Every year at this time, I'm thankful that I don't have rabies.
Well. It's hard to come up with a new blog post introduction sometimes, and that was the best I could do. Now I can move forward without the pressure.
Dawson and I look for a 1,000 piece Christmas puzzle to do each year while shopping at Hobby Lobby with the intent to start it while he's on Thanksgiving break. But this year we got a little anxious because the puzzle was just sitting around in the box and it was getting upset. I think we actually finished it before Thanksgiving break started. Then I was going to open the puzzle I got my mom for Christmas and do that one and ship her this one, but I changed my mind because I'm her favorite and I didn't want to impede on that.
Yesterday was Thanksgiving. I got up, made cupcakes, went for a 3 mile run in order to earn my turkey badge, then made frosting for the cupcakes, took a shower and made green bean casserole. That whole sentence was just to over use commas.
Jason was determined to frost the cupcakes and he ended up choosing a frosting tip that made the design look like brains. Brains with caramel ooze.
We celebrated at my sister-in-laws house, which is perfect because the kids all go downstairs to their basement and play and we don't see them for hours. I asked her if we could just move in and she said no.
After our Thanksgiving feast we all moved into the living room to settle on a Christmas movie or just any movie really, that would calm the kids down because they ate 3 cupcakes a piece and the aftermath was a display of crazy we couldn't tolerate in our state of turkey slump.
Dawson got to fulfill his dream of becoming a merman when his cousin let him borrow her mermaid cozy.
All of my other Thanksgiving Day pictures went on FB so I guess now I have to move on to our "day after Thanksgiving decorate for Christmas" tradition.
First. It was very hard to get into the Christmas spirit because it was 72 degrees and sunny outside. If I were back home in gloomy Indiana, this would be a non-issue and I would have seasonal depression by now.
This is me annoyed with said weather.
Second. The holidays have sabotaged my good eating habits this year. Just before we left for Disney, I was at a weight that I hadn't seen since before having children. It was all because of this awesome high fat low carb eating plan I was doing. Today when we went shopping I was starving and decided to really hop back on that band wagon and came home with this. Success.
The boys were surprisingly patient this year, while waiting to decorate for Christmas. Ordinarily I'd threaten all manner of "no Christmas presents for you this year" dither to demand compliance to my "we can't decorate yet" blabbering... but they stayed busy doing other things all morning so it was moot.
Third. Evan was watching Shaun The Sheep, rather than a Christmas movie which didn't help the 72 degrees, sunny outside bah-humbug feeling I was having.
Down in the deep dark recesses of our basement is a blue curtain. Behind this curtain is OZ a random assortment of items that we have no other place to put, including Christmas decorations.
For you, my valued blog reader, I'm prepared to pull back the curtain and give you a glimpse into the organized chaos of our basement shelves.
Yes. I'm available for your small space organizational needs.
We pile all of the decorations on the floor and have the boys carry them up to the living room. This is the living room before decorating:
This is the living room during decorating:
Yeah I was pretty proud of the way the boys lined everything up all color coordinated by staggering the silver ornaments with the maroon ornaments. It's aesthetically pleasing.
Jason sets up the tree, and he doesn't let me help with that part, because he likes to bend all of the branches a certain way in order for it to look full. Apparently I skinny up trees.
So while he's doing that, I set about loading the CD player with Christmas music. Dawson didn't tell me he was going to take my picture during this important part of the festivities.
Since I'm all about thankfulness, I can share here that I'm grateful my butt crack wasn't showing.
Currently, my 2 favorite Christmas albums are these:
Eventually it was time for the mess. My least favorite part of this tradition.
Evan found his stocking and said "Why do they have to be socks"? Jason and I couldn't answer that question.
Dawson found the art project he made for me when he was in kindergarten. I'm not a hoarder. He's lucky I kept that.
Finally it was time to decorate the tree.
No one bothered capturing the memory of me decorating our tree, so I took it upon myself and got photo bombed.
Even fake trees leave behind a wake of irritating pine needles.
It wasn't long before Evan got mad about something and pouted, so Dawson snagged a picture.
And then... the decorating was complete. Maybe that's why he was pouting.
I don't collect snowmen, but I have these guys that come out every year:
We hang our stockings up on the fireplace mantle. I need a santa hat for the fish.
The boys loved each other for one photo snapshot.
My newest addition to our Christmas decorating is this miniature Nativity. We've had several nativities over the years, all of which have not exceeded my standards and have been sold. Which is what might happen to this set as well. Especially because I feel that I put the figures too close together and it's smothering the baby Jesus. If he or Mary were claustrophobic, I imagine they would have had to enforce visiting hours, your know?
There you have the 2017 edition of our Christmas tradition.
Tonight, I'm breaking out The Elf On The Shelf for the first time. Let's hope the Elf doesn't die between now and Christmas.
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