Snow Day

A rare occurance in Central Texas..............Snow!

Train Ride!

Jack finally gets a chance to ride the "Zikler Zephyr" at Zilker Park, Austin's large "city park" downtown.

Lily's 1st Ice Cream cone..........

Fever Children

We have had some sick little ones the past few days..............

This picture is for Hunny Bunny. Jack is wearing a pair of moccassins she and my grandpa made long ago!

Beer Can Chickens

BBQ'd these birds yesterday.......they ended up looking strangely like the kids..........

Tea Time

Lily's New Bed

After several successful attempts of climbing out of her crib Lily is now in a "big girl" bed! We have since changed the direction of the bed.

Sometimes we find her like this...

and other times we find her like that :)

New Smoker BBQ

My Christmas present to myself this year was a smoker barbeque and all the accoutrement required. We have done some pork spare ribs (Smoked), Hamburgers (Grilled), and just yesterday, a beef brisket (Smoked).

Brisket was really why I wanted to get the smoker in the first place. Both Chris and I enjoy good brisket, and to be able to bbq our own is kind of neat. Because of the size of a brisket, it takes a long time, to bbq it "low and slow" in a smoker. I did all my prep work - organizing, getting my tools together, making my "mopping" sauce, and putting the rub on the brisket on Friday night. On Saturday, I got up at 4:45 am and had the smoker up to the right temp and ready for the meat at 5:56 am. After many adjustments of the firebox dampers, adding of wood, adding of lump charcoal, & flipping and mopping/basting the brisket, at 7:15 pm I took it out of the smoker. Yes, that's right, over 13 hours in the smoker! It then went into an empty ice chest wrapped in foil & towels to insulate and rest for an hour and a half. By this time, we had put the kids to bed, so I sliced the brisket (while Chris nibbled a bit), and put serving sizes into Foodsaver air-lock bags to refer or freeze. I am very happy with our results and look forward to doing more smoking soon. - JBS

Merry Christmas

This morning we woke up and the kids were very excited to see all the presents that were left for them! Nonni and Uncle Joe spent the night and we all opened presents and had coffee and cinnamon/orange rolls. My mom and I both bought each other a leopard print Snuggie without knowing it, we had some laughs. Some highlight gifts for the kids are: Lily~princess scoot car, baby dolls with high chair, crib, and stroller (she is obsessed with them!), princess water bottle, and much more! Jack~Little Einsteins rocket, fire truck, guitar, Bob the Builder DVD set, Thomas books, Thomas toys, and Thomas train tent, etc. We had a great dinner of ham, spinach gratin, twice baked potato casserole, cherry coke salad (still a favorite Julie :)), cranberry sauce, rolls. Nonni made a delicious pumpkin jelly role cake filled with a cream cheese filling and pecan pie. Needless to say I will be hitting the gym bright and early tomorrow. Hope everyone had a great Christmas. We didn't get around to sending cards this year, but enjoyed all the cards we received! Have a blessed New Year!

Christmas Eve

Last night we made Snickerdoodles for Santa, the kids had fun putting his plate together. It was fun to have Lily be part of the fun this year. The bottom picture is of the kids sitting on the empty Santa bag that we leave out for him to fill.

Jack's Preschool Christmas Party

Last Thursday Jack had his class Christmas party. Lily and I (Mommy) joined him! They made reindeer pots, made and ate snowman cupcakes, put on a singing puppet show, and then each family got to decorate their own gingerbread house (quite a challenging task when being helped by a nineteen month old and a very hiper 3 year old :) Jack was overjoyed to have us there and he presented me with a gift (an ornament with his picture on it) at the end of the party that he had made for Daddy and I.