Presents and Painting

 I love to watch the kids open gifts!  Glenn and I buy just for the grand kids - and they all draw names!  The adults do a grab bag later on in the day - this year we decided to buy a game for one bag and a restaurant gift certificate for the other!

So it was on to the present opening!!

Aleah and Kenzie love to have matching items so their gifts are ALWAYS alike!

Kylan is our gamer so this sweatshirt was definitely appropiate!

Once again I made Snapfish books for each of the kids - it may not be the most exciting gift each year but I know in years to come they will love looking back at them!

Gwyn was just a delight opening her presents!  She honestly had this reaction on every gift she opened!  I had bought all the kids the same gift which they  opened at the same time - glass mugs with their names on them!

I had bought the girls gnomes when I was in Iowa last fall - they loved them!

Jessi served her yummy cinnamon rolls with coffee right after the opening - we all so enjoy them!

And in the afternoon, painting was on the agenda!  Here are the group of painters - I chose not to paint as it's not relaxing for me and I'm honestly just not good at it!  But I enjoyed watching them and taking pics!

And here are the finished products - aren't they amazing?

Next up - grab bag gifts, predictions and fondue!

Our Family Christmas PIcs

 It wouldn't be Christmas if you didn't take the obligatory group pictures!  And we decided to do them FIRST THING when we got to Jaime's on Sunday morning for our Christmas!

I was amazed our group picture turned out excellent!!  It usually happens that someone has their eyes closed or one of the kids is making a funny face - but I was very happy with the results this year!

Jaime and Brad have such a beautiful house and we were lucky that the sun was behind clouds most of the day so it made for great pictures!

This is the kids from oldest to youngest! (And yes, this one WAS taken later as it's night outside!)

And here is our great family picture!!

Now that the groups are out of the way - we are on to opening presents!!!

Family Christmas 2020

 It might not be Estes Park at the YMCA but Jaime hosted one heck of a great time at their house for our Christmas!!  It was nonstop fun at the Smith household and even though it was a LOT of work, everyone enjoyed the time we all spent together!!

The Savages' stopped at our house about noon on Saturday so we could do some visiting and Robby could help set up a tv that's going to Mexico - then we all headed to Jaime's mid-afternoon and the fun began!

First up - making diamond dot ornaments for the tree!  The kids loved doing this and the ornaments turned out cute as can be!!

When the girls were done with the diamond dots, the boys came up and the girls moved to decorating cookies!  Jessi had made "ugly Christmas sweater" cookies and the kids had fun decorating them!  We made a LOT of frosting!

As you can tell from the pictures, most of the kids were drinking hot chocolate!  Jill had made "cocoa bombs" - the newest craze which is a fair sized chocolate ball with marshmallows or peppermint in the middle!  Matias is dropping his in!

I rarely get pics of the guys but love this one I took of Brad and Robby, deep in discussion!

We served soup for dinner that night - and then it was time to celebrate Kenzie's birthday which was Dec. 2nd AND Gary's which was the day we were together, Dec. 19th!

And finally that evening, we played bingo - just like in Estes Park but the winners got ACTUAL gifts, thanks to Jaime who had a whole tub full of items she had bought and was ready to be rid of!!  The kids had a ball picking out their prizes when they won!

I started out as the caller but Robby took over later as I was starting to get hoarse!!  And wouldn't you know it, I dropped one of the balls and it rolled under Jaime's frig - we tried and tried to get it out but to no avail.....darn!!!

After the kids went back downstairs, a few of us played bingo in the "quiet"!

It was an awesome day!!  We were all tired by the time we headed back to our house - the Keppy's (minus Evan and plus Aleah) stayed with us!  And then it was on to Day 2!

An Awesome Tradition - Our "Unchoir" Party

 It's been HOW many years since we sang in the church choir together?   WAY too many to count!!  And yet the choir director Arlyne and soprano Beth  - we are still great friends and try to get together once every couple of months to catch up with each other!

Yes, we're all getting older and our numbers for the "unchoir" party are now reduced to 4 of us!  Many have moved away - and yet we remember each and every one!

We decided this year to get together at lunch time so nobody had to drive in the dark - does that tell you anything??????  Beth and I headed over to Arlyne's about 10:30 so we could have coffee together and catch up - Steve arrived later for lunch!

We had a very nice get together and served a light lunch of soup and bread - and then had a wonderful Christmas dessert together!

Arlyne's house is always beautifully decorated and with the fireplace going and snow outside, it was truly a wonderful day!  

Home Holiday Tour

 HOORAY!!  We actually had ONE Christmas tradition that did occur during the holiday season for us to attend!  The Home Holiday Tour is something I have done for years and years - and I have rarely missed one!  This year Joleen was in town during that weekend and Jaime was actually off!!  Friend Jane joined us that morning also!

We started our day with coffee from Cafe Leo - always a fun way to start the day!  Jane could only join us for the first 2 houses as she had other obligations so we headed right outside of town for the first one and then did the 2nd one which was right inside the city limits!

There was actually 2 VRBO rentals on the list this year!  One was in the lower portion of a house and was as cute as ever!  The other one was up on a hill with a beautiful view of Pikes Peak!

We had a great day seeing the decorated homes and then ended with Chinese for lunch!  What a perfect day to bask in the holiday spirit!

November Photo Dump

 Surprise!!  I have absolutely NO photos to post in the November Photo Dump - I guess that means I sure didn't do much in Nov. after vacation since we were quarantined most of the month!!

I am still feeling just great - and tomorrow is my LAST day of quarantine, even though I have been out a couple of times to the post office and grocery store!  Glenn is feeling fine - he's out and about doing some small game hunting and working in the shop (which keeps him out of my hair!!)

In Covid news, our county is now up to 655 cases which seems to increase every day - BUT the good news is we have NOT had a new death in the county since last spring!  So that's good news!

The weather has been COLD the past few days - and we did have about 3" of the driest snow ever!  It was sure easy to sweep it off the deck!  Next week is a complete change - we actually have a couple days scheduled to be in the low 50's!  That's unheard of in December!

My friend Joleen is here from KS for 4 days - dental appt and celebrating Christmas with her son and grandson!  And we're BOTH excited to do the ONLY Christmas event that's happening in the county it seems - the Home Holiday Tour on Saturday.  We'll join friend Jane and Jaime to see 6 homes - they have lots of different measures taken to keep everyone safe and there are allotted times that you had to sign up for!  We'll grab some special coffee to go that morning and then head to the houses!

Is it possible that it's only Dec. 3rd and everything is done for Christmas except doing the cards which haven't arrived yet?  YUP - I sure had plenty of time on my hands in Nov. so it's all pretty much done!

Elk Summer Sausage

 Did I mention in any previous blogs that Glenn got an elk?  If not, he did!  It was an easy hunt over on our friends' property and Glenn did all of the cutting up and wrapping.

But a couple days ago it was time to make summer sausage - Glenn borrowed a really nice meat grinder from our neighbor and we spent a couple of hours grinding and making the sausage!

We did several packages of elk burger also - with the understanding that if we loved the sausage, we would thaw out the packets of burger and make more sausage!!

I was impressed with the tools used to fill the casing - so easy!!  I would push the meat down through the grinder and Glenn would fill the tubes!  I was NOT impressed with clean up though - I never am - it always takes a while with sticky meat tools and pans!

The next day Glenn smoked the rolls in the smoker - he must have done an excellent job of it because the summer sausage is REALLY good!!  I mean SUPER GOOD!!  I was very happy with it!

Glenn ended up cutting the rolls in thirds and vacuum sealing them before freezing - we'll be enjoying them for the next few months!