That Time We Cut Down a Christmas Tree

A couple days before Thanksgiving, a mom at the kids school mentioned to me that the 4th grade national parks pass also comes with a Christmas tree tag. And, not only that, she had already done all the research on where to go to get the tag and get the tree. She forwarded me the information, I mentioned it to Ian and we decided to go for it. Up until this point, we have either always had a fake tree or had no tree at all...because living in small quarters means no tree. 

We stuffed the kids in the truck and headed out the Friday after Thanksgiving. There was a bit of whining along the way until we saw snow. Then everyone was excited. And it started dumping snow, which obviously was SUPER EXCITING. When we stopped at the ranger's station for our tree tag, he told Ian a couple good places to find trees. The first place was covered in cars, so we continued on. We stopped in the second location, which had three other cars besides us. While we were getting Willa and Callum sorted, Connor and Isla went running into the snow...which at this point was a few feet deep. Before I knew it, Isla was waist deep in snow. Of course, after a few minutes, she was complaining she was cold and wanted in the truck. But, the rest of us were going to look for a tree nearby. Then, Callum kept getting his boots stuck in the snow and just walking around in his socks, so Ian asked me to take him back to the truck. At which point, Connor asked to go back too. So there I sat, in the truck with all the kids, while Ian went in search of a tree. He came back with one (pictured above) much quicker than I expected. 

Once home, we had to cut down our tree a bit to fit it inside. It's still much wider than our fake tree, but I like it. It reminds me of an oversized Charlie Brown Christmas tree because it only has needles at the ends. But, it's ours and comes with a fun story and for that, I totally love it. Also, there have been no bugs coming from the tree, which I feared because of the internet, and literally no pine needles have fallen. So it's definitely been a win and I would totally get a real tree again.

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6th Annual Christmas Card Challenge Winners

Let's be honest, this contest is the only reason many of you send me cards every year! And, you know what, I don't really care. I still like it! One of the winners is going to be pleasantly surprised they stuck with sending me a card all these years. Another one has won in another category before...so welcome back to the winners circle ;) As a reminder, the winning categories are as follows

1. first card to arrive
2. best handwritten note
3. best photo(s)
4. best update
5. best overall

A few things I would like to point out. Card number two was completely hand made. It was beautiful. And talk about impressive artistic skills I don't have! Number three may just be the best picture I have ever seen. Like literally the best. It makes me want to drag my kids to do the same. Number 5 was a beautiful card, with foil overlay and a fancy envelope to boot. I am all about the whole package! Also worth noting is this is the third year I have gotten New Years cards. I almost made an honorable mention category just for that. It's fun that the holiday card season is being stretched out, with me generally always getting my first one before Thanksgiving and my last one around New Years. Now for the winner of the bag of Bean Counter Coffee Roasters Coffee...

Let's be honest, with a family photo like that, a bag of coffee is well deserved!!!

Next I set aside every locally sent card I received for the month of bread from Alchemy Bread. If you're local and have never tried her bread before, I HIGHLY recommend looking her up. Your life will be changed. Her bread is THAT GOOD. The irony in the winner of this is I am pretty sure they gave me a card just for the bread. Well didn't they luck out!!! Everyone else who sent me a card just to win the bread is crying, alas there can only be one winner. 

Also ironically, card 21 was also the card that won category two above. They should consider themselves having a really good day today!!! I mean, winning the bread AND a category. Pat yourself on the back! 

And can we discuss that the random number generator picked both odd numbers? Or am I the only person that noticed that? I just thought it was funny. Alright, if you won a prize, I'll be contacting you. If you won a category, well done!!! I'm so proud of you :) Thanks to everyone who sent a card this year. I loved all the happy mail. 

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Christmas

Let's take a walk all the way back to last year. Ok, so Christmas was like two weeks ago. But I still want to document it so I remember it. We stayed home all day on Christmas and it was amazing. The above photo is the kids sitting on the stairs waiting to go see their presents. I didn't put any of their presents out until Christmas morning because Callum was really having trouble leaving presents alone under the tree. I did a video of the kids running into the living room from the stairs. Connor shoved Callum out of the way and went running in all excited, then stopped and said, "Oh." Apparently it was slightly underwhelming, haha! 

Connor's favorite present was his Harry Potter stuff, Isla's was her caboodle and makeup and Callum's was his work bench. Callum walked around in his construction vest for almost the whole day. It was really cute. Actually, I feel like I should throw in a caveat that the kids actual favorite thing on Christmas day was the candy in their stockings. I bought them the good candy that I know they like and it was a HUGE hit. 

Connor "bought" us all presents from his class store and it was really cute seeing him so excited to give them to us. And he really put thought into them, even getting Isla and Callum presents he thought they would like. Isla made two presents in class for us. The decorative wrapping that she drew she did not want thrown away. I forgot to take a picture of her presents, but one was this adorable ornament that had her hand print on it and contained a ribbon that was as long as she is tall. I thought it was incredibly thoughtful and I eat up sentimental presents like that. 

Later in the day, my parents, brother and aunt and uncle came over for dinner. The kids were spoiled with presents from everyone and enjoyed staying in their pjs and playing with their spoils all day. 

^^ We heard SO MUCH HAMMERING on Christmas day. I have since moved the work bench out of the living room, helping all our ears immensely. 

And because I can't resist matching pjs or a family photo on a holiday, here is us all match-matchy. 

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The Christmas Season

These pictures have nothing to do with what I am about to rant write about. They just stand as photographic evidence that I did actually do some holiday activities with the kids leading up to Christmas. 

Just to prepare you, I am about to go on a bit of a rant. Now don't get me wrong during this rant. If you are one of those Pinterest or advent calendar moms that loves (and has the time) to do activities with your kids every day, more power to you. I have friends that did some incredible things like this during this season and it looked super fun through instagram stories. But just as I don't judge them for doing things different than me, I don't want to be judged either. 

A couple weeks ago I was talking with a couple who have a Pinterest worthy daughter about my age. They were telling me all the amazing and over the top activities their daughter was doing with her children every day. Then, they asked what holiday activities I had been doing with my kids each day. Let's be honest, at this point, I can barely bend over and pick stuff up off the floor! And though I would love to blame my lack of doing an amazingly thought out activity with my children each day in December on my pregnancy, the fact is, it just isn't my personality. I am more of a go with the flow type person and rigid plans stress me out. But back to my conversation. As I explained that I had yet to do anything with my children (in my defense it was like the 8th of December or something) they looked at me in horror. Like actual literal horror. Then I was asked, "Do you even have a Christmas tree?!?" I do folks, don't you worry. It even went up the weekend of Thanksgiving. I love me some Christmas. I just don't love me a busy and stressful month. 

Now, here's the thing. Did we manage to squeeze in some holiday activities? Of course we did. We went to an angel breakfast that we have gone to the past several years. Ian took Isla to the Nutcracker. He offered to take the kids ice skating and they said no...hahahaha! We drove around looking at Christmas lights with hot chocolates in hand. Another night, we took a hay ride through a local farm's light display. And, on the morning of Christmas Eve, we squeezed in some cookie decorating. None of these activities were planned well in advance. Well, the angel breakfast was for like a week or two. Everything else just fit where there was time in our normal lives. 

And guess what? Even though we didn't do amazing activities every day, the kids still enjoyed themselves. We all did. None of us were out shopping in the chaotic stores days before Christmas...thanks to online shopping. When days already felt full because of school parties, work and other Christmas parties, friends birthday parties, even Callum's birthday, we didn't do things. It just felt nice not to cram things in and stress myself trying to fit it all in. Which, this again shows you a bit about my personality, I don't like being super busy. 

The moral of the story is, don't try to keep up with others if you don't have it in you. Celebrate their awesomeness in doing all the things. Then celebrate your awesomeness in cuddling up on the couch with your kids for the fourth night in a row. We are all hardwired differently. That's a good thing. A thing to be celebrated. Not a thing to tear each other down for us all not keeping up (or laying low) to each other's standards. 

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Christmas Decorations

Our Christmas decor has evolved and changed over the years. I think that's a natural thing because of styles, life changes, etc. I was probably at the top of my decor game when I worked at Pottery Barn. But I have since gotten rid of so much of that because it just isn't practical with kids to have breakable decorations e-v-e-r-y-w-h-e-r-e. As children have made me more practical, things have simplified. But some things, like my love of color and my love of twinkle lights in the home have not changed. I mean, twinkle lights just make everything better. Especially during those dreary winter days. I put them up in the kids rooms for Christmas a few years ago and ended up leaving them up year round because I loved them so much, and so did they. 

I finally bit the bullet two years ago and bought us all matching stockings. Of course those stockings aren't available anymore, so I will now need to stalk eBay looking for one for baby because I just love those stockings so much. Not to mention I am totally cheap and they felt like a huge investment (they weren't that much money, but still!) and don't want to have to replace all of them. 

We have a lot of kids Christmas crafts around our house from various years as well. I particularly love the ones that have pictures of the kids on them because it lets me reminisce and that's just one of my favorite things to do. 

I should mention, my decor prekids included a lot of fake snow, again thanks to Pottery Barn. It was beautiful but OHMYGOSH the kids just couldn't seem to keep their hands off of it. Which the stuff is beautiful and fluffy and white, so I get it. But I couldn't handle having to clean up snow twenty times a day, so that went bye bye too. I actually let the kids play with it before I threw it away and let it get all over because I figured "why not?" but that was a few years ago now. 

Alright, enough talking. My Christmas decor...well, my living room at least, as I did decorate the banisters on the stairs this year and they include twinkle lights because, HELLO, I did say they are my favorite. 

I mostly posted this for myself because I think it's fun to look back and see ways I have decorated in the past. But given it's my blog and I can post what I want, for whomever I want, I figure whatevs. 

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Decorating for Christmas

Isla helped me decorate for Christmas over the weekend and it really was a fun time. Connor was watching Home Alone and Callum was napping. With a Christmas movie in the background, we decorated. She really wanted to take the lead on the tree and did most of the decorating. She was so excited. It just melted my mama heart. I've decorated in years past by myself, so it's fun to have someone that gets just as excited about the decorations (if not more so) helping out. 

I definitely don't decorate as much as I did pre-kids...of course I was also working at Pottery Barn at the time and had that influence as well. There's no elaborate table decorations, as once I had kids, I realized how those annoying things have to either be moved every meal or get things spilled on them every meal. Practicality won out and the table now remains clear. Though I did add garland and lights to our stairs this year and that makes me insanely happy. But honestly, twinkle lights anywhere make me insanely happy. I am obviously easily pleased. I think it has to do with it being grey out and getting dark earlier that the burst of light in various places around the house is just appreciated. 

We put the Christmas tree in the corner of the living room this year, rather than front and center in the front window. Sure, there isn't magic in the window, but it really makes navigating our living room easier! It also gave the tree more space, as it wasn't having to be crammed up against a window so it wouldn't be so far in the room. All that to say, I am enjoying the set up this year. 

Now to get on with the Christmas shopping and wrapping. I was talking with someone the other day that had their shopping all done AND all wrapped. I am a bit behind over here, still trying to figure out exactly what I will get everyone. I find doing three presents each (wear, play, read), which we have done for years, makes me think longer about what I am going to buy each kid, as I want each present to really count and have meaning. But I am getting there, slowly but surely. I have never been out on Christmas Eve still shopping, so I am not too worried. It all comes together somehow. 

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The 6th Annual Christmas Card Challenge

Having already received our first Christmas card in the mail, I thought now was a good time to announce the 6th annual Christmas card challenge. Thanksgiving snuck up on a lot of us last year and is early again this year, so I thought the early reminder to get a card made (and capitalize on those Black Friday card deals!) would be good for all. 

This contest was born out of my love of Christmas cards. Well, not just Christmas cards, but any holiday card. We've even gotten some New Year's cards, which I think is fun because it makes the card season last even longer! I get so excited in this season to check my mail every day. I love seeing smiling faces of those I love on cards, I love the handwritten notes, I love the updates, I love the lush beautiful cards, I love the funny ones. I just love it all. 

The categories for cards will remain the same again this year, but I also have a fun little prize for anyone that is local, so be sure to keep reading! As a refresher, here are the categories:

     * first card to arrive

     * best handwritten note

     * best photo(s)

     * best update

     * best overall

The first card to arrive spot has already been snagged by someone who was obviously on top of their game. And being on top of their game helped me, as it reminded me to get to work on my own card. 

In the spirit of supporting my hubby, and supporting a local small business, I will be giving a bag of Bean Counter Coffee Roasters coffee to the winner. How it works is, after the New Year, I will choose a winner from each categories, then use a random number generator to pick the winner of the coffee. Now, for you locals, I have a separate prize. Also in the spirit of supporting a local small business, I will be giving away a month subscription (February) to Alchemy Bread. If you've never heard of her, go check her out. Her bread is AMAZING. If you win, you have to agree to pick up your bread once a week (either on Tuesday or Thursday) in downtown Modesto on 12th Street. You also have to be willing to provide your phone number for the subscription. You really want to be willing to do this because, guys, it's soup season and this bread is like no other. Your mind WILL BE BLOWN. And if you're not willing, I know plenty of people that would be, so...

If you want to join in the fun, but don't have my address, feel free to email me at jgrimbleby(at)gmail.com and I will provide an address to send it. And you need not be shy, I have had many people participate in the card challenge that aren't my close pals. And, guess what? Some have won categories! And, each one of their cards put a smile on my face because I LOVE CARDS.

If you are looking for some inspiration, here are the winners in years past - 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014 and 2013. Just a little tip, funny cards are totally my jam, as are anything that makes your card stick out from the crowd. That could be a different shape, a different colored envelope, or perhaps forgetting to change your last name on your card, so it says the wrong name! 

Now get to work on your cards! Remember, Black Friday and cyber Monday are always great times to score great deals on cards and is normally the time I order them every year. And, what's nice is you can have them all designed and ready to go ahead of time and just purchase them when the good deal comes around. 

I'm excited for my mailbox to start filling with cards! 

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Christmas

Let's start with christmas eve...that's when this picture was from, after the day was done, the kids were all matching jammied up and ready for bed. But, christmas eve was a full one this year. It started with church in the morning. Then we actually went and got bread from our favorite baker before heading out to Ian's parents to celebrate. Ian's brother and his family were there too. We all had lunch together, then opened presents. We stayed there all afternoon. In the evening, we were planning on taking the kids to the same light show we have for the past three years. But, we got there and it wasn't happening. Kind of sad. There were a bunch of other cars there all confused too. However, I knew of a cool house light show, so we drove to that instead. We watched that for probably 20 minutes (without any of it repeating!?!) before deciding to head home. That night the kids went to bed without a peep. It really was a christmas miracle! But I did tell them they needed to stay in bed and be quiet so I could set everything up. Apparently they listened! 

Christmas morning, everything was all set up and ready to go. I actually gave myself a blood blister trying to put together Callum's scooter. I guess I'm not always the handiest. Like last year, the kids each had different wrapping paper and didn't find out which was theirs until the bottom of their stockings. I asked the kids later what their favorite presents were. Connor said his was a box of jokes, which was in his stocking. Isla's was a fashion designer toy that I purchased on a whim. It ended up being really neat. Callum didn't tell me, but I am pretty sure his favorite were the Paw Patrol books. Paw Patrol is kind of his thing right now...which is sort of funny given we only have netflix and it isn't on there, so he doesn't really get to watch it. 

After all the presents were open, I made us pose for a family picture. In full disclosure, I first tried in front of the christmas tree, but given that the tree blocks our one large window in the living room and we only have one light in the room, it didn't turn out well. Sooo, I drug everyone up to our bedroom where the lighting is excellent. And, I have to say, it was totally worth it! 

The rest of christmas day was spent at home. We made dinner for my parents, my brother and his girlfriend and my aunt and uncle. We kept the fire burning in the fireplace all day. The kids got to play and play and play with their toys. It was a good day. 

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Just Gnoming Around

Get it? 

Instead of just clowning around, just gnoming around. 

Yep, I really do love gnomes that much. 


Buddy the elf says the best way to spread christmas cheer is to sing it loud for all to hear. But I am inclined to believe it really is to put on a pair of festive pjs and have some fun. Actually, not even pjs, just festive clothes. Last week at the park, this kid was wearing the cutest christmas dinosaur sweater. It made me smile. I enjoyed it so much that introvert Jessica actually started up a conversation with a perfect stranger just to talk to her about her son's awesome sweater. I tell ya, the older I get, the more generous I become with my complements, even doling them out to perfect strangers. But festive pjs, something that even a couple years ago I would have found an unnecessary frivolous splurge, have become something I enjoy getting. Of course, I am still very much me and managed to stack two coupon codes and a sale when buying them this year!

I got all the kids the same pjs as mine. They are Isla's favorite. She wears them as soon as they are washed. She wore them to pajama night at church and is planning on wearing them to pajama day at school on Friday. Even Connor likes his. I'm sure it's the gnomes. Because, when do gnomes not make people smile?! Come on, even the hardest of hearts crack a smile looking at adorable gnome Callum!

I really do love gnomes that much. Seriously.

Speaking of gnomes, did you know I've had a gnome stolen off my porch only to be returned a week later? Or that someone anonymously sent me one in the mail. And, just a couple weeks ago, one showed up in my yard, with gnome care instructions coming in the mail a few days later.

So, I'm just going to be over here gnoming around until Christmas.

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