Best Christmas Present...

Ever.

Yep, I'm pretty sure this is my favorite Christmas present ever.

Each year, after opening all our presents, my mom asks us to pick our favorite. This year it was tough, between the new pots and pans and the fancy chinks that I have so desperately been wanting.

Then this arrived (a day late because it was a custom order):

And it won hands down. It has every one of the kiddos on it.

All five of them. Our names wouldn't fit because five is the limit. Leave it to us to max out even Christmas ornaments.

Did anyone else have a hand's down, no butts about it, absolutely favorite gift this year?

No Butts About It

This was one fabulous Christmas!

Email me Paint Girl! You get an 8 x 10!

My little brother got a rifle for shooting squirrels, so most of the morning the boys were doing this:

My dad


Cowboy H


My bro

The pups also got their own Christmas presents. Hank took extra special care picking out just which one he wanted.

I think this is the one!


Hurry, Dad. Open it!

Don't worry. We didn't leave Huey out. He got is very own also.

I hope everyone else had a very Merry Christmas (it sure seems that way from the recent postings)!

I'll have a post on why Christmas on the Central Coast of California isn't so bad, even if its not white, coming up!

Christmas Card, 2009

We wish everyone peace, joy, love and lots of time spent with family this holiday season.


Merry Christmas!



Love,

Oz, Hank, Indy, Olivia and Huey

The First Day

The first day in our home was surreal. Most likely due to lack of sleep, but also joy and excitement and the fact that it was Christmas Eve. This didn't hurt much either:

This was the view from our driveway, looking above the house directly across the street. I love that our For Sale sign is still there, since I never thought to take a picture with it until it was gone.

Another surprise: Our first mail!

Unfortunately, it was from the insurance company.

Overnight, the cats had fully inspected the entire house, and left all the cupboards open for us.

Cowboy H took all the doors of their hinges and began painting them (to cover graffiti)

And also put our bed together, so we could sleep in our actual bedroom!

And I started cooking our "Christmas Dinner".

Since we were both working the next day, Christmas, we stuffed our faces a day early.

And that was the end to the most perfect first day in our new home ever. One that will be remembered a long long time.

Monday Motivation, Week ??

Its been a while since I've done Monday Motivation, I'm not sure what week to call it! Do continue counting from where I left off? Or do I count the weeks that have passed in between? I just don't know what to do!

But here are 5 things I know I need to do this week:

1. Hang the stockings
2. Wrap the last couple Christmas presents
3. Get stocking stuffers/gifts for the kiddos
4. LAUNDRY (there's always one downer, huh?)
   
5. Drive to my parents' house on Christmas Eve and open presents Christmas morning!

Christmas is coming, I hope y'all are ready!

The Tree Skirt

Go ahead, you can start being jealous now.

If someone else had this tree skirt, and I didn't, I would be jealous. I would be envious. Green with envy. Like the Christmas tree. I would want to steal it. I might actually steal it.

Hey! Don't be getting any ideas.

It's that time of year, remember? Santa's watching.

And so am I.

And I just might kick you with this high-heeled pointy-toe boot.

No, I WILL kick you.

Don't mess with my tree skirt.

Traditions

The other night, as Cowboy H and I were driving home, I began thinking of family traditions and holiday traditions and growing up and making your own.

When Cowboy H and I first got together we were broke. Cowboy and college student broke. Christmas came along and we were still broke, but we were together, so something had to be done. We couldn't afford to buy lots of Christmas presents. Heck, we couldn't even afford any Christmas presents. But we refused to not do anything. Instead of charging up cards, or borrowing money, or renting one's self out on the street corner, I bought dollar stockings, put our names on them with puff paint (remember that stuff?) and we set a $20 per stocking limit. Then we headed to WalMart (together), each got our own cart and spent the next 45 minutes trying to avoid each other while filling our own cart with dorky items for the other's stocking. It was so much fun! And here we are, four Christmases later and we are trying to schedule our annual run.

It has become our tradition. Even though there will be a few actual gifts under the tree this year, we will go to WalMart (together) and buy $20 worth of crap to stuff in each others' stockings.

I was thinking back on this the other night and how we did what worked for us, not what our growing up told us to do, not what the commercials told us to do, not what our friends told us to do.

Of all the Christmas traditions I have participated in, this has become my favorite one. It's my favorite because it belongs to us, was created by us, and it there so much meaning behind it. It gets me, right in the heart, and makes my heart swell up, to the point that it feels like bursting, just thinking about it. In fact, as I'm typing this, I've got a little smile creeping onto the corners of my mouth and my eyes are a little teary.

Does anyone else have a Christmas tradition that holds extra special meaning? Does anyone else remember the first tradition that they created? What are some unique Christmas traditions that you carry on each year?