The Sights of Christmas

With the week of Christmas filled with fun and travels to celebrate with family, blogging took a back seat. Below are just a few Christmas photos to document Miss L's 1st Christmas...

Getting photos of Miss L in her pretty, carefully selected Christmas dress was a bit of a challenge...as she wanted to chew on the decorative red and green satin ribbons and bows donning the front of her dress!

This is one of my favorite photos!

 We visited the "famous" MOA Santa. Although his personal approach was irrelevant this year...I'm sure in the coming years, she will enjoy visiting this special Santa.

Presents galore! Thankfully some family shipped wrapped gifts for us to open at home...which was fun!
And then, the best-wrapped ones are perfectly wrapped by my dear husband.
Mr. Cole makes the best tree ornament!

An AMAZING tree decked out! (not ours...of course, I wouldn't want that electric bill!)

Christmas Eve, Baby's 1st Christmas Jammies!

She looks like she just learned about "Elf on the Shelf!" That is next year, darling!

Merry Christmas!

What a {Great!} Year

For the first time in about 5 years, I did not write a lengthy and detailed letter to enclose in our Christmas card. So many friends and family follow us online on FB or on here...but for the record, 2011 was one for the record books. This weekend, we watched several shows on TV with the "top lists of 2011"- whether it was news, sports plays, etc. It always seems that the events that transpired back in January, hardly feel like it happened this year. We often wonder, "where does time go?" And now with children, it seems to fly by even faster. Together, we reflected on what an amazing and blessed year we enjoyed. Here are some of our highlights...

• Jeremy's promotion to Area Manager
• Our relocation to the North Pole, {aka Minnesota}
• A fabulous trip to Maui, thanks to Jeremy's leadership and management skills
• Surviving the Tsunami Warning, while in Hawaii
• Our new home...which we love
• My new{er}car...which I love
• Many blessings of generous gifts for baby L from many family and friends, including new friends here
• A healthy pregnancy and perfect delivery of Miss L
• Loving life with Miss L

Instead of waiting to see "what's in store" for 2012...I am determined to make it a great year. We look forward to an upcoming vacation with some of my family, starting solid baby foods and making our own baby food, exploring the Twin Cities, getting {back} into shape and doing my best to provide a fabulous life of experiences and fun for Miss L.

From our family to yours - May you have a blessed, peaceful and healthy 2012~

Favorite Holiday Movies

Last night we watched Home Alone (the original, dated 1990)...and I haven't laughed so hard in a long time. Although it's not a classic "holiday" movie, it does takes place at Christmas-time. This prompted a discussion on our favorite holiday movies. My list goes like this:

1. Elf - "Smiling is my favorite" - what can I say! :)
2. Christmas Vacation - Too many lines to quote, everyone LOL's all the way through!
3. The Holiday - hello Jude Law...and those little girls are darling with their accents (makes me want to send Miss L across the pond one summer to return speaking like that!)
4. Serendipity - because I do believe "everything happens for a reason," and yet that you control your own destiny.
5. Home Alone - yep, my cheeks hurt after watching it. Plus, it takes place in Chicago - which I call one of my homes.

Ho Ho Ho!

Santa has visited our home every year since we've been married, always in the middle of the night, filling our stockings and placing presents under the tree or anywhere they will fit (ie. my bicycle in our front foyer in Indy one xmas)...this year marks a new era of Santa. The kind of Santa that you have to set out a plate of cookies and milk for...and the kind that places shiny, red boxes from American Girl store under the tree, instead of pink, sparkly boxes from Victoria's Secret.

This year, since Miss L is a little too young to realize who this jolly big guy is...mommy and daddy have decided to take the reigns. We decided that we will each go out individually and shop for some special gifts from Santa to Miss L. Then, Christmas morning we can open each others gifts to Miss L and we all will have plenty of surprises. Knowing Jeremy, his creativity will be challenged and he will "out-gift" me, as he always does.
As far as my shopping list goes- we have less than 2 weeks until Christmas and I have to buy for Jeremy and the baby sitter. Not too bad. Now, just waiting for packages from Amazon.com to arrive to begin wrapping!

Ho Ho Ho!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

It is hard to believe December is upon us. It truly is a favorite month for our household. It's also time for the annual Christmas display - me enjoying decorating the all-mighty Christmas tree and Jeremy enjoying the great outdoors with his extreme lighting of our landscaped trees. Decorating this year presented more of a challenge than previous years. We had to work our set-up schedule around a little girl; but also, with a new home, we had to find new places for all of our different decorative pieces.

For example, our main nativity set is on our new media console in our living room. Meanwhile, our Willow Tree nativity found a home in our family room on an end table. Outdoors - we have five sconces to decorate with wreaths and Jeremy had to strategically decide which trees he was going to light up and what color exactly.

Turns out- his lighted trees are a big hit, attracting quite a bit more traffic to our cul-de-sac! After the hours he spent outside in the cold, decorating those 3 trees; I'm glad others are able to enjoy his hard work. I am also thankful I have a husband who enjoys the spirit of the season along with me! Merry Christmas!