The Last Day Of 2013



It's hard to believe that we've already come to the end of 2013.  Where does the time go?!

 

The McLaughlin Family has had another busy fun-filled year and I wanted to re-cap just a few of the highlights.

 

Braden made his First Communion in May.



 

Adeline loved to spend time at the splash pool during the Summer months.

Careline was voted in to the Student Council...a job she takes very seriously.

 

And the highlight of 2013 for Pat and myself was our fabulous trip to San Francisco in September to celebrate our 10th anniversary. 

 

Wishing everyone a safe and Happy New Year!

 



Some Of Our Favorite Things

Santa was good to us this Christmas and we were good to one another as well.  I probably can't even remember all of the terrific gifts that were exchanged but here are some of our favorites.  The first photo is of two homemade gifts that I'll treasure forever...the one on the left was made by Adeline (with a lot of help from her day school Teachers, I presume) and the one on the right was made by Buddy.

Speaking of homemade gifts.  How beautiful is the quilt that Grandma Ginger literally spent years making.  Thank You Mom.

Santa brought Braden and Adeline each a Kindle Fire.  Now all three kids have one and long car rides will be much more peaceful for Daddy and myself (man that Santa is smart!)

Adeline got the one and only thing that was on her list...a Dora The Explorer Dollhouse.

Santa brought Daddy a Packers t-shirt and sweatshirt so he can cheer for his little superstars in style.

Careline got a keyboard along with the promise of lessons from Mama.



 

And last but not least, Adeline seems to be truly enjoying Careline's new make-up kit.

 

 



Another Visit To The Science Museum

Today we took a family trip to the Science Museum.  For Buddy and myself it was our 2nd visit in 6 days.  We look forward to visiting the museum numerous times throughout the next year with our season pass (Thanks Grandma Ellen and Mary Jane).  Our adventure today included watching several informative demonstrations.  Careline even volunteered on stage during one of them.

Merry Christmas Eve 2013

Fantasy Football Champion

Perhaps I shouldn't give Pat such a hard time for constantly watching sports.  Last night, he earned the title of Fantasy Football Champion in the league he has played in with his college buddies since 1992.

This morning I found the trophy in the garage and left it, fittingly enough, on his recliner for him to find when he wakes up.  Hopefully my dear Hubby dusts it off before he finds a home for it in the bar for the year.

Buddy's Fathead

How cool is this life-size fathead of Buddy in his catcher's attire?  Daddy and I affixed it to the wall this morning and called Braden in to his room for the surprise.  He really likes it...as he should...it looks awesome.  

Pat asked me if I wanted to make a fathead of him sitting in his recliner watching sports and drinking a Coors Light but I declined as that picture is already permanently etched in to my memory bank...no fathead required!

Science Museum

Buddy and I spent a fun afternoon together at the Science Museum exploring, learning, and playing.  

New On The McLaughlin Tree This Christmas

The McLaughlin kids and the Kay kids have the fun tradition of exchanging ornaments each Christmas season.  Here are the ones carefully chosen by Emily in 2013 for our trio.

Celebrating Emily's 12th Birthday

On Sunday we celebrated Emily's recent 12th birthday with a nummy taco dinner at her house.  Do you like how she's holding up 12 fingers (Careline helped her with the 11th and 12 digits as she thankfully was born with the standard 10!)

Busy Busy Weekends





These days our weekends are super busy with us running the kids from one sporting event to another.  Let's take this weekend, for example.  Last night Careline played an indoor soccer game.  Then, at 10 o'clock this morning, she had a basketball game in St Paul.    

 

It doesn't matter that Careline is always one of the smallest girls on the court...she's guaranteed to be the most aggressive hardest working one out there.  Today she scored 6 of her teams 26 points in the 26 to 10 victory and was a part of much of the other scoring causing turnovers and double dribbling by the other team with her "in your face" defense and by making smart passes to her teammates which led to baskets.

We headed straight to the ice arena after Careline's game to cheer on Braden and his teammates.  I'm quite impressed with how these kids are playing their position and passing the puck in their just second game as Mites.

Buddy was not to be denied and got one goal today on this breakaway shot.

Addy's S"Elf" Portrait

And Yet More Cookies

 

This is my last post about Christmas cookies...I swear!  I just had to share a photo of the cute tray of Santa's and Rudolph's I made for our holiday party at work today. 

Gingerbread Men

The majority of this past weekend was spent baking and decorating goodies to share with friends and family this Christmas season.  I let the kids each decorate one Gingerbread Man all by themselves.  They wanted me to post their finished products (in no particular order) and let you guess whose is whose...so, here they are.

 

Have you made your guess???

 

If you thought the first one was created by Buddy, the second by Careline, and the third one by Adeline....you are absolutely CORRECT.





Buddy's 1st Official Packer Goal

First thing this morning Braden played in his first hockey game as a traveling Mite.  Here he is (the one in the gray jersey) scoring his very first official game goal!  He went on to score a hat trick today, but more importantly his entire team played well together.  We're looking forward to an exciting season of Packer hockey.

St Nicholas Day

It's St Nicholas Day today...so the kids left their shoes out on the step last night and awoke this morning to find St Nicholas had left them each a treat.

State Capitol Tour With Buddy's Class

A Traveling Mite

We got the good news last night that Braden made the SSP traveling Mite hockey team.  Starting this Sunday, he and his teammates will travel to other ice arenas to play hockey.  That's pretty exciting stuff for a kid who has spent the past couple of Winter's learning and practicing skills but not playing any real games.

Santa Claus Cookies

With Christmas fast approaching and Adeline hungry for a treat, this afternoon I made these Santa Claus cookies.  They're really not too difficult to put together and are super cute.  Here's the directions if you'd like to make them this holiday season.

yield 32 cookies

12 oz white baking chocolate, chopped
1 pkg Nutter Butter sandwich cookies
red colored sugar
32 vanilla or white chips
64 chocolate chips
32 red-hot candies

In a microwave, melt white chocolate at 70% power for 1 minute.  Stir.  Microwave at additional 20 second intervals, stirring until smooth.

Dip one end of each cookie into melted chocolate, allowing excess to drip off.  Place on wire racks.  For Santa's hat, sprinkle red sugar on top park of the chocolate.  Press one vanilla chip off-center on hat for pom-pom ; let stand until chocolate is set.

Dip other end of each cookie into melted chocolate for beard, leaving center of cookie uncovered.  Place on wire racks.  With a dab of melted chocolate, attach chocolate chips for eyes and a red-hot for the nose.  Place on waxed paper until set.

Pretty Colors!

One of the presents Grandma Ellen gave Careline for her recent birthday was a promise to take her to a nail salon for a manicure and pedicure.  Today the two of them went for their day of pampering. 

Missing Grandpa Jer

It was one year ago today that Grandpa Jer passed away.  Time is a funny thing.  Sometimes it seems as though just yesterday he was here with us and then other times it seems as though it's been forever since we've been in his presence.  One thing is for certain, he is missed by all of us very much.

Happy Turkey Day

Buddy's Turkey

Today was the kids last day of school before Thanksgiving, so home came some Thanksgiving artwork.  I totally got a kick out of Braden's masterpiece.  Each feather lists one person in our family and why he's thankful for us.  In case you can't read them, here's what they say:

The orange one says I am thankful for my dad because he helps me with my homework and makes sure I read 100 minutes.

The red one says I am thankful for my sister Addiline (he spells her name differently than I do, I guess) because she likes to help me do stuff.

The blue one says I am thankful for my sister Careline because she lets me play her Kindle.

And last, but not least, the green one says I am thankful for my mom because my mom washes my clothes.

Memories of Christmas Past

As I sit down at my computer today to create the McLaughlin 2013 Christmas card, I came across some of the very cute photos of the kids taken when each was just a babe.

Movember

My brother-in-law David, along with so many other men around the world, is growing a mustache this month for the sole purpose of raising awareness for men's health.

Here's his current look.

My Sister can hardly wait for December to arrive.

The Oxford English Dictionary Word of the Year....

SELFIE

I recently reported how Adeline is very much in to capturing images of herself on my phone and it seems as though she's not alone.  In fact, it came out yesterday in the news that the term was used so often in calendar 2013, up some 17,000%, that the Oxford English Dictionary felt compelled to make it the word of the year.

Here are just a few of the Selfies captured on my iPhone this week.