December Coffee Chat

Happy Monday, friends!  I hope you had a great weekend.  I am in denial that Christmas is 9 days away.  This holiday season has FLOWN by so fast.  I'm trying hard to enjoy the moments.

Grab your coffee (iced mocha for me) and let's catch up.

1. My crew has 11 different dress up days to participate in this week!  You read that correct - 11.  Yikes.  I'm hoping I got my calendar right and send the right kid with the right outfit on the right day.  Grinch day.  White Christmas wear white day.  Wear stripes for candy cane day.  Ugly Christmas sweater.  You get the idea.  Lots of cute Christmas clothes to coordinate.

2. How's your Christmas shopping going?  I'm getting close to done and have NOTHING wrapped.  I need a personal assistant to wrap and prep my house while I work.

3. I'm so excited to send home Christmas gifts with my students.  We have been working hard to make 3 different personalized ornaments that showcase their handwriting, their hand prints and their art.  I hope the parents LOVE them and I get extra excited when parents let me know that they loved something we did at school.  My challenge for you - if your child's teacher does something you love or sends home something wonderful - email them a THANK YOU.  It will make their day.

4. Have you seen the Marth documentary on Martha Stewart yet??  I enjoyed it so much.  Her life story was fascinating as well as her success story.  I'm still shocked she served prison time.  And I have a new reason to dislike James Comey.  It was so interesting to see how the highs and lows of her life changed her.  I appreciated her attention to every single detail, loved seeing her wardrobe and gardens and was surprised to here details about her personal life.

5. My Christmas decorating is finally done.  We started right after Thanksgiving, but it's taken me a while to finish.  Add in a very mischevious Mr. Mittens and our decor looks different this year.  We kept the breakable ornaments boxed up just like we did when the kids were toddlers and we're hoping that next year Mr. Mittens will be better behaved.

6. Opening the mail in December is one of my favorite things.  It brings me great joy to open Christmas cards from so many friends and family since I send out a bunch of Christmas cards.  I keep the cards in a basket in our kitchen and the kids love to flip through them.

7. Are your college football teams in the playoffs this year?  IU and ND play in a playoff game this Friday!!  It's a big deal at our house becuase I'm an IU grad and Kevin is an ND grad.  People are calling it The Hoosier Bowl since both teams are in Indiana.  So fun!  IU has never ever been good at football so this is a shocking turn of events.  We're hosting a fun playoff party to cheer on our teams.  Kevin says he can only cheer for ND and I'm going to cheer every time either time scores.  It'll be fun.

8. We only have one kid that wants to go visit Santa this year.  I'm hoping to head to the mall this week so Leo can talk to Santa.  He keeps saying he's going to ask Santa for a cyber truck and I sure hope he sticks with that plan.  Stay tuned for a Leo + Santa pic.

9. I completely cringe when I see teachers online listing out all the things that they DO NOT want from their students for Christmas.  I think it's so rude.  Their lists usually say - NO MORE coffee cups, candles, lotions, homemade treats, etc.  I think it's totally fine for teachers to have wish lists or favorite lists to share with their classes.  It just doesn't sit right with me to make fun of gift options that their students might gift them for Christmas.

10. I know the elf on the shelf gets a bad wrap, but I love it!  Our elves are cute and fun and all 3 of our kids wake up excited to see what the elves are up to each day.  I try to keep it simple on school days and do more ellaborate things on the weekend.

That's all for now!  Thanks for chatting :)