Rockin'

Tonight after supper I hinted that i might want to play with my new guitar.  This nearly brought Emma to tears.  "papa!  Don't rock! You rocked all day!"
it's true!

Happy family life

It'll be a shame when we get a black fridge on boxing day.

Gingerbread house

This is the first year ever that we've built and decorated a gingerbread house for Christmas. Thanks to Grandma for the icing advicing.

I feel the need to share the gingerbread recipe since it worked quite well for the house and it makes delicious cookies. (These are also the ones that we used to decorate the Christmas tree a couple of years back.)
1 cup sugar

1 cup butter

1 cup dark molasses

1/2 cup water

1 tsp salt

1 tbsp minced fresh ginger

1 tsp baking soda

spices:

1/2 tsp ground allspice

star anise - crushed

2 cardamom pods - crushed

1/2 tsp cinnamon

5 cups flour. (you can sub out 1/2 cup of flour for 1/2 cup teff if making cookies).

Beat sugar, butter, molasses and water in a large bowl until blended then 1 minute on medium speed. Stir in the rest of the ingredients then chill covered at least 1 hour.

Roll out on a floured surface and bake at 375 about 8-10 minutes. (For the house I baked at 350 to really dry it out.)

A couple of the kids' drawings

A Robin in the Wind - Oscar

Puppy - Emma