Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Eve Eve!

This is something I have said for years and years and years! It's the day before Christmas Eve and Christmas Eve is a holiday of it's own, right?! :)

I clock out at noon today and won't clock back in until after the beginning of 2016!

I will also be taking a blogging break during this time to spend Christmas and the time off with my family.

I wish you all a wonderful and blessed Christmas and let us not forget the true reason for the season, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!

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Merry Christmas!

Last weekend before Christmas

I can't believe that there are no more weekends between now and Christmas. We are officially in Christmas week. I know it's such a cliche thing to say that the time has flown by, but y'all, where has the time gone?! It seems like December 1st was just last week! 

December is such a busy month for us so I'm assuming that's why it went by so quickly. We've tried our very best to enjoy this entire Christmas season and boy have we ever!

On Friday evening we headed to downtown Savannah. The Westin was having their 1st annual light display so we wanted to watch that and then eat dinner. You could go to the Westin and pay $10 to watch it or watch it for free on the Riverstreet side. Since we wanted dinner we went ahead to the Riverstreet side, watched it for free and then had dinner at Spanky's. 

Thank goodness we didn't pay to watch it because it only lasted one minute. 

Yep! No exaggeration, just a mere 60 seconds and then the countdown started again at 29 minutes. Granted the $10 donation did go towards charity, but I'm assuming tons of those people were quite upset because the Westin did portray it as a huge 3D light show, when it all actuality it was just a 60 second movie played on the side of their hotel, but, it was still really pretty!

Cadence and I were all bundled and she enjoyed it :)

See those duck boots I'm wearing! I've been wanting duck boots ever since the beginning of the year. Tarl spoiled me and let me open them up on Friday night before we left the house. Early Christmas present and I love it!

Love this man!

After the show and dinner we rode around downtown and looked at Christmas lights adorning the town homes of lovely Savannah. It's just so darn pretty!

Saturday morning Olly wanted us to watch a Christmas movie. 

Saturday afternoon we had our annual family gathering. Cadence got play-doh and that's pretty much what we did the rest of the weekend :)

Saturday evening my sweet sister-in-law had her birthday, so we celebrated with them at their home. Love all their pets!

On Sunday we enjoyed the day. Went and saw Start Wars (which was good BTW) and came home to this silly kitty who gets in the craziest of places.

Sunday evening we went and walked our local light trail. It's a tradition we do each year by grabbing gas station hot chocolate and coffee and then walking the trail. It was chilly last night so we were all bundled up. 

On a side note - I am obsessed with my blanket scarf!

This morning Olly had made Cadence breakfast. She passed on the marshmallow, syrup, pop tart covered spaghetti but she appreciated the effort. Hah!

Hard to believe we only have 3 more mornings with Olly. 

I'm not sure how many more years our sweet girl is going to believe in this tiny elf so we are soaking it all in!

Happy Monday!

One week to go!

One week! 

One week until my most favorite day of the year!

Christmas!

Even Olly reminded us that there was only one week this morning!

I cannot believe that this year is almost gone and that 2016 is upon us!

The days are long but the years are short. 

I'm trying to soak up every little bit of Christmas fun that I can. 

We are continuing to do our daily advent calendar which has had a lot of fun stuff on there and it has truly kept us busy, but I wouldn't have it any other way!

Merry Christmas y'all!

Last night we played the game, Sorry. It was a gift to Cadence from my sister for her birthday. I can tell this is going to be a family favorite. We had so much fun knocking each other off the board and saying SORRY! #notsorry

We also did a canvas painting last night. So messy, but so fun!

Here are some of my favorites from this week!

*you may have to use your computer for this. It worked on my phone but did not work on Tarl's phone so I don't know the reasoning, but it has worked on all computers I've tried :)

Tuesday morning and all throughout the workday my upper left side of my body, on my back and shoulder area felt tingly. almost like it was going numb, but never did. Tuesday night I had a splotchy rash on my chest, and a little on my shoulder and back of my neck. All day Wednesday I still had this rash, which itched like crazy. It never spread violently and didn't even look nasty, just splotchy, a little raised and still itchy so I put some hydro-cortisone on it thinking it would help, but on Thursday morning when it was still there and still itchy I knew I needed to see a doctor.

Not only did I have a rash, but I also had a tiny lump I could fit in the lower part of my neck. Turns out I have shingles and the swollen lymph node (tiny lump that I felt) is most likely a result from the shingles. When my doctor told me I had shingles I said, "isn't that an old people thing". She laughed and said it is more common in older people but that people in their younger years can get it too. I also told her that I thought shingles was a very painful thing and she explained that often times it is painful, but that sometimes it can be itchy, which is what I have.

She said she had shingles a few years back and that her shingles were the itchy kid too. Apparently prior to the rash you will get either a painful sensation, or tingly sensation or both. Thankfully I just got the tingly sensation and have yet to have any pain. It's just really itchy, red, ugly looking and unfortunately causes muscle stiffness. I have had a stiff neck for almost a week now but thought that I had just slept on it wrong, turns out that shingles can cause a stiff neck. 

Thankfully I got to the doctor in time enough for her to prescribe me some antibiotics which will help it go away quicker than without them. From what I understand you can only take the antibiotics that she prescribed me within a 48 hour time frame. Whew!

I'm not going to lie. The swollen lymph node does scare me. It's very easily felt. You can feel it by simply just grazing your fingers along my neck, and of course, google is the scariest thing to look at especially when you type in swollen lymph nodes. The doctor did measure it and said that we'll re-check it in a month and see if it has gotten larger or smaller. I pray that it goes away by then and I won't even have to go have it re-checked, but she did ease my mind and say that it is a common side effect of shingles.

Bless it y'all...I keep getting these old people illnesses. 

Tarl teases me and says I already go to bed like an old person, might as well have the old people symptoms too. Hah!

In all seriousness, please keep me in your prayers that this swollen lymph node and these shingles disappear!

Today is my last full day of work for two weeks! Two weeks!!!

Next week we have short days planned and then we're obviously off for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Then I am off the entire week after Christmas. As usual, I will not be blogging during that time so I can spend some quality time with my family. 

I hope each and every one of you have a blessed and happy weekend!

xo

Cadence turned 7!

This year was the first year that we didn't have a birthday party for Cadence. I didn't go out and buy decorations. I didn't get tons of little pastries or finger foods. I cooked a simple meal of spaghetti with a side salad and garlic toast and ordered her a cake from the bakery and you know what...it was great!

We invited our parents over and two aunts and their families over who lives nearby. 

It was simple, no stress on me, no extra spending with decor and food. It was fantastic and she loved it!

...and this morning Olly was caught eating some leftover birthday cake. Silly elf!

Cadence.

Seven years.

Seven years of new experiences.

Sleepless nights. Fevers. Vomiting. Doctors visits. ER visits. Scrapes, bruises and bumps. 

Even with all the scary shit that comes with being a parent, it is nothing compared to the joy, the fun, the love and every other blessing that comes along with it!

Your smile, your laughter, the joy you have in your heart produces us with smiles, laughter and tons of joy in our hearts. My sweet sweet little girl who isn't quite so little anymore. It breaks my heart into a million pieces knowing that you aren't a baby anymore. Heck, you're not even a toddler anymore. You are a child. You are my child. You are a child of God. You are a child filled with hope and wonder and curiosity.

Seven years. Seven wonderful years!

Tonight we celebrate the Lords biggest blessing to us.

Happy Birthday to the sweetest girl I know, Cadence!

She'll get her gifts form us tonight, but Olly brought her, her most favorite thing, bubbles!

Weekend Recap | Christmas in Charleston | Savannah Day Date

What a busy busy weekend I had with my little family, and you know what...it was great!

Possibly even the best weekend so far this year. Let's recap...

On Saturday morning we caught Olly peaking inside the gift bags. Naughty little elf :)

Funny story. 

Cadence's second Christmas Tarl got me a Nikon. It was such a gracious gift because as we all know camera's are not cheap, specifically Nikons, but I have always loved taking pictures and with a one year old it truly was the perfect gift. Fast forward to Friday night. I knew we had plans to go to James Island the following day and I wanted to learn how to take bokeh shots because bokeh shots are just stunning when it comes to Christmas lights. If you're unsure of what a bokeh shot is, it's where you focus on something in front of a sparkly light, and the lights are blurry but stand out in the background. Like this...

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I knew without a doubt that we could achieve this, after all we had a pretty good camera with all those snazzy settings you need. Turns out the task wasn't as easy as I had hoped. 

Y'all I played with my Nikon for over 45 minutes trying to figure it out. I searched tons of websites and tutorials to no avail. I was on the verge of tears simply out of pure frustration so Tarl stepped in. Grabbed the camera and tried a shot at it.

He came very close and got those gorgeous blurry twinkly lights, see...

...only catch was, the camera wouldn't focus on anything in front of it. So all we got was just the above picture of the blurry lighted tree. I stood in front of the tree and he spent at least 20 minutes trying to focus on me but still keeping the tree blurry in the background. At this point I was even more frustrated so I just called it a night and went to bed. 

This is where those "it's the little things that mean the most" comes to my mind because on the way to Charleston with all of the camera settings back to their original place I went to delete old photos to make more room on the SD card and there were hundreds of pictures of Tarl holding a candle in front of the Christmas tree from the night before.

After I went to bed, he physically held a candle in front of the camera lens to try and get the lens focused on the candle but still have the bokeh effect with the Christmas tree in the background. We still never managed to learn how to do it, but it truly brought this huge smile on my face knowing that because it was important to me, he truly tried his darnedest to figure it out. 

Although it doesn't have the bokeh effect, I just adore the above picture I took on Friday night. 

Each year my little family of three chooses one special ornament of the year for our tree. We each get one and I write our name and the date on the backside. It has to be a unanimous vote or we don't get the ornament. I really wanted an Eiffel tower ornament this year but Tarl said no. Cadence wanted a big pink cupcake but I said no, but we all three agree'd on that white reindeer with the red bow. 

So that is our families 2015 ornament. :)

On Saturday I realized something, that Charleston is my most favorite city in the world second to Manhattan. I just adore Charleston with all of my heart. It seems like each time we visit Charleston Tarl and I discuss living there. Who knows, maybe one day it'll be in the cards for us, but for now, we visit as often as we can. NYC first, Charleston second and Savannah third. 

Charleston is just gorgeous. There is no other word to describe it's stunning architecture and southern style. Simply, we just adore Charleston. Although the lights aren't until night time, we wanted to make an entire day trip out of it, so we left bright and early on Saturday morning and made it to Charleston by lunch time. 

It was such a lovely day. The weather was just perfect! So we strolled King Street and ate lunch on the rooftop of Mellow Mushroom in downtown. Their pizza was great, but their cheesebread was out of this world. Next time we're just going to order like three of those!

After lunch we walked from one side of downtown to the other. We strolled the battery and then found a park and let Cadence play for close to an hour. We even played some hopscotch and enjoyed the playground. 

These two have my heart!

The lights, as always, were breathtaking!

my favorite light - duh!

boarding the train

sorry for the dark picture, but we're riding the train so a selfie was necessary

After the lights we went to dinner at our favorite restaurant in Charleston, The Charleston Crab House. Yum!

We were all starving after all our walking and playing and we couldn't wait for dinner. It didn't disappoint. After dinner we headed home. Cadence didn't make it out the restaurant driveway before she passed out and Tarl said I made it halfway between home and Charleston before I dozed off. 

Seriously, best day ever in Charleston!

I made our advent calendar on November 30th. I cut strips of paper and shove them in each day slot. Each morning Cadence wakes up and the first thing she does is find Olly, the second thing she does is read the advent for the day. She looks forward to this every single morning and we love seeing her face light up. To be honest, after the first week I completely forgot what each advent was. Turns out I put us down for ice skating for yesterday. So what we thought was going to be a relaxing Sunday, turned out to actually be a great Sunday Funday in Savannah!

It took her a while to find Olly on Sunday morning. He was tucked away with all her other stuffed animal friends.

Before ice skating we had brunch at our favorite spot on River Street, Hueys. 

Their beignets are so incredibly delicious and light and fluffy and the price is on point too!

This girl loves her beignets!

Ice skating was an experience to say the least! Tarl and I aren't pro's at it by any means of the word, but we can at least stay on the ice without slipping (sometimes). We knew with this being Cadence's first time she was going to fall and we told her to be prepared for it. She fell, like three times, but had a blast. We all did. It was hilarious and so much fun. 

We also did some last minute Christmas shopping afterwards, and this hurricane simulator called our names!

Oh, and this morning...

I loved this quote and I thought it was great to share to hopefully start everyone's week off right.

So true!

xo

P.S. If y'all have any tips on how to do bokeh photography, please share them with me! I have a Nikon D3000 and am desperate to learn this before Christmas Day so I can take some pretty pictures!