Wednesday, December 31

Christmas Cookie Cookin'

For our Christmas goody boxes and plates (see explanation below), we made these peanut butter star cookies, chocolate crinkles, sugar cookies, chocolate chip cookies, salted nut rolls, chex mix, cereal mix and pretzel chocolate M& M doodads.

Ever since Blogger changed their format for loading photos, none of my pics are ever in the right order. If they'd make it easier to move them around that'd be nice, but for now, you'll all just have to deal with the dysfunction of my photo loading efforts. Above is the photo that'll make Tori drool! It's the table full of cereal mix drying in the open air. Jack, Amy and I made boxes and plates of Christmas cookies and other assorted goodies for neighbors, family, friends and a few shut-ins the Saturday before Christmas. I was up into the wee hours of Saturday morning, then got up and got to cooking again and cooked all day Saturday. We handed out the goodies on Sunday after church and before our program (yes, Amy and I sang!) and cause much delight as we passed them around. We REALLY enjoyed making all the goodies and will definitely do it again next year!

Jack was a great deal of help, as you can obviously tell by the photo above.
If you wear the mitts, you're officially in charge, kid.
This photo doesn't belong here at all. Grammy Tami and Gampa Jerry gave Jackles a doctor kit for Christmas. Amy took it with her to the doctor that Monday for his appointment and it really helped with his fear. The nurse would check him and he'd check her. It works really well for all you parents with doctor-phobic chitlins.
Jack's buddy Owen sent this all-too-fitting shirt to him for Christmas. It says, "It's my way or no way."
And now we're baking cookies again! *%#&ing Blogger. 
I don't even remember why he was crying here.
Putting the sugar into the mixing thingy. He had a good time helping out...for about an hour, then moved on to something else.

Tuesday, December 30

Fetus Whisperer Prediction

Okay, I get it. You want some Christmas pictures. I promise some as soon as I get the paper done tomorrow morning. All the pix are on my work computer. Maybe in the meantime, Aunt Susan can send me some and I can do just one post...hint hint...

For now though, I am forced to do a fetus whisperer prediction. My sister finds out tomorrow what she's having. I've put off as long as possible this particular prediction 'cuz I thought for sure I was right last time and was WRONG, totally messing up my ratio.

So now I have to totally wing it again and I have no clue! Usually, in order to predict I have a simple system. I picture the family, then picture the family with one or the other. That system ALWAYS gives me a strong feeling either way and I just roll with it (and 13 for 15 is a pretty good system, right?). On this one, I have absolutely no strong feeling either way at all--probably because a year ago yesterday she had Jacob. I need more time to feel out the family dynamic! (I'm gonna have to make a rule about distance between kids 'cuz I need an Excedrin right now. As I'm sure she does also.)

Right now I'm going to go into a dark room and really concentrate on what it is. I'll be right back to post my prediction....

... I'm back and it's a...













....stay with me now....













....wait for it...













...a little more patience....













....keep scrolling....















It's a....











GIRL.

Amy's at it Again

New and improved weight loss blog....

amyvrbi.blogspot.com

Sunday, December 14

Check It Out!

My first few days at work happened to be the same week our web page redesign was launched. Since I feel like I know a little bit about that and the program was similar to what I use here, I appointed myself the guru of the site. My first three days involved troubleshooting the site and getting everything uploaded. By Friday afternoon, I felt like I'd taken 'stupid pills' my brain was so fried!

I have some tweaking to do--of course--but overall I think it's pretty awesome. We are now able to put news on as it happens (cuz there's always breaking news around here!) Check it out:

www.waunetanebraska.com

And make sure you vote in the poll!

Saturday, December 13

An Olde Fashioned Xmas Day

We headed downtown today for Palisade's Old Fashioned Christmas celebration. I was photographing for work, but snapped some photos of Jack and Peyton too. Here, Jack gets his stockingful of goodies from the man in red. He looked up and very enthusiastically shouted, "Thanks, Santa!" It was totes adorkable.
Peytie with Santa Claus. She was pleasin' with some cheesin'.

Jack and I had been discussing what to do when you sit on Santa's lap. He wasn't nervous or shy a bit. Santa asked him what he wanted and he said "cars". (I think he put an order in for Nathan too, Missy). Then he said "Thanks, Santa" again and just kinda sat there talking to him. Any fears I ever had of Jack being shy have disappeared lately. The kid is a jabberbox and will literally talk to ANYONE.

Okay...yep...you know what I want for X-Mas now...nice to meet ya...can I get down now?
When I'm photographing for the paper, I get all kinds of crazy ideas like climbing on top of buildings and stuff like that. I'm only posting this photo, which we won't use for the paper because it's a bit overexed, because I thought it's funny that the two chitlins running around like screaming banshees were the two Vrbas boys' spawn. Whodathunkit?

Wednesday, December 10

Granny Janny's House


Mommy was muy sicko all weekend (and part of this week already too), so Jack and I spent very little time at home in an attempt to avoid her icky mommy germs.
On Saturday, we went to a movie with Granny Janny, Unca Joe, Aunt Sarah, Peyton and Luke then to Tori's game with Heidi and Heather. Sunday, after church, we went to Granny Janny's and chilled there. And this is the only photo I took all weekend. It was naptime and Jack and Granny Janny were both needing their beauty rest. I love the fact that Jack has a Hawaiian Punch 'stache in this pic.
Mommy is still having stomach issues, so we're hoping that clears up soon. It's no fun having a sick mommy.

Tuesday, December 2

Craft Time


This morning, Jack and Daddy decided to do a quick craft after Mommy left for work. We'd had the stuff to do it for a while but I was finally patient enough to try it this morning. Jack did a great job of putting the letters on where I asked and told me all the sounds the letters make (thanks, Leap Frog videos!). Then we both worked together on the pipe cleaners. The little swirls are from his fingers. Some of the others are from mine. The yellow one on the right side is something he did and I thought it was cool so we put it on. At our house, we always say "I love you seriously." It's something I started when Jack was an infant and it just sorta stuck. It's our thang. Now Mommy has something to decorate her room with! YAY!