It’s beginning to look like a lot like Christmas….

I haven’t really been around these parts lately! Although last week I was in the mood to do some decorating, so the blog has been festive for awhile now. Jaden was out of town for the entire week last week, so now I’m trying to play catch up with everything. We’re so glad he’s home!!

Thanksgiving was wonderful, mellow, delicious, relaxing. Hardly took any pictures, I’ll blame my apparent laziness on the tryptophan. I pitched in with green bean casserole and a yummy pumpkin cream pie. Everything was so good.

We’re almost done with the holiday decorating. It’s fun having a new place but tough at the same time–it’s like a giant blank slate and I’ve been so indecisive on where I want everything to go! We put up our new tree the day after Thanksgiving and it looks awesome. 9 feet of pre-lit goodness. The kids clapped when the lights were “officially” turned on. I love the coziness of having the tree lights as the only light in the room at night. Brandon and Annie have had fun getting into the Christmas decorations. My mom and grandma came over and helped clean the house and helped inspire me in making the house look fabulous.

Here’s Brandon and Annie playing with my Bethlehem village, before I get it all set up with lights.

I have some more pictures. Last week to help cure my insanity with Jaden being gone, we went over to Julie’s to play. I was trying to be a fun crafty mom so I brought some paints and some little projects for the kids to do. Let’s just say that Julie and I laughed ourselves silly, as things didn’t quite go as planned but the kids all had fun anyway. Hey, I tried. They finger painted reindeer pictures(Brandon’s had 8 legs and Halle’s had wings) and made little Rudolph suckers with pom-poms, pipe cleaners and googly eyeballs and tootsie pops.

Even Annie and Aiden got into the fun….for a few minutes. The rest of their time was spent sharing their suckers with baby Avery. Which I’m sure she enjoyed.

The finished masterpieces! Now Halle’s reminds me of a turkey with antlers. We had a great time!

The big snow storm hit last weekend! Right in time for us to pick up Jaden at the airport, which was more than a little bit scary and slippery. We did get home safe and sound, in time to grab lunch and then get the snow gear out to play in the DEEP snow!! It snowed all day long. It was lovely.

The mountains were so pretty at sunset. I love our view.

It was a fun day. We also watched the Polar Express and drank hot chocolate together.

I’ve been wanting to do some fun traditions with the kids. We have an advent tree they love where each day we hang a little ornament on a little tree. I also got a little crafty and made another advent tree–I used small tins from Roberts, covered the lids with a little digital-scrappiness and hot-glued them to a canvas. Inside each tin are 2 pieces of candy to help us count down the days until Christmas. Just something a little fun for Brandon and Annie to look forward to each day. They love it! We’re also going to open a Christmas book each night and read it together. Just haven’t started that one yet. There are other things we plan to do as well. Tonight we might try to go to see the lights at Temple Square, one of my favorite traditions….

What Christmas traditions do you have?? I always love hearing more ideas.

So there you have it. I hope to write more often because December is full of stuff I want to remember. Have a great day!