Christmas Day Morning

I wont bore you with the details,

but Christmas morning was wonderful.

Very laid back.

We didn't even open presents until around 11AM.

 

Thor posing with Lexx.

Austin mugging it.

Me, pre-makeup...don't Judge!

Thor keeping an eye out.

Making sure nobody was going to take our presents.

Priceless!

Todd opening his gift from us.

It's a Kreg jig. 

It's kind of self serving gift, because now

 he can make furniture for me.

Austin showing off all his gifts from Santa

and the parents.

Lexx showing off her booty!

 

I hope you had a nice relaxing Christmas Day.

 

PS - Have a great New Years Eve. 

 I will be spending it in bed and asleep by 9:00 PM

as I have some sort of flu bug!

Kids gave it to me.

Boo.

I hope your New Year starts off better than mine.

Long Friday Drive to Work

I had the most beautiful drive into work today.

As I crested the hill near my house, this view caught my eye.

I leave my house around 7:30 AM,

so it's shortly after sunrise.

I also happened to be driving on the main highway I take to work,

and had to drive through a fog bank.

When I cleared the fog bank, the sun was shining

and made everything look golden.

It was hard to capture on film.

I only had about 13.5 seconds to get out of my car,

take a picture, and continue on to work.

You can tell what I'm talking about a little bit

in this picture, but it doesn't come close to

looking as beautiful as the real thing.

It was almost ethereal.

Hopefully I'll be able to take some awesome pictures this

long weekend (weather permitting).

I hope you have a great weekend.

See you back here Monday.

~Kisses~

Brenda

Christmas Eve

My fam and I spent Christmas Eve with my parents.

My parents were out of town and didn't get back until Friday,

 so they had very little time to decorate.

I was anxious to see what my parents could 

throw together in such a short time frame.  

This is what welcomed us...

Ohhh, what a cute little Charlie Brown Christmas Tree.

But wait, what is that thing coming out of the top of it?

A string?

A string wrapped around a nail, holding the tree upright.

Because my parents had so little time, they just

went outside and cut a little tree down from their property.

Being that it was so small, it wouldn't fit in the tree stand,

so my dad improvised,

and 

VOILA!

A dangling tree.

(Feel free to insert any redneck joke here).

While I was busy admiring the ingenuity,

my mom was hard at work finishing up dinner.

As my mom was working her fingers to the bone,

we all stood around eating and taking pictures 

(Relax - I did ask if I could help with anything).

Snacking

Pretty table

Picture taking

(My family)

When mom finished up, we all got down to business

and ate like there was no tomorrow.

YUMMMM!

Immediately after dinner we opened presents

And had dessert.

Some of us had dessert all over us!

After all the festivities, 

I wanted to have a picture taken with my parents.

My sister lives in a different state, 

and I wanted to send her a picture of the three of us.

My parents were sitting at the table,

so I thought I would just stand behind them. 

Easy peasy.

Well, it wasn't that easy.

I'm tall, like over 6' tall with shoes on.

When I stood up behind them my head was out of the picture,

so I had to bend over.

I felt like I was too tall still,

so I decided to do the splits thinking that

you couldn't see what I was doing.

So I finally figured out how to pose,

and while I was standing behind them 

doing the splits,

I happened to ask Todd

 (who was taking the picture)

in a somewhat scary voice

"Does this make me look skinny?"

to which Todd replied,

"I don't know, see what you think."

Soooo

what do you think?

Awkward.

Doesn't it look like I'm going to swoop down

and eat their faces off?

I guess I don't have to worry about becoming 

America's Next Top Model!

We had a great time eating and celebrating.

Thanks mom and dad for an awesome

Christmas Eve!

Some More Holiday Tradition

You know that the fam and I,

as part of our holiday tradition,

usually go and get our tree

from a Christmas tree farm.

We also have a couple (few?) movies

that we generally watch/

Another tradition that we follow is watching

as many holiday related movies as we can.

Our staple movies are:

The Grinch

This is the BEST Christmas movie ever!

We watch Grinch every year while we are

decorating the Christmas tree.

Elf

A Christmas Story

and a new one for us,

The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe

(Santa even makes an appearance in this movie!)

I love watching the movies because it really 

helps me to get in the holiday spirit.

Do you make movies part of your holiday tradition?

Merry Christmas!

Santa is finished!

I know because he emailed me this picture

when he got back to the North Pole.

He visited our house early this morning,

 and I have to say

we must have been very good this year.

Hope you enjoy your time with family.

Here's to a wonderful and stress free day!

Happy Holidays

The Christmas cards are out, the gifts bought, 

presents wrapped, there is not much more to 

do except to eat way too much food, enjoy some 

wonderful quality time with our families 

and wait for Santa.

Here's wishing you and yours a beautiful holiday season.

Kisses~

Brenda

Mayan Apocolypse?

 

It looks like we survived another day.

Phew, that was a close one.

 

I guess that means now I have to get on

the ball and finish all those last minute

errands before Christmas.

(Can you believe there are only 4 days until Christmas?)

 

Here's hoping you have a wonderful weekend,

and may you find some awesome sales.

 

Stay safe my friends!

 

 

Partying Too Hard

I have consumed more food in the past

three days than I have in the previous

three years.

I've been eating non stop since Tuesday!

Christmas parties, pot lucks

and more Christmas parties.

I don't think it is going to get much

better being that Christmas is 5 days away.

I'm thinking any form of diet is

out of  the question.

Link

Christmas Cards X 2

I promised you I would show you the 

Christmas cards we sent out this year

as soon as I felt everyone had received theirs.

So without further ado -

here you go.

Note:  These are terrible quality pictures.

Sorry!

I did try and copy it from the website,

and for some reason it will not let me.

This is the front of the Christmas card.

It is sort of like chalkboard black with 

white writing and little holly branches (?)

on the side.

The back of the card.

As you can see it has little holly things again

and a squarish pattern.

I really like how Tinyprints decorates 

the back of their cards.

I included a letter from the family

 in with all of these cards 

kind of outlining what had 

happened during

2012.

And because I was so on the ball this year, 

and because the puppies told me that they 

felt left out, they actually sent out 

Christmas cards to a select few.

Who really ate the last Christmas cookie?

(Yes he is wet and dirty in the picture.

We were at the park and he had played in the river 

and was rolling in dirt - that is why he is smiling!)

Then on the back we decided to put a little something extra.

Shutterfly allows you to add stuff for free,

so we did

Loki says,

"Wishing you and your pack the Merriest Christmas

and a yappy New Year!

So there you have it.

Nothing super fancy, but nice enough.

It really was a Christmas miracle that these 

were sent out, and even on time.

I haven't been on the ball enough to mail

out cards in about, oohhhh, five years.

I know-

for shame Brenda.

Ya whateva!

So were you on the ball this year and

get your Christmas cards out,

or did I just own you?

(Hey a girls gotta brag when she can!)

Foxy Little Tree

So you saw that we went to the tree farm and cut down 

a tree for our living room, but what I didn't show you

is that I went out and bought a cheapo little tree, 

and have it sitting on our kitchen table.

I named him Ted.

Ted the tree.

Ted pre-ornaments.

And yes that is a Thanksgiving tablecloth....

Shhhhhh!

Ted, in fact, is the only real 

Christmas decorations that we have up to date 

(procrastinate much?).

My original plan for the Ted was to take the

well loved and mismatched ornaments that we own,

and give them a new home.

That didn't happen.

I got a little excited and went out and bought some

new ornament that match absolutely nothing in our house.

I don't care though -

You wanna know why?

Cause they're super cute.

I visited Target and in their dollar bin found your 

normal run of the mill ornaments.

But then I had to go deeper in to the store 

and search a little more.

Bad idea!

Let's say I was only $3 in at the front of the store,

and by the time I left Target - I was out over $30.

I fell in love with some little glass Fox ornaments.

They were so bright and cute, and they

just called my name and somehow 

they ended up in my basket.

Wanna see?

Ted mostly decorated - 

I just need a tree topper

that won't topple the tree.

(Say that 3 times fast)

A little closer.

As close as I can get.

Sorry for the poor quality,

but my good camera hates dim lighting.

You get the idea though.

So what do you think?

Should I just stick with the big tree,

or do you think Ted is a cute little addition?

O Christmas Tree

So the big tree debate was solved.

We went to the tree farm and had a great time.

The puppies got all spiffy, 

and they got so excited when we neared the farm.

Look dad and mom...

our favorite Christmas tradition.

Thor sporting his bow tie.

You never know who you might run in to...

like Santa!

Loki was much more chill.

We found a tree quickly and took turns 

cutting and taking pictures

Timber!

It was a little overcast and cold,

but we had a great time as always.

It is always more fun when the kids can join us,

but the older we get, the less they 

will be able to join us I suppose.

So where did you get your tree from?

Only 11 More Days

 

I've got a busy weekend planned.

All my shopping is done

(except for the tree of course),

but I have several other holiday

 related errands to run.

Once those are done, we've got decorating,

baking and cleaning to do.

 

It sounds like I might be so busy

 that I may need to practice

 the workout above.

 

Hope you have a stress free and fabulous weekend.

Holiday Traditions

My family is nothing if not traditional.

Todd and Lexx especially like to make family traditions

and stick with them year-after-year

(Austin and I are more go with the flow type people).

One of our ongoing traditions is spending the morning

at a tree farm and cutting down our Christmas tree.

We do it every year, no questions asked.

Picture from last year.

Go here to see last years post.

This year presents a problem.

Austin and Alexxa are both working

Saturday & Sunday until 5 PM.

What does that mean?

They won't be able to cut down a tree with us this year.

Todd and I are vacillating on whether to still

go to the tree farm and cut the tree ourselves,

OR go to some place like Home Depot,

grab a tree and call it a day.

We argue that although we wouldn't have the

kids, the puppies still love to go tree shopping

with us and they look forward to it every year,

it does keep with tradition, and when all is said and

done you have a nice fresh Christmas tree.

Yummy pine scent...mmmmm!

Then we postulate, it is quite a drive,

it is more expensive, and do the dogs truly care?

We haven't made a final decision.

We will decide on Saturday if we are going to

make the trip or not.

So what do you think?

Would you stick with tradition or

would you save time and money and make

a quick stop at super store?

(Sorry fake tree people...

this is not an option.  

Todd refuses to have a plastic tree).