2016 Christmas Card

This year for our Christmas card, we attempted to take some family photos at Eric's parents house while visiting for Thanksgiving.  Below is the final card result and some favorites from our photo shoot both with Eric's brother Rob and on our own.

The front of our card.

The Inside Letter

Our 2016 Christmas Letter:

Life goes by fast and with every passing year the time seems to speed up more an more.  I can remember years waiting for Christmas when I was a child and feeling like it would never arrive.  Now it seems I simply blink and we go from one Christmas to the next.  Poof…another year is gone.  With kids, this crazy tempo of life is even more evident.  We look at pictures from last year and realize how much has changed: both boys have grown into completely different sizes of clothes, Avery went from knowing only a couple of words to having a much larger (albeit often indistinguishable) vocabulary, and Asher’s independence daily takes me by surprise.  Where as the time gone?  How have my babies grown up so quickly?  As I think about the pace of life these days, God keeps placing one word and its two meanings on my heart: Present.  Be Present and savor the Presents of life.  The phrase “live in the moment” seems so trite and yet it is what I have to keep reminding myself.  Be Present and recognize that every moment we have is a Present in and of itself…

I remind myself during daily office work and the mundane chores of life to be Present and focus on the task at hand as whatever I do I should “do it all for the glory of God.” (1 Corinthians 10:31)

I remind myself at home to be Present and not let my worries of work, finances, the kids, etc. keep me from enjoying the precious moments God has gifted me as “tomorrow will worry about itself.” (Matthew 6:34)

During the few moments that Eric and I are alone or able to have a short date together (like a work function to see Seinfeld, a simple Friday night board game, or a football date to Michigan Stadium) I strive to be Present to support our marriage and love on my husband.

During the crazy celebrations of Asher’s Superhero birthday, my dad’s retirement and Avery’s Tailgate birthday, I remind myself to be Present and not get carried away by the fuss and details but rather join in on the celebrations of my loved ones.

When the chaos of life seems tenfold at home (i.e. the two hours after work that we have to make dinner, fight with the kids to eat and get ready for bed), again I remind myself to be Present.  Through the dirty diapers, the random tantrums and the evasion of bedtime, I try to appreciate the time we have (even if I don’t absolutely relish it all the time).  I am constantly reminding myself to savor those gifted moment and the snuggles, story time, wrestles, block building, hide & go seeks and more that come with.

During our week in Florida enjoying the beach and sunshine with Eric’s family and our week in Atlanta and Tennessee hiking God’s creation and catching cup with dear friends I worked to be present and focus not on how many days of vacation were left until returning to normal life, but rather on the wonderful moments we shared playing in the garage as it poured outside, building sand castles in the sand, jumping waves with Gramps, rocking on the porch swing of our cabin rental and taking in the views of Great Smokey Mountains National Park.

As the trials of life came this year and I witnessed beloved friends suffer through great loss, God again reminded me to be Present.  I am reminded to be there to comfort those in pain, to be Present, to take full advantage of every second God has given me and those that I love as I will never know how much time we have.

During our holidays and random fun weekends of the year we are reminded to be Present and enjoy our friends and extended family by coloring Easter eggs at Grandma and Papa’s, decorating Valentine’s cookies at playgroup, touring Chicago as a first for our kids with Grammy and Gramps, jumping in the cottage lake and playing around the grandparents’ basements with cousins.

Now as Christmas draws near I am yet again reminded of the word Present: To be Present to soak in the glow of the Christmas tree…To be Present to tuck away memories of our boys’ precious smiles and excitement through the season in my heart…To be Present to teach them the true meanings of Christmas.  My prayer for myself, my family and you this season is twofold: 1 To be Present throughout the season and the coming year, remembering that “this is the day that the Lord has made…rejoice and be glad in it” (Psalm 118:24).  2: That not only are we present, but that we remember the greatest Present of all…the reason for the season: Jesus Christ, who was born, suffered, died and rose again so that we might not live simply for the present, but for Eternity with Him.  Merry Christmas & Blessed 2017!

Team Week 116: Cookie Weekend

The second week of the Christmas season was quite exhausting.  I felt pretty run down from my cold for most of the week and went to bed early several nights.  On the evenings that I did have enough energy to stay up for a bit, I worked on Christmas presents.  On Thursday night my work week came to a close and by then I was feeling quite a bit better.  Eric and I got the rest of the house decorations up (inside and out) as we prepared for my parents' arrival later that night.  Then the next day, I enjoyed a Monday home with my mom as we had our annual Christmas cookie baking marathon.

When we first bought our home, we began collecting Christmas decorations for our yard.   I found the "squatty penguin" first and loved his cute proportions.  For a few years after, we bought a new decoration every year to go with the penguin, including a "squatty snowman", puppy and moose.  For the past couple of years none of them have worked.  I was disappointment and didn't want to let them go so easily.  Last year we tried them again and they still didn't work.  Eric wanted to throw them away, but I told him that I wanted to relight all of them.  So, I put a reminder for every couple of months to work on them for the entire year.  I told Eric that if I hadn't fixed them by Christmas of this year then he could throw them out.  On this evening, as we worked to get the rest of our decorations up, it was also trash night.  I told Eric he could throw them out because although I had good intentions realistically I would probably never get around to working on them.  Excited, he took the decorations out of the attic to put in the trash but decided to plug them all in one last time.  Surprise!!!...A Christmas Miracle!!...3 of the 4 worked perfectly! :)  All but the moose were saved from garbage and have been happily lighting our yard up ever since!

Cookie day was a lot of fun.  My mom and I have become an efficient machine.  We can bust out the cookies quite flawlessly while chatting away and enjoying our time together.  It is an exhausting day, but one of my favorites of the year!  Without fail, however, there are a few casualties every year.  Sometimes we forget something in the recipe and have to thrown the batch out, sometimes things get burnt and have to be thrown out and sometimes things get dropped on the floor and have to be thrown out (like last year when I dropped an entire tray of chocolate covered pretzels!  :(  This year, there was only one casualty and it was the very first thing I made: Peanut Butter Blossoms.  I made the dough, rolled the balls, placed them on the sheet and then baked them while my mom worked on making English Toffee.  When I pulled them out I noticed that they looked odd, but I couldn't figure out what it was.  Then my mom looked and noticed that I'd forgotten to roll them in sugar.  Not a huge deal.  I thought I'd try to just sprinkle some sugar on them while they were still warm.  I set them down on the stove, sprinkled on the sugar and moved on to my next batch.  A minute or two later we started to smell burning sugar and then my mom looked at the stove to find that the cookies were burning!  My mom had forgotten to turn off the burner while she worked on the toffee and I had set the cookies right on top of it!!  Needless to say these cookies were not salvageable, but according to Eric the rest of the batch was the best I've ever made (& it must be true because he rarely eats home baked goods, but the Peanut Butter Blossoms are almost gone!).

Mom working on Million Dollar Cookies.

Mom and I worked hard all day and by the time the boys came home we had almost everything finished.  We worked on finishing up the candies and the spritz with some help from the boys (with very clean hands and under close supervision).  I wasn't sure how they would do, but Asher was actually a great helper and dipped about 1/3 of all the pretzels after I showed him how.  Avery on the other hand needed to be closely monitored as he was much more interested in eating than helping.

Asher unwrapping Rolos for me.

Avery helping Grandma squish the peppermint patties.

Making Rolo Pretzels with Grandma

Mission Accomplished!  My baking list all checked off!

Christmas: The one time year that my refrigerator's fruit drawer becomes a chocolate drawer.

On Saturday of this week, we continued the family fun time by heading to Crystal Lake to celebrate my nephew Gabriel's 1st birthday!  It was a fun (& crazy) time with a Gone Fishing theme and 9 kids under the age of 7 running around!!

The kids playing a game where they had to bite a gummy worm off a string with no hands.

Asher was not too sure about the game.

Eliza trying to get her worm.

Playing a fishing game.

Gabriel shows off his new moves by taking a couple of steps for everyone!

Gabe gets to open his presents (or rather his brothers open them for him)

Before we left the party, we took advantage of the opportunity to take a picture of all 6 Klingenmaier grandsons before Micah turns 7 at the end of the month...

Micah-6, Caleb-5, Asher-4, Hudson-3, Avery-2, Gabriel-1

After the party we headed back home, but with 4+ hours till bedtime and Gurnee, IL on the way we decided to make a stop at Bass Pro Shop to see Santa.  Both of the boys were passed out when we got there and Avery was not thrilled to be woken from his nap, but they both warmed up to the idea quickly and were happy to play around Gurnee Mills Mall for a while as we waited for our turn to see the bearded man.

We spent about an hour of our wait playing in the Lego Store.

We enjoyed some pizza at the food court while we waited.

We checked out all the toys that Bass Pro had to offer.

Video: "Gi-e-up Ho-sey"

We rubbed our butts on the glass of the fish tank (& by "we" I mean Asher & Avery).  Why?  No idea.

I wish this picture had turned out.  They were acting adorable on purpose.

Finally it was our turn to see Santa.  The boys were really excited to see him but as soon as he talked to them and asked them to tell him what they wanted for Christmas, they both froze and refused to talk or make eye contact.

On Sunday we rounded out the second week of the Christmas season with a little fun in the new snow and a performance by the IBC kids (including Asher & Avery) at church.

Video: Kids Sing at IBC for Christmas

Merry Christmas from Our House to Yours!!