homemade ravioli night

David and the children made ravioli for supper last weekend. The pasta recipe came from Jamie Oliver and was rolled out by hand. The filling was chard sauteed with garlic, oven roasted grape tomatoes and onions, and some feta cheese and sour cream all stirred up together. We made a simple marinara sauce to spoon over the cooked ravioli. Yum!

the big snow

Last week we had a "perfect storm" of weather conditions that brought us a lot of snow. A very big snow. And a blizzard with howling winds and arctic temperatures. It was the most snow anyone in Kansas City has seen for along while. The children had two snow days, and even David could not get to work on the day after the blizzard (although if his building had not been closed I am sure he would have tried to go in anyway!).

meet Ollie

Heaven help us, we adopted a dog. He's a young Golden Retriever, probably about 16 - 18 months old. Oliver or "Ollie" came from a Golden Retriever rescue organization here in Kansas City. We'd been sort of casually watching their list of available dogs, when suddenly this guy showed up on their list at www.petfinder.com and he seemed like a really good fit for us. We were not disappointed when we met him, so we took steps to officially adopt him, and he joined our family just a few days before Christmas.

Since that time we have fallen in love with Ollie and we have learned that it is no longer safe to leave food on the kitchen counter unsupervised or it will be consumed by "the red menace." But really he's not a menace, just a big furry sweetheart who wants nothing more than a couple of walks in the neighborhood each day and lots of playtime with the children, liberally mixed with cuddles and cozy places to nap. He would gladly be a lap dog if we'd let him, but he weighs in at about 55 pounds, so I'm discouraging that!

first snowfall

We got our first snowfall of any significance last night. Not much, but enough to do a little snow play this morning. James shoveled snow to his heart's content, then made a snow angel. Then David and Laurie came out with the sled and everyone had a blast sledding down our little hill. James is old enough and big enough now that he really got into the whole sledding thing . . . then he asked me to explain snowboarding to him. Oh dear. Time to distract him with a cup of homemade hot cocoa in front of a roaring fire.

oh! tannenbaum.

This year we decided to try a Christmas tree farm about 45 minutes away in Ft. Osage, Missouri. It was a lovely drive, and when we got out there it didn't take us long to choose a hilariously chubby-but-yet-beautiful Scotch pine. It was bitterly cold, so we wasted no time cutting it down and dragging it back to the check-out area of the farm. Unfortunately, our tree was SO chubby, that it became stuck in the "bagging machine" - the device that tightly wraps fresh trees in a mesh bag to make them easier to transport. It was so very stuck that it could not be pulled back out or pushed forward. The family that operates the farm was at a loss, trying different things, nothing working. And in the meantime, about a dozen other families had all arrived and selected trees, but no one could leave, as our tree was literally stopping up the operation. It became quite a little party, with all these families standing around the bonfire to keep warm, throwing out suggestions, criticisms and encouragement. Finally some brute-force and a pickup truck pulled the tree through the machine. We assumed it would be a loss, as it had taken quite a beating, but it looked alright, and the tree farm family assured us that if it turned out to be damaged, they would bring us a replacement tree. So, we took our chances and brought it home, removed it from it's bag, and lo and behold, it was gorgeous. A little scraped up on some of it's lower limbs, but nothing broken. Of course, it is SO chubby that we had to move all the furniture out of our library to make room for the tree, but it looks lovely, and it makes us smile every time we pass it.

Thanks to Ft Osage Christmas for making this Christmas tree one to remember!

thanksgiving

We had the nicest Thanksgiving this year. My new brother-in-law invited us out to his family's farm for the afternoon, so for the first time in many, many years we did not host a family Thanksgiving supper at our house. It was so refreshing. Not that I don't love doing Thanksgiving . . . it's my favorite holiday to cook for . . . but it was a nice to do things differently this year. Of course, I still made pies. Of course. But that was all.

And it was a lovely, if a bit chilly, day. The children had a ball exploring the barn and playing in the hayloft, and it was lovely driving home that evening and seeing all the holiday lights that had already gone up.

The only drawback to our Thanksgiving was not having the big kids with us, but we made up for that by doing Thanksgiving II on Friday. Because I just couldn't get through this weekend without roasting an enormous turkey . . . so we had another very nice evening of Thanksgiving dinner and a rousing game of Trivial Pursuit . . .

afternoon walks

I've been trying to make the most of the nice weather we've been having by walking to Lucy's school to pick her up in the afternoons. It's not too far for Lucy to walk, and it is so nice to be out in the sunshine enjoying the fall colors. I know all too well that soon it will be too cold to be outdoors much at all, so we're enjoying it while we can. James rides in the stroller on the way to school, but on the return trek he walks with Lucy. They both gather handfuls of leaves and play hide-behind-tree games while Lucy tells me snippets about her day I might not hear otherwise. And of course there's the added benefit of James sleeping better at night when he has had a nice long afternoon ramble through the neighborhood!