Christmas #2

We were blessed to celebrate Christmas again with Uncle Brandon, Aunt Liz, Cousin Emma, Grandma Mary and Papa D.! The cousins played, played, and played some more, inside and outside! The adults worked on several projects like making homemade Lefse, a catapult for Liz's physics class and party plans and we all went ice skating.  Mom and Dad cooked us an amazing salmon dinner.  Thanks to Peter (who had to work) made us some awesome lunches! It was a wonderful couple of days.

Lefse

The Johnson family grew up with Lefse as a special holiday treat made by Grandma Johnson.  It is a Norweigian flatbread made with potatoes, flour and cream.  We always spread butter and sugar on it. Liz made a trip to Aunt Barb and Uncle Duane's a couple of years ago to learn how to make it and they gave her and Brandon lefse making tools as a wedding gift.  So we decided to give it a whirl...

In short, here is the process...

Step#1: Boil Potatoes

 

Step #2: Potato Mash

Step #3: Roll dough balls and chill

Step #4: flattened dough until you can see through

 Step#5: Lefse Stick Master

 Step #6: Griddle

Step #7: Serve rolled up with butter and sugar

Bowling Break

In between Christmas #1 and #2, we visited the bowling ally! Kate and Max challenged themselves to more bowling without the alligator ramp.  Anna loved every minute of her turn and helping all of us get our balls ready to roll. Alexander practiced his counting and pushing the ball with his two pointer fingers.  Such an easy way to have some family fun!

Christmas Day

Christmas Day was a magnificent blur of gifts, brunch and lots of play time!  We started the day with lots of surprises from Santa, Mom & Dad and each other.  We kissed Uncle Matt off to work. Peter made an awesome brunch with scrambled salmon eggs, bacon and taylor ham, fresh fruit, pastries from the neighborhood baker (Ms. Marie is the best), and freshly squeezed orange juice from Mimi! The kids requested snowflake pancakes and hot chocolate!  Mimi, Pop Pop and Aunt Anita joined us for brunch and a little play time before returning to Greensboro.  The rest of the day was play, play, play!!!

Kate was super excited about setting up her doll's kitchen set and all the accessories.

Max was in heaven with all his lego sets.

Anna was thrilled to see the triple bunk bed for dolls and Snuggles the dog.

Alex was totally into everything and very proud to be able to ride his very own bike. 

It was a wonderful day!

Merry Christmas

May All Your Days Be Merry and Bright!

Christmas Eve

Peter's gift to himself is Christmas Eve!  He goes to multiple stores, multiple times to find the perfect produce, meats, cheeses, wines, and specialty ingredients for his xmas eve spread!  He spends the entire day (plus a few additional days) cooking, creating, and preparing.... No picture will quite capture the aromas and flavors that we savor for hours!  It is exceptional and every year he outdoes himself from the year before.  In between rounds, we let the kids open gifts from aunts, uncles, and grandparents. It is an exciting time at our house!

Ice Skating

Uncle Matt and I decided to take the kids ice skating for the very first time while Daddy stayed behind to prepare his Christmas Eve extravaganza!  All this kids had a blast and did exceptionally well.  They are already making plans to return in the near future! It was the perfect Christmas Eve activity!