You Can't Catch Us Cause We're The Kapnick Boys

Leland has wanted to make gingerbread men for some time now. So we finally got the chance last week. I ended up staying home with Leland last Wednesday because he was not feeling well. We were able to get the dough mixed, but then he spent the rest of the day on the couch or in bed. I thought we would bake them the next day, but wouldn't ya know Sutton ended up catching the beetle. So I think we finally baked/decorated them 2 days after we mixed them up. Sutton was still not feeling well so he was only up to decorating 1 gingerbread man before he had to head back to the couch.

Can't Everyone Please Look At The Camera And Smile At The Same Time Just Once?

Well it was Nate's favorite time of year again, time to take the family photo in front of the Christmas tree!!!! It didn't go any differently than expected. I finally selected a photo only because no one would cooperate to have any more taken. Then when I printed them at Target and brought them home it looked worse than before. I even ended up coloring the dogs eyes in with a brown crayola marker. Oh well I guess when you have 2 kids, 2 adults, and 1 dog what do you expect.

Frozen Fun

Last Friday we attended our second Christmas parade. After attending the first we decided that it was so awful that we should go to one more that was sure to satisfy. Nathan's Aunt Kay had watched the boys for us that day and then we attended the parade with her. Actually Sutton never made it home that day, she had taken them to her house and Sutton was sleeping when I got there, so I left him sleeping and only brought Leland home between work and the parade. The boys got the usual parade fill: candy and squeeze balls. The parade was a sure fire thriller with things like a goat wearing Christmas lights and jeeps and tractors all decked out in holiday spirit. Of course Leland was looking for the John Deere tractors and when a red one finally came by Sutton said "hey International that's my kind". We ordered a pizza hoping to eat before the parade, but to our surprise it took about an hour and 15 minutes to get a pizza to go. Lesson learned on the night of the parade call about 2 hours ahead to get a pizza!!!

Let The Tractor Hanging Begin

The boys were anxious to help put the ornaments on this year. I was asked about every 2-3 minutes as I put the lights, berries, and other items on that they could not help with if it was time to put the ornaments on yet. When I finally gave the go ahead boxes were ripped open with passion, especially the boxes which contained tractors!!!

The Hunt

I wanted to get our Christmas tree a little earlier this year because it always ends up taking a week or a little longer to get everything out and decorated. Since Nate did not end up working the weekend of Thanksgiving we were able to go on Saturday of that weekend. Nate tried talking me out of a real tree several times by reminding me what a mess they make, but you can see he never did succeed. My dad and Kathy came along this year and also got a tree. While on our hunt Nate kept reminding me not to select trees that were too big, but I always remind him that we have 27 foot ceilings!! All the trees I selected were too big for his liking or the trunks were crooked. So we finally decided on a lovely tree that Nate selected and when we got home he determined it as being too big, go figure!!

From Old Traditions to Red Neck Turkey Frying

After we left Pete and Grandma's we came home to prepare for our next meal. Nate's dad, Pam, Pam's parents, my grandma, Aunt Debbie, and cousin Jessie came for dinner. Nate is not a fan of oven cooked turkey, so our turkey was to be deep fried. Of course just as Nate's dad got here with the bird it decided to start raining. So being the genius engineers that they are they built a tent out of tarps. It was pretty fun watching them devise the plan. I do have to say that it was successful and the turkey turned out wonderfully.

Just Like The Old Days

We had a very relaxing and peaceful Thanksgiving this year. We started our day out at grandma Rosie's and Poppa Pete's. We had a wonderful meal. Following the meal as has been the tradition now for quite some time we celebrated Christmas. The boys of course enjoyed opening presents and playing with all the other kids, from rough housing to playing bubble gum bubble gum in a dish!! It was nice to see everyone this year, usually by the time we get there most everyone has left.

Building With Poppa And Painting With Grandma

My dad is good at and enjoys woodworking, so when we went to the Home Depot for the first time and saw that the project was a fire tug boat we thought the boys would enjoy making them with him in his wood shop. So on a recent Friday off of work the boys and I did just that (of course only after a brief visit to the mega farm, we pass by a very large dairy farm on the way to my dads house and we are not allowed to go to his house without first stopping at the farm). The boys had tons of fun using all the tools in the wood shop and I think the best part was getting to paint them when they were done building.

An Unexpected Late Night Visitor

After a recent late night shopping trip I was coming down stairs from putting the kids to bed. I hear Nathan calling me "Am, we have a visitor". I could not imagine what it could be, it was 10:00 pm, so I didn't figure it was a person. As I walked into the kitchen I see this teeny tree frog hanging onto the edge of the grocery bag. Nathan decides that we need the fearless frog catcher to assist with the removal. Leland was delighted to assist with the frog removal!!

Grandma E. Turns The Big 8-0

My grandma celebrated her 80th birthday last week. As we have done for the past couple years we celebrated with dinner and cake. Sutton wanted to help blow out the candles, so much that as I lit them he blew them out.

Bargin Shopping

When is the best time to buy Halloween costumes. About 1 week after Halloween when they are 75% off. The boys enjoy dressing up so this was the perfect time to stock up on dress up items. I paid anywhere from $3 to $6 for the costumes and only ended up spending a little over $20 for 4 of them. I was able to find a captain, a swat team officer, an astronaut, and superman.

Spice Rack Building Gone Wrong

The Home Depot does a free kids building clinic the first Saturday of each month. For the month of November we built spice racks, well some of us did. Nate helped Leland and his turned out beautifully. I helped Sutton and well what can I say his didn't turn out so beautifully. When I turned it over, Nate instantly says how is that going to hold any spices (like we were really planning to use these to hold spices)? I took a close look and responded "I don't really know". Some how Sutton and I had managed to place the dowels for holding the spices in the rack directly against the back of the rack. Thank goodness Sutton didn't even notice and was exclaiming right after completion of the project "I did it!!!" I think next month I will read the directions!!