Guess what?! I'm Back!

Which is funny, considering that I didn't go anywhere!  

So I just got busy the past week.  Tons of cooking and eating for Thanksgiving made me a little short on time to blog!  I loved every minute of it, and I guess I was just too busy enjoying myself to stop and take the time to document it right then.

But, now Thanksgiving is over.  And December is here.  Which means: Christmas time!!!  (I thoroughly believe that Christmas time should not begin until after Thanksgiving is over, so I've just started celebrating!)

That being said, I've done quite a lot in the first four days of December!  I've started my Christmas shopping, Thomas and I got our tree up and the house decorated!  I've already wrapped several presents!  And I'm planning a mini Christmas party for my Life Group girls!

We got a new (bigger) couch earlier this year, so we had to find a new place to put the Christmas tree.  Turns out that we didn't have many options if we didn't want to have to hop over it to walk around the house!  (Our new couch is a lot bigger than our old one... which is exactly why we love it!)

I also hung some icicle lights and ornaments over the sliding door out to the porch because I just love icicle lights!  We have more lights, but I just can't think of anything good to do with them... maybe I'll get more creative as the season continues!

Lolo is pretty good with the tree (we put one up every year).  But so far, she has enjoyed tunneling under the tree skirt and knocking off the ornaments she can reach.

I'm interested in seeing how she does with presents under it this year.  Since we usually travel back to Missouri for Christmas, we don't have many presents under the tree.  Also, Thomas and I are horrible about waiting to open our presents all at one time (we've never been at our own house to open them Christmas morning, so we plan to do it early anyway.), but usually Thomas caves so badly and pleads with me to open my presents as soon as he buys them.

This year, however, I am INSISTING that we wait until Christmas to open them!!!  (We're staying in Florida, so this is our very first Christmas in 5 1/2 years of marriage (and 8 1/2 years as a couple) that we are able to open our presents from each other on Christmas!)  I am ok with opening some presents on Christmas Eve night, but we are at least getting that far!  I am going to stay strong this year!  I WILL NOT CAVE!!!

I have yet to bust out the Christmas music (we always decorate the tree while watching a movie instead of with music), and I haven't baked any holiday goodies either.  I'm also trying to think of some new Christmas traditions we could start since we'll have our first Christmas at home.  More to come on that later though...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!!