Pre-Christmas 2013

I certainly can't let the month of December pass by without sharing about our Christmas. I'm really going to work on updating this space more often. Really. I am. Promise. Even if my mom and Owens are the only two people left reading - I will update for the two of you. 

We started the month of December by celebrating sweet McNary's third birthday. It was so much fun and McNary had a special guest - Santa! MK is a big fan of Santa. She gets it honest. I'm an even bigger fan. 

Initially, MK wanted a jeep for Christmas. The only issue - she already has a jeep and it works perfectly fine. Yes, it has some wear and tear which is mostly our fault because we've left it out in the rain, but we've promised to paint it and it will be good as new. After it was established that Santa doesn't bring gifts you already have (even if he did last year), she then wanted a guitar, cash register and BB gun. She really stuck to that list.

Socks, our crazy elf, was back and one night he decorated our garage door. MK was very surprised!

 

The Friday before our break started, MK had her school program. It was absolutely precious! Travis and I were both able to attend and my parents came as well. 

Friday by lunch time I was feeling kind of tired and achy, but thought maybe the work week was just getting to me. By Friday evening I felt terrible. Saturday morning I started running a fever and could not get out of the bed. Travis convinced me to go to Urgent Care, so I did. After being there for two hours and only wanting to lie down on the floor because I felt so awful, I found out I had the flu. Yes, the flu. The start of my Christmas break and I have the flu. I was so disappointed. So sad. So angry. But almost too exhausted to even care. I came home, put on my PJs and crawled back into bed. After a few days of Tamiflu I was feeling better. Thank goodness. However, it was very short lived because on that Wednesday, after a dentist appointment, I found out that I needed a root canal. I.Thought.I.Was.Going.To.Lose.It. And I may have once or twice.

Despite my bad news on Wednesday, MK had great news. She had a terrific checkup at the dentist and to treat her we took her bowling. She had the best time. We had the best time. It was nice to get out of quarantine and live a little.

 MK did not understand why we needed to wear "funny shoes".

By the end of the first week of our break I was feeling more like myself and actually able to get out and finish our Christmas shopping. I might have also made a few stops at Starbucks. My favorite.

By the Friday before Christmas, all of our shopping was complete and all of our gifts were wrapped. It felt SO good!

Saturday evening we headed to my parent's house for the holidays. My mom let MK open one of her gifts - the game HedBandz. We all loved it and spent hours playing it that night.

Owens and Trenholm had planned not to come to my parent's house. They weren't going to travel for Christmas because they wanted to keep Loitton at home and away from germs. Yes, they had their baby and yes, I have lots to catch up on. (Story to come soon.) Of course, we were super sad they weren't going to be home for Christmas, but definitely understood their desire to keep Loitton at home. I kept them posted on their gift status by sending them text updates of things I found under the tree. 

During our time at home we went over to Mammie's house to help prepare for Christmas Eve dinner. While there we had to sample some of her baked goods. Her wreath cookies are a BIG hit in my family. Mammie makes them every year and makes about 140 of them. It's crazy!

 My mom and my uncles always joke about who gets more wreath cookies.

We also helped Mammie make candy. Will and my mom had it under control, I just made a mess. 

A few nights before Christmas we took MK and Hunter's annual PJ picture. I can't wait for Loitton to be in the picture next year! The top picture is this year, the bottom is last.

We also baked cookies while we were at my parent's house. I should say we attempted to bake cookies. They definitely did not turn out like Mammies.

I had two "helpers" for the decorating part. The only problem - they wanted to eat more of the decorations than actually put them on the cookies.

 See…these are not very pretty. Or tasty.

 More to come about Christmas Eve and Christmas Day...