* Snow had fallen, snow on snow *

Carrie & Colin joined us downtown this week to see it snow inside Pacific Place. Pacific Place is a mall with shops, restaurants, and a movie theater, once a night during the holiday season it "snows" inside. Ben and I have been wanting to see the "snow" for sometime, especially after we heard that the flakes had a minty taste! We finally made it down there this week and once the snow started coming down Ben and I promptly looked up and opened our mouths trying to get a little taste. Much to our surprise and disappointment the "stuff/snow" coming down was more like soap suds than minty flavored snow. Even though we left with soapy mouths seeing it snow inside was really cool! Colin was SOOOOO excited!

Merry Go Rounds, Hot Chocolate, Gingerbread Houses...

We went with a group from church to ride the Merry-go-Round downtown and to see elaborate Gingerbread Houses that architect firms from around the Seattle area design. It was cold but a lot of fun!
All of the Gingerbread "Houses" had to be constructed only out of candy! They were pretty amazing!

IT SNOWED!

We were very excited to see snow on the first day of December and then sad to see it was all gone by the second! Here are a few pictures, we didn't get out to take pictures until it was dark so some of them are a little abstract... :)
A few from inside our apartment our sky lights looked like we'd been snowed in.

Jello Creation

For the past few Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners I (Mandy) have been given the great honor of making a "Jello Creation" for everyone to enjoy. My dad is always disgusted by what I create because he claims he can't stomach jello... not even during the holidays. (Party pooper...) I think my dad might wonder why a "Jello Creation" tradition has become a tradition in the first place. Before I reveal photos of this past Thanksgiving's creation I need to explain...

I always enjoy trying to create the "next best thing" each holiday dinner, I feel it's a great way to tap the "inner artist" in me! :) Unfortunately jello hasn't always been good to me, and to be fair to jello I haven't always given it a fair chance. For instance the time I tried to create using a Springform pan. No one told me, and I failed to notice that on the inside of the pan there is a lip that you are supposed to rest the bottom of the pan on. I rested the bottom of the pan on the opposite end, tightened the springs and it seemed to hold together nicely. I proceeded to fill the pan with some delicious jello that I had just dissolved in water. As I lifted the pan off the counter and opened the refrigerator door the bottom fell out and jello went EVERYWHERE.

Nothing quite that funny happened this year, but we did have a few laughs over jello. Wednesday night before Thanksgiving I started creating, I figured I'd do it the night before so it would have plenty of time to set. Thursday afternoon Ben and I drove over to Kirkland with the jello still in the mold, everything was lookin' good. I had layered two kinds of jello (Black Cherry & Orange) and added raspberries with a lil' Cool Whip.

When it came time to de-mold, the top layer decided to stay firmly in it's place. We thought we could put some toothpicks in the middle layers and then place the top layer on the toothpicks.

The following pictures are what happened during the next 30 seconds of this jello's life...

We ended up enjoying this creation in a bowl as the mold failed to hold up on its own. (It did turn out to be quite tasty.) This is what my dad thought about it...

*Disclaimer* All persons who handled jello had thoroughly washed their hands before the de-molding process began. DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME.