Christmas activities of late

The holiday season tends to be a busy one for pretty much everyone. There are parties to go to, decorations to put up, gifts to buy & wrap, etc. You want to be sure to "slow down" as much as you can to really actually enjoy everything, rather than just fly through it all. I just wanted to say that... and, to tell you a little of what we've done lately.

We took the girls to pick out a tree. That was a fun trip. Olivia chose the perfect tree (which totally grew on the way home, I promise). We all decorated it together. For a long while, Adelle wouldn't touch it at all; she would literally hug the wall to go past the tree (like she knew it didn't belong inside). That was cute.
The tree has lots of white lights & we decided just to go with red ornaments this year. I made a red bow to go on top. This past week, Adelle has gotten used to the tree & it's pretty hard to keep her from pulling the glittery ornaments down. She did get into the decorating spirit though... She had seen us putting things on the tree, so she added her own things... a nutragrain bar... one of her snow boots... a toy... LOL.
Olivia & I put up the kiddos' pink tree. It has white lights & pink ornaments. Of course, the tree itself is also pink.  ;)

We went to the 56th Army Band's unit "Holiday Party". Everyone is so careful to be PC about everything. they insisted on calling it a holiday party & yet, there was a massive Christmas tree & Santa came to see the kids. Hmmmm.... sounds like a Christmas party to me. Ha!
At any rate, we had a pretty good time. I had volunteered to help the FRG with preparations & with the "white elephant" game. This had me on my feet for most of the night. It's probably important to the story if I mention now that I had on some hott new boots. The pain-to-hottness ratio was almost too close though. I thought. My feet. Would fall. Off!
Anyway, the food was good (my homemade cheesecake got devoured), Olivia & Adelle had a great time, I got to see Kerri & Terri (neither of which I see often enough) & I made a few new friends. Oh, and the gift we ended up with is pretty cool.

Let's see... what else?

Friday night, I put the kids down for bed & then went to hang out with Kate. We don't get to spend near enough time together. We watched Eclipse, again, had a few drinks & yummy appetizer-type foods and talked for a long time. I dare say we both needed a relaxing-kid free-girl's night. Thanks, lady!

Saturday night (last night), Becki came over, with two of her kids, to watch the girls, so that Eric & I could go to a Christmas party. It was at our neighbors' house across the street. It was a themed party (which I totally love, btw) to which the men could come dressed as a reindeer or an elf & the women could come dressed as their interpretation on Mrs. Claus or an elf.
If I had to give the party a title... it would be "Ho! Ho! Ho!". And, really what I mean is: the ho-ho-hoier, the better! Lol. Some of us ladies were dressed a tad on the sexy side.
The food was great- I took double chocolate chip brownies. The battle over whether to play holiday music or regular chart topping stuff was ongoing & quite amusing. The drinks were nice- I think Eric likes American Honey (whiskey). We took tons of pics that I'll try to get & post later (some of them anyway). We did a gift exchange there too. I think everyone had a great time.
Meanwhile... the girls were awesome for Becki & they had a lot of fun with Ian & Will.

As for holiday festivities, there are three more things on our to-do list.
1) We want to take the girls to "Zoo Lights". Point Defiance Zoo strings millions of Christmas lights throughout the entire park for families to walk through.
2) I'm sure we'll go to a Christmas service at church. The girls will look beautiful in they're matching dresses.
3) On Christmas day, after we've opened gifts & had family time, we plan to go to the Apelar household. They invited us for lunch/play time. Amy says that we have to come in our PJs, because that's a lazy day. We can totally do that.  :)

As much as I want a white Christmas, I don't see that happening. I'm going to try super hard to stay optimistic though. You know... crossin' my fingers & what have you.

I hope everyone is enjoying the season. You should.
Make sure to enjoy each other.

Peace.