Home for the Holidays

An entire month has passed since I’ve blogged.  I know, I’ve missed you too!

Happy December.  Happy St. Nick’s Day.  Happy Hanukkuh.  Merry Christmas.  And what the heck, I may as well go ahead and say Happy New Year!

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It has been a whirlwind month. We’ve been getting ready for our little addition (nursery pics coming soon), we’ve been decking the halls, now we’ve been undecking the halls, we’ve been visiting Santa, but the one thing we haven’t been doing is traveling.  Given our upcoming due date we decided to spend this year at home.  We were Home for the Holidays and it was quite lovely.

Being home for the holidays meant that Denny and I were responsible to make not only the turkey but also the memories for Makenzie, and that in itself, is pretty cool about being an adult. The more we pumped up the holidays, the more excited Makenzie became.

Being home for the holidays meant that Makenzie was able to sleep in her own bed on Christmas Eve.  It meant we were able to enjoy our own Christmas tree and Makenzie was able to run down our own stairs to see if Santa made a visit.  It meant that we were able to relax as a family on Christmas Day… no running around, no driving and no time constraints.  It was very relaxing and it was very special.  We missed seeing many of your favorite people in Ohio and Pa., but we made up for it with lots of holiday fun and lots of visitors.

Here’s how we filled our non-travel December…

::  Having brunch with Santa at the Zoo  ::

Brunch was delicious and the zoo was fun, but meeting Santa was not in the cards for Makenzie.  She was really excited while we waited in line but when the time came to get close to him, she got nervous.  This was as close as we could get.  But in reality I’m quite thrilled that she didn’t have interest to sit on a random man’s lap.  If this continues until she’s about 35, we’ll be all set!

Keeping her distance.

::  Visit from Mamaw and PapPap  ::

A few days before Santa visited, we had a visit from Denny’s parents and our nephew Connor.  We checked out the holiday light and the Christmas Village at the fairground.  It was so cute!  Lots of festive activities including crafts, a holiday train, holiday singers and of course Mr & Mrs. Claus.  Connor was brave enough to sit on Santa’s lap, but Makenzie would only sit on Mrs. Claus’ lap.  We stayed out way past the kids’ bedtime and we had fun hanging out in SantaLand.

McGee selfie!

The sweetest Mrs. Claus ever!

Cousin picture! Did I forget to mention that as an early Christmas gift Makenzie slipped in the tub and ended up with a black eye? She was fine after about 5 minutes but my mom guilt has yet to leave from letting this happen. Ugh!

::  Christmas Eve Fun  ::

We went to a candlelight Christmas Eve service which was beautiful although we opted out of the candle light part.  Flames and toddlers… c’mon, tell me I’m not the only Mom who sees nothing good coming from that.

All dressed up for church!

We (Aka Makenzie) took a bath, put on Santa jammies and wrote the jolly old guy a note. Quite adorable if you ask me.

Dear Santa…

And we left the note write by the fireplace along with a cupcake for Santa and some cheese for the reindeer.  Note to self, don’t forget to buy carrots next year at this time of year.  Luckily  Makenzie didn’t seem to notice.

Twas the night before Christmas…

Opening gifts on Christmas morning! Turns out those Crayola tub crayons she’s opening were an awful gift because it took about an hour to clean them off the tub. Next year we’ll just tell Santa to bring a drum set instead.

::  Visit from Nana and Papa  ::

We kept the welcome mat rolled out all month and the day after Christmas Nana and Papa drove up for a visit.

For me?!? Presents for me?!?

Nothing made Makenzie happier than the singing Elsa doll from Nana & Papa!

That’s a happy little girl. 🙂

Reading with Papa.

:: Gingerbread house decorating  ::

Teamwork!

::  And a trip to Kelkenberg Farms  ::

This was one of my favorite activities of the month!  We went to a local farm and spent hours seeing the animals, walking around and enjoying a sleigh ride aka hayride.   Maybe next year the weather will be cold enough for a sleigh ride but luckily we had a great time either way.

Family photo… could it be our last picture as a family of 3?!

Enjoying another day with Nana and Papa!

Brushing the pony!

The strong horses who pulled us on a ride, pregnancy weight & all! I felt kind of bad for all the chocolate I consumed leading up to this.

::  And lastly, using her new presents from Santa  ::

Makenzie must have been a very good girl this year because she received lots of fun gifts.  Here is the first (and last) picture of her loving her Crayola crayons.  Turns out they don’t clean up as easily as advertised but she had quite a fun tubby time.

Creative girl or future graffiti artist?

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We’re looking forward to all that 2015 will bring including a snuggly baby boy.  His arrival countdown is at 18 days, and I promise I’ll have more updates about him shortly.  Wishing you a wonderful 2015!

See you soon,

Erin

xoxo