Soup, Stockings and Fire

Annmarie was sick home from school and I realized I had all the ingredients to make some fresh chicken noodle soup for the both of us. She even made roll dough so I could make rolls later and we had fresh homemade chicken noodle soup and rolls for lunch.

I made a Texas stocking for Travis for Christmas, which is what I did for Caleb and Westley.  I had to get a Christmas package together before Thanksgiving so Aaron could drop it off with a courier service in Utah to get it to Africa by Christmas.  He did get his package!

I went to a Relief Society "Friendsgiving" dinner and the entertainment was from Sister Tatiana Randall who came from Russia and was in the Russian circus.  It was amazing!

 

Cinco de Mayo

Sunday was Cinco de Mayo and while we generally don't celebrate this holiday, I thought it would be fun to make some homemade churros.  They were delicious!

Travis Bakes

Travis is enjoying his culinary program at Wylie High School.  He is learning to make some pretty delicious pies.  He hopes to become a baker some day and have his own shop/restaurant.

First Annual Fowles Christmas Brunch

I decided to borrow a page from the book of the Smith family and hold a Christmas party. We decided to do a brunch. Everyone brought something to contribute, from fruit to juice to breakfast casserole. We had a game to play and we also did a white elephant gift exchange.

 

November Highlights

Eliza made the musical for Wylie High again, this year it's Beauty and the Beast. The theatre department put on a camp for a fundraiser and I signed Annmarie up.  She enjoyed the camp.  She also gets to go to a character meet and greet for the musical when it happens as part of the camp package.  

I came upstairs and found this meeting happening on the coffee table in the play room.  Not sure what kind of conspiracies are being concocted, but it looks questionable.  

Jonah and Nathan had fun walking around the neighborhood the week of Thanksgiving break and raking leaves for some cash.  They made $100 in one week raking leaves and they split it between them.  

We hosted Thanksgiving dinner at our house again.  This time Austin was able to come, so that was nice.

I took a picture of me talking with the boys on their missions.  It's cool to show how we are able to communicate with our missionaries now--us in Texas, Westley in Wisconsin, and Caleb in Ohio.

I found this scrumptious recipe for hot chocolate cookies and decided to try it and they are the bomb!  Travis is going to try and get orders for them for Christmas.

 

Travis the Baker

Travis submitted a pie at the Texas State Fair and won a prize for third place! The pie he submitted with a raspberry cream pie.  He is really enjoying his culinary class. I was able to pull some pictures of him from culinary off the district's Facebook page. 

 

Violin, Strawberries and Sleepy Sunday

I took a picture of Eliza's violin lesson so I could draw her teacher Audrey, who is one of my good friends. I think the picture turned out rather nicely and I was able to document her violin lessons. I enjoy going because I learn a lot about violin from the lessons too. I also made chocolate covered strawberries just because I had a lot of strawberries. One of my most favorite indulgences. And I had to take a picture of Corey "watching" Come Follow Me insights with Taylor and Tyler.  He always insists that he is not sleeping.

New Driver and Baker

Travis finally got his driver's license! For some reason, we just had a hard time getting all the driving hours in for him to pass his driving test. The worst was that we got to the DPS to take the test and found that one of the tail lights in the van was out. So we had to reschedule the test for the next day and get it fixed. Actually, the worst was that I had the replacement bulb right there with us in the van, I just didn't know! We could have swapped it out and taken care of it same day. Better remember to check all the lights next time! Nathan learned how to follow a recipe and bake something himself. He made these muffins entirely by himself, a recipe from the Disney Princess Cookbook.

 

Thanksgiving and More

We hosted Thanksgiving dinner this year for Grandpa and Grandma and Paige and the kids.  And for the first time in a long time, we did gingerbread (graham cracker) houses made from graham crackers.  Annmarie's kept falling apart so she said it was in an earthquake. 

 

Nathan the Baker

Nathan helped bake cookies for school lunch desserts.  He used his preschool apron and hat that I bought last year for preschool cooking activities.  What a cutie!

Paige's Birthday

Amid all the crazy of the end of the school year, Paige had her birthday, so we women got together and went to dinner at Cheesecake Factory.  We are allowed to remove masks while eating, so we had the server take a photo of us without masks.  Kaori made it possible with her gift card.

Gator Greeter, Jazz Band, Family Breakfast

Jonah got to be Gator Greeter for several weeks. It's a morning duty for the fourth graders. Travis and Eliza did it too. Westley had his final jazz band concert. He had his wisdom teeth out at the beginning of April, right before Annmarie's baptism, and then he had his tonsils out two weeks later. This is two weeks after tonsil surgery. He probably shouldn't have played, but he did fine. And the last picture is us having breakfast. I wanted to document the fact that we try to have family breakfast every school morning.

 

Tasty Treats

Travis and Mom decided to make their way through the Williams-Sonoma pie cookbook that we have.  We made a citrus chiffon pie, made with lemon juice, zest and orange zest and flavoring and a ginger snap cookie crust.  The other pie is raspberry creme.  Both delicious!  And Mom told Dad a little while ago that there aren't enough pictures of her, so now he takes random weird pictures of her.  She is enjoying ice cream at Braum's.