Recent happenings

Well, it's officially December & the holidays are in full swing around here!  Thanksgiving came & went in a hurry, but we had a great time spent with family & plenty of food.  Before we even got to Thanksgiving, we celebrated Reese's birthday.

Since Reese & her BFF Sammy are only a day apart in age, it was an easy decision to have a birthday party together.  Everyone had a blast at Chuck E. Cheese & the best part?  There was no clean up before or after the party!

Now that Thanksgiving is behind me, I'm trying to get as much done in preparation for Christmas so I can actually enjoy the holidays with my sanity somewhat intact.  I have to say that I tend to be a very high strung, anxious person naturally, but at the holidays that tends to increase.  With longer hours at work & Mike traveling more, I'm basically in survival mode during the week.  There are definitely not enough hours in the day.

There's so much pressure as a parent & of course, at the  holidays, you want things to be perfect for your kids.  Generally, I think the pressure is even higher for moms since we set our expectations so high & are less forgiving of ourselves.  I always joke that I'd love to borrow Mike's brain for even just a day since it's such a peaceful place.  He jokes back saying that he would absolutely not want to borrow my brain for a day since it's such a hectic, chaotic place.

Thanks to Amazon Prime, I'm already more than halfway through my shopping.  Mike's office is piled high with unopened, brown boxes that have been delivered throughout the weeks.  Next chore is to start tackling the wrapping so we're not up until the wee hours of the morning just before Christmas!

Rambling aside, I'm so thankful that Christmas is upon is; my favorite time of the year!!

Our house is looking super festive...

And our sweet little elf, Fella is back in town, yay!!   Happy Christmas!

Happy birthday, Reese Elizabeth!

This little face turned FOUR today!!

Happy birthday to my sweet, precious & amazing Reese Elizabeth!  Words cannot say just how much we love you & how much absolute joy you bring to our lives.  You are such a vibrant, funny, sunny person.  You are truly my best girl friend in the whole world.. I always tell you that God must really love me to have given you (and your equally amazing brother) to me!

 

The years have gone by quickly & I've cherished each & every day spent with you.  You're in such a great phase right now.  You're independent & insanely imaginative; you can play pretend in your room with your toys & dolls for hours.

You adore wearing fancy dresses & as you can see in the picture above, this is how you just came out of your room as I type this.  You often have wardrobe changes throughout the day; luckily you have a big collection of hand-me-down princess dresses.

No birthday would be complete without your annual birthday pic with your BFFs, Sammy & Taylor!

You love school & make friends easily.  You have a lot to say & can talk all day, non-stop.  Reese, you can also be a little headstrong & bossy, but I respect that about you; you don't take anything from anyone.  I hope your confidence stays as you grow!

You love playing in the yard, stomping around in puddles when it rains & swinging on the swings at the playground.  You're insanely dramatic & I'll be shocked if you don't end up on Broadway.  Whatever you decide to do with your life as you grow, I know you'll be amazing.  I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always, as long as I'm living, my baby you'll be.  Happy birthday, my sweet Reese Cakes & to many, many, many more years & new adventures!!

Christmas movies for the kiddos

It might November 9th, but I'm sitting here listening to Christmas music as I type this post.  Most some would say that it's way too early, but I'm all about maximizing the season since it flies by way too quickly.  While we ate dinner tonight, I wanted to come up with a list of Christmas movies to watch with the kids this year.  Here's what I came up with!

 1) Home Alone

2) Elf

3) Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

4) Dr. Suess' How the Grinch Stole Christmas

5) A Charlie Brown Christmas

6) A Christmas Story

7) It's a Wonderful Life

8) Frosty the Snowman

9) Mickey's Christmas Carol

10) Mickey's Once Upon a Christmas

11) Mickey's Twice Upon a Christmas

12) Arthur Christmas

There are a ton of choices when it comes to Christmas movies, but these are the ones my family is drawn to.  Merry early Christmas!!

Goodbye Halloween, hello, Thanksgiving!

Halloween has come & gone in a flash but it was a blast while it was here!

How awesome was it that Halloween fell on a Saturday?!  Too bad it can't be that way all the time!  Next year it's on a Monday, wha, wha, wha.

After Cam's baseball game, we carved pumpkins & got ready to head to our neighbor's for a get together before trick-or-treating.

It was all about the Bears this year since Cam was a Bears player & Mike carved a Bears pumpkin.  Of course my little gal pal was none other than a princess.  Her dress lit up & played "Let it Go" which we ended up hearing no less than 150 times on Halloween.

We had so much fun hitting the streets with the neighbors who the kids adore.  Unfortunately, it's been hotter than hell in Florida so we were pretty sweaty trick-or-treating.  It's going to be nearly 90 degrees today with God awful humidity.  It does NOT feel like Fall around these parts!

Now that Halloween is behind us, it's time to move toward Thanksgiving!  I don't have all that many Thanksgiving decorations, but it looks pretty festive around here anyway.

I found this great idea on Pinterest (go figure!) for making a thankful chain in honor of Thanksgiving.  Each night at dinner, we've been going around the table & saying what we're thankful for.  So far, Cam's thankful that we live in Florida & for his pets & Reese is thankful that Mommy & Daddy always love her & also for Mommy & Daddy & Cameron.  It's cute to hear what the kids have to say & to focus on being Thankful for the things we have instead of focusing on what we don't.

This holiday season I'm dead set on staying ahead of the game so I can truly enjoy the time since it's so fleeting.  I usually have an anxiety attack as December hits, but not this year!  I've even nearly finished my annual Shutterfly calendars that I give to the grandparents (and us) each year.  They're a lot of work but so worth it!

Both Mike & myself have been working long hours, so I've been a little more frazzled than usual.  I'm most definitely thankful for my Wednesdays off since I'm able to catch up & not lose my mind on the weekend.

I'm so, so happy that the holiday season is upon us!  What an awesome time of year!!

We are savages

For the past few months, Mike & I have been training for the Savage Race which my coworker roped me into participating in.  Luckily Mike agreed to join me since I'd have been terrified to run the 7.25 miles with 30 obstacles in between. 


 I'm definitely not considered a runner in any way shape or form.  I get bored easily & have never experienced the "runner's high" I often hear about.  But, it was a great motivator to get to the gym without question & get a few miles in each day as to not die on the day of the race.

The first obstacle was to jump into an icy vat of water which was positively shocking to the system.  To top it off, there's a wall in the middle that forces you to completely submerge.  Brr!!!!





It was a very filthy race that involved wading through mud & going under muddy water.  The picture above was the scariest & most challenging obstacle.  To get to the top of this huge slide, I had to scale a 90 degree wall via rope.  Lucky for me some nice guys at the top hoisted my large bum over the wall.  Going down the 90 degree slide into a vat of dirty water was pretty intimidating too.  You'll see from my face that I was a tad nervous.  It's funny though, because I never considered not doing some of the scarier obstacles since adrenaline kicks in & everyone around you is doing it too.  Not to mention, once at the top, there's no backing down!!

I was being dramatic in the picture above since the log I selected wasn't very heavy at all!

 

Unfortunately, my coworker's fiancee broke his leg during one of our obstacles.  The poor guy has to have surgery next week & can't bear weight on his leg for the next two months.  The medics swooped him away a couple of miles in, but we were left to finish the race... it was so sad to see the poor guy laying in the mud, shaking & in shock.

We plan on participating next year too, since it was both challenging & fun.  Now that we're creeping up in age, the scale is definitely creeping up too.  Gotta have a reason & motivator to stay in shape!

We'd never participated in a race before so it was satisfying to know we could do it & finish (above average time to boot!)

Nothing like jumping over hot coals before passing the finish line!

We may be getting old (and boy, did our bodies feel old the next day!), but we still gotta lot of life left in these old bones!!