yup. i am one of those moms.

i think my little baby is the cutest thing out there.

the thing is...... i think sully thinks so too.

finally!

we had our annual gingerbread house decorating contest on wednesday....

and my house finally won! i would like to take this opportunity to thank tagg, who helped decided where the snowman should go. and megan, who made the gingerbread houses. without her, this wouldnt have been possible.

the way hot chocolate should be

i tried out this recipe for the first time last week and it is a winner. and a homemade marshmallow completes the experience.

hot chocolate

1 cup water

5 ounces unsweetened chocolate

2 cups sugar

1 pint whipping cream

milk

in a large saucepan, melt chocolate and water. add sugar, stirring until dissolved. cool and refrigerate. whip cream. add chocolate mixture and whip a little more. transfer to a container and store in refrigerator (stays fresh for about a week). to serve: add 2-3 heaping teaspoonfuls of chocolate mixture to hot milk. stir and enjoy.

bellevue d'lights

last nite, we walked thru the bellevue botanical gardens to see their christmas lights display. it is pretty amazing what they can do with little christmas lights. our favorite part was the waterfalls (behind craig).

christmas parties

last weekend, craig and i hosted a little christmas party for our friends.

i was slaving away on these cupcakes right up until the party. i made one batch of frosting and didnt really like it so i started all over again. kind of annoying but i take my cupcakes seriously.

matt and hanna. they just found out they are going to have twins!! i am so dang excited for them.

we had a white elephant gift exchange too. emily and elliot waited patiently to see who would open their amazing gift (and by amazing i mean crappy and semi-inappropriate). ali got the best gift of all! a dungeons and dragons sword. complete with chains and a sheath. tagg was obsessed. he wanted it soooo badly.

he drowned his sorrows about not getting the sword in my french hot cocoa with homemade marshmallows.

the girls. tagg randomly jumped in the shot to grab onto emily's white elephant gift. which, lets just say, was a failed attempt by one of her second graders to sculpt a lighthouse.....

after my party, i ran over to my brother's annual christmas party. that's tucker, in the red and black plaid shirt, playing a little christmas music for some of his friends. so fun!

a christmas carol

our group was slim pickins this year, as we headed downtown for dinner and a christmas carol. but we still had a great time. we went to nordstrom cafe for dinner. they have the best pizza. ever.

megan and grace at dinner.

as we were walking over to the ACT theater i noticed a restaurant across the street..... SULLIVAN'S! what a cool name.

when we got to the theater we were all freaked out at how empty is was. usually you have to wait in line for ten minutes to get a picture taken in front of this tree. we were all really depressed thinking that the economy must be so bad that people arent doing fun things anymore. ummmm yeah. until we realized that we had rushed over to the theater 40 minutes early. oops.