December 2013 Update

I could have sworn I was just typing the November recap. It seems that December flew by. It’s not that we were super busy. In fact, this was probably our most low-key December today. I think I just had a lot on my mind.

For starters, Mike lost his job at Bass Pro. It was certainly a shock but I’ve had an amazing peace about the whole situation from the beginning. We’ve also really enjoyed having him home over the holidays because he’s normally working a crazy schedule this time of year. For example, he was home on the first day it snowed. Mama doesn’t do snow but these two went sledding and had a blast.

We did some our traditional holiday activities such as Walk Thru Bethlehem and celebrating with Mike’s family. The Nashville parade was cancelled due to ice but that actually freed us up to attend our niece’s birthday party. We had a Feliz Navidad party with our Lifegroup, holiday lunch at Skylar’s school, and Christmas Eve service, which pretty much sums up the extent of our holiday festivities.

Speaking of school, we are elbow deep in trying to make a decision about homeschool. That has consumed quite a bit of my thought process this month. CONSUMED, I tell ya. Right now we are even in the midst of reconfiguring our entire upstairs to accommodate the possible change.

I’ve been rather bah-hum-bug about Christmas this year. A huge part of me is regretting having ever told my child about Santa. All that “magic” seemed right, at the time. I think, deep down, I thought if I were lackluster about all things Christmas then maybe my kiddo would finally figure it out. Bless her little heart. She doubts and then she just talks herself right back into it. I had big plans for this December but I failed miserably at most all of them. My Christmas cards went into the mail earlier than ever before, and it was all downhill after that.

We made Jesse tree ornaments back in November yet we didn’t hang a single one. I crafted another Pinterest-inspired Advent calendar over Thanksgiving. It took me until the 5th to get it properly strung and somewhere around the 9th I totally forgot to keep up with writing down the special activity for each day. After about the 14th, my girl stopped asking about it. I did, however, manage to wrap 25 Christmas books and she got to open a new one each day but the novelty of that wore off about 19 books in. We didn’t make it to see Santa but we did send him an email. Red Robin did show up (a day late) and I only forgot to move him twice. I was a little scroogy about gift giving too. The idea of shopping for that special gift for someone kind of made my head want to spin. We gave out lots of cash and gift cards. Those who did actually get a gift from us should consider themselves very special.

And then sickness struck our household and hung on for dear life. With the exception of 3-4 tiny little outings, I have literally been at home in my pajamas consistently since December 22nd. I’m not even kidding. tLG broke out with a 103 fever that lasted for 2-1/2 days and a cough that will not go away. Exactly a week later, I came down with a 102 fever that, thankfully, only lasted one night. As soon as my fever broke, Skylar was begging to go visit her grandparents in Bham so I drove her halfway to meet my Dad in, you guessed it, my pajamas. Facebook is warning me of vicious colds, nasty flu, and a stomach bug germ that refuses to die. I believe it. This is certainly the most illness we have had in a long time.

So, that brings us to the lovely end of 2013. I’m very much looking forward to 2014. I anticipate lots of changes for our family, which is both scary and exciting at the same time.

More December Pics found here.