Wise Men Hide and Seek - Day 9

Technically today was supposed to be our daughter's turn to hide the wise men but I had an idea that I wanted to try and she was excited to see it.  I had her go into another room where she counted to 10 and then came out.  When she saw them she thought it was so funny!!

Wise Men Hide and Seek - Day 8

Today it was my turn to hide the wise men.  Our daughter thought it was hilarious when she found them relaxing in her doll house.

Wise Men Hide and Seek - Day 7

Our daughter is getting pretty good at hiding the wise men as well.  This time she hid them under her bed with her stuffed animals and other toys.  I found it kind of cute and funny she set them on top of a shoe box with the words "Never Stop Exploring" written on it. :)

Wise Men Hide and Seek - Day 6

Today our daughter found the Wise men hiding on her Thomas the tank Engine boat in the bathtub.  She almost missed seeing them because the shower curtain was closed. :) They're pretty good at hiding. :)

Wise Men Hide and Seek - Day 5

It was our daughter's turn to hide the Wise men tonight.  She is clearly very creative. . .she decided to hide them in the kitchen cupboard among the dishes.  I think they look pretty good hiding out with the rainbow of colours. :)

Unfortunately we couldn't find the camel's saddle tonight in time to hide them before Daddy caught us. . .hopefully the camel won't look so naked tomorrow night. :)

Wise Men Hide and Seek - Day 4

I wouldn't normally post a picture of this chair since it's our cat's chair and the only chair in the house with a ridiculous amount of cat fur on it, but my husband decided it would be a good idea to "hide" the wise men on the chair, should have picked the living room couch in my personal opinion, or really anything that wasn't covered in cat fur because personally I think it looks gross, lol, but this is where he hid them and our daughter thought it was so cool!  I would never let anyone sit on this chair lol and it's hidden from view of company normally. .  .oh well. . .

It's our daughter's turn to hide them tomorrow night. . .once again, she's super excited.

Wise Men Hide and Seek - Day 3

Last night was our daughter's turn to find the Wise men.  It took her a while but she found them and was very excited when she did.  Tonight it was my daughter and my turn to hide the Wise men again for my husband to find when he gets home.

Our Advent Calendar has large pockets at the bottom so we thought it was the perfect spot!

Wise Men Hide and Seek - Day 2

Wise men hiding in my fairy collection

Well, my husband has taken my daughter to dance class tonight and I've been left alone to hide the Wise Men.  When they return, the two of them will go searching.  Do you think they'll find them?

Wise men Hide and Seek - Day 1

Wise men hiding in the blanket box under our daughter's bed.

So practically everyone I know seems to have an Elf on the Shelf so I guess I started wondering if we were missing out on something.  Elf on the Shelf specifically is not my cup of tea because Santa doesn't visit our house.  Our daughter will tell you that Santa is imaginary if you ask her.

For our family, we have chosen to make the birth of Christ the focus of our Christmas celebration.  We do, however, still exchange gifts and we still have stockings hung on our fireplace.  They're just not from Santa. Our daughter helps us choose gifts to put in our stockings and we give her the gifts in hers.

So, this year I came across an idea on Pinterest called Wise men's Adventures.  A Catholic mom wrote up a blog of a set of Playmobile wise men getting into trouble around her house daily.  Her idea was similar to Elf on the Shelf, in that, the wise men came to life every night and her children woke up to find them getting into trouble.  She took pictures of the trouble they got into.  Each night they got closer to the manger scene as they were on their way to see Jesus while they got into this trouble.

I thought it was a cool idea.  However, the more I thought about it the more I started worrying that we were literally just replacing one for the other.  The only thing that was different was that nobody reported back to Santa, which was often part of Elf on the Shelf's job.  However, these wise men still came to life on their own and I still felt like I would be lying to my daughter if we did it that way unless she knew that it was just pretend.

So. . .here's what I came up with. . .

Wise men hide and seek.

Our daughter is nearly 4 and LOVES Hide and Seek so we decided that instead of only us making the Wise men get into trouble/ hide, we would include our daughter in this.  So today my daughter and I "hid" the wise men together and her dad will have to find them when he gets home from work.  Tomorrow he will hide them for us to find.

She was IMMENSELY excited by this.  It's allowing her to be creative and imaginative.  She came up with where to hide them today!  I'm hoping this game will continue to be a lot of fun as we continue to play it throughout December.

Beef and wine

This morning we took our daughter to our local Santa Claus parade and then came home, had some hot chocolate and set up the Christmas decorations!  We watched some Christmas movies and before I knew it it was dinner time!  Unfortunately I hadn't really planned ahead and my husband was in no mood to run out to the grocery store.

So, I decided to look in the fridge and cupboards and was able to throw together something I'll call "Beef and Wine." I'm happy to report that it turned out well.

Here is my recipe:

Beef and Wine

Ingredients:

1lb beef stew meat

1 tsp onion powder

1/4 tsp thyme

1/2 cup red wine

1/4 tsp garlic powder

1 tbsp melted margarine

2 carrots cut up

1 cup frozen green beans

1 cup of long grain white rice + water needed to cook it

Directions:

1) Preheat oven to 350F.

2) Put melted margarine into the bottom of a casserole dish.

3) Place beef stew meat in casserole dish with margarine and sprinkle with onion powder, thyme, and garlic powder. Toss together.

4) Add carrots, green beans, and wine on top.

5) Bake in oven for 1 hour.

6) While beef mixture is cooking, prepare rice according to package directions.

7) When beef has reached an internal temperature of at least 160F, serve beef mixture over rice.

8) Enjoy!