Christmas Cards

First and foremost, I want to send a special thank you to all of you who have sent us the most adorable Christmas cards...and I'm going to apologize in the same breath for not sending out our own. Truthfully, I grew up in a house that never sent them out so I've never done them myself, but boy do I love getting them! I'm thinking next year might be the year I actually do them...until then, consider this a special Christmas greeting from us at With Wiz. Wishes for a blessed and merry Christmas, lots of love and joy in the new year and peace in your lives!

Dr. F looks like a creepster, I'm having an awesome hair day and LM, well his face says it all. PS. nice jeans, Santa...

S.A.D

This time of year usually feel a little bipolar...I love love love Christmas, the traditions, the food, the snuggly, sitting by the fire, heart full of love feelings I get when I think back to my childhood Christmases, but I also have this sad, depressed feeling around the holidays too. As intense as my joy is, my sadness at the knowlege of what other people, especially children, will not have is just as intense. I make sure to participate in the food drives and angel trees, but my heart breaks each year at Christmas as the weather turns colder and I know there are kids all over the world who have so much less, who need so much more, and I feel helpless to make a difference. If left to my own devises, I'm afraid we'd have a house full of abanonded kids and animails.

The last few years this has only intensified as I've watched my own child grow. I see how small and innocent and completely dependent he is upon his daddy and I. I am also plagued by the feeling that we aren't doing enough to make a change, but will it ever be enough?

This isnt uplifting or fun, but its been rolling around in my head for awhile now and I'm just not sure what to do with it.

Basketball, Babies & the Godfather

Before I get into today's post, I want to revisit my Thanksgiving post complaining about feeling large in my sweater dress. I loved the comfort the dress provided as I consumed mass quantities of food and will totally wear it and feel good in it again. Also, I can't wait to look preggers again, when I'm actually pregnant. I loved loved loved having a big belly and feeling all mother earth/fertility goddess... I guess I just still feel self-conscious about my weight now, even though Aidan is 2 yrs old already! Oh well....

This past weekend was busy and we like it that way. On Saturday we caught up with some friends in the city whose baby girl is almost 3 months old. Aidan was utterly fascinated by the baby and was totally fine with me holding her. YESSS! I am convinced that letting him play with a baby doll at home has helped. Dr. F and I even got to go on a date to watch an NBA game. I am not a big basket ball fan, but Dr. F is....so it was fun to have him teach me about the game and the stadium was pretty empty so we got AWESOME seats (like 4th row) for cheap!

It is so odd to be the more experienced mom of the group. I feel like I still have a "baby"!

And the highlight of the weekend was Dr. F's cousin's baptism. He was asked to be the Godfather. He was incredibly honored... and I was subjected to weeks of bad Godfather movie impressions...

Aidan with some of his cousins. He looooves them so much!

How to make whipped cream

At Pinch Me's request, here's how to make homemade whipped cream (OHMYGODITSSOGOOD)

1 carton of whipping cream
powdered sugar
vanilla extract
food processor/electric mixer*

A few hours before you want to get started, put your metal beaters & metal mixing bowl/food processor bowl & blade into the freezer. Something about using cold instruments makes the difference.

Pour cream into bowl, add a tsp of powdered sugar and a dash of vanilla (I just use a regular spoon and often leave out the vanilla...this is all to taste anyway)

Beat the cream until it gets stiff (about 3-5 min).

Turn off mixer and lick beaters (this step is optional)

Serve immediately and refrigerate unused portion.

That's it, so easy and so good!

*I don't have an electric mixer, although I've asked Santa for one this year... So I improvised with my food processor and it worked like a charm. Necessity (or broke-ness) is the mother of invention after all :)

Its the most wonderful time of the year

Ok ok, I've been pretty uninspired to post anything lately, which could be due to my post Thanksgiving exhaustion. Don't get me wrong, we had a blast and I was (mostly) successful at keeping my mother and mother-in-law out of the kitchen. Whew. Let me tell you, that was NO easy task! Additionally, my spread sheet was the perfect kitchen companion and it all went off without a hitch. The turkey was moist, the sweet potatos were to die for and we will never buy cranberry sauce out of the can again (1 cup apple cider, 1 12 oz bag of cranberries, 1 cup of sugar... bring to a boil, then cook covered for 10 min till the cranberries "pop" let it cool then refridgerate over night. OMG soooo good!)

I also made Victoria's pumpkin custard pie. Seriously, this is part of the new tradition and I will make this multiple times a year it was so good.

We also celebrated the Little Man's 2nd birthday, Dr. F's almost 30 birthday and my Mother-in-law's bday.  At first I didnt want to post these pictures because my sweater dress and poor camera angles makes me look preggers, which I assure you, I am not...but eff it. We had a blast!

LM got the world's largest rubber ducky for his birthday

We also went to his favorite place on earth, the museum!

Don't hurt yourself!!

My dad, the Little Man, Dr. F and my bro

not the most flattering angle.... but we sure do look happy

My "little" bro making fun of my regimented turkey basting schedule

But it was soooo good.