Snow In the New Year

Happy New Year!  I don't think I've been happier about saying goodbye to the old one and welcoming in a new one.  We can only hope this one is filled with promise of a return to normalcy.

In the meantime, our family of five, celebrated in the snow...with masks on.  Who would have ever guessed.  Way back when life was normal, we had a planned a post Christmas vaca to Hawaii.  As 2020 turned into the saga it was, those plans quickly got postponed and we scrambled to fill our winter break.  Insert a tag along with family fiends and we were set to head out West.

So here we are...Park City, Utah.  With it being last minute, only the boys were able to get lift tickets, but the girls and I found plenty to keep us busy. 

After morning skis, we met back up as a family and made some great memories.  The girls and I filled our mornings with shopping, ice skating, and lots of sledding.  Our greatest family time memory was most definitely the snowmobiling...absolutely incredible!  And the snow tubing park comes in a close second.

So here we are celebrating 2021 in the snow...in no particular order, because I don't have the energy or time with virtual schooling upon our return.

But man, getting away was great while it lasted!  Love my family and traveling and best of all traveling with my family.

 

Christmas Morning 2020

Merry Christmas!  My little ones have been anticipating this morning for quite a while now.  As usual the jolly ol' fella filled the playroom with Santa sacks for the kids. They were right under the kid's tree as expected.  Santa and I came up with this plan as a way to keep the living room presentable for adult Christmas celebrations.  Brilliant, huh?

The biggies this year were an electric scooter for Jack and hover boards for the girls.  

Jack also cashed in on a few Lego sets, gift cards, and some gadgets.  While Maggie got lots of beauty products and Lucy scored fun art supples.

I swear this guy knows what Christmas is or the excitement was just that contagious.  Shelton couldn't have been more excited to open his gifts from Santa and he even got one mailed all the way from Grammy in Florida.

And look at what Mama got.  If you ask me, you can never go wrong with diamonds.  Love!  Smoochies to my thoughtful hubby!

Before we made our way upstairs to do the rest of the adult gifts, GG and I snuggled in for a restful viewing of White Christmas.  I love old movies, especially musicals and especially next to my Grandma.  As hard as I tried, I couldn't keep the kid's attention. They could be found either riding up and down the road on their new transportation, building Lego creations or more roller skating in the garage.

When the final credits rolled it was the grown ups turn...

One of my most favorite parts of Christmas is gift giving.  I love finding just the right present for my family.  And if I actually get to see the recipient open the presents it's a double bonus for me.

Look what I found for my FSU loving hubby...a signed Bobby Bowden game day picture.  This will be perfect in his office.

And for my Aunt and Mom, a few girly goodies.  Since Maggie has banned me from buying clothes for her without her input, these ladies fill the void.

I'm convinced I could wrap up a rock for my Grandma and she would think it was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen.  She is that easy to please.  But no rocks for my Grandma this year.  I had fun finding little activities to fill her time, soft jammies, and pictures of the kids.

Please note how she saves all the bows in pristine condition.  I can't imagine what she actually does with them.  Such a gentle soul.

As much as I enjoy watching others open their gifts, it was fun to open a few of my own.  I adore this map of our lake house.  So thoughtful from my brother and sister in law.  I'm looking forward to getting up there and finding the perfect place to hang it.

I also can't wait to try out my new Yoga pillow from Grammy when I can get this sweet sack of sugar off of it.  It made for the perfect resting spot after a busy morning of hover boarding around.

Now if that wasn't eventful enough, the real celebration begins when we host Christmas dinner.  This year was a bit quieter due to Covid, but we still managed to host 8 adults and 5 kiddos.  I'm looking forward to next year when we can have the whole crew here.

Regardless it was a very Merry and as always busy Christmas.  Merry Christmas to all!  Now on to the New Year...yippee!

Christmas Eve +More

Seriously, how amazing was this Christmas?  Something about being isolated and having a what feels like eternal cleared calendar made this year's celebration all the more sweeter.  Now that doesn't mean I won't be celebrating next year when we can return to our traditions of Christmas productions, cookie parties, gift exchanges and all the other busy goodness that comes with the season.  But just this one year, it was nice.

Even with an empty December calendar, Christmas weekend was a whirlwind of friends, family, food, presents, love, lots of smiles, and who am I kidding...a few stressful moments too.  Tis' the Season.

On Christmas Eve Eve, we welcomed some of our Florida family on my side.  Always so happy to see them.  And even though we just saw them on Thanksgiving, it's never enough.

Maggie prepped by baking Christmas cookies.  And by baking, I mean ingredients all over every surface of the kitchen.  Therefore I spent the day cleaning...even after Clarence.

By Christmas Eve, we were back in the kitchen.  But this time we were making our traditional Gingerbread Houses.  This year we thought it would be fun to try a village with mini cottages.

And we love a Little GG in the action to make the tradition all that much sweeter.

The final product was pretty cute.  They completed it with a powdered sugar road.  Adorable!  Wish I had grabbed a photo, but I was probably cleaning...again.

Another Christmas Eve tradition is exchanging family gifts.  The siblings each picked out a gift to give one another and Clay and I gave each of the kids a gift.  The latter of this tradition started way back when one of the kids questioned, "why don't you get us anything for Christmas, you get one for everyone else in the family?".  Geez, we couldn't let Santa get all the credit.  So there the tradition was born.

This year we "gifted" Jack with some Mario race car game he wanted and the girls with roller skates.  Happiness all around.  The girls spent the better half of Christmas Eve skating around the garage and using whatever props they could find to stabilize themselves {i.e. suitcases, canes, brooms} and Jack headed straight to his gaming computer to set up his Mario race course.

And please don't be jealous of my stunning garage.  I swear I've had that garage floor painted umpteen times.

After all of that Christmas Eve excitement, it was time for Mass and dinner at Grandma's.  We dressed up and streamed the live Christmas Eve Mass right in the middle of our living room.  I definitely missed the magic of being in the Cathedral but the surprise snow fall right in the midst of the homily was pretty dear. As my Grandma always says during a moment of awe, "God is Good.".  And he certainly was this Christmas Eve 2020.

Now we are off to Grandma's house for way too many Christmas presents, a delicious dinner, and family time.

Can't wait for Santa...

Deck The Halls

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas around here.  I have never been more ready to pull out the Christmas decor, start wrapping gifts, and celebrating the season than I am this year.

We aren't off to a bad start.

We have the fresh greenery {inside and out} and stockings hung.  Next up Christmas trees and table decor.

Clarence is back from the North Pole!  And he is bringing lots of giggles and smiles with him.

And we've even knocked out teacher gifts and classmate presents.  I found these monogrammed cheese boards on sale on PotteryBarn and snatched them up.  We tied up an Amazon gift card {because who doesn't love Amazon} and they are ready to go.  Now if we can just stay in school until break.  Fingers crossed.

For classmates, we packaged these adorable Christmas face masks.  My girls are super into face masks these days.  Prime Amazon find.  Im so glad I grabbed them when I did because shipping is s....l...o...w.

Maggie wasn't too worried about the boys in her class.  {I mean 5th grade boys are kind of gross and it would be "embarrassing" to give them a gift.}  But innocent Lucy still appreciates the boys.  So she decided to give them wind up Christmas characters as a way to spread Holiday Cheer.  Another Amazon find and they are pretty cute.  And work to boot.

Next up finish gift wrapping, yes, my shopping is complete {one of the perks to Covid and having way too much time on my hands} and also finalize decorating.  

Christmas can't come soon enough this year!