Deck the Halls

The Christmas season is such an incredibly magical time! Even more so with a child around our home! Last week we brought up all of our red rubber maids from the basement and decorated our house for Christmas. My favorite moment and a picture I will cherish forever from that night is this one ...

He was so proud that he got to be the one to put the star on our tree! And then there's Nic who was living his Lion King fantasy during this moment saying, "Everything the light touches, Simba!" haha That guy always knows how to get a good laugh out of me. :)

Our Christmas tree ...

My favorite ornaments are always the ones with pictures. These are two of my favorites, one from our first Christmas after we got married and the other for Liam's first Christmas only a couple months after he was born.

Inspecting it first ... ;)

One of my favorite spaces to decorate for every holiday ...

I love this picture we had taken of our family last Christmas!

A little bit of mistletoe ;)

Last year I put our nativity on a shelf overlooking our living room and I loved it so much that I did the same this year. 

Look at that sweet baby Liam in a Christmas mug. One of my favorite Christmas pictures of all time! I did it again last year but with a not so asleep baby and although that Christmas mug didn't survive the season (it got dropped), I just might have to find a new mug to carry on the tradition for this year.

We inherited this beautiful Christmas village from Nic's dad that spans our entire living room and kitchen ledge! It even has Waldo. ;) Can you spot him?!

I thought for sure half this village wouldn't survive the unboxing and putting up phase. Liam loved "helping" and things were clanging together and village trucks were being added to his toy box while we worked. It really was a Christmas miracle that none of it broke. haha Christmas with a toddler! But to be fair, he rarely ever touches the tree or any of the presents underneath so I think we are pretty lucky.

There is even a little bit of Christmas cheer in our master bedroom!

All week long I've wanted to spend all of my time in our living room around the lights of the Christmas tree. There is just nothing better and the cherry on top, we even have snow falling out our window! So much magic in the air. I know when we've said goodbye to Christmas and January comes I am going to be sad to take it all down again so I will be soaking up every last second surrounded by holiday cheer. :) 

a festive weekend

I always look forward to the weekends but they are even more fun and special during the holiday season! This weekend was nothing short of that. We finally finished decorating our house last week and just got to enjoy being surrounded by Christmas lights and evergreen garland this weekend! There is nothing better than that evergreen smell at Christmas time. It makes me a bit nostalgic for a real tree in my living room like we had when I was a child but garland is the next best compromise! ;)

On Friday we had our ward Christmas party and among a yummy ham dinner, catching up with friends, and listening to several beautiful musical numbers (Joy to the World is my favorite and I teared up when the primary children sang too) that made me feel the spirit of Christmas, Liam got his second opportunity to see Santa. I mean, the picture speaks for itself so I don't think any words are really necessary ...

Is that not the most awkward Santa picture you have ever seen!? Santa was too freaked out to hold Liam in his lap for a crying picture so he suggested that Nic face the wall while holding Liam and that it be a family affair. We might have to hit up the mall Santa after all. haha

On Saturday we pretty much spent from sun up to sun down baking Christmas cookies. I always forget that every sugar cookie recipe makes about a bajillion cookies. haha On Black Friday I ordered these fun letter shapes to add to our cookie cutter collection and we made a few holiday words out of them to celebrate the season! We might even save "HO HO" for our new Santa plate on Christmas Eve! ;)

We might be finding flour everywhere it is not supposed to be for the next year but it was totally worth it to make memories with our little baker!

Advent Calendars

Happy December! It's the most wonderful time of the year and another year of advent calendars! I shared our advent calendars last year, one of which was scripture based and the other one, a book calendar. We loved them both so much that we decided to do them again this year but with a few changes and added a third calendar as well! 

A few of our favorite Christmas books from our collection for our book calendar ...

A fun change I wanted to make to the book advent calendar this year was to wrap each book like a present. Every day Liam gets to choose a book from his shelf to open and it has been a fun surprise so far to see which ones he has picked!

Liam opened the first book yesterday and found Little Blue Trick's Christmas inside. Not only does it has his favorite truck inside but a Christmas tree lights up and flashes at the end of the book! He already loves it so much! Today he opened Follow the Star. An adorable book from my childhood about the wiseman following the star to Bethlehem.

At the moment, we don't have a mantle in our home. It made hanging the scripture advent calendar I made last year pretty tricky. It fell down quite a few times during the season and with grabby toddler hands, just didn't seem like the best fit this year. Thank goodness for Grandma West, she came to our rescue! She got us this adorable pocket tree calendar and gave it to us when we visited last weekend. All the scripture cards I made fit perfectly in the pockets and of course, we added treats inside to go with it! After mentioning the grabby toddler hands, I feel silly admitting that I hung it low enough for Liam to reach thinking it would be fun to have him be able to reach inside on his own. What was I thinking?! haha I now find the scripture cards strewn about our house and had to take the chocolates out of the bottom part of the tree to keep him from eating them all at once. I think we will be moving it up the wall by the end of the day! haha

Liam is really into numbers right now and points them out on the calendar and traces them with his finger, it is adorable!

Reaching in for his first treat yesterday ...

The scripture we read got me so excited to hear pieces of the Savior's birth over the next 25 days! The activity was to decorate for Christmas but we already took care of that. ;)

Look at that sweet face! He makes the best excited noises when he gets to have a treat ...

Opening it all by himself ...

The third calendar we decided to add this year is called "Light the World - 25 Ways in 25 Days". It is so important to our family to keep Christ in Christmas and our hearts focused on him as he is the reason for the season. What better way than 25 days of service and giving just like he did while he was on the Earth. You can find the calendar here! Happy Advent friends! XO

our weekend in Meridian

The day after Thanksgiving we woke up bright and early and headed to Meridian to see my family. My brother flew into town for Thanksgiving and my dad and step-mom just moved back there after living in Denver for 5 years (yay!) and it was the perfect time to see everybody all together!

On (black) Friday we shopped until we dropped (mostly online). We got 90% of our Christmas shopping done that day! My mom babysat Liam for a couple of hours while Nic and I went to a few different stores in person but we honestly had more luck online than we did braving the crazy crowds. In the evening we celebrated my brother's birthday (it was on Sunday) with my mom and a couple of his friends. We made homemade pizzas and salted caramel ice cream from our ice cream maker my brother bought us for Christmas last year and enjoyed everyones' company. Liam even got his first visit from Santa that night!! As expected, he wanted nothing to do with him and either gripped onto me or my mom during the whole thing. He was willing to accept a candy cane from him so, baby steps. Sorry in advance that these are really poor quality Santa pictures. They were taken late at night with a cell phone but no Santa visit can go unshared so grainy pictures it is!

I think my mom was secretly loving that he chose her over Santa. ;)

On Saturday we got to have breakfast at my dad and Edie's new beautiful home! I got the grand tour while Liam drug Nic upstairs to the toy room and made himself right at home! Wouldn't even leave later that morning without three cars he found in there in hand so we borrowed them for a few hours until we came back later that evening.

During the day, my brother sweetly hung Christmas lights on our mom's house for her ...

Meanwhile, I contributed my talents and just took pictures of everyone haha ...

Liam is in love with Christmas lights and gasps every time he sees someones house lit up, it is adorable! I can't wait to start a little Polar Express tradition of hopping in the car and driving around to look at Christmas lights with hot chocolate in hand this year! I think he'll love it!

My brother is such a good uncle, he adores Liam and I think the feeling is mutual ...

He also adores his Sita too!

My mom really wanted a picture taken for her Christmas card while we were all there. This was our best attempt haha ...

On Saturday night we went back over to my dad and Edie's to celebrate my brother's birthday round two. They made delicious enchiladas with their left over turkey from Thanksgiving and better than sex cake for dessert! ;)

Love these two ...

At one point during the night when we were all standing around and talking in the kitchen, I looked over at the stairs and saw this adorable moment. I couldn't run fast enough to get my camera!

I have the most darling little nieces ever!!! Abby and Ava are such good big sisters/cousins!

And that most handsome nephew!

Everyone sang "Happy Birthday" and then all of the little cousins helped their uncle blow out the candles on his cake. ;) 

Olivia and Liam were loving playing in the boxes, bows, and wrapping paper during present opening. Look at that darling little mischievous smile ...

I love how in this next picture, everyone is focused on the knife that Brendan just opened and then there is Olivia and Liam in their own little world in the middle. She reached out to hold Liam's hand and I died from the cuteness!

There is nothing better than family and everyone was so happy to be back together again!

And last but not least, my sisters. Besides the woman my brother will marry one day, they are the only sisters I will ever have and I couldn't be more grateful for them. They are wonderful mothers and  incredible role models to me!

After we put Liam to bed for the night, we watched something I have been dying to see for weeks now, the winter episode of Gilmore Girls! Can't wait to finish the rest of the season soon. We couldn't have asked for a better weekend with my family! We miss them all so much already and can't wait until Christmas!

Thanksgiving 2016

On one hand, it is hard to believe almost a week has gone by since Thanksgiving already but on the other, we have been knee deep in Christmas mode the last few days (Christmas music, lights, and evergreen garland everywhere you go in our house right now!) so it definitely looks more like Santa will be visiting soon than a turkey. ;) I can't forget the memories we made together on this special holiday though.

I made brunch on Thanksgiving morning and my mother-in-law joined us! We had chocolate chip pumpkin waffles (my first time making them and they turned out AMAZING, definitely a new holiday favorite) with scrambled eggs and fruit.

For some reason, Liam was being super shy at first around his Grandma but one bite of that syrup and peanut butter covered chocolate chip waffle and you would have thought he was Buddy the Elf. "Buddy, do you like sugar?" "Is there sugar in syrup?? Then YESSSS!" He was quite the sticky mess. haha

He started showing off for everyone about 2 1/2 minutes after the sugar rush kicked in to overdrive and he was dumping out baskets of toys and climbing in them ...

Turkey hat and ALL! ;)

Cutest pilgrim and turkey!

Grandma brought Liam some belated birthday gifts and one of them was this talking dinosaur from Doc McStuffins, which he loves! We are so thankful for all of Liam's sweet Grandma's and Grandpa's in his life who make him feel loved and special!

After brunch Liam went down for his nap and Nic and I jumped into a couple of projects for a bit. He hung Christmas lights on our house for as far as the clips would take him. We ended up with only half our house in lights because we ran out but that sweet man worked in the snow and dark on Monday night to finish them. I puttied holes on Liam's big boy bed (which is sooo close to being done and turned out adorable!).

When Liam woke up we drove to my father-in-law's house to celebrate with his side of the family! I wish we would have all gotten a picture together while we were there. I felt so incredibly grateful all evening for how much work they put in to making an amazing Thanksgiving dinner for us! Despite my efforts, they wouldn't let me lift a finger.

The turkey my father-in-law made...

It tasted even better than it looks!

As we suspected, Liam wouldn't eat very much of the meal (he's a picky eater) but he did try his very first olives off of his chubby little fingers and a helping of sweet potatoes (must have been all of those marshmallows that drew him in)! I tried just about everything and even had seconds! haha It was so yummy!

Liam entertained us for most of the night of course! He also colored that adorable turkey picture. It says, "I am thankful for pumpkin spice marshmallows (he is obsessed) and egg nog!"

Trying his very first drink of egg nog with daddy ...

He loved it!

The very next morning we got up bright and early and drove to Boise to see my family for the rest of the weekend. Lots more pictures and stories to come from that adventure. :)

Hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving with those you love. I know we did! We are so thankful for our families and all that they do for us. I am also thankful for my two boys and the joy they bring to my life every day. I can't imagine my life without them.