One Day in December

Today was “tacky Christmas sweater” day at school. And since this is her only Christmas sweater, this is what she wore. I wouldn’t’ say it’s tacky though, in fact, it’s adorable!

And since it was a mere 39 degrees outside this morning, we opted to take our morning photos indoors, by the little Christmas tree and fake fireplace; which I now realize you can’t even see the fireplace..

I finished up this audio book a few minutes after getting to my office, and I really liked it – 4 stars.

I went to lunch with my coworkers today at Backwoods Bistro, to celebrate my work friend Toni getting a promotion. (Yes, the same one I interviewed for a few weeks back, and yes, I honestly am happy for her.) Tomorrow is her last official day in our unit, and then it’s going to be an interesting (read: hectic/chaotic) few months for me, while her position is empty, before we can get someone new in. Her and I worked very closely together doing a bunch of the same stuff, so I’ll have to handle all of it by myself for a while, and it’ll be crazy! Anyways, the food was delicious (although we had terrible service and it took wayyyy too long), and we enjoyed ourselves.

Since I had finished one audio book first thing this morning, I started a new one after work today. I’ve been waiting to read this one for a while, and my hold came through at the perfect time of the year. I’m so excited for this one! (What was even more specifically perfect, was the title of the chapter I listened to while washing dishes tonight, “December 18th.”)

Since we had the Singing Christmas Tree last weekend, we don’t have choir tonight, to give us a little break. (Actually, we won’t have it for three weeks in a row, because of Christmas & New Years’ falling on Wednesday’s this year.) There was still Bible study/prayer meeting/communion stuff at church tonight, but we decided to skip it and just head home, since it’s been such a crazy few weeks, and it’s only going to get busier in the next two weeks!

I made a simple dinner of chicken, rice & green beans, and we just had a nice night together at home. I love cooking the chicken like this, a la Pioneer Woman – pan sauteed in equal parts olive oil & butter, and I also season it with salt & pepper & garlic, and tonight I added onion salt (from Trader Joe’s & it’s delish), and paprika. And it’s sooo good.

And this nugget ate soooo much food tonight! She ate all of the chicken I gave her (probably about three Chick-fil-A nuggets’ worth), and then FOUR helpings of rice! But probably zero green beans. BUT, the rice was cheddar broccoli rice, sooo… veggies 😉

She had bath time after dinner, and Daddy wrapped her up so good like a little burrito baby. She was loving it.

And I always love her crazy messy hair after I towel-dry it. Also, these are the Christmas pajamas she wore to school last December for pajama day. They are 12-month size, and my word she has apparently barely grown since then! They are a bit snug, but they work, and she was excited about the reindeer on them.

She was also excited about her chocolate advent calendar, of course!

Before bedtime, we did a video chat with her big brothers for a little while, and she was just chatting away with them. The very first thing she said was, “Santa coming to school tomorrow!” So I’m hoping if she was excited enough to tell them, then she’ll be excited to see him, and not get scared!

After chatting a bit, and reading a couple of books, and saying night-night prayers, she wanted to tell Mommy just a few things. The first thing she said was, “William & Andrew go bye-bye,” which is the firs thing she’s said to me every night for the past week and a half or so. I think she’s a little bit obsessed with her twin-friends at school.

She was relatively easy to get down for bedtime tonight after our lullabies and “Jesus Loves Me,” and then I spent some time working on washing all the dishes. We had tonight’s stuff, and some mugs & bowls & glass storage containers that had been piling up for a few days. Once I got most of it all done (there’s still some stuff there, I just quit for the night though), I put on the kettle for tea, and came to write this post.

Jeff poured, steeped, and sweetened the tea for us, and now that I’m done writing, it’s time for another Christmas movie! We watch pretty much nothing but Christmas movies during December, and I love it! To add to the list I shared the other day, I forgot we watched “Christmas in the Wild,” “Let it Snow” & “The Knight Before Christmas” from Netflix. My friend Kayla suggested “The Mistletones,” so we watched that Saturday night, and it was cute & cheesy & great. I think tonight we’re going to watch “White Christmas,” which is one of my absolute favorites. Who else has fun Christmas movie suggestions?