Update

I realize that I'm not off to a great start this year as I have not made one post thus far this year. Frankly, nothing much is going on. The kids got back to school after the break and we got back into our routine.

Except for the dreaded college students living on our street, our little cul-de-sac is mainly comprised of nice quiet retirees. Unfortunately, in the past month, three of them have passed on. One is left a widower. One leaves a son but we are uncertain how long he plans on staying and the other house is empty. The family is still sorting through the house. We are afraid of what will become of the empty house.

I did work on my new blog book though and have sent it in to get published recently. I think overall, it went faster than the first since I knew more of what I wanted and did not try quite so hard to squeeze everything in. I have not yet received it though.

The only thing exciting going on for the month is my new found love for no knead bread. I read about it some years ago (3 or 4 at least) and kind of saved the information but made excuses to myself of why I did not try it. One of which was that I did not have a covered cast iron or enameled iron pot. Well, we got one from a friend a couple of Christmas' ago (ehem) and hummed and hawed some more over it. Earlier this month, I finally took the dive and tried it. It was easier than anything I've tried in the past and the result? Fabulous, if I say so myself! Better than anything I've made in the past (although, for my part, I'm not the bread baker of the house). Moist chewy crumb, thin crispy crust and yes, no kneading involved! And, Christian was even impressed! I've made about 5 loaves already. I can't get enough of it and I highly recommend it to anyone who loves bread!

The key is in the wet dough and a long slow rise. It is so wet, it makes if very difficult to knead even if you wanted to. And the slow rise gives it a good flavor. Plus, cooking it in the covered pot keeps the moisture in that helps to give it that steam injected treatment of professional bread bakers ovens and creates that ever elusive thin crackling crust. Then the cover is taken off so that it can bake into a nice golden brown. Nothing is easier! I only wished I tried it sooner!

Sea World

Chistian's dad got our family tickets to Sea World this Christmas. We decided that we would go on Monday after Christmas between rain storms while the kids were still on break. Big mistake. The place was packed. Or it's been years since we went last, maybe it is always that packed now? They have also replaced a lot of the nice exhibits. My favorite was always the Manatee Rescue exhibit but they moved that to Florida earlier this year. Now they seem to be replacing real exhibits with a bunch of carnival rides.

Sure the kids think they are fun, but that's not what we are going to Sea World for. We can catch those at Castle Park...for a lot cheaper, I might add.

We were only able to catch the Shamu show. The trainers don't even get into the tank with the orcas anymore. The dolphin show got filled up the three times we attempted to go see it. Hopefully we can figure out when a better time would be to go again to catch the things that we missed before our tickets expire...we'll see.

The crowds started to disperse when most of the shows stopped and it started getting colder. Christian and Emily decided to jump on the Shipwreck Rapids towards the end. Caitlyn wanted nothing to do with it, so I stayed out with her. They got soaked. And boy were they cold afterwards! That is a fun ride but I don't know if I will be able to get Caitlyn on it even in warmer weather.

Needless to say, we were exhausted by the time we got home.

More on Christmas Day

In the afternoon, we headed out to my sister's house to spend time with my family for Christmas. My sister's in-laws were planning to join us for dinner, so we went early to exchange presents before they all got there.

Yup, a ton more presents for the kids. The girls were so excited to get pillow pets from my sister. They just love those things for some reason. My mom crocheted all the girls a little shrug. She's been taking classes. They are a lot fancier than the one I attempted for Emily last Christmas.

We had another huge feast after the rest of her guests arrived. And the girls love playing with their cousins. But most of the night was spent on their WII. Christian and I have not yet given in to getting them any kind of gaming system. So, they never turn down an opportunity when they are given the chance.

Luckily, the girls caught a quick nap in the car on the way over. It was quite late by the time we headed home for the night. But that didn't stop Emily from having a sore throat and feeling generally sick by that time. Of course, she was fine up until we told her that it was time to go home.

Here is the kids annual Christmas picture.

Christmas Eve

We did our usual Christmas Eve get together with our friend Marian. The girls were so excited for their Auntie Marian to spend the night with us. She arrived in the late afternoon with a gigantic rib roast for dinner. It ended up to be big enough for three dinners! We had to take a long walk afterwards!

After the kids got off to bed, we put out and wrapped a couple of last minute odds and ends. Of course, we stayed up way too late hanging out and talking.

Christian still got up in the morning with Emily to go for a little jog. Apparently, Marian has talked us into extending our weight-loss bet a bit. Unfortunately, it was not enough to get either Marian or I up and out to go jogging with them after staying up so late. I still really need to make sure that I get enough rest. I am deathly afraid of getting sick again.

The kids were so patient Christmas morning, waiting to open more presents. Guess what Santa brought them?

But with all the presents that Christian's mom sent them plus all the presents that their Auntie Marian brought, they did not miss opening ours (although we had a token gift left for them) since they had already opened ours early this year.

And for breakfast, we had our traditional belgian waffles! After cleaning up a little of the mayhem, I had to start making food for Christmas dinner with my family and Marian had to head back to take care of her dogs and to get ready for her own Christmas dinner plans.

Caldwell Christmas

On Saturday, we headed down to San Diego to celebrate Christmas with Christian's side of the family. The girls have been excited and waiting for it all week.

Their cousin Michaela is just a couple of months older than Emily and the three of them seem to get along really well. The girls love getting together so that they can play.

Plus, they got to open more presents. How can it get better than that?

The only problem was that their cousins just got over the flu. When we got home, Emily threw up...twice. Oh joy for us. Like we really need another bug floating around the house.

Christmas comes early for the Caldwell Girls

The girls started opening Christmas gifts just after Thanksgiving this year. We put up the Christmas tree the Saturday after Thanksgiving so that we can take their yearly Christmas picture and so that I can get to work on our Christmas cards. I even considered taking a family picture this year (instead of just the girls) but since I had a cold and looked like Rudolf, I scratched that plan pretty quick.

Anyway, after we put up the tree, we let the girls open up one of their gifts. It was, of course, their new Christmas dresses (for their, eh hem, Christmas pictures).

Neither Christian, nor I had too much patience for a long picture taking session as we were stressed out about our car and sick. There is always something but I am never entirely happy with the Christmas picture we end up with. It gets worse when you fix it the way you want it and they "color correct" your picture for you and screw it up again. So it is a bit redder than it is supposed to be. Shutterfly used to let you turn that option off but I don't think they give us that option anymore or have cleverly hidden it so that I have not been able to find it. I may have to switch to Kodak instead next year.

The week after, they were to get the second part of their Christmas present, which is a cute little DVD about the Nutcracker. They show scenes from the ballet while narrating the story. In between acts, they describe and show the girls little ballet moves. Caitlyn got the Swan Lake one last year or so and the girls loved it.

So week three, they got present number three, which was tickets for the Nutcracker presented by the Riverside Ballet Co. at the new Fox Theatre.

Unfortunately, I didn't really get any pictures. But the girls got to wear their new Christmas dresses and were able to follow along with the story because they knew what was going on from the video.

It worked out pretty well. We had second row seats and the girls were really excited. Christian and I were a bit put out though because it was really difficult to find parking since it was so crowded plus the city closed the only free lot in the area to put up some kind of hotel?

Plus, the orchestra was not that good. They sounded like a bunch of RCC students instead of a real symphony orchestra. But the girls didn't notice and had a great time.

I had also found out a week ago that we could have gotten tickets to the Friday night show for FREE! I was less than pleased as we spent a bit more for their presents this year than I would normally have liked to but we really wanted them to experience going to the ballet...and seriously, they needed another toy like they need another hole in the head...that is in the opinion of this mother, and do not reflect the views and opinions of my daughters!

That evening, was our ward Christmas dinner and the girls were in the little Primary program.

They also got to see Santa who came by at the end to visit all the kids.

Emily didn't know what to ask Santa for but Caitlyn definitely wanted a Nutcracker!

Honor Roll

Both girls made the Honor Roll this first trimester. The scheduling was a bit different and a little hard for me this time though because I'm still pretty tired all the time and I had to stay for quite a few hours to catch both ceremonies so I just helped out in Caitlyn's classroom in between instead of driving back and forth.

None of the pictures usually turn out that great but at least I captured the event and we are so proud of the hard work our girls put in every year.

Emily gets an added prize for meeting her AR goals. They have some special pirate themed assembly for them after lunch but I could not stay any longer to check it out.