holiday musings

as it gets cococolder & snow coats the earth

it's undeniable the holidays are here

so after having a completely different experience for christmas than what i'm used to last year i'm really looking forward to celebrating what i've always known.

last year was great and super interesting celebrating the holidays in a very different way. full of posadas, where we would walk the street and then at the fiesta one group would go in and one out and they sing back and forth asking for entrance. and piñatas, i don't want you to picture the nice piñatas from your childhood where it just sits there while you're turned around 3 times nicely. nope, it's not like that. they swing that piñata around after spinning you quickly and of course blindfolded. and singing and rocking baby jesus. and different food. and celebrating the three kings. even a visit from santa clause with kiddos.

and a topper. i cannot believe i went to a water park around this time last year...an outdoor one. it was chilly (it was a hot spring or something) but not too bad.

so here i am back in the states and super pumped to celebrate the holidays with my family and friends, like i'm used to. ... and unfortunately that includes the cold. but i'll even take that.

this year we started with thanksgiving. i really did enjoy thanksgiving. thinking of all i really do have to be grateful for. it's a great holiday to get together with family and friends without pressure of gifts and be thankful for each other and blessings.

karen and i got into holiday spirit extreme the next day. first mom, dad, karen & i went to the christmas tree farm to pick out our perfect tree. which was so fun!

then we got home and karen & i took ALL the christmas decorations out of the attic (they've collected quite a few over the years) and dove right in to decorating! we put the lights on the roof and bushes outside, put up everything inside, got the wreathe on the door, got the tree up and decorated it too! it was GREAT! i love decorating for christmas!!!

then i came back to chicago and took things in little by little. the only down part was one saturday when i decided to go downtown. bad bad idea. with all the tourists the lines were insane and i could barely even walk around in the stores so i left and went home. i bought nothing. but now i know. that was a bad decision.

the decorations in chicago are beautiful. i often get caught up in walking as quickly as i can to the next destination (it's been really cold) that i forget to look around. i've really been trying to take a little time and look up into peoples windows to see their decorations. I'm also planning on hitting up zoo lights this week so put the icing on the cake.

karen came in to visit for a week and we hit up a lot of stuff together. the windows at macy's on state that they always decorate with a christmas story, kindlemart (sp?) it's daley plaza, ice skating downtown, we got some great deals christmas shopping (on a tuesday), and of course we had a walk in the snow.

i love the christmas cards too. i actually got a ecard from my friend jen, that's so super cute and pretty creative too!

then of course there's all the holiday parties. i already talked about work. they also had a cookie exchange at work, which i decided not to participate in because it was on monday and i don't work mondays. but they made me a bag anyway, which was nice but A LOT of cookies. thankfully it came in handy a few days later when kel, sarah, and bryan came over for our holiday get together.

one of my friends had her bday party friday which ended up being so much fun. so it wasn't technically a holiday party, but it was so close... anywho it was good to see some my seton buddies who i see often, but one even came in from the burbs, who i rarely see so it was soo good to see her too. and then i even randomly ran in to some of my youngen depaul buddies. one that i taught during discover depaul and another dabber. they just seem so young to me and they're SENIORS! wow. that'll make you feel old. it was so good to have a little chat with both of them though. it was actually a really great night, minus the blisters.

and now i'm so excited to go back to the big MO on wednesday. i'm only technically supposed to get christmas day off, but since i started so late in december i told them that i needed more of a break on my first day so we're going to make it work. i'm going to be working a lot the last week of december, but i think it'll be worth it.

so i get to go see circ de soleil the christmas show wednesday night. i haven't seen any circ de soleil shows before so i'm super excited about that. hopefully there aren't any delays and my travels go without a hitch or i might miss it.

we have cookie baking time and mass time. and my grandma's cooking.

oh i just can't wait.

i hope you all have a super holiday time too.

i really do love the holidays.