Happy 2014 and a Christmas Recap

Happy New Year, guys! Today feels like the start of a new book and I can't wait to begin the first chapter. I have so many exciting things planned for this year--races, trips, events.  The arrival of my first nephew (OK, so maybe I didn't plan that one, but I will be planning a trip out to see him, so that counts, right?)

Since we hit the slopes right after Christmas, I haven't had time to recap our holiday.  (My house hasn't had time to recover from the holiday either, but that's another story!)  What better way to start out 2014 than with a post about our Christmas?

Christmas morning started later than usual--the girls slept until around 7:30.  We have this tradition where all the grandparents (and great-grandparents) come over to watch as the girls see what Santa brought.  The grandparents on my side have to make their rounds (Mal goes first, then Ali), so we were the last stop.  The girls and I spent about 30 minutes after they woke up doing the morning routine of brushing teeth and hair, and then talked about what they thought Santa had brought.  The grandparents arrived around 8:00 and the girls were able to come out and see their surprises.

The wrapped presents in the middle were from Messy, the elf.  He left a letter saying goodbye and that he can't wait to see us all next year.

The ONE thing Kyndall asked for was the full version of Minecraft.  She had the free version on her iPod, but apparently, the full version has so much more to offer.  She thought Santa would get her old ipod and put the full version on it.  She tried hard to hide it, but I could tell she was a little disappointed when she didn't see her old ipod out there.  The disappointment didn't last long when she spotted the ipad mini though--she opened it right up and looked through the apps.  When she spotted the Minecraft full version, she broke out into a huge smile.  (Santa could've saved a lot of money this year and purchased just that app for K and a Frozen dress for L!)

We spent the entire morning playing with the girls toys.  All the grandparents and Aunt Mal even got in on the action with the Nerf guns and the scooters!  It was so wonderful.

Then, Christmas night, we went to Gra-Gra's.  My mom has started the tradition of us playing games on Christmas night and we get SO into it.  This year, Justin and I DOMINATED over Mal and Trey.  The first game was called Holiday Kiss.  We had to hold the golf ball between our mouths and run around the house and back.  

Justin and I actually won this game, but there is no photo evidence of that :)

There was a game where we had to suck a cotton ball onto the end of a straw, and run the loop in my moms house.  And another one where we had to toss Hershey Kisses into a stocking.  And yet another one where my mom put out a stack of wrapped presents, and we had to open them up.  Some contained gift cards, some contained coal.  <--This game resulted in a few injuries, and a few gift cards being hidden in gross places!

We had to shake ping pong balls out of a tissue box taped to our back, which resulted in lots of flips and jumps in the living room.  It's a wonder my mother's furniture survived intact.  

It was a night packed with fun and laughter, and I'm so glad my mom started this tradition!  After loading up our gifts, we headed home to pack for our trip.  Which, by the way, was a Christmas present from my mom and dad.  All in all, I think this was our best Christmas ever.

PS:  Stay tuned for details of our snow skiing adventure! :)

Christmas Eve Joy

We started our Christmas Eve off right this morning--by sleeping in!  I think we all finally started getting up around 8:45.  Once we were all up and moving, we put on some decent clothes and went (with no makeup or anything!) to Jacks for breakfast.  Then we fought the crazy crowds to run a few errands in town before heading back home.

I locked myself in the bathroom/closet to do a little wrapping and this is what I dealt with:

Why yes, that IS little fingers under the bathroom door :)

After getting all the presents situated, I jumped on the treadmill for a quick 3 miles.  Then it was time to get ready for Christmas at Meme and Papa's. We started out the night with Kyndall reading the Christmas story from Luke 2.

And then posed for some family photos:

We ate TONS of great food.  (FYI:  My meme's banana pudding is AMAZING!)  Then we opened presents... and opened presents... and opened presents!  When we finally headed home it was 10:30.

The girls had lots of Christmas Eve preparations to take care of.  They had to put out the reindeer food:

And tell Messy goodbye until next year.  This was not nearly as heart-breaking as last year.  A quick hug and kiss and they were all good :)

We had not iced Santa's cookies yet, so that had to be done.  Everyone knows Santa prefers chocolate icing on his cookies.

When the girls were FINALLY tucked into bed and asleep, it was inching close to midnight.  Then Santa and Mrs. Clause had LOTS of work to do, so that is the reason for such a late blog post.  You know, just winding down, reminiscing about our day.  

Merry Christmas to you and your family, from our family:

Workout Rewind and A Christmas Partying Weekend

I'm noticing a trend with my workouts lately.  I do REALLY well at the beginning of the week, and then not so well at the end.  The end of our week just seems to get busier somehow?!?  This week went  a little like this:

Monday:  4.5 miles on the treadmill with my new friend Lipstick Jungle.

Tuesday: 4.5 miles on the treadmill.

Friday:  4 miles on the treadmill.  Making my way through Season 2 of Lipstick Jungle.

And that's it.  Total miles this week = 13.

No long run that is very much needed for this training.  No outdoor runs at all.  My plan for this coming week is to switch it up a little--I'm going to attempt a long run early in the week (Monday or Tuesday) and then the shorter runs towards the end.  We'll see how that goes. :)

Yesterday, we had Christmas with my Dad's Dad's side of the family (That's not confusing at all.) for brunch and then Justin's Dad's side for lupper.  (<--Yes, that's my word.  If there is a brunch, why can there not be a lupper?)

Via Instagram.  Our Papaw ALWAYS makes deer jerky and gives it to us for Christmas.  We look forward to it every year!

And then, today, we had Christmas with my Dad's Mom's side of the family.

We rounded out the weekend celebrating my cousin's 13th birthday.  She is officially a teenager, and I can't believe it!

How was your weekend?

Any winter training tips to get me ready for this half at the end of January?

A Day of Christmas Parties (and a post full of pictures!)

Both girls had their Christmas parties at school today.  And like the Mom-of-the-Year that I so obviously am, I forgot my camera at home.  {Insert really mad face here!}  Thank goodness for camera phones, right?

Libby's party was first, at 9:00 a.m.  They sang Christmas carols, and then made Gingerbread houses.

Libby and Koby--the "Dynamic Duo".

Kyndall's party was at 12:30--they had cookie cake and a book swap.  

We lined the "Fab5" up for their traditional photo, and of course, we get this:

After a little fussing, they cooperated and we got a better one:

We are blessed with amazing teachers this year, but also with awesome classmates.  My girls have such sweet friends, and I am so very thankful for that.  And now they get a two-and-a-half week break from school! Yay! :)

Electrical Tape Fix and Complete Randomness

What do you do when your leggings get a rip in them and you don't have a needle and thread?  Use electrical tape, of course.

Yes, this really happened.

Over the weekend we had Christmas with Justin's family.  Check out these crazy cousins:

My secret pal at school got me the greatest gift(s) ever today.  Essie "It's Genius" nail polish, a sage green Mossimo top, charm bracelet, and a $25 Darden Restaurant gift card.

Yes, I painted my nails as soon as I got home and how cute is that top?

Did I get spoiled or what?

And just to completely round out the randomness of this post, I ran 4.5 miles on the treadmill tonight while watching this:

If you haven't seen it, it's great.  I think they only produced 3 seasons and then cancelled it, although I'm not sure why.  I discovered it on Netflix last night and I am completely addicted.  I was up until after midnight last night because I had to watch just ONE MORE episode.  Curse you, Netflix!  And, as a matter of fact, I'm going to curl up in bed and watch another episode (or three!) right now!

These are a FEW of my FAVORITE things....

Last night, I hosted my 2nd annual Favorite Things Party.  I look forward to this ALL year!  Our guest of honor was Carrie--we are celebrating her 2nd Cancer-Free anniversary!  YAY for kicking cancer's butt!

The rules are simple:  pick one favorite item, $5 price range.  Bring 5 of that same item to the party, unwrapped.  During the party, we explain why the item is our favorite and then draw 5 names from the bag to receive our favorite item.  It's kind of like Oprah's Favorite Things Show!

Here are this years' attendees:

And the gift selections:

Gifts included:

• Post-it notes, gift tags, and paper clips in a cute box
• Glad candle and plug-in
• Christmas bag with snuggly, warm socks
• Scent brick (Grape)
• Jordana Eyeliner and blush
• Organizing pouch
• Coffee mugs
• Pouch with favorite candy, tissues, and chapstick
• Box containing multi-colored pens and favorite chapstick
• Pretty pouch with triangle-shaped mechanical pencils and mints
• Pretty picture frames
• Bath and Body works foaming hand soap and purse-sized germ-x

I ended the night with the scent brick, Bath and Body works, a blue coffee mug, the organizing pouch, and the box with multi-colored pens and chapstick (Burt's Bee's pomegranate, which is awesome!).

A few of my favorite people, a few of our favorite things, and our favorite foods....what's not to love?  The party started at 6:30 and lasted until around 11:00.  We had SO much fun swapping gifts and stories and just LAUGHING until we cried.  Being with good friends is the best.

What is YOUR favorite thing?  $5 or less.......

Elf on the Shelf: Trauma Recovery

After this post yesterday, I know you are all anxious to know how our elf, Messy, is recovering.  She returned this morning, looking like this:

And with this note:

After carefully unwrapping her gauze, we found that she did, in fact, look as good as new.  The girls are so excited to have her back (all in one piece) and promised to be EXTRA careful with her from now on.   And just so you have a comparison, here is the before and after:

Santa can work magic, I tell you.  I may ship myself to the North Pole for a little work :)

Gingerbread Houses and Our Shopping Story

At 5 and 7, my girls are pretty good shoppers.  I have learned that MY attitude dictates our shopping experience.  If I am rushing and fussing, they are going to be more slow and uncooperative.  If I am considerate that they want to look at things too, they are considerate as I look for things.  It's a win-win!

So yesterday, we went shopping for the millionth time for Christmas presents.  We started at the mall, then made a quick run to Office Depot, and ended the night at Target.  Overall, it was an extremely successful shopping trip.

We did have a little incident with the shopping cart, though.  I'm not sure how it happened--like I said, the girls were actually being calm and not running wild for once.  But it happened.  One second, we were walking along checking out the scarves and gloves.  The next second, the cart had flipped over sideways on top of not one, but TWO West girls.  We all just stood there stunned for a few seconds.  The girls were not injured in this incident-- the fountain drink I had purchased at the concession area did not fair so well.  (Sorry Target workers, that Dr. Pepper spill was us.  I looked for one of you to clean up the spill, but had no luck!)

After cleaning up the spill as best I could, we walked on around toward the toy section.  I sent the girls with an item to the price scanner at the end of the aisle.  A few seconds later, Libby came running back, leaned over, and covertly whispered "Ca-caw! Ca-caw!"  Apparently, she was warning me, in code of course, that Kyndall was coming back.  That girl is hilarious, I tell you!

In other news, we made Gingerbread houses tonight.  (The kits were a purchase from Target.)  I don't know if any of you have tried the kits before, but they are not nearly as easy as they look.

One minute we were like this.....

and the next, we were like this.

Yes, those are real tears.  That house just collapsed!  Maybe we didn't have enough icing on there or something?  I'm no gingerbread house expert, but these weren't nearly as easy for us as the old fashioned milk-carton-and-graham-cracker houses.  They are much cuter though.

It worked, and that's all that matters.  Here's the finished job (s):

Christmas tradition #5 is now checked off our list.  Only ten more to go :)

Have you ever flipped a cart while shopping?

Gingerbread houses---old fashioned or with a kit?

Christmas Parade Fun

With this crazy Alabama weather we've been having, some of the parades we usually attend have been postponed and/or cancelled.  So far, we have made it to two parades this season.

The Decatur Christmas parade.

And the Trinity parade.  Kyndall was able to ride in this one, on the Student Council float.  The rest of us met up with the Johnson family to watch.

We got to see Gabby go by.  She was TOTALLY focused on her majorette stuff though, and didn't pay any attention to us! :)

And Kyndall's 'float' as it went by.

Even though Trinity is a small town, they always have SUCH a good turnout for the parade.  I love it!