It’s the most wonderful time of the year… and the busiest! In addition to preparing for our own Christmas celebration that I like to think would make Martha Stewart envious, Bill and I have been attending various holiday parties.
Last Thursday night we attended a work party thrown by a friend of Bill’s. I’ve gotten to know some of the people there since this was our third year attending, so I didn’t just stand next to Bill smiling and chugging wine, I actually talked to a few people!
We arrived home from the party to a package on our front porch. The package was from Williams-Sonoma and contained a pre-made gingerbread house from one of my clients. Is she sweet or what? In the past she’s given me W-S kits, but knew that I was a little overwhelmed this Christmas and sent the ready made version!
Saturday night we attended a Christmas party in our old neighborhood and got to catch up with lots of friends! This particular little dessert was not only beautiful, but it was delicious. Mint and chocolate… yes, please!
Sunday afternoon I made Rein-Beer as my gift for the Cruisers Christmas party that Bill and I were hosting that night.
And by hosting, I mean that we all met at a local Japanese Steak and Seafood House for dinner, and then came back to our house for after-dinner drinks and our Silly Santa gift exchange. We had a pretty good turnout at dinner, but only three couples came back to our house this year. I included Bill and me in the couple number to make it sound better!
Last year I made Rein-Beer and Beth picked them, but they were stolen from her before the night was over. In fact, it was the most stolen gift last year, so I had to make them again, right? This year she chose them and was able to hold onto them! In fact, no gifts were stolen! Talk about a tame and boring Silly Santa exchange! At least no fights ensued and we all went home happy!
I’ve had my house decorated since the weekend immediately following Thanksgiving, but I’ve had shopping and my cards hanging over my head for the past couple of weeks. On Friday, I trained my early clients, and got on the road by 9:45 AM to hit the local mall, outlet mall, and a few other stores. I shopped non-stop until 6 PM and pretty much got everything taken care of. As I told Bill, “I may not have gotten my workout completed that morning, but I gave our American Express card a really good workout!”
Sunday afternoon before the party, I got all of the gifts wrapped; and by wrapped, I mean put in pre-wrapped gift boxes and gift bags that I bought at Costco. Now all I have hanging over my head are my Christmas cards, but I knocked some of them out yesterday and hope to finish them tonight.
Spoiler alert! If you usually get a Christmas card from us, and don’t want to see this year’s photo, close your eyes now!
And lastly, during the craziness that we have turned this most holy holiday into, I keep reminding myself of what we are really celebrating. Linus sums it up for us…
Hopefully, I can get some homemade Christmas cookies baked this weekend. If not, there’s always slice and bake! Shhhh, don’t tell Martha!
- Questions:
- How many holiday related events have you attended so far?
- If you celebrate Christmas, are you stressed ?
- Which is your favorite Charlie Brown show?
Rein-beer – too cute!! That family picture is fantastic. Definitely a good choice to make into your card. We did photo cards too, two versions. One was pictures of both us and the cats with a brief synopsis of our year and the other was just the cats that we sent to our animal lovers and our vet and shelter we adopted them from (we didn’t make too many of those).
So far, we had one of my work parties last week. We have a department pot luck today and then our entire company work party tomorrow. I’m not really very stressed because we finished our shopping early, got the cards out early and really all we need to do is bake next week and we’ll be good to go! We do the traveling in our family so we don’t have to worry about hosting or cooking, which is nice. I definitely don’t mind driving vs. cleaning up! LOL
After a few days of staying very focused in my spare time, I’m not very stressed anymore! Merry Christmas!
Such a beautiful family photo for your Christmas card! And your rein-beer are so cute- what a great idea!
Sounds like you’ve had some fun celebrations already! And I think eight hours of holiday shopping counts as a workout!!
This is actually the most organized I’ve ever been. All my gifts are purchased except one and I plan to wrap them all this weekend!
I’m frustrated about our cards. I ordered great photo cards online with the promise they’d be delivered by Dec. 11. They’re still not here! There’s no way I’ll be able to write and send them on time.
Thank you! That’s really annoying about your cards, especially since they were promised so long ago!
Perhaps I should be stressed – but so far, not really. My parents are coming for the holiday, and we’ll be celebrating in pretty low-key style with KMN’s family. My contribution will be dessert, but once my parents arrive, there will be a host of elves to help with the baking. I’m not too fussed. 🙂
So far…just one Christmas party!!! [In which the dresscode was “Winter Wonderland White”. Oy!]
It’s awesome that your parents are visiting you during the holidays!
I don’t mind the dress code being black tie or casual, but being that specific is too much for me!
What a lovely family photo! Perfect for a Christmas card! My family has been going to a Japanese steak house on Christmas Eve for over 20 years. It’s one of my favorite family traditions. My oldest loves to watch them prepare the food. I’m sure little sister will be all about the fire this year!
I like that tradition!
Your Christmas card photo is so cute! Julie fits right in 🙂 I love your rein-beer, too. My family also does a gift swap like that where you can steal from each other, except we call it Cutthroat Christmas. You have to be 18 to play, but the younger ones get to do a kids grabbag (with no stealing allowed).
I got my Christmas cookies made over the weekend, Christmas cards done on Monday evening, and mailed the cards along with three Christmas packages on Tuesday. Whew! Crossing things off of my to-do list 🙂
I’m finished except for baking and mailing one package. I kept forgetting to take it with me, and now it’s probably going to get to it’s destination late… 🙁
Thanks!
Linus is my favorite right now (of course)… thank you for sharing the video. 🙂
I’m definitely making Reinbeer for someone (probably my brother in law) this week! I’ll be clicking on your pics to see what I need from Michael’s! 🙂
Glenn and I are going to have Overnight Blueberry French Toast Christmas morning! 🙂
Is it too much that I used three smiley faces? Here’s another!
🙂
I just got home from the grocery store and picked up all of the ingredients for our Overnight Blueberry French Toast, too! I’ll be posting pictures after Christmas! 🙂
I say, the more smiley faces, the better! 🙂 🙂 🙂
Looks like a blast!! I have to admit being away from fam and friends I am kind of missing all that bustling about 🙂
We were away from family our first two years and I really missed them. This will be my first year without my dad and that’s going to be very hard…
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