Well everyone, it seems that us Beautiful Workers have lost our steam for writing posts. (I’m sure you noticed). We don’t want to abandon the community that Beautiful Work has created, but with two newborns arriving to half our troops within a month (me and Kate) and general family busyness, we needed to adjust the time commitment. So, we are moving to Facebook for a more interactive discussion of all things WHAM. We are really excited about this because it will be an easy way to hear from all the participants of this blog, writers and readers.

Click here or contact one of us and we’ll get you officially “invited”.  :-)

See you there, and thanks for being along for this ride!

The Eggimann family is on their way home with their new son!  Please pray for them as they travel in the freshly fallen snow.

Andie is currently away awaiting the final steps to adopt their son.  They are with him and would just appreciate prayer as they wait for all the paper work.  We are all so excited to meet this new addition!  More news to come…

This week we are suppose to be sharing special things we are doing to celebrate Christmas this year.  This year for us the month of December will include celebrating a very special wedding, hosting out of town guests, showers and then hosting my parents for Christmas.  We are so excited!!

Our special Christmas tradition usually falls on Christmas eve.  This year we will attend church and then come home to meet my parents (who will hopefully get in on time).  During our Christmas eve meal we usually read through different passages of the Christmas story that will correspond to different course of the meal.  Like during appetizers we will read about John the Baptist who was the forerunner to Christ.  This year we are eating fish tacos and salad.  After dinner the girls re-enact the Christmas story and then we open pj’s and head to bed.  We try and keep the night fun and yet reflective.  We will sing songs and try to keep things moving with toddlers at the table :)

What things are you doing??

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!  We celebrated the day by having 21 friends over to share turkey and sides and fun.  We had 10 kids under the age of 8 so it was a lively occasion :)  Only one major mishap happened and it involved a pie loving squirrel.  The much loved French silk pie was placed just outside our back door to keep it cool.  Within 10 minutes a squirrel had opened the plastic container and taken out a big chuck of pie.  When we ran out to try and save the pie he took his chunk and proceeded to eat it in a tree right in front of us just to taunt us.  I never thought a squirrel would be able to get through a plastic, well sealed pie container but it just goes to show how I underestimate the power of chocolate.  The pumpkin pies were just fine :)

This deal is online only through the 29th.

Well, this week we were supposed to be posting our favorite fall pictures. Funny thing is, I am the only one who is not really busy preparing for Thanksgiving. We will be going to Gretchen’s house because our baby is due any day now and we’ll have to take off to pick him up. The other funny thing is that we have hardly any good pics from the fall. We were sick almost the whole month of October, so we didn’t get to take multiple trips to the orchard like I’d hoped. Oh well, here are a few pics to make you laugh.

Because we’d like to have a bunch of kids, Andrew decided early on that we needed “a sustainable model” for birthdays. Those of you who know him will not be surprised by this terminology :) Basically, we didn’t want to have huge parties for the first couple kids and then not be able to keep it up for the others. Consequently, we have pretty low-key birthday celebrations.

Ruth is turning 4 on Thanksgiving this year and we just celebrated her birthday a few weeks early  since it will likely be busy on the actual day (it adds to the chaos that the baby is due 3 days after her b-day). This was the first year that we had “little friends” over for Ruth’s birthday. The past few years, we have just had a couple special adults come over to celebrate by joining us for dinner or dessert and present opening. Similar to the Naugles, we usually let the birthday kids choose special foods to eat that day.  I also usually get a mylar balloon from the dollar store. We have varied when we open the gifts. When possible, we have done it at breakfast so they can enjoy new toys during the day.

Ruth’s celebration this year was tailored to what she likes- we dressed up and had a tea party with 3 of her girl buddies. We used real china and had special tea party foods, complete with mini chocolate eclairs for dessert. We asked that the friends go low key in the gift department, as I wanted it to be more about the experience than the gifts. Their gift was fitting-  a tea cup with roses :)

This is Birthday week!  We are going to be talking about how we celebrate our children’s birthdays in an affordable fashion.

At the Naugle household we love to celebrate.  Each birthday starts with a special breakfast complete with decorations.  For some of my girls this means bacon and eggs for the others it means cinnamon rolls.  We then usually try to do or go somewhere fun like  swimming at our local YWCA or to a movie or the zoo.  Dinner that night will be the child’s choice and we end the evening with cake or pie.  Sometimes these festivities include family and friends and sometimes it is just our family.  We have 2 birthdays right after Christmas and it is often difficult to do actual birthday parties with lots of friends so we try and make it special with just our family.  We also end the day by talking about and praying for the birthday girl.  It is fun to incorporate each of their personalities into making their birthday special.  For our youngest this year we just did a dance party after nap time and ate pizza and played outside.  She had a great time!  Our second really likes big parties and her birthday is in July so we have often just invite families to come bbq with us in the park where there is a wading pool and playground.  The kids swim and play while we grill and I do not have to clean my house afterward :).  Our oldest was born on January 6 and this has proven really difficult to even attempt birthday parties for with all the partying from Christmas and New Years so we usually just let her pick an activity that we all do with  her.  Our third was born 3 days after Christmas and her celebration usually includes a pizza dinner with her good friend Ruth :)

Birthdays for us do not always include a big production but we do try and take into consideration how each girl likes to celebrate.

(disclaimer: this is NOT my freezer...but it is an inspiration, isn't it?! How organized and tidy!)

I admit I’m not a freezer cooker.  I love to cook, therefore freezing entire entrees/dinners doesn’t really appeal to me….that’s the honest truth!  I know it saves time (and sometimes money!) but I just like to cook it – then eat it!  :-)

• Breads/Muffins (Banana, Zucchini, Zucchini-Pineapple)
• Breakfast Items (Buttermilk Pancakes -recipe below, Waffles)
• Meats (Cooked and shredded Chicken, Cooked Ground Beef, Turkey Burgers Mixture, Meatball Burgers Mixture)
• Meatballs (Italian Sausage Meatballs -recipe below, Ham Balls)
• Fruit (Rhubarb, Strawberries, Blueberries, Blackberries, Bananas, Peaches -ready for Waffle toppings, Smoothies, Coffee Cakes, Freezer Jam, or a Dessert)
• Shredded Zucchini (portioned out in 2 cups bags for quick breads)
• Potatoes (cooked and diced to be tossed with Lipton Onion Soup Mix and baked)

Buttermilk Pancakes

2 cups flour

2 t. baking powder

1 t. baking soda

1/2 t. salt

3 T. sugar

2 eggs

3 cups buttermilk

1/2 t. vanilla

Combine, let sit 5 minutes and cook on greased skillet!  Super fluffy and YUMMY! (I’m not a pancake girl and I LOVE these!!!)

Italian Sausage Meatballs

2 lbs ground beef

1 T. course ground fennel seeds (I don’t grind mine…too lazy….)

2 bay leaves, crushed

1 T. dried parsley

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 t. salt

1/4 t. pepper

4 T. water

1/8 t. red pepper flakes, optional

Mix, then let stand in fridge for 1 hour.  Mix again and form into balls.  Place on foiled and greased cookie sheet and bake at 350 degrees approximately 20 minutes, or until done.  Meatballs may be frozen pre-cooked or raw.  If you choose to freeze them raw be sure to freeze them completely on the cookie sheet first, THEN put them into a freezer bag for storage.  (Otherwise you will just have a big frozen lump of meat rather than individual balls….).

Enjoy with Spaghetti, in a crock pot with sauce as an appetizer, or with marinara and mozzarella on a stadium/hoagie roll for a Meatball Sandwich.