Fast Forward

I feel like my life has been in fast forward for almost 2 months now. Every time I think about the week ahead of me, it seems to include the start of a new month. It's not a feeling I enjoy in most cases, but for blogging purposes I am also going to opt to "fast forward" through the month of November, at least until Thanksgiving. Suffice it to say it wasn't a great month. In fact it was sad and difficult and no one would enjoy reading about it. I would also not like to write about it, so we'll just pick up at Thanksgiving and move on from there.

This year we spent Thanksgiving as we usually do - doing the tour of our hometown where both of our parents still live. Before heading there though, J and C watched the Macy's parade (C was mesmerized) while I did some cooking and prepping for the two dinners we were about to partake in. We hit the road stopping first for dinner with J's family and then on to my Mom's for dinner there. It's a tough life :)

Homemade cranberry sauce - so easy & so good!

Chillin

Doing some baking of her own

Pushing her 25-year old uncle around the house on a toy car

Uncle J and Eli relaxing with a good book :)

J went out shopping on Thursday night with a friend to pick up a season on DVD. He was home by 1:30. Then he got up and went into work on Friday morning only to get a call from his dad who wanted to go shopping. They had a good time out in the madness while C and I shopped online from the comfort of home! I didn't get any spectacular deals but I also refuse to buy things not on my list just because they're a deal.

Friday night we had "Friendsgiving" with J's college roommates - a tradition they've carried on every year since college. Saturday we put up our tree and then went to J's brother's house for their annual post-Thanksgiving football game. We arrived after the football portion was over though due to C's nap time.

She was excited to help me put "necklace" on the tree

We had a usual quiet Sunday and celebrated my nephew's 5th birthday.

Then I did a little more shopping online today. Christmas shopping to me is one of life's great joys. C has been talking for weeks about wanting two things for Christmas - a "Christmas bicycle" and a "Christmas Barbie." Today the bike was delivered and I can hardly contain my excitement. The anticipation of her reaction when she sees it has my mommy heart just ready to burst. J is equally as excited of course and told me he "waited his whole life" to put together his baby's first bike for Christmas. It's just one of those parenting moments, I guess. We're ecstatic :)

Browsing the ads

Between now and then I'm also really excited to teach C all about Christmas through advent activities. I'm going to make our calendar tomorrow. She has been very excited about Christmas this year so I know she'll get a kick out of a countdown with Christmas activities each day.

While I know our Christmas season will be busy and will likely pass by faster than I'd like it to, I'm really hoping it doesn't go by in fast forward like the past two months have. I'm also hoping (perpetually) that I'll be able to document our fun here on the blog.

Anyone else have fun activities planned for advent or the Christmas season? I'd love to hear :)