Christmas Eve

I can't believe it's actually here already, but more shockingly I can't believe I'm actually ready and not stressed out this year! The house is all decorated, presents are all wrapped, cookies are baked and we're not hosting any meals at our house, so very little left to prepare.

Decorating this year has been interesting.

First, with our ladder and step stool at the lake, adding the tree topper proved to be a bit difficult. After a few failed attempts dangling Katelyn in mid-air, we opted to wait until we could get a ladder.

Lindsay is very much into pretend play. She's often playing with babies or little dolls having quite the conversations. It shouldn't have surprised me, but I did get quite the chuckle when she started arranging my ceramic Santas so they were knocking on the doors or peeking in the windows of the various houses on my coffee table.

I was able to go to both of the girls' class Christmas parties this year. Katelyn's was very fun with a tissue paper snowball fight! And Lindsay's class enjoyed a visit from Santa.

Katelyn and I love to go to the Children's Theater in downtown Charlotte. This year, she and I saw "Peter Pan" and "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever". But on Sunday, we got to introduce Lindsay to the theater when all 4 of us went to see "The Velveteen Rabbit". She did great sitting still and being quiet - until she yelled "Wake up Bunny!" But I think she really liked it since when the show was over, she wanted to stay for another one.

Yesterday we had lots of fun baking Christmas cookies. Katelyn, Lindsay and their cousin, Ally, made sugar cookies in all sorts of colors and shapes - even bunnies. I made the old stand-by peanut-butter blossoms and then finished off my baking day with kolachky - walnut and raspberry!

So after sampling lots of cookies yesterday, I decided I better start my New Year's exercising resolution today...we'll see how long it lasts!

Hope you all have a Merry Christmas!

Not too late to be Thankful!

So, I know I've been considerably absent from posting in quite awhile. I often think of great things to write about and foolishly tell myself that I'll post a little later when I have more time. I'm slowly but surely realizing that that time NEVER comes! Now I have the issue of what to write about....it's far too late to ramble on about how great Thanksgiving was, but I guess I will start there anyway :)

It really was a great holiday. We have so much to be thankful for after a year full of health issues. We started the weekend before celebrating with Mike's Dad and Ruth and the whole family. The cousins all had tons of fun playing all day!

Then we started our drive up to NY on Tuesday. Our travel plans changed about 10 times trying to figure out whether the kids would sleep in the car, could we drive through the night and still function the next day, was the weather going to cooperate or were we going to get stuck with everyone else who decided that flying was too expensive this year. Lindsay did ask about 10 miles after leaving our house if we were almost to Grandma and Grandpa's house, but all in all the kids were great travelers (Thank God for car DVD players and Katelyn starting to outgrow carsickness!)

For Thanksgiving day, we went to my Babci and Dziadzi's - this was particularly special since my grandfather is home now recovering from a stroke this summer. It was so good to see him up and around since when we last saw him he was in the hospital! There was still a little bit of snow left in the yard, so Katelyn and Lindsay (and me since Linds is connected to my hip these days) got to go sleigh-riding. It was the tiniest of hills, but my kids don't know any better so had a fabulous time! They even made a little snowman with Grandma.

Then back to Mom and Dad's to relax with my brothers and visit with Aunt Kathy. I was able to get in some of my "food fixes" like Tony's (well...Nick's now I guess), Nirchi's, Romas, and Cider Mill....so much for watching my figure ;) It was a bit colder than last year, but the cider press came out and the girls enjoyed making their own fresh apple cider.

Our trip wouldn't be complete without visit Jeff, Christine, Ryan and Emily. I can't believe how big all the kids are getting -- or that they could all fit on the slide to make our own little totem pole!

Before Thanksgiving, I remember feeling on top of things with our annual family pictures done and Christmas cards printed. Now I'm not sure where the last three weeks have gone and how Christmas is possibly going to be here next week when I'm not nearly done with my shopping and haven't baked a single cookie! So stay tuned to hear more of what's going on with us, but keep in mind that I cannot write or post anything while out shopping, at kids holiday parties, or up to my elbows in cookie dough :)