Matt had decided that we should put lights on one of the trees in the backyard. There is one that is a perfect little evergreen right outside the back windows, so that was the one that we chose to decorate. Unfortunately we guessed wrong on how many strings of light it would take and were one short. We bought another string, but hadn't gotten around to hanging it yet. So I was determined to get it on before Christmas.
I grabbed the lights and the dogs joined me on my quest to finish the tree. On the way over there, Natalie had me seriously distracted. She was in snow up to her belly trying to decide how to use the bathroom and it was the most hysterical thing I had seen in a while. So hysterical that I missed the fact we had a visitor until it huffed at me...
Matt and I are still debating what I actually said when I saw a moose about 20' away from me, but I didn't make it to the tree with the lights. I managed to get all three of the dogs back to the house without them noticing our huge visitor.
Of course, once we were all safely inside and the adrenaline wore off, Matt and I were much more concerned with getting photos of the moose! We used the zoom lens and stayed close to the doors, but she wasn't really all that interested in us. She wandered off after nibbling on our trees. She showed back up in the neighbor's yard at sunset and settled in for a nap. Much more exciting than my usual view while doing the dishes!
And I had been putting it off (well mostly because it's late when I get home from work...), but I really wanted to try decorating cookies with Thomas this year. So I made a batch of peppermint pinwheels - I figure we will save the candy cane shaped variety for next Christmas. And because it is Matt's favorite, I made a buttercream icing to put on top instead of the usual glaze.
It only took one cookie to realize whichever cookies Thomas decorated were going to be germ laden treats. So we gave him his own little bowls of decorations and limited him to two cookie palettes.
But of course he wanted to help his Daddy decorate his cookie too...
At some point he realized it wasn't just the decorations that were edible and lost all interest in decorating the cookies. Instead, he was more concentrated on devouring them. Unfortunately the cookies were a little crisp thanks to the fact they have actual peppermint candy pieces in them that melted and then solidified on the bottom. He was content with attacking the icing though.
But not sharing. I'm not sure which of the girls was begging, but I'm pretty sure this is him telling them to get lost. :)
And of course things just went downhill from there. He had icing smearing all over his face, his glasses and in his hair. But he had fun, which was the point anyhow. And I timed it so that this event occurred right before bath time. Smart momma!
The finished cookies (decorated by Matt and I) ended up being quite the hit with the friends we shared them with. The cookies alone were pretty (I left one unadorned so you guys could see) and addictive, so adding goodies on top of that was just asking for trouble on consumption levels. Speaking of which, I think there might be one or two left...