Ugly Sweater

Joel is helping with the youth group at our church this year. It's a bit out of his comfort zone but he is showing up and helping where he can. Last Sunday night they had their Christmas party and everyone was suppose to wear an ugly Christmas sweater. We didn't have anything here and I couldn't find anything at Goodwill so I turned to a friend and asked her if she had anything we could borrow. Sure enough she came through for us and Joel was able to wear this funny gingerbread man sweater/shirt. I think it was actually homemade which made it even more funny to wear! Joel didn't win the contest but he got several comments on his gingerbread man shirt. He was a good sport!

Christmas Photo 2015

Oh goodness you know my strife and getting these girls to get a good photo taken...well they strike again! Last week one day after school Maya wanted to try on her Christmas dress. So I said oh great Cora lets get your dress on too and take some pictures. I was thinking we could finally get a good Christmas picture to send out. After about 2 hours of chasing them around, bribing them, and a few wardrobe changes, I finally just gave up. We have a saying from the Vermeer side of the family "we done the best we could" and folks that's where we are at. The picture you'll most likely get in the mail in a few days is just that. Not great but it will have to do. Once again I feel defeated when it comes to these two girls and photos.  And yes I realize I'm being overly dramatic.

 See what I was dealing with? 

I'd get one of them separately but not together

Cora is smiling here but I could not get her to smile with the two of them together.

At one point Maya brought in these blue chairs but this was not the "look" I was going for.
Although now I'm thinking this is the photo we should have gone with. 

Anyway we hope everyone has a great Christmas celebrating the true meaning, which is not making sure you have the perfect card to send out to family and friends. We are getting excited for Christmas around here. We will be in Ohio with the Seitz crew for a few days over Christmas and then will do a quick stop in Michigan and Chicago for a few days the week after with my side of the family. Wishing everyone a wonderful Christmas and many blessings in 2016!

Christmas Program

Maya had her Christmas program at church on Sunday night. The 3K - 4th graders performed a play called "A Star is Born." Everyone did such a great job. I think Maya wanted to be the "star."  These programs are always so hard for me as a parent. Maya is such a wild card I never know what is going to happen when she is up in front of people. She knew the songs and all the dialogue by heart. If anyone would have been sick she could have stepped right in and played their part. Maya loved it and had a great time and hopefully she'll take the true message of the program and ponder it in her heart and continue to learn and understand who the real "Star"is of Christmas.

Here is a bit of the set and the"star" at the end of the program.

Cora stayed in for part of it but wanted to go play in the nursery once she realized she'd need to sit and be quiet. Here they are after the program together at the front of our church. It's decorated so beautiful for Christmas.

Recipe InSeitz - Mint Oreo Frozen Dessert

It's that time of year again when things get busy and there are lots of parties and dinners to attend. It's fun but it can get a bit nuts. At Christmas time I am always drawn to peppermint. This dessert is one of my favorites and since you can usually only get peppermint ice cream around this time of year it's about the only time I make it. We had dinner with some friends tonight and I brought this dessert to share. It's a fun one because it's a bit different than the usual Christmas cookies that are usually brought for dessert at this time of year.

Mint Oreo Frozen Dessert

30 oreo cookies
1/2 stick of butter melted
1/2 gallon of peppermint ice cream
1/2 jar of hot fudge ice cream topping
whip cream (optional)

Crush cookies and reserve 1/2 for topping. Combine rest of the cookies with melted butter and pat into a 9x13 pan. Soften ice cream and spread over the oreo crust. Then top with the rest of the oreos and freeze for a few hours. Once you are ready to serve drizzle some hot fudge ice cream topping over the top and you can also top with some whip cream and serve. Yum!

Happy Harvest

I've written before about the neighbor that puts out their Allis Chalmers tractor every year in the Fall. We drive by it every day on the way to school and Maya and Cora always say "there's the tractor." We haven't taken a picture by it for the last few years but Sunday it was so nice outside we went for a walk around the neighborhood and decided to stop and take a pic by the tractor.

Maya being a goof ball and Cora wasn't so sure about sitting on the hay.

I was having the girls say "happy harvest" and here they are right in the middle of saying it.

Here is a post I did a few years ago if you want to see how tiny Maya looks when we first took a pic on the tractor...you can click on the link below.  Happy Harvest!

http://familyinseitz.blogspot.com/2012/10/neighborhood-tractor.html

Sandy

Like I mentioned a few weeks ago we have several one hour time slots to kill each week after we drop Maya off at school and before our morning activities start. We've added a new store to our weekly routine and it's Meijer. Meijer opened up at the end of the summer and it's close to Maya's school and our church. For those of you that don't know what Meijer is it's pretty much just like Target only it has a bigger grocery section and their prices are suppose to be cheaper. And at Meijer they have "Sandy" a ride on horse that costs a penny. Yes for one cent you can take a little horsey ride at Meijer! Who says you can't buy anything for a penny these days?

Here is Cora's first ride on Sandy. She wasn't quite sure about the horsey.

Oh and look what we found at Walmart last week. A ride on Mickey Mouse! She likes driving Mickey much better than riding Sandy. But let me just say that Mickey costs a lot more than a penny.

Playing in the Leaves

We've had a great Fall and I think our nice warm sunny weather is coming to an end soon.
We've had lots of afternoons playing outside after school and "raking" leaves. We don't have a single tree in our yard so you would think we wouldn't have very many leaves to rake. But for some reason we always seem to have a lot that end up in our yard. The girls love raking a little pile and jumping into the leaves. What a fun Fall activity!

P.S. We have a 2 year old that is getting her 2 year molars and is chewing on anything and everything. Hence the new born baby paci in all the pics. I don't even know where she got this thing from. This isn't even her normal paci. It's also impacting all our sleep. Lets hope they all come in quickly!

Halloween 2015

Halloween 2015 was cold, rainy, & raw! But we were troopers and went out for about 40 minutes. This was the first year that I've lived here that West Allis actually had trick or treat on Halloween. There weren't very many houses that had their light on in our neighborhood but we did just enough that the girls' buckets were quite full by the time we made it back home. They spent the last hour handing out candy and honestly I think they had more fun doing that.

Maya wanted to be a mouse this year

Cora was a little pumpkin. She started out walking but didn't like the cold rain.

Cora really had it made. She had daddy pushing her around and her big sister 

getting all her candy for her.

The White family was visiting this weekend and it was so fun to trick or treat with friends!

Here they are all four of them...the mouse, Darth Vader, the pumpkin, & Stormtrooper

And what would Halloween be without jack o' lanterns?

Maya wanted a scary face and Cora opted for a goofy one.

Linder's Farm

Last weekend we decided to head to a little pumpkin farm that is close to our house.  It's pretty understated and very reasonable compared to the other pumpkin farms in the area. We were all going a little stir crazy and needed to get outside of the house so this was the perfect Fall activity for us.

Maya loved the giant slide but Cora wasn't too fond of it.

There was a little track to ride little bikes, tractors, and old cars around. There was a little gas station where they could stop and fill up the cars and Cora loved "going to get gas."

There was also a little petting animals area and a corn maze that we did. It was a chilly day but it was so good to get out and have a little Fall fun with the family. We skipped last year so the last time we had gone to Lindner's farm Cora was just 10 weeks old. I think she looks so old standing here next to her big sister.

Recipe InSeitz - Cinnamon Pumpkin Seeds

We carved pumpkins last night. What a messy job! I've never made pumpkin seeds but thought I'd try some last night. I remember my mom making them when we were growing up and I didn't like them at all. But I thought I'd try a more salty/sweet combo and found this recipe online. You may be ahead of the game and already carved your pumpkins and roasted your seeds. If so you can try this out next year. And if you are right on time for Halloween this weekend I'd give this a try; they ended up pretty tasty. Stay tuned for pics of the girls and their costumes. They are quite excited! It's suppose to be rainy and cold on Saturday so we'll see what happens with trick or treating.


Cinnamon Pumpkin Seeds

1 cup pumpkin seeds
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
2 tsp. brown sugar
1/8  tsp. salt
1 tsp. melted butter

Mix everything together in a small bowl. Spread coated seeds on a cookie sheet. Bake for 45 min at 300.

Fall at the Zoo

The Milwaukee Zoo is absolutely beautiful in the Fall. It's my favorite time to go.  Maya had a little Fall break this week off of school and Grandma and Grandpa Sikkema were here for a few days on their way home from Iowa. It was great to be able to go together and see all the animals and also the beautiful foliage.

We had to take a train ride of course. There were Halloween decorations and carved pumpkins along the route so that made it extra fun! 

We had a perfect, sunny, warm, Fall day this week! So beautiful!

Recipe InSeitz - Butterfinger Cookies

I signed up to bring treats this week to Coffee Break my weekly Bible study at church. I wanted to bring something different so I went to the store and looked in the "chocolate chip" aisle and found these new Butterfinger baking bits. Yum! I decided to try the cookie recipe on the back and they were delicious! I highly recommend these and if you don't want to buy the Butterfinger bits you could just wait until after Halloween and crush up some of those fun size Butterfingers that come home in your child's candy bucket. The recipe calls for 1 3/4 cups of what are really crushed up butterfingers. You won't be disappointed if you make these cookies!

Butterfinger Cookies

3 1/2 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 cup butter (2 sticks)
2 eggs
1 3/4 cups Butterfinger baking bits

Combine flour, baking soda & salt in a small bowl. Beat sugar and butter in large mixer bowl until creamy. Beat in eggs; & gradually beat in flour mixture. Stir in Butterfinger bits. Drop by tablespoon onto ungreased baking sheets. Bake 8 minutes at 350.

Black eye

On our way home from Iowa we stopped part way and stayed at a hotel. We thought it would be helpful to break the trip up a bit. The girls love to swim so they were super excited. We had just unloaded all our stuff from the luggage cart and were getting ready to bring it back. I'm not sure exactly what happened but Maya tripped on her flip flop and fell and hit her eye right on the corner of the cart. Poor thing had a horrible black eye. We put ice on it and gave her Tylenol and she handled it pretty well. The hardest part was on Monday when she went to school and everyone kept asking her what happened.  In this picture it looks bad but in person it looked even worse and it lasted for a whole week.

Marker Face

This little lady had a little too much fun on the 8 hour car ride to Iowa. 

Blue marker all over her face. Fun!

Pictures

About a month ago we had five year old and two year old pictures taken. What was supposed to take 10 minutes took literally an hour and ten minutes and I was a sweaty mess by the time this all ended. It was a wrestling match between a two year old, a camera lady, and the mama! And the two year old won! We could not get Cora to cooperate for one second. Even Maya was trying to give Cora treats and make her smile and "sit down" just to get one picture taken. It was a disaster. And now I have a whole year to recuperate before doing that again. Cora may never have another picture taken again.

Maya - 5 years old

Maya 5 and Cora 2

Cora - 2 years old

STINKER! Seriously don't let this fool you...this one pic was well fought for! Blood, sweat, & tears!

Grandma Vermeer

Last weekend we made a trip to Iowa to celebrate the life of Grandma Vermeer. Grandma passed away on Monday, October 5. She was 96 and had lived a long and full life but it's still hard to say good bye to her. We have so many memories with Grandma and she will be missed! She's left a wonderful legacy she should be proud of!

The visitation was Friday night and the funeral was on Saturday. The service which Dad conducted was so nice; she would have loved it.  Juliana gave a wonderful tribute to Grandma and we are so proud of her for standing up and sharing with everyone that was there.

Here is part of what Juliana shared:
We are here today to celebrate the faithful and vibrant life of Great Grandma Vermeer. What she would want us all to remember is this.:   What is your only comfort in life and in death?  That I am not my own but belong body and soul in life and in death to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ.  He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood and has set me free from the tyranny of the devil. He also watches over me in such a way that not a hair can fall from head without the will of  my Father in heaven.  In fact, all things must work together for my salvation. Because I belong to him, Christ, by his Holy Spirit, assures me of eternal life and makes me wholeheartedly willing and ready from now on to live for him.  We know that Great Grandma prayed for us on a daily basis and along with Great Grandpa Vermeer laid a strong foundation of Faith for Generations to come.  As a  family, we are eternally grateful.  We are also grateful for the laughter, delicious cookies and caramel corn,  demonstrated work ethic, just out of reach pink peppermints on top of the fridge, and wise words that Great Grandma shared with us.  Please allow me a few moments to share some collected memories from Great Grandma’s clan.

~No matter how big or small the accomplishment, if something nice happened Grandma would always make sure to send a card of congratulations and encouragement. (She just sent Maya a card in June for turning 5. Amazing!)

~Fresh green beans & raspberries from Grandma’s garden will always be legendary!

~Playing Rook, Dominoes, Sequence or one of the other games in the corner closet was a favorite evening pastime.

~Grandma was a meticulous seamstress.  We all loved our name pillows and sock snakes.

~Coming down the steep stairs early in the morning, to find Grandma in her cozy 
slippers and well worn bathrobe with Bible open and hands folded in prayer.

And so we celebrate this amazing lady – the way she lived, loved and cared for others so well.

*Thanks again to Juliana for sharing the tribute so eloquently at Grandma's service! We were all in tears.


I'm so thankful the girls were able to meet their Great Grandma. And although they probably won't remember her we'll have pictures to show them and stories to share with them about how wonderful she was!

Grandma holding Maya when she was about 6 months old. 

Grandma holding Cora when she was 10 months old.
I love this pic and the way they are looking at each other!

This was just a few months ago at her 96th birthday party.

Here are some beautiful flowers we got to take home with us that someone so graciously 

sent to honor Grandma.

Johanna Henrietta Vermeer

June 25, 1919 - October 5, 2015

You're already greatly missed Grandma! 

Recipe InSeitz - Spice Bread

This week it's really started to feel like Fall around here! We got coats out and I even put socks and shoes on yesterday for the first time in months. For those of you that know me I am not a fan of wearing socks. If I could I'd wear flip flops all year round. Anyway September really felt like an extension of summer so I shouldn't complain.

I haven't posted a recipe in forever! This is a great bread recipe for the Fall. I have fond memories of my mom making this bread when I was growing up.  I remember her making muffins the most and they were always a special treat when she made them. This bread is a great way to welcome Fall!

Spice Bread

1 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup oil
1 egg
1 cup buttermilk (or 1 cup milk with 1 tsp. vinegar)
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 tsp. cloves
1 tsp. soda
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt

Mix all together and pour into loaf pan and bake for 45-55 min at 350.
Or you can make 2 dozen muffins. Bake at 350 for 20-30 min.

The Park

Tuesday afternoons Maya has swimming lessons after school. But we have about an hour to kill between school and her lessons.  I feel like Cora and I have so many "one hour" time slots to kill each week between school drop off and MOPS, and Bible Study and swimming. It's honestly kind of driving me crazy. We can only go to target so many times each week. Thankfully the weather has been really nice so we've been visitng some local parks after school on Tuesdays. A tire swing is hard to find at most parks these days but there is one that is near Maya's school that we went to last week. The girls spent practially the whole time on this thing. So.Much.Fun.

Another Big Milestone

Someone hit another big milestone this weekend! Maya learned how to ride her bike with no training wheels! She is beyond excited. I was shocked at how quickly she learned. I thought there would be lots of falling, lots of tears, and frustration. But Daddy took the training wheels off on Saturday afternoon and by Sunday she was riding all on her own up and down the driveway. We went for a walk yesterday afternoon and she rode her bike the whole way.  And today before school she had to take a quick lap up and down the driveway.

So fun and she is loving it!