We’ve been doing our NYE dance party for a few year’s now. I think when we started it was just True and Brave. This year, the girl’s requested we do a theme inspired by Jem and the Holograms. They had wanted Ben and me to dress up like Rio and Jem for Halloween, but things were busy that we never got our act together for it, so they asked if we could do the 80’s Jem and the Hologram party for NYE, so we happily obliged.

We gathered wigs during Halloween time and I found my hot pink (way too tight) one shoulder dress at the thrift store. I think our getup looked 80’s enough. The girls just wore their “fancy” dresses from Soul’s birthday (from FabKids); a couple of the girls got side pony tails and tada, we were ready for the 80’s! Last minute, I ran to the dollar store, picked up these star mylar balloons and funky glasses and we were set. Plus, we already had a strobe light and fog machine (yes, we really already own those things from previous celebrations) and we were definitely going to have a rockin’ new year’s eve celebration.

Ben made us our traditional NYE black eyed pea dish and spicy garlic shrimp. We all had a nice sit down dinner first, then after, we cleaned up and got ready to party. The girls had a blast with the loud music we were bumpin’ and they danced the night away. Glow was a little apprehensive about the weird lights and fog that she just sat on the side and didn’t really want to get into the action. We kept dancing, and dancing, and dancing, and the it got so foggy that we set the fire alarm off! Despite the constant ringing, the big girls kept on dancing (with their hands over their ears), while Ben tried to air out all the smoke. It was pretty hilarious, but the party must go on! After we were all feeling pooped out, except that Brave because she can keep going, we called it a night and put on our pajamas. Ben and I tucked the girls into bed (this is all way before midnight, but it had to be midnight somewhere right?!) and we settled in our room for a movie. Ben and I did manage to stay up just until midnight, gave each other a kiss, then went to bed.

We took video of the girls going crazy with their dance moves and I love watching it over and over again. They are so funny! We asked Brave, “Brave, where did you get your moves?” She replied, “From me.” That’s our girl, just so matter of fact.

How did you ring in the New Year? Do you still wait up until midnight or are you already snoozing before the clock strikes twelve?

Baked Corn Tortilla Chips
yields about 80 chips

Ingredients:
10 corn Tortillas
Cooking spray
Knife
Baking pan
Salt

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Stack your 10 tortillas together and cut them into eighths. Lay out a single layer of chip pieces onto your baking pan, and lightly spray cooking spray throughout all the pieces. Lightly sprinkle a couple of pinches of salt throughout. Bake for about 15-20 minutes until golden brown and crispy.

I always like to keep a close eye because my oven tends to cook faster. I usually do a second batch, since not all 80 pieces fit in one pan or you could also bake 2 pans at one time.
Chips and salsa is Ben’s idea of dessert, so it’s much more guilt-free to have them baked. Writing this post up also has me craving some of my mother-in-law’s homemade salsa. Her salsas are always bomb dot com. When we were in Texas, we were spoiled by all the deliciously spicy salsas she made for us. I’ll have to get the salsa recipes from Ben’s mom to share with you.

Putting a batch of chips to bake in the oven is so easy! They come out much thicker than store bought tortilla chips, but I’ll take baked over fried any day. I have another recipe to share with you soon, so that you could eat these baked chips with something super yummy.

Let’s rewind a bit to last year… when we’re in San Antonio, we try to get away and spend a day together in Austin. It’s a little over an hour away, so it’s not that far, especially for us Southern California folk who are used to driving around town (and in traffic) to get from one place to another. We stopped into Uncommon Objects first, then headed over to some vintage shops nearby. This visit we were hoping to find some shirts for Ben, I’m not in need of anything, so I stayed away from looking because I know I can easily get weak in the knees for something. Sure enough, I did just a teensy bit of poking about in the jewelry section and found a vintage ring that I really wanted, but didn’t get because well, it wasn’t in the budget for the month. We visited about 5 shops and he only found 1 shirt, our guess is the day after Christmas isn’t the ideal time to go shopping. It seems everything was already majorly picked through… oh well!

We had plans to eat at Swift’s Attic for lunch, but by the time we headed there, we realized lunch just ended, so we headed to Torchy’s Tacos instead. The tacos were yummy and their sauces were absolutely delicious. I want to try to recreate them at home! It was just a lovely afternoon out together. With kids and all, it’s hard to find time and a babysitter to get away for a day, so anytime we do get this time, we try to enjoy it as much as possible and do as much hand holding as we can. When the little ones are in tow, we’re holding their hands instead of each other’s, so it’s always so weird and nice when we are able to hold hands. Amidst the hustle and bustle of the holidays, I’m so thankful for this afternoon to get to spend time together. He’s my favorite and I can’t wait for all the adventures the both of us will embark on (with kids in tow) this new year!

Happy New Year! Life has settled a bit and homeschooling doesn’t resume until next week, so we’re kind of taking it easy. Ben is back to work, I’ve been trying to catch up on emails, and the girls are having a blast playing with all their toys all day long. One word to sum up last year would be insane. There are so many things good (and bad) that I never expected to happen. We had lots of heartbreaks and tears, but also a lot of joy. I can’t help but feel anxiety about this new year. I don’t know what it is, but maybe it’s cause we’re are slowly getting older, the kids are getting older, and maybe it’s the reality that life isn’t always roses. You just never know what can happen, and I’m nervous about the unknown. Anyone else feel that way? I read this verse yesterday and have been trying to meditate on it to encourage my heart… Psalms 27:1 “The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom should I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life, of whom should I be afraid?”

Besides my bit of anxiety, I do know that this year will also have good things. There are already a few things I know that will be happening in the next few months, which I’m quite excited about. I spent a lot of time last year purging and getting rid of things, so it’s really helped keep our house as clean and sane as it could be with 4 little children living here. This has also given me more time to relax a bit with the kids, and they are really learning how to be contributors in our home. We have lots of garden projects in the works too, so I can’t wait to see how those turn out and be done with them. That garden of ours is always a work in progress though.

Yesterday, I worked on creating an “official” budget for us. We are typically good at knowing our monetary limits, but we’ve never had it actually written down on paper, so we can only get better right?! Thankfully, we have no credit card debt and are done with school loans, so it’s just our mortgage and setting limits for our living expenses. We just think it’s good to be better aware of where everything is going, to be able to set some aside for house improvements, and to save as much as possible.

As for this space, I’d love to get more projects and recipes up, but also just keep sharing life here. I’m thankful for all of you that have followed along in this journey; it’s been fun and I hope to have more fun this year!

Something I’d like to work on is simplifying all the tabs open in my brain. I feel like I’m always trying to do a hundred million things and can’t focus. I think social media has really been a distractor too and I’m not even that good at constant twittering, instagramming, and facebooking. Oh and pinterest, even though that’s my fave. This post really resonated with me, it’s another thing to work on.

Rather than choosing resolutions, Ben and I have been discussing a word to set for the year. I haven’t figured mine out, I told him I’d have it by next December (ha!). Maybe mine should be focus, I need that reminder everyday. I easily get lost and then all chaos breaks loose in my brain. Focus on my girls, focus on trusting God, focus on loving Ben, focus on healthy living, focus on growing friendships, focus on being financially wise, and focus on the present. I will definitely keep thinking about that word and ask Ben what he thinks tonight.

How has your new year started? If you had a to set a word for this new year, what would it be?

On Christmas morn, Papi Claus surprised the girls (and Ben’s mom and sister) with a visit and joined us for all the merry festivities! He came in the room with sleigh bells jingling (from his iPhone) and was the one to pass out the gifts to the family. It was absolutely hilarious! Plus, Papi Claus was cracking lots of jokes, so we spent a lot of the morning just laughing and laughing. Glow was a little nervous, but she did eventually make her way to him, and Soulie was completely convinced that Ben was in the shower the entire time Papi Claus was with us. Believe it or not, the big girls were fooled too and didn’t realize it was Ben until his hat fell off.

Ben had been wanting to dress up as Santa for a few years now, but every year, we never remember to buy a costume until the day before Christmas, which is too late to get one by then. The local Japanese dollar store had the costume for only 5 buckaroos, so when I saw it, I scooped it up. This year, we were prepared! The costume isn’t the best quality, but it did the job, and it’s still good enough to last us a couple more years (and maybe more!). The big girls went hunting for the costume after Papi Claus left, but we hid it, and it won’t make another appearance again until next year when Papi Claus comes back to town. It was absolute fun to have Papi Claus join us that I think we just started a new family tradition!

What are some of your family Christmas traditions? Anyone dress up like Santa?

Christmas came and went. We went to Texas and now we’re home. Everything about last week flew by so fast and now it’s time to usher in the new year. We never had time to go Christmas lights hunting here in Southern California before we left for our road trip to Texas, so we made sure to do that in San Antonio. We went to the neighborhood of Windcrest and admired all the pretty lights there. There was this insanely long line to see all the houses, but somehow we managed to snag a map of all the winning houses. With the help of my iPhone, we avoided getting in that long line and mapped out house to house, and saw all the lights that way. The best part of it was True and Brave and how excited they were about everything! And in true baby, copycat fashion, Glow was reiterating everything they were saying. It was filled with lots of…

“THIS IS SO COOL!”

“WOW! THIS IS SO FUN!”

“OH! THAT’S MY FAVORITE!”

I have to use all caps in writing it because they were pretty much shouting it with lots of exuberance in their voices. We were just laughing at all the funny things they were saying, and I love how simple things like pretty lights make my girls so happy. We have never done any lights on our home, but maybe we should because they get all crazy happy about this stuff.