Christmas 2020, Part I

We went sure how he was going to act with the tree. But he left it alone for the most part...all except for the two specific ball ornaments.  

Our elf, Rikki, shows up every year in the wee hours of December 1st. She brings with her an advent calendar every year to help the kiddos countdown 'till the big day!

He was NOT happy about being made to sit still with his dad for a minute.  He was ready to roll!

Then he figured out there was chocolate involved, and it all became ok!

We had a few close friends over for a little cocktail party a few weekends prior to Christmas.  Everyone brought a xmas themed app and cocktail to share.  I only got these photos- but one of the apps we made was an antipasto wreath.  My lover was helping me thread the goods!

I've been listening to Christmas music on and off since mid-October (smh) The closer we get to Christmas, the more sick of it I get.  So a few days before xmas,  it was time to switch it up a bit.

While this may look like a commercial for Winco, its truly just the beginning of the goodie trays.  Lots of stuff!

B Bop helping to decorate sugar cookies

one of the goodie trays

I also made some people cannolis

He would NOT leave these two balls alone!

The first go of the xmas lights.  He added more around the windows and stuff, but i never got pics of that

This dog is so weird.  She LOVES the cold.  It was like 10 degrees outside and she wanted to lay by an open door

Rachel made an ornament for the tree.....look closely at it....Im thinking the quarantine has gotten to that girl's head!! ;P

A little 'thing' Louis made for rachel using the 3D printer

We went out to Caldwell to have dinner at the Indian Creek Steakhouse and look at the lights in the Indian Creek Plaza. Didnt get any pics of the lights, but dinner was pretty good.  It was canyon county so there was no mask mandate and not a mask was to be seen.  We still wore ours, but it was like a whole different world over there- Covid does not exist in 2C apparently

He loves sauces. He is licking cocktail sauce off Louis' napkin...little gross kid!

Pre-Jax Project #2: Master Bedroom

 Jax is coming at the end of March and we have a laundry list of projects we want to get done. Most, if not all, are home improvement projects.  We are coming up on 3 years in our home, and while it has flown by and I still think of our house as brand new, it definitely has some normal wear 'n' tear that needs to be spiffed up.

Some of these projects include:

• Jax's nursery
• the boy's playroom
• repaint all the walls in the house
• replace all the base boards
• fix the walls- we have rounded corners, and unfortunately, those and a 115 pound pit bull puppy don't mix well together.  every time him and the kraken fight and he slams his huge blocky head into one of those corners, they dent and then eventually the metal piece that rounds it 'pops off, leaving dry wall and even the metal piece itself exposed

We have already completed, within 99% at least, the makeover of the boy's bathroom.  Which, as you may have guessed from the title of this post was Pre-Jax Project #1.  I will get some photos and such up here soon.  I still want to get a little shelf for in there and a few other little trinket type things, but it's close enough to share I think.

We have now moved on to Project 2- our bedroom.

We started with the biggest and most obvious piece- the furniture.  We decided it was time we might as well go ahead and purchase a new bedroom set.  We've been talking about it for a bit, and decided now was the perfect time to do it.  

We went with this set which included the bed, dresser and mirror.

We also added 2 of these night stands.

We ordered them the Sunday after Thanksgiving and they wont be here for about 10 weeks. So, the goal in that 10 weeks is to figure out a new accent wall color, and then from there bedding, a rug, a few wall hangings, accents and decorations and we will be good.  

As I mentioned above, we are also replacing the base boards. Our current ones are a 4 in press board.  Cheap and not nearly durable enough for a house with 3 dogs and soon to be 2 boys smashing cars and things into them.  We are replacing them with a 6 inch solid wood base board.  I didn't really care much about the size, but Louis suggested we go the larger ones and I'm really happy we did.  Two inches makes a huge difference and the solid wood is really just a necessity that I'm sure we will be happy we did in a few years. So, we will do them in our room when they take our old furniture out.

We've been busy with Louis' birthday and Christmas and all that fun stuff, so shy of buying the furniture we haven't done much of anything else, but as soon as I start to focus some time and energy (what little I have!) on it, I'll post some pictures and such!

Thanksgiving 2020

Happy belated Thanksgiving from our family to yours! Hopefully the pandemic didn't spoil your holiday too much, and you were able to spend time with family and friends, via zoom, text or chat.

We had a small gathering at our house of just Louis, me and Tatum, Nana, Papa, Granny Rose, Auntie Kate and Uncle Josh. We didn't do a 'Friendsgiving" this year or anything like that, but we had plenty of food, good company, and a lot to be grateful for, this year especially.

a few munchies to nosh on while I finished up dinner

daddy spent his morning chasing down this little monster

We deep fried our turkey this year, and unfortunately, it doesn't make for an appetizing sight...fried swamp monster comin' up

daddy frying that bad boy up

they don't look 'pretty' at all in pretty of the frying stage, but, there is no better way to to prepare a turkey....fry it!

we didn't get a pic together, but I was able to snap a couple with Winskie

Tatum doesn't really eat meat, but he enjoyed all the salads and suprisingly, devoured the homemade cranberry sauce.

nana and papa

pops and unc

my granny Rose

whew...too much food!