December Recap

I don't know about y'all, but it seemed like Christmas came and went in a matter of minutes. It's hard to believe we are already in 2017. Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to start a new year as 2016 sure wasn't my favorite, but I still love Christmas and I always get sad to see it go. 

We decorated this year the week of Thanksgiving, but, we didn't go and get our tree until after Thanksgiving because this year we did something totally new, got a real tree. 

Out of 4 trees in our home, my coastal tree was probably my favorite!

Picking out the perfect tree...

...as beautiful as it was, and boy was she a pretty one, real trees are messy! I kid you not when I say I swept twice a day. We kept it watered properly but the leaves fell all the time and add two cats who like to touch and climb and my goodness the mess, but there is no better smell than that of a real Christmas tree. I wish I could bottle it up and smell it year round.

We took lots and lots of pics in front of our beautiful tree.

In December we celebrate two very important birthdays, of course Jesus, the most important, but second most important, our sweet girl! She turned 8 this year, where did the time go?!

We had a painting party planned. December had been unseasonably warm (some days in the 80s!) and we thought it would be perfect to have an outside painting party, cat themed of course! My aunt even drove up from Orlando to come visit and paint, only for it to turn into the low 50s the day of her party. 

The painting studio won't come to your house and do a painting party outside unless it's at least 65 degrees and our house is way too small to fit everyone who came so we improvised, had a fire to keep warm and just celebrated our sweet girl turning 8. 

My aunt stayed with us for two days and we spent the entire weekend hanging out, talking about mom and how much we miss her. We even did some Christmas shopping. Mall decorations at Christmas are the best!

Our advent calendar kept us busy. It included things like make a gingerbread house from scratch, going and seeing lights from places like Savannah to Beaufort to Charleston, parades, painting pictures, sipping hot chocolate, reading the Christmas story in the Bible, and spending lots of time together.

One of my most favorite things we did was giving back to the hospital. They treated us so well and were so kind and caring when Cadence got diagnosed with diabetes that we wanted to do something special for them, so we took a toy collection and the first week in December we delivered them. I was so proud of Cadence!

Before we knew it December 25th arrived. Cadence received lots of goodies, so did Tarl, so did I. We spent lots of time with his family and mine. Even the cats got a little something from Santa, which made Cadence one happy girl.

I miss Christmas but I know December 2017 will be here before we know it!