December One

I made a promise to myself to get back to the things I love the most this December. We've been gearing up for the holidays, decking the halls, penciling in lots of time with family and friends and starting a few new traditions of our own.

 I have also taken a good long break from blogging and I miss it. Here's to hoping this December I slow down and take time to document all the fun we are having.

Happy December 1!

"Jingle" - our Elf on the Shelf - came to visit this week and Annalee is thrilled! She runs downstairs every morning to look for Jingle and make sure he came back from the North Pole. We weren't sure if she would really "get it" yet, but she proved us wrong. Our big girl is full speed Christmas all the way... just like her Daddy!

I may have mentioned this before, but J LOVES Christmas. I mean, don't get me wrong, I do to - but he really LOVES it.

We have a new house to "Deck the Halls" and it has been SO much fun!!

We trimmed the stairs with Magnolia garland, which I love! It may be my favorite decoration.

Making the garland last week - with a beautiful bolt of plaid ribbon I scored at TJMaxx for $11.

We also discovered Annalee dolls, and Mom bought one for Annalee this year. A fun new tradition to start. This is our cute little Santa Annalee doll. I had never heard of them before, but a co-worker of J's told us about them after Annalee was born. Last week Mom and I stumbled upon them in TJMaxx and they are so cute!

We added one more stocking to the mantle this year - a train for Mr. Ford. We get our stockings from Lands' End and they are great quality needlepoint at an awesome price point.

We also started our advent calendar that my sister-in-law made for us years back. However, this was the first year we added a special treat to the day for Annalee to find. She was SO excited running out the door to Mimi's this morning.

Cheers to a great Christmas season and seeing the joy through the eyes of a child. It's so amazing to remember how special this time of year is and be able to share that with our little ones.

We have our local Christmas parade tonight and are making Gingerbread houses tomorrow. Then it's time to cheer on my Auburn Tigers in the SEC Championship game. War Eagle, friends!!