The Oatmeal Rasin Cookie

 

 

This is a memory I shared with Pie Pie recently and she enjoyed it tremendously.

 The year Pie Pie was one we spent Christmas living with Daddy's family. Their names are Grammy and Grumpy. I did not choose their grandparent names. They were chosen long before I came into the family. I do, however, enjoy their unique names!

It was shortly after Christmas day and we were playing a card game together. Grumpy was looking for whatever cookies he could find and Pie Pie was just roaming around. The only cookies Grumpy could find were oatmeal raisin. He is not fond of raisins. He actually calls them bugs. He did want to eat some cookies, so he decided to pick the bugs out and just eat the cookie part. He would place the "bugs" on the end of the table and Pie Pie would snatch them off and eat them. I, of course, had a laugh about the whole situation. That's what I call sharing!

So, if you ever see a smile on my face while I am eating an oatmeal raisin cookie that is the reason why!

From Grumpy Pants to Happy Sheep

Originally, just Pants was supposed to be in the Christmas play at our church, but in the end Pie Pie and I joined in too.The play was called Shepherds, Sheep and a Savior. It was a cute play with funky songs.

 

 

  The practices were pretty hard on Pants and she made it tough for us to get her to participate. The day before the actual performance, I couldn't get her to do much of anything! When the day of the performance arrived, she transformed into the best sheep ever!

 

 

She did everything she was supposed to do in the play with a great big smile on her face.

 

 

Pie Pie did an excellent job as a traveler. This is the role I played as well. We had to pretend the sheep were smelly and ignore the shepherds. My friend said we did such a good job (along with other travelers) that she could actually smell the stink! We even got a chance to go up on the stage at the end and help the rest of the cast sing.

 

There I am in the brown with the blue sash!

 

 

 

 

All of the other kids did great! I'm very happy that my kids could be a part of such a great program. This play reminded me that Jesus came for all of us even people that we might not view as important.

Luke 2:8-16

New International Version (NIV)

⁸ And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. ⁹ An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. ¹⁰ But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. ¹¹ Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. ¹² This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”

¹³ Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,

¹⁴ “Glory to God in the highest heaven,
and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”

¹⁵ When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.”

¹⁶ So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger.



More Books

I read most of these books a little while ago, but I haven't had a chance to post them on here. My current reads are Christmassy. There are certain books I love to read this time of year. Perhaps I will get to share them in a later post. Anyway, here are some of my recent reads on Nikki's List of Books!

 

Watership Down

by Richard Adams

This book is a great adventure story. It's about a group of male rabbits trying to find a new home. They have lots of trials in the search and when they do find a home, they realize there is no female rabbits. They decide they need some women, so the dangers start all over again. My favorite rabbit in the book is Bigwig. He is a tough fighter and knows what he wants. This is now my favorite in Nikki's List of Books. I would recommend this book to everyone!

 

The Catcher in the Rye

by J.D. Salinger

This book is a story where you are basically thrown into the brain of a 15 year old boy, who is on his own, over the course of a couple of days. He sets off from school and heads to New York. A lot of unusual events happen. He drinks and smokes and does other things you would expect him to do on his own. The ending is rather abrupt as well. It was an interesting read. If you like a lot of curse words, you would love this book. I'd put it on your maybe list.

 

The Great Gatsby

by F. Scott Fitzgerald

This book is a love story. It was a rough start, but it gets very good. I actually started the book, put it down, read another book and came back to this book. The second time it was much better. I really got into the mysterious Gatsby. It's set in the 20's, so there are lots of fabulous parties. These parties are all planned with the hopes of reuniting with a lost love. Will the Great Gatsby find his love? I recommend this book to everyone.

 

What should I read next?

Referred Reading

This book was given to me a while ago to read and I never quite got a chance. I thought now would be a good time to give it a read! This book is called Blink of an Eye and it is by Ted Dekker. I have seen some of the movies based on his books, so I was fairly certain this would be a good story, and I was right!

 

 

This is a very suspenseful story. It is about a man who has a special gift of seeing the future. It is not just one future either. I'll let the book explain that idea to you. This man is on a mission to save a girl he doesn't even originally know, They get to know each other as he uses his gift to save their lives. There is a LOT more to this story. I would highly recommend this story to any and everyone! It has suspense, action and some mushy stuff too!

Thanks to my good friend Pam for the referral!

Smiles

Give Thanks!

 

 

In the month of November we like to do a project to remind us of what we are thankful for in our lives. I decided to share a few on our blog.

 

Pools, sisters, daughters, cousins,

 



 

flowers, Pants,

 

 

Daddy, Pie Pie,

 

 

my nephew, Knoebels, smiles,

 

 

dance,

 

 

birthdays, my parents, food, friends,

 

 

Grammy and Grumpy, cozy hugs,

 

 

God's love, the Bible, Jesus, Church, Awana and Bible Study!

This is just some of the things we are thankful for today and every day!

 

Smiles,

Nikki!

Birthday Pants!

We recently celebrated a very special Birthday! Our very own Pants is now a full hand old!

Here she is with her bestie!

In preparation for her Birthday, we made a countdown chain that she could take a loop off of each day. This solved the problem of her asking me how many days it was until her Birthday. Which she asked a lot, until I put the countdown chain up for her. Once this was up, she could figure it out on her own.

We also read some fun Birthday books we checked out from the library.

 Birthday at the Panda Palace by Stephanie Calmenson 

Cake Soup by Richard Scarry

Otis and Sydney and the Best Birthday Ever by Laura Numeroff

Angelina's Birthday by Katherine Holabird

Little Mouse's Birthday Cake by Thacher Hurd

Ladybug's Birthday by Steve Metzger

Five Little Monkeys Bake a Birthday Cake by Eileen Christelow

Little Mouse's Birthday by Jeanne Modesitt

The Biggest Birthday Cake in the World by Elizabeth Spurr

You Have to be Nice to Someone on their Birthday by Barbara Bottner

 On her actual day, we had a little party. My Mom made her a fabulous pink bunny cake! It was, of course, chocolate. Pants loves chocolate.

She blew out the candles on her fourth year and got ready to start her fifth!

She's growing up way to fast!

Happy Birthday Pants!



Smiles

I have some pictures of some of the fun things we have been doing.  They are completely random, but super fun!

 

 

 Pants making new kitty and people friends on the farm.

 

 

Mickey out Trick-or-Treating with Ballerina Minnie.

 

 

My girls enjoying their treats and balloons.

 

 

My friend and me.

 

My Nephew's favorite Birthday present!

 

 

I leave you with a stinkbug on a cupcake!

 

 

Smiles,

Nikki!

 



Referred Reading

I recently posted about a list of books that I want to read. Just so everyone knows this is My List. I made this list up all on my own in my head. I don't know why, it's just something I want to do. Well, anyway, I asked for some ideas for books to read too. You can never have too many books to read! One of my friends referred this book to me. If anyone else has any suggestions feel free to give them as well. You can post them in the comments on my blog or on one of my Facebook pages.

 

Flowers For Algernon

by Daniel Keyes

 



This book is a happy and sad story. It is about a man and a mouse. A mouse named Algernon. This story is written in journal form, which I personally love. This book tells the story of a man with very low intelligence who is given the opportunity to have very high intelligence. Unfortunately things do not always go as planned. I wouldn't recommend this book to everyone, but I enjoyed it. (There are some parts in it that I know some of my friends would not like.)

I just want to say thank you to my friend Michael for referring this book to me!

Deep Roots Valley Farm Field Trip

For the second adventure of our little learning group, I thought it would be fun to visit a farm. Everyone loves animals and farms are always a fun time. It just so happens that my cousin and his family live on a farm and they invited us all to come and visit.

 

First we said, "Hi!" to some cows, while everyone arrived.

 



 

Then it was time to take a hayride. I love hayrides and made sure we could have one when we visited. It was a great, bumpy ride!

 

 

 

 

After the hayride we visited the rest of the animals. There was

Horses,

 

 

goats,

 

 

turkeys (yummy for Thanksgiving!),

 

 

and the Happy Hens!

 

 

We got to hear a little talk about how they raise their chickens. We also got to see the difference between their eggs and the ones you buy at the store. There is a big difference in taste as well as looks.

 

 

We got to feed the chickens and then it was time to feed ourselves.

 

 

We ate lunch by their pond. It was great weather for a picnic. The bees loved our lunch too! The kids had a great time running around and playing. The moms also got a chance to talk a bit too.

 

 

All of the families went home with a dozen, delicious eggs! We had ours for dinner.

If you would like to know more about Deep Roots Valley Farm please check out their website here.

We all want to say thank you for the hospitality of the Smith family in letting us take a trip to their farm!

 

Pants the Sheep

This year one of our girls is going to be in the Christmas play at church. Pants is going to be a Shaggy, Smelly Sheep!

That's what they call her in the play. I personally think she smells quite nice! She is very excited to be a part of the play this year. She likes going to the practices and she is learning the songs.
 

Sometimes the sheep get a little too into the music.

She's waiting for her cue to do her favorite part. Chasing the shepherd!

She's a very quiet sheep.

 

I am very happy Pants is enjoying being a part of her first play.

She loves being on the stage!

Smiles

A Look Back....

I thought it would be fun to post a few photos from our first Corn Maze Day!

Pants and Pie Pie were so little then.

 

 

 

They have grown up (and are continuing to grow) beautifully!

Smiles,

Nikki!



Fifth Annual Smith - Edgar Corn Maze Day

 

 

It's hard to believe this is our fifth corn maze day. My Mom always plans a wonderful day for all of us. We start out the day at the corn maze. The kids had a wonderful time climbing on each other and a giant pumpkin.

 

 

Then we headed into the maze. The kids love to find the question signs that are supposed to help you through the maze

 

 

We made it out of the maze rather quickly this year. I don't know if we are getting better at the maze or if we were hungry!

 

 

 

Then we went back to my parents' house for the kids to decorate pumpkins. Stickers are my favorite for kids. They can do it all by themselves and no mess!

 

 

Then it was on to a yummy dinner of 'Sketti and Worms! There was also some meatballs!

 

 

For dessert we had Puddin' and Eyeballs!

 

 

 

Little blurry, but we were laughing!

 

 

We had a great time and lots of laughs!