Moran Family Fun

At the end of November Jared, Abigail, and I spent a day at Jared's mom's place going through her home and helping her clear out and make room. One of the things we took out of her home that day was some old quilts. Some were completed and in need of repair, some were in progress, and one was just a completed quilt top. I didn't really look at them that day but when I got home and was going through everything I pulled out this beautiful hand-stitched quilt top. I immediately knew I had to find a way to complete this quilt because it would make the perfect Christmas gift for my mother-in-law. I bought some soft flannel for the back and some lovely grey binding and got to work.  I'm really not much of a quilter and this is only the second quilt I've ever made; or at least the second I've ever made correctly. Up until about three months ago every quilt I've made has been sort of thrown together in the easiest way I could figure out and the end results were...

We have a Christmas Eve birthday girl in our family and we love her so very much! Samantha turned 10 this year and having a two digit age makes her an official big girl in our household.  So that her big celebration doesn't get lost in the Christmas festivities we start partying at lunch on Christmas Eve. After a birthday lunch of shredded pork tacos (Sam's favorite meal) she opened her presents which we always make sure are NOT wrapped in Christmas paper. Lucky Samantha hits the present jackpot for two days straight every December! Books from Abigail Webkinz from her sisters. She still loves Webkinz, even though it's no longer 2009! We took a little break after opening presents so Samantha could play with her new things and change her clothes for the third time that afternoon - I'm not sure what that was about but the usual rules don't apply for the birthday girl.  We had to get to the cake fairly quickly though because if we waited too long we wo...

A miniature gingerbread village has sprung up in our dining room and all the kids want to know is if they can eat the houses.  Granted, the houses are made out of gingerbread and decorated with frosting and candy, but I thought they would want their creations to hang around for a little while before eating them! I have declared that the gingerbread houses are to be left alone until after Christmas Day so on the 26th they are fair game. I wonder if they will even taste good at that point? Actually, I kind of wonder if they tasted good to begin with since we used pre-baked, store bought gingerbread.  Either way, we spent an fun evening around the dining room table assembling our various houses. I think the phrase "I have dibs on the icing!" was uttered no less than 5,000 times that night!  They really are teeny, tiny little houses. I think the tallest is about four inches? Anyway, above we have Emily's (with the lollipop trees), behind that you can just see the roo...

Earlier this month we spent an evening at the Washington DC Temple enjoying the Christmas lights. Madison, Emily, and Abigail spent part of the night partnered up with full-time sister missionaries being hosts at the Visitor's Center. I think they all had a good time being hosts and talking with all the people who were there to see the lights and enjoy the musical performances that night.  While they were busy being junior missionaries, the rest of us wandered around the temple grounds.  Sometimes silly, spooky things happen at night Natalie forgot to bring her coat so we couldn't spend too much time outside before it was just too cold for her - the cute sweater dress wasn't nearly as warm as it looked!  Thankfully, there are plenty of things to see and do inside the Visitor's Center. The girls especially liked the interactive displays with games they could play and pictures to color. We actually had two reasons to go to the temple that nig...

Natalie turned eight this past week and she had a great day!  Her birthday was on a school day so the celebration started with cupcakes at school with her class. Once we were all together at home we opened presents. For birthday we let the girls choose between dinner at home or dinner out. Natalie chose to go the Golden Corral because she'd heard they have cotton candy there. She definitely loved eating there. Buffet restaurants are the best for picky eater like Natalie - lots of choices so she's sure to find something she likes and parents who don't really care if you finish what's on your plate before you head back up to get another plate. According to Natalie, Golden Corral is, "Like a restaurant, but better!" Cotton candy 1 of 3 These are just our dessert plates... By the time we got home we were so full that we couldn't imagine eating any birthday cake so we put that part of our celebration off until the next day.  For Natalie,...