The past few weeks have been filled to the brim with lots of fun things to celebrate Christmas!
One of our favorite traditions to kick off the season is getting our picture with Santa at PetSmart. This was our 6th year! Now, this tradition did not start off as a "family" picture, it was fully intended to be just Izzy and Santa but once we hit the second year she started freaking out (probably scared from the first year with Scary Santa) and wouldn't sit still unless I was holding her. Hence, it's now become a family shot and despite what you all think about me forcing John to do this, he likes it and never complains about it! Of course it's because this is for Izzy, I'm sure if his mom and I asked to get him to get family pictures (at some place else besides the pet store) there would be grumbling involved.
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| 2007 - Scary Santa |
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| 2008 |
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| 2009 |
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| 2010 |
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| 2011 |
I had Christmas dinners with my girlfriends in lieu of our annual Girl's Christmas party which we didn't have this year due to our crazy weekend schedules. I was thrilled when I found these little notepads at Target that said "Mildly Addicted to Cheese". This was the perfect little gift for us cheese lovers! I literally gasped when I saw them and bought every one they had. The cashier asked me as she was ringing up the stack, "um maam, I have to ask, do you like cheese??" I wish I could have seen the expression on my face back to her... do you really need to ask?
The oil was changed in my Jeep the week before Christmas and I am pretty sure by New Years I will need another one. We have been road tripping all over Pennsylvania this week! We treked back east to see my family the weekend before Christmas. It was a short and sweet time catching up with everyone I could, including my grandmother and aunt/uncle from Minnesota which was a special treat. I was happy Lauren also came down from Jersey for the weekend. I got to see my little nephew, Joey and he is getting so big at 3 months old already! My mom, sisters and I baked cookies during the day Saturday and the only batch I made were peanut butter reeses cookies and as I was pulling them out of the oven the tray flipped and the cookies went all over the bottom of the oven and melted. I was so annoyed. Needless to say those were the only cookies I made this year.
Saturday night, Paige's (one of my best friends I met in college who moved to Cali) parents were having a Christmas party at their house which is north of Philly. Lisa and Carrie were going and I wanted to surprise her since she wasn't expecting that I would be home that weekend. John and I snuck into the house and hid in the bathroom while Lisa greeted Paige and told her that something was wrong in the bathroom. I had to contain my laughter when her response was that it was probably her brother or dad's doing... nope, surprise, it's us! It was great catching up with our Pitt crew and Paige's family for the few hours we spent there.
Sunday we were back on the road again home to Pittsburgh to celebrate my father-in-law's 60th birthday. Carrie, my sister-in-law organized bowling and we had a great time! It was Julia's first time and sadly I think she beat me during the first game. I made a small come-back during the second one... I think we need to start playing more regularly, I forgot how much fun it is!
Christmas Eve, I decided to work from home and it was a good day to catch up on the stuff I'd been putting off for awhile since almost everyone else had taken the day off. That night we had dinner with John's parents and then went to church for a beautiful candlelight service. I took a moment to reflect on the poor families that are without their loved ones and the little children that won't be opening their presents on Christmas morning. I don't know if I'm just paying attention to it more or I'm really hearing more bells this season but the one line from It's A Wonderful Life keeps playing through my mind.
"Every time a bell rings, an angel gets it's wings"
Christmas morning, John and I both woke up around 9:00 worrying that something was wrong because Izzy hadn't gotten up yet. You must know that Izzy wakes me up EVERY morning somewhere between 3:45-5:30 to go the bathroom and eat. It's horrible but I've done it every morning for 5 years so I don't even think I'm fully awake going through the motions. So for me to sleep through the night until 9am, this was one of the best gifts! She was fine, also just really tired from all the traveling and interruption to her normal napping schedule. We opened our gifts to each other (even though every year we say we aren't doing gifts because we have everything we want, need!) John surprised me with a beautiful diamond bracelet and I picked up a few more golf-related items for him to go with the new clubs.
We spent the afternoon/evening celebrating with the Kapusta family, opening presents, eating, talking and eating some more! John's parents love Christmas and they always go way overboard on the presents for all of us. It still feels like we are kids with the stacks of presents under the tree each year! Now we're just asking for more adult things, like a Dyson hard floor attachment for my vacuum. Yeah that's right, it's awesome.
Today, I was all psyched to hit the after Christmas sales since I was off, but mother nature had other plans in mind with a winter storm. We have several inches of snow, which has now turned into freezing rain. It was probably better off that I stayed in and did laundry and cleaned anyway!
Here's to wishing all of you a very Merry Christmas season with your families!
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