggs, beaten
3 tablespoons butter, melted
1/2 cup dark corn syrup
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons good-quality bourbon
3 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
Directions
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Cover bottom of pie crust with pecans.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs and melted butter. Add the corn syrup, sugar, bourbon and the chopped chocolate. Stir until all ingredients are combined. Pour mixture into the pie shell over the
pecans and place on a heavy-duty cookie sheet.

Bake for 10 minutes. Lower the oven temperature to 350 degrees F and continue to bake for an additional 25 minutes or until pie is set. Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack.

This one is I guess my mom & my Deviled Eggs Recipe.  I think she does them pretty much the same way. 

 

Deviled Eggs

18 eggs
3 heaping tablespoons mayo
2 tablespoons dill pickle relish
1 teaspoon yellow mustard
1 teaspoon brown mustard
Salt
Pepper
Paprika, for dusting

Place eggs in a large wide saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring to a boil for 12 minutes. Remove eggs and and cool in refrigerator. Remove shells from eggs and slice in half lengthwise. Separate egg yolks and place into a bowl. Place whites on a separate plate. Add mayo, mustard, relish
and salt and pepper, to taste, to yolks and mash together with a fork until creamy
and smooth. Using a large star tip and resealable plastic bag, pipe the yolk mixture
back into each egg, enough to fill yolk holes completely. Dust tops with paprika. Refrigerate.
Serve cold.

We had a fun filled 10 days when Sean's mom & dad were in town for a visit.  We stayed pretty busy.  We exchanged Christmas gifts with them and Keira and Cooper got a bunch of goodies. Sean and I got gift cards.  He got a visa, and Sean's parents really know me, they got me a $150 gift card to Target!!  I budget my money very well, coming in .22 cent under.  I got a pair of boots, canisters and a platter for the ktichen, Pictonary Man,  (which is so fun) and a docking station for my ipod.   Keira got her first pair of roller skates and we tried them out in the basment, I'm sure she'll get the hang of them next summer.  We also took her ice skating for the first time, she did better than I expected her to do to be honest.  We skated with her, but a couple times she wanted to go off on her own. 

Cooper took his first step, but nothing since then.  He just tries to go and kind of falls foward.  I'm convinced that by Christmas he'll be walking. 

We went and had the kids pictures taken for Christmas and I should get them tomorrow sometime and we took the kids to see Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa, very very cute movie.  I highly recommend it.

We went to Color me mine again to do Christmas gifts for Sean's sister and her fiance', so Keira painted to huge mugs and I helped her a little.  I painted her this ice cream cone box, I've been wanting a jewlery box for her, but this was the best they had.  BTW, I don't know what I was thinking with the purple stripe. 

 

 

And on Saturday we had our Thanksgiving Feast since I'll be working on Thanksgiving this year, which if you didn't know will be the last time I ever work on Thanksgiving.  LOL! We had a few of Sean's friends come over, I think he just wanted to show off how much food I cook. 

 

 

Today we watch Wall-e, it was really cute, I laughed outloud a lot and if you watch movies with me, you know that I really don't laugh outloud that often.  Sean actually said something to me about it.  Keira seemed to like it.

Speaking of Keira, big news, but I'll have to wait to tell you, she has to call her Grandma and Grandpa first. 

And, scrapping, I've been scrapping this weekend.

 

 

 

 

Oh, one last thing, Karah Fredricks is releasing a new kit tomorrow at Oscraps.  Check out her blog for a little teaser freebie- RIGHT HERE

Here's my layout with the new kit by Karah.