The Sprinkles of Life: Tradition 5: Cookies and Sleigh Rides

Well, if you haven't gotten the picture by now, you probably never will; I like to cook! So, of course, a Christmas tradition will involve baking cookies. This year we decided to have our neighbors, the Saads, join us for a night of sleigh rides, cookies, and charades. You are probably wondering how we do sleigh rides in California. Well, we all cram into the van and drive around and look at Christmas lights on people's houses. There is one neighborhood in San Ramon that always has tons of decorated houses, so of course we saw that. Then we went to this new house in Danville that has all their lights timed to Christmas songs. It plays 5 different songs and there is a different light show for each song, take a look!

We headed back to the house for some hors d'oeuvres which mom threw together at the last minute when she found out the day of the party that we were having people over!

The "AHH, people are coming look!" but she pulled it together and made some great snacks.

Now it was time for the long awaited cooking decorating! My dad decided to make a contest for: Most Creative, Most Christmasy, Most Unusual, Looks Best to Eat, and Looks Worst to Eat. This meant the stakes were pretty high!

Philip wearing his signature Santa suit, but with his long hair, he looks more like a Joseph or Jesus!

Even the moms got into it!

Amber hoping to get some scraps.

Everyone got one vote per category.

The Winners!

Katrina: most unusual ~ Griffin: worst to eat ~ Mom: best to eat ~ Kevin: most creative & most Christmasy

The hors d'oeuvres were such a hit, especially Brian's guacamole, so we had to make more before playing charades.

It was originally Mandy's recipe, so she made sure Brian got it right.

Next up was charades! Everyone wrote topics on pieces of paper and we took turns acting them out. People were surprisingly good at guessing, but for those we couldn't guess, we all ended up in tears laughing from their failed attempt to act.