I put up my tree. :) :) :)

and all other things Christmas in my house.

Jason and I spent our Sunday afternoon decorating our tree, and I quite enjoyed it.

I love going through our ornaments and remembering when or why we got them.

Behold the tree (sorry its so dark)

Each year we each get a new ornament that depicts our year.

Jason got a coca-cola bottle. He says its because he loves coke, I say its to remember the year of all his kidney stones. :)

I chose an SLR camera ornament, for obvious reasons.

Then, of course, we had to get one for our kitties.

I sat on our couch this afternoon and thought for a while about how weird my life is to me now. Not in any sort of bad way, but for 20 years of my life, I lived with my parents, putting up their tree, sitting on their couches, and being a part of their daily lives. Its surreal to me, even still, that I have my own house, with my own stuff, I put up my own tree, with my own ornaments and my own little family. Although daily life seems normal, when I look at everything from a distance, it is still so weird that I am an adult. I wonder when this will feel completely normal. I sure do love my little adult life though.

Progress is definitely being made on little Henry's nursery, slowly but surely. I would post pictures, but I would rather do a big reveal post than tiny as we go posts. The paint is %95 done. The wall decor is all purchased, painted, and put together. I made a rug the other day that I oh so love and would have cost at least $100 if I would have just bought it. The only thing missing, and the only reason it is not completely finished is the crib set. We had a crib set all picked out, then we learned the the 3-in-1 and 4-in-1 cribs were being recalled, or flat out canceled because they were falling apart and children were dying in them. So now we have to find another set that we like and that is certified safe, which %90 of them aren't, sadly.

Well there is nothing much else going on with us. We will be doing our Christmas cards soon so send me your address if you would like one. I am doing something different with mine than others do, so I am really excited about it. It will be the most fun card ever received. :)

more traditions.

If you remember from here, I have a list of traditions I want to have in my own family.

I need to document some more. :)

St Pattys day.

Honestly I don't know why we celebrate this holiday in America, other then the overwhelming need America has for a good reason to get drunk.

But, none the less, I love a good chance to celebrate. :)

So in my house, with my kids, St Pattys day will be a holiday we use to celebrate different nationalities, of course mainly Irish.

I worked in a daycare in high school, and we did something there with the kids that I always wanted to do with my own kids because it was so dang cute and the kids absolutely loved it.

We took the kids outside to the park, and the teachers that stayed behind would create a leprechaun attack. How? simple, they just knocked over the chairs, threw papers everywhere, got the blankets all over the place etc. But then they painted little green leprechaun footprints everywhere, with washable paint obviously, on the tables, windows, fridge etc. and left little piles of chocolate gold coins everywhere for the kids. When the kids got back in and saw the chaos we gave them shocked faces and explained that leprechauns had come in while we were gone, and left gold coins everywhere on accident. They absolutely loved it. They were so excited for the whole day and couldn't wait to tell their parents. I plan on doing this every st pattys day with my kids.

Here are the footprints. :)

You make them with your hands, obviously.

(By the way, these foot/hand prints were totally made by me. in my kitchen. see thats my ugly blue counter tops.)

Green things. Obviously you have to wear green, but I think its fun to make green foods, and make the whole day green.

for dessert after dinner, making a cake with green frosting and then making a rainbow on it made with m&m's.

Easter!

Clearly, decorating eggs is a tradition that you are crazy if you don't do. Jason and I even did it this year.

See?

Of course they will be hidden somewhere in our house.

a new easter outfit will be needed for each kid obviously.

One thing my mom did that I thought was fun and I didn't realize she did this until I grew up, was we got gifts on easter, but they were almost always gifts that we had to use together. Like games or something that required us to play together and have fun. So it was nice, we didnt just get our gifts and run off to our rooms to play by ourselves, we played with each other for hours.

I am up for extra ideas and fun traditions so if you have any that you have enjoyed with your family, tell me about it!

(P.S. I wrote this post back in April, but apparently never posted it, I just came across it today so now it is posted. buwahahaha)

New tradition? I think sooooo

so I in my 6th week of pregnancy, and I think I have unearthed a new tradition in our family.

If you scroll to the very bottom of my blog, you will see a pregnancy ticker that compares the fetus to fruit, in size.

Well, Jason and I are going to celebrate each week with each fruit!!

So this week our baby is the size of an apple seed, so we will be enjoying delicious red apples this week.

(because I hate green apples)

traditions

Over this Christmas season there were a lot of traditions that I heard about that different people do, and I thought they were so sweet.

So I am going to make a list of traditions I want to start or continue with my own family.

1. Putting up the Christmas tree in my house was always a big to do. It never was required that we be there, but over the years we all realized how much fun we have putting it up, for several reason. reason 1 is that my dad blasts the christmas music and we all dance around for about 5 minutes before we start, singing at the top of our lungs and looking silly. reason 2 is that 75% of our ornaments have a story behind them, and every year we always re-tell all the little stories of how we got that particular one, like,"that was the year we were so poor, you kids got a box for Christmas and we told you it was a club house" or "That ornament says Trina on it because that was the year Kati decided to change her name to Trina so her YW leaders put Trina on her ornament." We always have a good time telling the stories that we all already know. reason 3 is that we used to get real trees so if you wanted a say in how big or tall the tree was, you had to be there. I very much want to continue this tradition.

2. Butterfinger the Elf. At my house Butterfinger the elf is a little elf puppet that sits at the bottom of the stairs and "watches" you to see if you are being nice. If you are, then he will bring you a gift that you get to open on Christmas Eve, which is always PJ's. I will continue this one as well.

3. Everyone's bedroom has to be clean or Santa is not coming. My mom seriously said that every year and almost every year we cleaned our rooms so Santa would come. Need I explain why I will carry on this tradition?

4. My family has always done a nativity scene on Christmas Eve, and while I think its a good reminder of Christ, I think the best way to truly encompass the meaning of Christmas, is service. So instead of a Christmas Eve nativity scene, with my family we will read the scriptures about his birth, and then do acts of service on Christmas Eve. like this friend of mine who took oranges to the fire house station to all the fire fighters who have to work on Christmas Eve. Think of all the people who have to work on the holidays that get little or no thanks for it. That will be our Christmas Eve tradition.

5. I read on a blog that someones tradition is to wrap 25 christmas books separately and put them under the tree, and each night they pick one to unwrap, and they read it before bed. I thought that was awful sweet so I already bought 2 books to get my collection started, feel free to contribute to my fund ;-).

6. Sub for Santa. Our YW's at the end of the year had only used, like maybe 10% of their budget for the year, so they decided with the rest of it(which was a lot) to do Sub for Santa for refugees in Utah. It was so sweet, and so fun and I want to do it every year.

7. Now this friend of mine has a tradition in her family that every Christmas they each open one gift, then play a game as a family. Then open one more gift, then play another game, rinse repeat til the gifts are done. That one seems a bit too constructive, but I think its worth a shot, cause they love it!

8. On Christmas Eve night I want all my children to sleep in the same room. Where ever they want, but they will be all together to snicker and laugh til they fall asleep, and then to wake up all together on Christmas morning. I think that would make it so much fun for them.

There are a few more I am sure and I just can't think of them, but there are also a bunch that don't relate to the holidays that I need to write down so I don't forget.

thats all for now, I am off to cuddle with the hubby.