- It's beginning to feel a lot like... -

CHRISTMAS!!!!!

So much to squeeze in in December to prep our house for Christmas and our hearts for the newborn Christ...it's insanity! But I love every second of all of it, because this is truly THE MOST WONDERFUL TIME OF THE WHOLE ENTIRE YEAR!  Yipeeeeeeee!  

THIS MONTH, we enjoyed... 

...the Lighted Christmas Parade in Highland [Santa sighting #1!]...

 

 

...visiting Santa at the local children's museum [Santa sighting #2!]...

...and running around the house allllll month cleaning up messes after our elf, Twinkle Toes, who came back in 2022 with a mission to be more mischievous than ever!  Good NIGHT, this little elf is crazy!

 

^^ Apparently, T.T. snuck in all his shenanigans while the Head Elf of the house caught some zzzzzz's...

...because one morning, the girls found this note and whipped back the bedsheets to find Brian's toenails painted a bright coral color!  He sprinted to the bathroom cabinet with finger nail polish remover and went to work on his toes before we could snap a pic! ;) :)

Also this month!  We crafted for Christmas...

...toured the Anheuser-Busch Brewery Lights with Brian's family...

 

 

...and had a parents' night out at my work Christmas party!

On the morn of December 6, the kids were ELATED to find that St. Nicholas had visited our house! We love this new tradition inspired by our Catholic school girls! ;) :) ...Meanwhile, I am still waiting with bated breath for the laundry fairy to appear! O Christmas tree, O Christmas treeeeee...how lovely are your ever-growing branches!!!

 

And then!  While Harper attended a school lock-in [Santa sighting #3!], Scarlett and I got invited to The Fox with the Wagahoffs. Fun night for all [even for Daddy and Super J who enjoyed Texas Roadhouse take-out and a night at home together!]...

 

 

Mid-month, we "Journey[ed] to Bethlehem"...

...celebrated at the annual Croatian Lodge Party [Santa sighting #4!]...

...[edited to add a side-by-side of the three sisters all at age 1 with Santa, #thirdtimesthecharm]!

 

Harper caught the sickies the day after Christmas break started, so #PHEW...we juuuuust made it through most of the Christmas celebrations and school plays/programs and classroom parties before the viral ball dropped.  Thankfully, Twinkle Toes made sure to steer clear of the germs in the house!

And!  With 3 days 'til Christmas, everyone has a cough, attitudes abound, snow storm is predicted for tomorrow!

MURRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL, AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT!

 

 

 

- HBD, GOAT! -

After an afternoon of cake baking and icing...

...Daddy made it home from work and we were able to shout/sing, "HAPPY BIRTHDAY!" to the GOAT [greatest of all time, that is!]!

With dinner and cake at our house on his REAL birthday and adult-only dinner at Popeyes the day after, we celebrated this guy in style!  Happy birthday, Brian!  We hope this one is your best year yet! :-* 

 

 

 

 

- Lights and garland and ornaments...OH MY! -

Disclaimer:  We never ever ever put up the Christmas tree until Thanksgiving has passed; in fact, it's TRADITION at our house to put it up on Black Friday!  But womp wompppp.........this year I got roped into working Black Friday [which was a v. v. unexpected plot twist], and as a result, a very small soft spot in my heart gave the kids permission to put the tiny tree up in their bedroom the weekend before Thanksgiving!  Their box of purple decorations has just the right amount of balls to keep everyone's attention to span the entire decorating process and just the right amount of glitter to make the continuous month-long mess that every mom dreads!

But! It's up, and it's beautiful!  Trimming the tree with happy hearts...THAT'S THE WAY OUR HOLIDAY STARTS!  

In no time at all, it was the Saturday after Thanksgiving and all five of us got to work decorating the house for Christmas!  It's the most wonderful time of the year!

 

^^ Twinkle Toes always returns the day we decorate our tree, and the girls are allowed to play with him THAT DAY ONLY since he doesn't have his magic yet!  It's tradition to read the Elf on the Shelf book that night, and then he flies to the North Pole each night thereafter to give Santa the 4-1-1 of what he sees inside our humble abode.  So far, everyone has been on extra good behavior this holiday season, most definitely cautious of what T.T. might be telling his white-bearded boss! ;) :)

After a full day of decorating, we took a break to visit Santa at the local children's museum!  Unlike both of our other children at age 1, Juliette didn't scream her head off at the mere sight of Santa, but was also not jumping at the chance to sit on his lap...  She preferred to give him the stare-down from afar and stayed cozied in on Harper's hip for the duration!  Scarlett told Santa she wanted model magic clay for Christmas while the other two sisters just stared at him like mutes [although, later Harper said she knew he wasn't THE REAL Santa and was instead just a helper since Santa can't be all around the world for sightings while he's prepping all the toys for good girls and boys, and THAT.IS.WHY she did not want to waste her time rambling on about her list. Meh, I'll give it to her.].

After visiting Santa, we stayed around at the museum to play in their "Into the Arctic" exhibit.  I absolutely loved watching the girls build an igloo, go ice fishing, and take care of the dog sled team.  This is such a fun little place to play and I love how it encourages imagination and wonder!

Later that night, I read Harper's diary entry and realized that both older girls thought "decorating day" was Christmas Day... This also explains why Scarlett was begging to open the one lowly gift that I put under the tree! L to the O to the L.

After hot chocolates for everyone and a family Christmas movie night, the kids were nestled all snug in their beds...

...while visions of Twinkle Toes danced in their heads!  Because what whattttt?! On Sunday morning, he had made his grand return and was found hanging from the living room chandelier with a marker in each hand and a blank Santa's workshop to color down below!  Juliette FaceTimed all of her grammies to squeal at the screen in delight and point to the weird-@$$ elf hanging from the ceiling. GIRL, welcome to crazy: the fun times of this holiday season are just beginning!

Whether you are far or near, we're sending you cheer... May you revel in all the magic and blessings of this wonderful Christmas season that is upon us! 

xoxo

- "A person's a person, no matter how small!" -

Alert: #MOMPOST 

I don't make these kinds of posts very often, but today I am so super proud of Harper ...and her creativity ...and her love for Jesus and life ...and her super big heart ...and I just feel like boasting it loud[ly] and proud[ly]!  God broke the mold when he made this girl! <3

After entering a poster into the Respect Life Week art contest at her school, she ended up winning the K-2 category and being awarded a $50 gift card to any place of her choosing.

["A person's a person, no matter how small...and God wants us to love them all!" was her poster!]

She chose a Bath & Body Works gift card [after having a sniff into her cousins' lotion collections recently and discovering that there is a whole huge world of nice-smelling things that exist outside her mom's anti-chemical, anti-fragrance, anti-xenoestrogen ways!!!].  And! Bath & Body Works apparently has a great Black Friday sale where you can buy 3, get 3 free... But! I had to work on Black Friday from 7-11am, plus there are no B&BW stores close to our home... Although!  There is one large stand-alone B&BW store juuuust down the street from my work... AND SO!  Off to work with Momma this girl went!  Our alarm went off at 5:45, and we were up and dressed and ready to hit the ground running at 6:10am!

While I worked, Harper ate breakfast, sipped hot chocolate, read a few chapters of Junie B. Jones, and enjoyed a couple of HOURS [!!] of coveted, uninterrupted screen time [#cringeycringecringe]... And in no time at all, the clock struck 11am and we were outta there...

...and onnnnn to Bath & Body Works!!!  Harper had THE BEST time shopping and spraying/sniffing almost every single scent [at least once, if not twice], and I had the best time watching my big girl shop around and spoil herself with her shiny new gift card.  She also picked out a handful of things for Scarlett, which I thought was so nice of her!  The workers in the place all loved helping her and wanted to pose for a photo at the front door before we left with her loot! 

We escaped quickly after the photo shoot, because #holyheadache after not wearing fragrances for at least a decade and then sniffing ~200 in a matter of an hour, L to the O to the L, zomg.  

Brian was still gone with the little girls when we got home, and so Harper planned and executed a huge scavenger hunt full of little games/activities for Scarlett that ultimately led her to the bathroom where she had a Twisted Peppermint lotion gift waiting.  She wanted to give her one thing as soon as we got home and wrap up everything else for Christmas.

Goshhhhh, this girl and her HUGE HEART... I just know she's going places in life!  Meanwhile, we'll just be over here continuing to #respectlife and #smellgood while doing it!!! :)

Happy Black Friday, friends!

- Gobble gobblE... -

Gobble 'til you wobble!  I absolutely LOVE Thanksgiving and all the fall festivities and preppity-prep that comes along with it!  We have some hardcore Thanksgiving week/Day and Black Friday traditions, and repeating/reveling in those each year is just my "piping hot & perfect" cup of tea!  FIRST of all, I swoon over all the adorable holiday artwork that comes home in the kids' school folders...

^^ Scarlett was so supa' proud of her "chicken mask" and wore it all around the house leading up to T-giving 2022.

 

Then!  It didn't stop with "school" artwork... Juliette started with a new babysitter for Mondays at the beginning of November [another much more elaborate post coming about this later, because I have to take a lot of minutes to brag on this ANGEL of a woman loves our lil' girl soooo so well!], and she came home the Monday of Thanksgiving week with this little gem. I literally almost cried. <3

We added Juli's little handprint to the Thanksgiving pumpkin this year [just wasn't quite brave enough to craft with a 2-month old last year, haha!]...

...dressed in our cheetah best to make some foam turkey crafts...

...and went to Grammy and Papa's house on Wednesday afternoon to help her start decorating the Thanksgiving meal table and also finish food prepping!

All.the.sudden it was Thanksgiving morning!  Our tradition of take-out Starbucks coffee shifted to brewing Starbucks coffee and hot chocolates at home...

...and our tradition of watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade shifted to Scarlett and Harper recording most of the parade on their new iPads and Juliette not really being interested in the TV program at all...

...but!  Praise be to God, one tradition stood strong, and that was browsing Black Friday ads!  While Juliette took her morning nap, the big kids cut out some items they saw that they wanted to add to their Christmas lists and glued them on a piece of construction paper to show Santa. ;) :)

The rest of Thanksgiving Day was spent in normal fashion: lunch with Brian's family and dinner with my family!  I only have these few pictures from the rest of the day, but it was time well spent with the people we love the most!

 

 

Feeling extra extra grateful this year for health, happiness, and the many, many blessings that surround us each day!!!  The family and friends that we love -- and are loved by, too -- are truly what I'm MOST thankful for!

 

Happy Thanksgiving! :)