Saving Christmas

Don't leave. You're in the right place. 

This little blog just got a little face lift.

I figured it was high time that I spent the time to put together some updated pics. 

And high time that I spent some time parked on the couch for a few minutes, staring at this screen. Something that I haven't done in a very long time. Because Christmas, New Years, the flu that knocked me right out and killing myself staining my staircase has taken over my life. Yes, staining my staircase. Oh man. It's a job. One day you'll see before and after pictures...and I might look about 20 years older too when it's all said and done.

     

But, minus the never ending staircase, life is slowly getting back to normal now. The Christmas lights are coming down, the house is back in order, our normal daily routine has started up again and the treats are slowly being eaten out of our cupboards. 

But in the meantime, I didn't want to forget to seal our Christmas pictures in this space. Because in the wash of Christmas craziness, it's easy to leave these pics on my camera and just move ahead. 

Because, to be honest, Christmas can feel like a bit of a blur once it's all said and done. 

From early Christmas celebrations at our place with Terry's side of the family--where little people decorated gingerbread houses (or, graham cracker houses actually)...

(made out of little milk cartons so they wouldn't fall apart when rough fingers pushed delicious candy onto them) --and where I learned, after breaking at least 20 crackers, that using a BREAD knife to cut these things is key. Good to know.

To sitting around the Christmas tree, opening gifts...

and breaking out all of the new toys.

Then in a flash, we were packing our bags and moving into mom and dad's house for the week, as we always do each Christmas with my sister and her family too, and we let the real craziness begin.

So with traditions in full swing, where Santa secretly mailed them a book on Christmas eve to read before bedtime...

and where reindeer food was scattered on the snow grass in case the reindeer were hungry...

and where matching jammies were unwrapped on that big night right before bedtime,

and cookie crumbs were found left over the next morning, our Christmas was full. Because traditions are something that I want the kids to always expect and remember.

So with a week full of gorging on delicious food, cousins and siblings playing nicely one minute, then fighting the next, then making up 2 seconds later, then bouncing off the walls with Christmas excitement...it was a wonderfully full, busy, crazy Christmas.

We're still reeling from the mounds of Christmas cookies that were decorated with Grandma,

the parties that forced us to wipe the baby spit off of our clothes and pretend that we have a night life...

the play dates with school friends just before going back...

and the exhaustion that Christmas and the holidays is bound to bring.

So, here we go--the pictures are now set in this little place of mine, so I can look back one day and remember. Remember the good, the crazy, the exhausting, the wonderful reality of it all.

And to finish it off--a picture just because it makes me smile. Our girl showing off her new skills on all fours, and her tiny friend Ivy. Cutest ever.

Happy first week back to reality everyone.
One more day until the weekend. Hang in there.

Erica