Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow...

Oh, the weather outside is frightful...to the tune of 21.5 inches of snow as of 7pm this evening. It was a good day to stay inside with the kids and bake Christmas cookies. Steve, however, thought it was a good day to take the car in to the shop since we had an appointment at the dealership for a service check. He made it home in one piece (barely) and $900 later, the car is fixed up for now.

The snow is now almost as tall as Austin and the wind chills are getting way below zero, but Austin couldn't understand why he couldn't go out to play in the snow. We had some fun inside instead...

I have been on the hunt for a new sugar cookie recipe to make our family Christmas cookies.  As noted in the last post, we used to use the Pillsbury cookie dough, but then realized the folly of our ways in that the Pillsbury dough was terrible for us.  So I have been trying out recipes over the past couple Christmas seasons.  This week, I actually found the recipe for the Pillsbury dough and modified it to be healthier and it was a huge success!  The dough tastes great, makes cookies that are the perfect consistency to support our buttercream frosting (family tradition!), and I can even freeze the dough in rolls and do the slice and bake cookies with this dough.  I also discovered the use of parchment paper to keep cookies from sticking to the pan and cracking when you try to scrape them off.  Ah, a happy day!  The search is over.  Austin and I made the dough a few days ago, then cut the cookies and baked them today.  Then I frosted them and Austin helped me put the sprinkles on.

Sarah was initially scared of the Christmas marching band toys, but now she thinks they're great and enjoys dancing to their music with Austin.

In other news...
Sarah took her first steps on 12/9.  She took about 4 steps from Mommy to Daddy!  We got her to replicate it briefly the next night, but it was right before bedtime and she was tired and cranky, so we only caught a few steps on video before she got really fussy and headed off to bed.

Life keeps moving faster and faster every day!  We've been busy getting ready for Christmas, chasing the kids around, and keeping up with work.  Only 2 weeks to Christmas!  I'm excited to watch the kids experience Christmas this year - Sarah's first Christmas and Austin now old enough to understand what Christmas is.