Decorating the tree

We chose to get a real Christmas tree this year because we like the smell and love to clean up all the needles that fall. Just kidding, we don't like that part. The kids had tons of fun putting on all the decorations and the lights. We did it first thing in the morning so the girls have knotty hair. And yes, I am that mom that goes around after and spaces out the ornaments and puts some up higher where they couldn't reach. I just have to have it look nice, okay?

Thanksgiving 2011

Thanksgiving this year was filled with the normal Strong family fun: playing with cousins, lots and lots of delicious food, and a visit from the Great Turkey.

Halloween 2011

Halloween started with our traditional festive cookies...

And dressing up for the ward Trunk or Treat.

We had a cat, a skeleton, Dorothy...

and a little jack-o-lantern!

Explosion!

I started making bread and after everything was mixed together I had to leave and pick up Matthew from school. 20 minutes later I came home and the bread had risen and popped the top right off. It reminded me a little of the movie "The Blob."

New haircut

I was gettting tired of all the tangles in Corinne's hair so I cut it. Yep, I did it myself. It didn't elliminate the knots, but it doesn't always look like a rat's nest in the back anymore.

Masen pictures

I've been behind in posting pictures of Masen. Here is my attempt to get caught up for the past 4 months. I tried to put them in chronological order, but I can't be sure if they are.

Summer 2011

We've had a busy summer. Nevermind I had a baby in May and then was called as the ward Young Women president a few weeks later. We had fun and celebrated Jeremy's birthday in June with the traditional carrot cake...

And blowing out the candles. No, he's not 45. These were the only candles in the house at the time.

We also celebrated Matthew's birthday in August with the same traditional carrot cake. But he wanted violet frosting with chocolate sprinkles. Done and done.

Lucky for him his birthday coincided with a visit from Jeremy's sister, Tammy and her kids and his sister, Sheridan and her kids moved into the neighborhood about this time.

Aunt Tammy wanted to pretend she had daughters for a little bit and spent time with the girls painting their nails.

Some of the cousins.

And more of the cousins.

We also took a trip to Utah in July for Pioneer Day. We stayed at my brother Daniel's house and got to spend time with their cute boy, Rusty. The best part of the drive--when all 4 kids were asleep.

Some friends from CT came to visit for Independence Day and invited us to their hotel to play at the waterpark and then we took them to a nearby splash park and played with sparklers while waiting for the fireworks show to start.The kids learned how to joust at stake activity...

and we spent even more time at the splash park. What a fun and busy summer!

Favorite dishes

For the past year we've been trying to make it a goal to make as much of our food from scratch as we can with all natural ingredients and as much from our garden as possible. Here are a few of our favorites. We're thinking about creating a webpage or blog to document our garden successes and to post our recipes. Pictured: cream of mushroom soup, tomato basil pizza and garden vegetable pizza, lemon basil penne with lemon marinated grilled chicken, pasta with garden vegetables topped with freshly grated parmesan cheese, and home made chicken pot pie.

Picnic with the ducks

I know these latest posts are out of order. I'm just getting caught up since having the baby. Around the beginning of May we went to a local park to feed some ducks. It was beautiful weather in the evening and we had a little picnic of sandwiches, chips and salsa and guacamole. We brought a lot of stale bread and old pancakes to feed to the ducks. The kids just loved it. We even saw a mama duck with a group of baby ducks behind Corinne in the second picture. And the last picture is me about 3 weeks before Masen was born.