December Details

For almost everyone December is a busy month!  If you remember my post about last December you remember the crazy December we had in 2013 and how we added a huge layer of complexity to an already busy time of year.  While this year our December wasn't riddled with moving, it was a month full of decorating, shopping, gatherings, graduation, celebrations, and more...PHEW!

We didn't waste any time after we got back from Colorado to get the house decorated.  We were anxious to actually decorate the house this year since we weren't focused on unpacking boxes!  It took a little bit of time, but eventually everything found its place.  We also went on the hunt for some new decor to add to the mix because our house now has more opportunities to spread the decor around!

Magical Mantle!

A tradition we have had since Lila was little is her helping Mike put the star on the top of the tree.  As you can see, this year it was a bit more of a challenge as she is getting big!  She isn't quite ready to do it herself, but it isn't as easy to effortlessly give her a lift to the top of the tree, but they got it done!

Adding the star to the top of the tree

Our little family taking a quick pic in front of the tree!

My girl!

At our other two homes we hung lights along the roof line to decorate our exterior for Christmas.  The Hemlock house had a big porch that we could decorate, too.  Since moving into the new house we have had to re-engineer what the exterior of the house looks like on Christmas.  While we didn't do lights on the roof line we did decorate the porch and are excited about the ideas we have for years to come for the outside of the house!

Front porch - the dogs are keeping watch!

The first weekend in December always marks Santa's visit to downtown CR.  We are always so fortunate that he makes a special stop at TrueNorth to spend some time with the kids, hear their Christmas wishes, and the kids can pick out a toy right there!  There is also a hot chocolate bar, Christmas treats, and the kids do a Christmas craft to take home with them.  All three of us love this tradition!

Ready to see Santa!

"I have been nice, Santa!"

On top of all of the holiday celebrating we had another big thing to celebrate in our family, Mike's graduation from Kirkwood!  Two years ago Mike made the life decision to go back to school to get a degree in Human Services and a certificate in Drug & Alcohol Counseling.  It is amazing how two years ago this day felt like it was so far away, and here we were, giving him hugs & kisses as he walked out the door as a student for the last time!  How exciting?!?!

Daddy's last day of school!

It was strangely bittersweet for Mike to graduate!  While all of us were excited for him to graduate, it also meant that change was on the horizon.  A new focus, a new job, a new schedule...it was definitely going to take some getting used to.  He was fortunate enough to have a really great internship, working with kids 13-17 with drug and alcohol dependencies, they valued him so much they kept him on staff as a full-time position, what an awesome compliment!  While change is coming, we are just excited to celebrate with him and enjoy the time we all have off between Christmas and New Years!

Mid December found us attending Shrek the Musical, the Christmas show at TCR!  Lila is quite mystified by performing, so she was super excited to see the musical, but nothing compared to her excitement to see my co-worker Mallory in the performance!

Super excited to see Shrek @ TCR!

The show was positively awesome, I was lucky enough to see it twice!  The talent in CR is really impressive and you could tell that the cast had a wonderful time performing in the show and were excited to share it with the audience.  Lila was in total awe and rekindled her love for the story of Shrek!  After the performance was over the cast members go up to the lobby and greet the audience members.  As I stated above, Lila was pretty excited to see Mallory, not only does she have an admiration for Mal on a normal day, she was blown away that she was going to be on stage singing and dancing!  It was darling to hear Lila gasp when Mallory sang her solo!  Maybe someday Mallory will sit in the audience and hear Lila's solo?!  We shall see!

Posing with Raggedy Ann (aka: Mallory)

A little Fiona love!

Throughout the month we also shopped and wrapped and shopped and wrapped!  We have A LOT of people to buy for, so it seems like the wrapping paper and tape are in abundance at our house during the month!  While I do love to buy gifts for people, taking the time to find the perfect item, I do really love wrapping - the hunt for the perfect paper, the bows to match, and cute tags!

Wrapping and wrapping and wrapping...

On December 15th Lila's school put on a Christmas concert.  Lila has always participated in the smaller one with the preschool which is the Saturday before the "all-school" concert.  While I was a bit nervous about how she would do with the length of the show, I was actually excited to see her perform as a Kindergartner!

"Mary had a baby, Oh Lord!"

 Each of the grades, K-5, sang two songs and then the whole school came together to sing "The Twelve Days of Christmas," with the kids divided up in sections all throughout the gym to sing a particular part.  Lila's portion was "...two turtle doves..." and boy did she SING it!  It was pretty hilarious!

All school song: Twelve Days of Christmas

Proudly performing with the whole school!

The trio!

The Sunday before Christmas always finds us heading to Lamont to celebrate with my Smith side of the family!  Lila loves this Christmas in particular because it means getting to hang with her cousin Audra.  She doesn't get to see her that often, but when they do get together they have so much fun!  Grandma's house is always full of people, love, & laughter.  It is a wonderful way to kick off all of the Christmas celebrations throughout the week!

Our little poser!

To Grandmother's house we go...

What could be in those huge boxes?

Life size Elsa, of course!

The week of Christmas the tree skirt disappeared under all of the presents and we continued to wrap up the last minute grocery shopping and other details.  Lila had school on Monday and Tuesday that week with lots of fun planned for the kids.

More and more presents under the tree!

On Monday the Kindergartners were encouraged to show up to school in pajamas as they were going to board the Polar Express that day!  When we picked Lila up the magic had really set in.  She had her little jingle bell in the palm of her hand, signifying that she had road the magical train, and she was almost giddy with anticipation for her Christmas party the next day!

All ready to board the Polar Express at school!

At Lila's school she only has 15 kids in her class, but there is another Kindergarten class that has 16 in it that they often combine and do things together.  The classroom is set up with a lot of thought.  They have a movable wall in the middle of them to be able to open it up to both classes or close it off so the smaller groups can work.  In the case of the Christmas party it was something the big group enjoyed together!

Kindergarten Christmas party

Three wise men relay!

A few of the moms actually planned and executed the Christmas party!  I was lucky enough to be able to volunteer to help and be a part of all of the festivities!  The kids started off with a fun craft - creating Christmas trees and gingerbread men, moved on to decorating donuts, a relay as wise men, and they finished the morning off with a student to student gift exchange!

Lila & Addy

Gift exchange

Christmas Eve morning marks our traditional morning with my Mom & her husband.  Everyone comes to our house and we have a delicious breakfast/brunch and then open gifts!  It is really hard to believe that within 6 days of moving into our house last year we were hosting this!  It felt much better this year considering I wasn't an emotional basket case and I felt like the house was in better order!

Christmas Eve is traditionally one of my favorite days of the Christmas week.  Spending the morning with my family and then moving into the evening at Jason and Jen's to bring our families together for soup and singing -- it's my favorite!

Christmas Eve morning

Our tradition: singing on Christmas Eve night with our family

This year Lila was keenly aware of Santa and how the whole operation works!  So, while she was having fun on Christmas Eve night, she was also very concerned about not getting home and to bed soon enough.  She was so scared that Santa might skip over her house because we weren't all snug in our beds!  We left Jason and Jen's and got Lila all dressed in her Christmas pajamas, set out the plate of cookies, carrots, and milk for Santa & his reindeer, and tucked her in!

Low and behold!  Santa found us and we had a thrilled little girl Christmas morning as she made her way down the stairs to see all that was waiting for her by the tree!

Santa found us!

An Anna to go with Elsa - Santa, you shouldn't have!

Look at all that loot!

More Frozen stuff...who knew?!

So.  Much.  Stuff.

It was kind of interesting, this year Lila didn't ask for much of anything.  In fact, she wanted two things: a Frozen vanity and a life-size Elsa.  If asked what she wanted for Christmas she would either reply, "nothing," or she would say, "surprises!"  Well, Santa must have known her pretty well because without little guidance he seemed to really hit the mark -- and she certainly didn't go without!

The afternoon of Christmas we loaded up again, but for a short little jaunt to my Dad's house.  We all gathered to have a delicious meal, open gifts, and just hang out and enjoy each other's company!

A quick snapshot of the three of us Christmas Day!

Cinderella's castle

Sleeping Beauty's beautiful dress!

Our favorite gift!

A little game of Fibber brought a lot of laughs!

The Saturday after Christmas found us at Mike's grandparents celebrating with his side of the family!  It seems that more often than not we wrap up our celebrations on the Eddins side, which is such a nice place to end a crazy holiday week!  With our smallest group, we always have such a nice time just relaxing and getting through the day without a rush.  After the whirlwind of the week, the smaller, low key celebration is always so welcomed!

Another crazy  pile of presents!

We have seen another Christmas come and go and are ready to close the book on 2014.  While we had many amazing blessings in 2014, I do believe this little family is ready to bid adieu to the year and are excited to welcome 2015!  Our hope for 2015 is to have a quiet year focused on settling into our new routine and enjoying our many blessings!  

We hope you had a very Merry Christmas and wish you a wonderful 2015!

{Home} for the Holidays

I never quite realized how important the term "home" is to me until recently.  Don't get me wrong...I have always known that home is my center, it is my respite and refuge, a place for me to unwind and recharge.  Home is a place I crave when I have been gone for too long.  However, I am pretty sure I took for granted the stability and comfort that my home has provided me, especially during the holidays. 

Mike and I found ourselves starting to look at real estate about a year ago.  We were still debating on where we would ultimately send Lila to school and started to weigh our options.  During this process we made the final decision on where she would go to elementary school and were happy staying at our current house for the meantime.  However, it wasn't but a handful of months later and I was back looking at homes online rather consistently and low and behold a house caught my eye.  This wasn't just any house, it was a beautiful, older home with amazing amounts of character, a house I could see us living in until we are too old to climb the stairs, a house that Lila would eventually bring her family home to stay someday.  It could be our forever home!  I daydreamed about it often and finally an open house was scheduled and we went for a visit and then another, and another, and another!

Mike and I had endless conversations about what we should do.  Is this something we really want to do?  Are we ready for such a different house?  We would be leaving our comfortable life in our 7 year old home to live in a house that is more than 10 times older, would we be happy there?

Ultimately we decided that we were ready to take the plunge.  So, in mid-November we put an offer in on the house and it was accepted!  We worked around the clock to get our house ready to be put on the market, we did this a little backwards, and within a week our house was up on the market, too.

Things were moving really fast and the holidays were approaching quickly, too.  We had been presented with the opportunity to take possession of the new house a week before Christmas, another decision we needed to discuss and think long and hard about.  If we stayed at the other house through the holidays we needed to be mindful of the amount of decorations we had out, we couldn't put our presents under the tree, and we also wanted to be really sensitive to the fact that it was Christmas time and Lila deserves to have a normal Christmas.  The idea of moving into the new house before Christmas also became more and more appealing because trying to keep a house "show" ready with a 4 year old, two dogs, and the holidays is a challenge!  While we knew we were going to add some extra stress to ourselves, we made the decision to move into the house before Christmas. 

The official For Sale sign

Then the chaos really set in!  We were fortunate enough to have a friend loan us a snowmobile trailer to get some of our stuff packed up before we had the movers come and do all the big stuff.  We had Lila's Christmas concert at school on Saturday, December 14th, which happened to be the day that we got access to the house.  We had packed up a full trailer load and dropped it off on our way to Lila's concert.  We were excited to watch Lila's concert and then invite the family that came to see her perform to come and see the house! 

Loading up the trailer

I should apologize now for the length of this post because I intend to intertwine all of what we had going on during December into this one post as it is really the only way I can keep it all straight!  Lila's concert is such a darling little show that the preschool puts on each year.  When we saw it last year she was in the group of the youngest kids, this year she was in the oldest group, it was hard for me to watch knowing that she will be in the "all" school performance next year.  She is growing up too fast!

All ready to sing her heart out!

Lila is in the second row - second in from the far left!

Each of the groups sing two songs and then they bring the 3 year old kids back out to sing "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" as a whole preschool!  I continue to be amazed that Lila stands right up on the stage and sings without any stage fright!  If she doesn't continue to perform in some capacity I think Mike and I will be surprised!

After the show was over we loaded up and headed over to the new house with family in tow.  This was the first time Mike and I were going to be in the house since the offer was accepted and since the other people had moved out.  We were equal parts excited and anxious to have everyone there, it was all becoming very real!

Our new home!

We eagerly opened the door to the house and *boom* it hit me, like a ton of bricks, the emotion of what we were doing.  I did my best to hold it all together while we were touring our family around, but my heart was pounding and the nerves were starting to take over.  Have you ever had one of those moments in your life where you had an expectation for the way something was going to turn out and it doesn't measure up?  Of course you have, we all have, but this was different.  This time I couldn't even tell you what my expectations were...they just weren't met.  The house was still the beautiful house we fell in love with, but it wasn't the home that we had toured so many times, the home that wrapped its arms around the previous family, the home that I was anxious to make our memories in...it was a big, empty, cold, and dirty house.

Thankfully we have the best family in the world.  They didn't have quite the expectations built up that I did that morning and they got it!  They completely understood our vision and were elated for us as we take this huge step in our lives.  For that very moment, they balanced my angst with their happiness!

After our family left, Jason and Jen were so kind to take Lila for awhile, Mike and I began unloading the trailer into the house.  We made an agreement with Lila that we would unload the trailer, but that the first thing we would physically unpack was the Christmas tree and we would put it up together that evening.  We wanted to be sure that no matter what Christmas wasn't short-changed due to this move, so it was the first priority!

Enjoying a snow date with her cousins!

I picked Lila up from Jason and Jen's and got her settled in for a nap at the old house while Mike continued to work away at the new house unloading the rest of the trailer.  After he was done he came and met us at the old house and picked Lila, myself, and the pups up to go to the new house to get the Christmas tree put up!  We didn't have much in the house yet, but we did have card tables, so we placed them in the dining room and had Sweet Basil's pizza for our first meal in the new place. 

Dinner in style!

With the way everything else was going, it would only be appropriate that our Christmas tree wouldn't light correctly.  It has worked without any issue for 7 years, but this time we had a lighting issue.  Mike plugged in the two portions of the tree and everything except for the very top of the tree lit up.  Of course!  In the grand scheme of things it didn't matter...Lila now had her Christmas tree and Santa was sure to know where to find us now!

The first Christmas tree in our new house!

The whole family!

Smooch!

In the spirit of honesty, from this point on I was a wreck as the emotions of this decision were really starting to sink in.  I can smile about this now, but this particular day kicked off a whirlwind of emotions and insecurity for me...I was a literal mess from December 14th through New Years.  However, moments such as the picture below were the warm moments in my heart reminding me that, despite all of the chaos, we made the right decision.

Our winter wonderland!

December 18th was the day the movers were scheduled to come.  Considering the house wasn't as ready as we expected we had a lot to do between Monday and Wednesday of that week.  Thank goodness we were able to find two companies to come in and clean the carpets and another company to come in and do a whole "move-in" clean for us.

Seeing the moving truck pull into the driveway was surreal for many reasons.  The first, I couldn't believe we were leaving our house.  We had made this decision and it felt right way down deep in my heart, but it was agonizing actually doing it.  Second, I mentioned borrowing that snowmobile trailer above...that is the same trailer we used to move into our house on Hemlock.  We didn't hire movers, we did it all ourselves, and quite honestly...I think we only had one trailer full, we didn't have a lot.  This time we needed movers to move us out.  We are a family now, we have built a life in this house and we have accumulated stuff, enough stuff that movers were needed for this next move.  Wow!

Two Guys & A Truck (and that is exactly what we got!)

Our movers were Mike and Mac.  They were super nice guys who made a sad day a little brighter!  We knew we were likely spending the whole day with these guys, so it could have been really awful if they weren't friendly.  It took very little time for them to get to work and before I knew it the house was starting to look really different...empty.



Moving out

While our home on Hemlock started to transform into an empty house, the house on Vernon started to transform from an empty house into our new home.  The movers listened to our every request.  They placed things exactly where we wanted them, went up and down the stairs a hundred times, and helped us put the beginnings of our life together in our new house. 



Priorities!  The TV was one of the first things moved in!

The beginnings of Lila's room!

Welcome to our family room!

While Mike finished up with the movers I ran Lila across town to dance.  We wanted to make sure that we didn't disrupt her life more than necessary with the move.  The move alone was going to be a lot, but we wanted to preserve her day to day as much as possible.  So, off to dance we went!  I will never forget sitting next to my good friend Monica while the girls were off dancing, I was exhausted and I think I even smelled a little from all of the work we had done that day!  I wanted to break down bawling right there, she was safe to me.  I was so confused by my emotions...why was I feeling this way about all of this?  Instead, I shared with her where we were in the process, hoping that my feelings were just the fact that we had, had a couple of very long days.  After dance it was back to the Vernon house to check in on Mike and the movers and get Lila's room situated for her very first night in the new house!  I was a bit anxious about how our first night would go, but it went without a hitch.  Lila snuggled right into her new room and we didn't hear a peep from her until morning.  Success!

As I have mentioned before, Christmas was mushed up among all of this craziness, too!  So, December 19th - 21st was spent unpacking boxes, but we were also preparing for our first Christmas celebration on the 22nd.  So, just as we would get one box unpacked, I would turn around and wrap a box! 

Definitely the preferred type of box under this tree!

Our Christmas traditions are generally kicked off with the Sunday before Christmas at my Grandma Smith's house!  My Grandma is always more concerned about having us all be able to attend vs. having our Christmas on Christmas Day, which we appreciate with our busy schedules during the holiday.  It is always fun to kick off Christmas here as it is a full house and there is no shortage of laughter! 

Cousins!

Grandma & her great grand-girlies!

The Smith-Eddins-Saylor's

Grandma & (almost) all of her grandkids!

Santa Baby!

The kiddos opening their presents!

A princess pillow for a Princess!

After we finished up in Lamont we headed back home and got Lila situated at Dad and Laura's for a sleepover.  The next morning would find us heading to their house for our family Christmas and they were happy to have Lila stay the night so she could wake up in the morning to a tree full of presents!

The next morning brought lots of excitement...Grampa and Laura are always good at present buying!  These three girls sure don't want for much, they must have been good little girls all year! 

Stockings...check!

Laura, Lila, & Bitty Baby!

A beautiful desk from Dreaming Bear for Lila's new bedroom!

Lila, Grampa, & her new Unicorn!

Pretty ballerinas!

If you can believe this...it was December 24th, Christmas Eve, and we were hosting our first gathering at our new house!  That was 6 days after we moved in!  At this point I think we were officially crazy, but we truly wouldn't have had it any other way.  We have created the tradition in which we celebrate with my Mom and her husband, Terry, on Christmas Eve morning and it is historically at our house...so again, keeping with tradition, that is just what we did!



Christmas Eve morning in our living room!

Happy girls!

Even the puppies got in on the action!

The other tradition we have each year is to go to Jason and Jen's house on Christmas Eve night to enjoy soup and the company of our family.  It has grown in the past years from just being my Mom's side of the family to what it is now...a mixed bag of families coming together to celebrate the season!  This particular tradition is my most favorite tradition of the whole holiday.  It isn't about any of the "hype" of Christmas, it is truly about the people you call family and the spirit of the season!  There is good food, good company, and it always ends in singing!  It is the perfect end to Christmas Eve and we find ourselves heading home with anticipation of Santa!

With the move we continued to reassure Lila that Santa wouldn't forget us now that we were living in the new house.  Low and behold, he didn't miss us!  In fact, I would say Santa maybe overcompensated a little this year because he wanted to be sure Lila had a Merry Christmas among all the changes at home!

She must have been on Santa's nice list!

Happily opening!

The true magic of Christmas is in that smile!

Add another princess to the toy box!

And last, but not least, we spent Christmas afternoon at Wayne & Elaine's!  This was the perfect way to end our crazy Christmas schedule.  Once again we enjoyed a yummy meal, present opening, and good company!  We weren't in any huge rush to leave as we didn't have anywhere else to go, it was nice to be able to just sit back and relax!  Unfortunately my pictures from that day didn't turn out all that well, but I was able to snap a good picture of Maria and Dan! 

Maria should officially have her kitchen outfitted!

As you can tell from all the pictures above, we had a wonderful Christmas!  We are beyond blessed to be surrounded by people that love us and we are very close in proximity so we can celebrate the holidays together and continue to create such wonderful memories and traditions!

It is pretty amazing that I am now to the point where I can push "publish" on this post.  Back to being honest...this post took me well over a month to write.  I slowly chipped away at it.  I would write a little, I would download pictures, and then I would cry and promptly shut my computer.  Blogging is therapeutic to me, so I naturally thought writing about it would help, but as I look back at all of this I swear I was on auto pilot!  I don't know how else to explain it.  I was merely existing. 

For whatever reason, this move has been nothing short of hard on me.  It isn't a big surprise to those that know me that I enjoy being in control, so when we made this decision, it wasn't one that I took lightly.  As I stated above, Mike and I took months to make this decision, we didn't dive in head first, it was a very well thought out decision.  We thought of "everything;" all of the finances, the timing, the long-term gain...we thought we had covered it all.  While I knew that leaving the home that we came home to as Mr. & Mrs., the home we brought our little girl home to, the home we lost Baxter in, and so many other memories, would be hard...I never anticipated just how hard it really would be or how much value I placed on the word "home."  Insert the emotions!

As things have settled down and I have worked through those emotions, I still miss our house on Hemlock, but what I realize is that I miss the ease that living there for 7 years provided us.  It was a fantastic home, one that I was proud to call mine, it had become a big part of our story! 

And as I write this we are busy starting the next chapter of our story...in our new home!

Making new memories!

Exploring her new playhouse!

The important things in life!