December Highlights

December really was a blur of Christmas festivities, school, packing, moving, buying/selling houses and all of the chaos that comes with relocating.  We had plenty of fun times in the midst of all of that and I didn't want them to go undocumented.

The memorable moments of December:

I got to visit Kevin's new office and meet some of his colleagues.  We got to pick out his office location, visit the bookstore and enjoy being on campus before we closed on our new house.  My parents had our kids for the day so we could get as much done as possible.   This was also the same day we closed on our new house, did walk thrus and toured the kid's new school.

Olive's hair is growing nicely and she's so thrilled to have longer hair.  She's seeming so much older lately with big thoughts, opinions and ideas.

Fletcher is such a funny guy.  He had so much fun playing with rolls and rolls of masking tape this month.  I had a huge stash and he went through all of it.  He made cat forts, ninja traps, barbie things and these hilarious tape socks.  He was very proud of his invention.

Leo plays hard and naps hard.  Look at those cheeks!

Even though lots of life felt chaotic, I made sure to keep many of our routines in place for the kids.  I packed lunches the whole month and kept life as consistent as possible for them.

We finished our 16 slot Santa frame!  I worked really hard last year to print out all the Santa photos I could find starting with Olive's first Christmas in 2013.  I adore this big frame!!  Each photo is 4x4 and I LOVE looking back at all these sweet Santa moments over the years.  I'd highly recommend doing this.  I know it'll always be one of my favorite Christmas decorations to put out each year.

It's not too late to finish up those Christmas crafts.  I bought these wooden frames at JoAnns for $1 each and used gingham ribbon from my stash to add a bow to each wreath.  I couldn't wait for the kids to decorate them.  I had big plans to have them paint, but markers worked great.  They each decorated their wreaths and then signed the back of their frames.  I added in a recent photo from our Fall family pictures.  I can't wait to hang them on the tree next year!

I took all 3 cats + Leo with me to their yearly vet appointments.  Sometimes you've just got to make it happen when you're in a time crunch.  They all needed their yearly shots and check ups.  They all got good reports and were mostly well behaved.

I went to a really fun Favorite Things Party with friends before we moved.  There was a $15 gift budget and everyone brought appetizers or desserts to share.  We had a blast!  I came home with a bath set and brought my favorite eye shadow pallet to give away.  I love these kind of parties!

Leo and I spent a lot of time in the car running errands, having to be out of our house, waiting on pick ups, etc.  He was a total trooper.  Also, he could sit in the van and press buttons all day long. 

Some of the sweetest moments happened as the kids were wrapping up their last weeks at their old school.  Olive cashed in her reward tickets to read to Fletcher's class one last time.  His teacher sent me this picture and I cried.  It wasn't easy to move them mid year, but we're optimistic that they'll be really happy and settled in their new school soon.

Olive's class had a weekly Mystery Reader.  She'd asked my mom to sign up and I promised I would do my best to get her in town before we moved.  We managed to pull of a little bit of a surprise (although Olive said she totally knew it was Mimi) and my mom got to read to her class.  Kevin and I got to read to her class in October and it was such a fun experience for all of us.  I'm so happy this happened!

SO many boxes!!  We're still unpacking and working to get settled, but reflecting back on our December, I can say that without a doubt, Kevin and I worked tirelessly to make it the smoothest transition possible for our whole crew.  I've got a long list of moving tips I'll have to share with you this month.  They're updated since our last move in 2016 now that we had 3 kids and 3 kids to move.

Thanks for reading and focusing on all the highlights of December with me!