St. Patricks Day Fun

St. Patricks Day we kept it simple. I always try to celebrate the day because I am part Irish even if it's just a little I still want the boys to celebrate the holiday. Since they're so young right now I keep it simple. I found this cute Shamrock game on pinterest. If you'd like to check it out go to my St. Patricks Day pinterest board you'll find it there. I like to give credit to these wonderful people who have these amazing blogs that like to share free print outs. This game was perfect for preschoolers. You roll a dice count the number of spaces from the dice on the board. If you land on a shamrock you get to keep a shamrock card. The player with the most shamrock cards wins the game! We also had a little treasure hunt where Liam had to find gold coins which he received a quarter for each one he found.  Liam loves starfall.com. a website that has educational games for kids. He will play all day if I let him. I had to use it for a reward because it got to be too much. But I let him go on starfall.com today to play their St. Patrick's Day educational games.  I highly recommend them here's their link  www.starfall.com

Here's a little video of the game in action. Liam I think was tired that morning he wasn't really "with it" if you know what I mean. He's 3 but sometimes I forget because he usually is so quick but sometimes he has his slow days like us all. He's so smart and he really enjoyed playing we played most of the 

morning while Blake took his morning nap.

Valentines Day Fun!

 Valentines Day has become such a fun holiday for us. Lots of fun Valentine parties this year. We first hosted a Valentines Day cookie decorating play date for our KinderMoms group. The kids were so sweet they had fun decorating their cookies but loved eating them of course. It was wonderful to have some company and chat with some Moms too. I was so surprised that Blake slept in his swing during the entire time.

Liam had two Valentines Day parties. The first one was for our KinderMom group. Every year they hold one and the kids exchange valentines. These have been a hit the past two years so I decided to make them again. These are Teddy Gram crackers and Gummy Bears wrapped in a treat bag labeled "You're Beary Special From Liam Hoffman." Liam brought these to school also for his party there too. He had so much fun!

One of a ton of valentines Liam received from his friends at school I thought this was a cute one

Baby  Blake's 1st Valentines Day!

Blake was such a sweetheart! He's my little Valentine. He went out to lunch with Chris & I  at our new favorite spot The Red Rooster while Liam was at school. Chris had to work at 3 p.m. so we had our Valentines Day lunch to celebrate. It was such a beautiful day out.

HAPPY NEW YEAR! 2012

We celebrated the New Year with Liam first. Liam & I went to a "Noon Year" party with friends from our Moms group here in town. We've gone every years since we moved here ( 3 years now) and its so much fun. All the kids get together have snacks and at 12 noon on New Years Eve they count down and have a party! Since most kids are in bed during the real New Year's Eve this lets them be a part of the celebration earlier in the day. We love it. The video of Liam is when we came back home. He kept counting down and saying Happy "Noon" Year. He had a blast. Later in the evening Chris & I attempted to have some kind of celebration. I had some of my favorite clam dip and special spritzers since I'm nursing no alcohol for me. We also were up with Blake who has colic so badly. He cried from 8 pm - 5 am so it was a rough new years. It's always great just to hang out together. We're so blessed to have Blake though. This year some New Year's resolutions I have are to try to keep positive, become more organized with making dinner & cleaning, spending more time with family, having more celebrations and being more social hosting parties etc. Looking forward to lots of fun in 2012.

Kiss Me It's My Birthday! The Big 35

I enjoyed celebrating my 35th (UGH!) Birthday with my favorite guys. I was so happy I was able to sleep in. I woke up only to nurse Blake then Chris got up with both boys. While I was sleeping Chris & Liam baked me a delicious strawberry fun fetti cake. It was so sweet. I really appreciated Chris taking the time to make a cake with Liam. It is such a challenge cooking with a 3 year old I give him props for even attempting. He's an awesome Dad Liam had so much. We then went out for a birthday lunch. Later I went out for coffee with a friend in my Sunday School class that shares the same birthday as me ( January 21st) It was great to get out of the house and have some adult conversation. Is it just me or does receiving birthday checks in the mail still give you a smile on your face? My aunts always sent me a birthday check usually $25 or so. Now that I'm in my 30's I still look forward to receiving them and so blessed they still think of me. They're so sweet.javascript:void(0)

A Happy Hoffman Christmas!

Christmas morning Hoffman Breakfast YUMMY!

Advent Calendar Fun

I started a Christmas Advent Calendar last year with Liam that was so much fun that I decided to make it one of our yearly Christmas traditions. It was especially fun this year because Blake joined in the fun for his 1st Christmas celebration. From December 1st - 25th the boys got a treat & and we did a fun Christmas activity. I made the advent calendar myself out of stockings, clothes pins, and yarn. We had so much fun this year and now that Liam is 3 years old he is starting to understand it. He always looked forward to looking inside the stocking each morning to see what fun activity he would be doing. He also loves numbers and counting so he liked to read the numbers and had fun counting down to Christmas day. I wanted to take a picture of each activity we did but being busy with a newborn with colic it wasn't very easy so I did the best I could. I was just happy I was able to keep up this year. Here's a list of the activities we did.

Day 1
We went out for ice cream at Dairy Queen

I took Liam out to Dairy Queen and we both had yummy Pumpkin Pie Blizzards. We were both still sick getting over our bad colds we had on Thanksgiving but it tasted so yummy!


Day 2
Watched Frosty The Snowman & drank hot chocolate. This Liam's favorite Christmas movie!

Day 3

Made a scrap paper stocking

Day 4

Painted a cookie plate with Santa

A pottery making shop here in town called Bisque Bistro had a paint with Santa day. Liam painted a cookie plate, Santa ornament, and got to meet the big man in red himself. It was a blast. Its a great place to go and the lady who owns the shop is a member or our church and is always so sweet to us when we come.

Liam painting his Santa cookie plate
Painting a Santa Claus ornament
Close up of the handprints
What it looked like after
Santa's cookie plate with cookies Liam made
Liam & Santa

Day 5

Christmas shopping with Mommy

Day 6

Watched a Christmas movie & ate popcorn

Day 7

Decorated Christmas cookies

Day 8

School Christmas Concert

Liam's school put on a Christmas concert. It was so adorable! You'll have to read my other post about this day. Lots of memories made that day. It was so special to watch Liam sing. He did such a great job!

North Pole Village

This is such a wonderful family fun place to celebrate the Holidays. We have gone every year but this year it was special to have Chris come since he's always working he was able to take the night off. Its run by volunteers. They turn a warehouse into a Christmas wonderland village. Kids can decorate a cookie, write a letter to Santa, adopt a pet (AKA stuffed animal), pick out a book, go ice fishing for prize, pictures w/ Santa, hayrides, live nativity, caroling and lots lots more.

Our first family picture with Santa
Liam loves getting his face painted

Blake had fun hanging out

Day 9

Watched Muppets Christmas Carol & drank hot chocolate

Day 10

Made Rudolf craft & watched the movie Rudolf The Red Nose Reindeer

Day 11

Children's Choir Christmas concert at church

Day 12

Made Christmas gifts for teachers

Day 13

Made Christmas cards for teachers

Day 14

Made Reindeer cookies

These reindeer cookies were the death of me. I saw them on pinterest and thought they were so cute and looked like they would be easy to make. Well I was wrong. They were so ridiculously hard it was crazy. I could not for the life of me get the chocolate covered pretzels (AKA antlers) to stay on. The chocolate would melts and just fall off. These reindeer looked like they were being hunted. I have to say despite how they looked they tasted yummy. I guess that's all that really matters anyhow.

Day 15

Christmas party at school & watched Charlie Brown's Christmas & drank hot chocolate

Liam had such a great time at his school's Christmas party. He got lots of goodies and gifts from his friends.

This is Liam's new favorite movie thanks Grammy who bought him

a bunch of cool Charlie Brown Christmas stuff for Christmas one year. This is his favorite part watching them lift their head up when they sing.

Day 16

Went to a birthday party at The Jumpy Place

Day 17

Sang Christmas Carols

Day 18

Watched Twas The Night Before Christmas

Day 19

Went out for breakfast

Day 20

Drove around looking at Christmas lights

Day 21

Helped wrap presents

Day 22

Went to see lights at West Pole House

Every year after Thanksgiving this home turns on thousands of Christmas lights that are synchronized to music. They do this each year for the public to watch. Its so amazing. Its all controlled by a computer and you just tune your car radio to the radio station to hear the music. It's wonderful!!

Day 23

Looked at Christmas lights downtown

Day 24

Opened one present & read Twas The Night Before Christmas

Day 25

Enjoyed Christmas day read The Story of Jesus' Birth & sang Happy Birthday to Jesus