Christmas Decorations

As promised here are pictures of the tree and our balcony. :)

COMING SOON!

I have to finish wrapping the presents under the tree, but I should be able to do that tonight. That means very soon I will have picture of our tree up! Yay! Aren't you just so excited? ;) I'm also working on finishing up Christmas cards, so hopefully those will be able to go out next week. I just have to find stationary somewhere. All the places I've been haven't had any Christmas stationary. K-Mart didn't even have any non-Christmas stationary. I was quite disappointed in them.

More importantly...COMING SOON TO MY BLOG:
I've been feeling pretty inspired by other blogs I read, so I thought I would introduce a few new things starting January 1st. I read a lot of fashion blogs because I'm a junkie (my favorite is Jen Loves Kev), so I thought I would try my hand at posting Style Files too. So once a week I am going to try to post a picture of me in a (hopefully) fashionable outfit. I shop mostly at JC Penney and Kohls, so it might be interesting to see how my styles measure up to the real fashion bloggers, haha.

I'm also going to introduce a weekly What's for Dinner? post. I'm a foodie at heart and I'm  constantly making new things in the kitchen. I'll take pictures and post the recipes for all of your enjoyment. And I just like talking about food.

Lastly, I am going to make an effort to post pictures of my scrapbook pages. I  know a few of my friends like to scrapbook, so I thought it might be fun to post what I'm doing and maybe it will inspire someone in their own work.

So there you have it. Three things to look forward to starting in January. Look for my first Style File Jan 1!

Until then, here are some pictures from our recent trip to Colonial Williamsburg. We went for the Grand Illumination, but it was so cold that we left before all those festivities started. It was still fun. :) It wasn't as decorated as i thought, but there were some pretty wreaths there.

I found what you can do with your extra Yarn Balls mom! Make a wreath! haha.

Christmas gifts, Christmas cards, Christmas cookies...

This morning has gotten off to a slowish start, but that's ok. I was up at 7:30 when my alarm went off, but then I kind of laid in bed messing with my phone until 7:55. Then I got up, got the dog out and all my other morning routines (i'll spare you the details, haha). It was really cold in the house, so the dog jumped on the bed and buried herself in the covers. I thought that was a good idea, as I was cold too, so we got in some belly pats. Then I finally got to eat my breakfast of Champions (Toast and Hot Chocolate with two large marshmallows). So now here I sit sipping my hot chocolate (i've already eaten the marshmallows) and I decided to blog. In the order of my title.

Christmas Gifts:
I'm 100% in Christmas mood. I have almost all of my shopping done. I still have to pick up a few things and order a few things. I need to work on wrapping stuff and getting my in-laws gifts out in the mail soonish. They gave us some gifts at Thanksgiving to keep until Christmas, but I must confess that I've opened some of them. I'm a terrible person.

Christmas Cards:
Last night I put in Home Alone and began filling out Christmas cards. This year I am doing something I swore I would never do: I am making a Christmas letter to go inside of the card. So much has changed for us I figured people might appreciate a little bit of an update. I just have to get some stationary to print them off, then I'll get the cards out (hopefully) by the 17th. That's my goal anyway.

Christmas Cookies:
This coming weekend (or maybe next weekend) Brad and I are going to make awesome Christmas cookies. I found them on the Pioneer woman's blog here: Decorated Christmas Cookies

If you don't want to sift through the post here's what they look like:

 I am excited. They're made with Royal Frosting, so that means the cookie had better be good because the frosting is not the star. That's ok, they look awesome. Maybe if they turn out well, I'll make more and give them as gifts. There are more pictures of what you can do with them on the blog post. I love the Pioneer Woman.

Brad officially had Northrop Grumman pay for his class, so he's officially all set to go, complete with getting his book ordered. I ordered my books for next semester too, so they should be here soonish. I have to do a bunch of reading for my January class and write a paper before January 1st. Icky. I'm hoping to get it all done before I go to MI, but we'll see. I know I'll have time while I'm up there, I just don't want to deal with it on vacation!

Speaking of school, I should really get going. I have a bunch of reading and papers to write!

What a blustery day!

According to Facebook, everyone is getting snow! We are not, but it is very windy out and a storm is on its way. We are under a Tornado Watch, but I'm not too concerned because the sun just peeked out from behind the clouds.

I thought I would show some pictures of our Thanksgiving weekend! This is going to be a way picture heavy post. But that's ok. :)

 Waiting eagerly for the food to be done! I think the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade was on.

 Brad and Kathy. :)

 Turkey!

 It was so yummy!

 Presents for our Christmas celebration on Friday afternoon. I got a George Foreman, the blu ray of White Christmas, scrapbooking gear (including the circle cutters! So excited about them!), a recipe organizer, and Bath and Body Works stuff. Brad got a good assortment of gift cards, movies, and other various stuff. :)

 Megan and Faith concocted an elaborate activity before the gift exchange commenced. Each little package had instructions on it that you had to follow. Jeff's said he had to read the Christmas story. Mine was initiate a group hug. Others were to lead the group in the Hallelujah Chorus, laugh like Santa, lead the group in the 12 Days of Christmas, there was a mini-scavenger hunt for someone, and other such things.

 

Faith and Lawrence. :)

Bree and Grace also wanted me to take some "Senior Portraits" of them together (they're both high school seniors). Here are a few I've already gotten around to editing:

I might put up some more as I edit them. I'm sort of playing catch up on school work this week. I didn't do much while I was gone, and I'm subbing on Friday, so I have my work cut out for me. Plus I have some papers that are going to be due in  two weeks, so I really need to get going on them too!