On Friday Dec 21^st, it was in the 60s and actually SUNNY outside. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to get out for a walk/run when I got home early from work. Still loving my Brooks shoes.

              Saturday morning Brian and I headed out to the gym, before getting in the car for a drive to Ohio.

              We got a bit of a later start, but stopped by my aunt’s house to see my grandma and then continued on to my friend’s house another hour and a half drive for the night. After grabbing some Mexican food for dinner, we headed back to my friend’s house and she had some friends come over and we played Relative Insanity with them.

 

              It was a lot of fun and we talked until midnight before finally calling it a night.

              Sunday was a good morning to sleep in. I was still up at 8am and let Brian sleep. I played with Ashley’s cat, Dill, for a bit and ate some breakfast while I waited for the others to get up. Once Brian was up, we were talking with Ashley for a while and losing track of time. We had an hour and a half drive to my aunt’s to meet up with my parents who drove from Illinois. Ohio is a good meeting place between Illinois and New York.

              We stopped for lunch at Panera which was delicious because for breakfast we munched on gingerbread cookies.

 

              We arrived at my aunt’s after 1pm and talked until dinner at 4:30. We had a ton of food including ham, veggies, potatoes and bread. For dessert, we had giant pieces of carrot cake as well. We were stuffed.

              At 6pm, we headed to a park to drive through and see Christmas lights. We did a similar thing in Daytona Beach, Florida last year, but it was nice to have the windows down there and take pictures. In Ohio, it was a bit chilly with the windows down, but it was a short drive through and nice to take some photos of the lights.

              From there, we went back to Ashley’s house for the night, arriving around 9pm. We decided to watch A Christmas Carol. I’m not sure of the last time I saw that movie all the way through. It was hard for me to stay awake this time too, but we went to bed a bit earlier, at 11pm.

              Christmas Eve morning, I slept until 8 again. I ate some breakfast and showered before getting Brian up. We had a long drive ahead of us, so we tried to keep the morning chit chat short. Dill (the kitty) was wild in the morning and having fun with me while I did some brief stretching and yoga in the living room.

              Leaving around 10:30 am, we planned a stop to Chick Fil A for lunch. I missed their diet lemonade.

              Once we hit Erie, PA, we knew to expect some lake effect snow. However, we did not know exactly how much we were in for on the drive. In Erie, we stopped at a gas station and switched driving. Brian was now driving through the worst of the snow. In retrospect, the snow was not that bad and there were not too many cars on the road, but it did slow us down.

              The plows eventually showed in PA as we got onto I 86 from I 90. We figured the snow would slowly stop, but instead it seemed we followed the snow squalls. It was a very long drive. What we thought was only a few miles turned into 200 miles of snow off and on. I drove a bit before dark and as the sun set, but in the end, I had to have Brian drive, because the wind and horizontal snow spiraling in the dark was so bad that I was starting to get motion sick trying to drive.

              Arriving about 2 hours later than expected, we arrived to everyone at the house and had a few appetizers for dinner and did the gift card exchange. Everyone brings a $30 gift card and it’s played like a white elephant where you draw a number and can steal from the previous person. I ended up with a Boscov’s gift card that I later used to buy a salt lamp and purse.

 

 

It was a jam packed weekend and I think I need a weekend to recover from my weekend, especially since I didn’t really do any studying for my accounting exam I need to take this week. I did have a lot of fun though. I may fall asleep at 8 tonight as I write this Sunday night and it’s somehow only 5pm and I am tired and so is Brian. I blame the rainy gloomy weather we had today and also the busyness of shopping and running around.

              Friday night was a chill night. I worked late for month end so I wasn’t home until about 7pm. I had a small snack and watched a movie on the couch.

              With the sun rising later and the days growing shorter, I sleep in later too. I slept easily until 7am on Saturday morning. I felt I needed the sleep, because I felt so off on Thursday and Friday and my stomach had been bothering me. Sleep on Friday night was finally better and a solid 10 hours!!

              Brian and I still started the morning slow. We each made some breakfast and relaxed for a bit. Around 8:30 we finally got moving and I had to drop off my car because my tires hate me as always. It was nice to have Brian home so we could still run errands. I volunteered to do some shopping for a family we adopted at work for Christmas. Since the kids wanted some winter clothes, I headed to Kohls and found some cute sweaters and leggings. The items I picked up were on sale and I had an additional coupon so I was surprised when I only spent half the money I had to spend. We then headed to Target for a few items for me and some more for the kids. By the time we were done at Target, my car was ready. They found one tire sensor that had gone bad and I gave them permission to replace it. I want to replace all 4 due to age and to keep them all new at the same time, but with all my recent car repairs and school, I need some time to save. I was happy and relieved when they did discover one was bad to verify I am not going completely crazy and calm my nerves.

              After Target we still had to hit up Wegmans. That was a quick stop since my list is pretty similar each week and I know that store so well. Checking out probably takes longer than my shopping most times.

              Then it was back to get my car and head home to unload all the bags. I was shopping for 3 kids so I sorted out the piles for each kid and added up how much I spent per child as well, to try to keep it even.

 

              After eating some lunch, we headed out to get our Christmas tree!! In our 9 years together, we did get 1 tree back in Philadelphia in 2015, but this was our first year picking and cutting down a tree and putting it up in OUR house.

              Since the snow was melting away this weekend by our house, I was not expecting the tree farm to have so much snow. Definitely glad I wore my snow boot even if I picked short socks and my boots got filled with snow. Luckily it didn’t take us long to decide on a tree.

              We stopped at a friend’s house on the way back home and then it was time to make dinner already. I forgot to take a photo of my beautiful turkey meatballs and spaghetti squash. It was a great meal. I then watched a Christmas movie while Brian went down to his “man cave.”

              Sunday was another busy day. We enjoyed sleeping in and got a “late” start to the gym around 9am. It was still a good workout though. We then headed to the store to get avocados and eggs. Brian called us typical millennials going to the store in our gym clothes and buying avocados and eggs.

              After a quick snack and a change of clothes, I headed out for some shopping, on a mission for a tree skirt, a tree star and some more items for the kids I was shopping for. Hitting up Home Goods, Michaels and TJ Maxx, I made out with some good finds. Unfortunately the stocking holders I got didn’t work on our mantle and Brian decided to stick an ornament hook into the mantle and that actually held up better so I will be returning the ones I bought. Round mantles make it difficult, but I still enjoy my cute decorations all 40-60% off at Michaels already.

              I decorated the tree and facetimed with my sister for a bit. I was trying to explain to Brian how to decorate by putting the lights around the WHOLE tree, yes even the back. We even usually decorated the whole back of the tree growing up because my parent’s just have so many ornaments, probably enough for at least 3 trees!!

              I did the bulk of the decorating and then Brian helped build the chairs for our new table finally. Man those chairs were a lot of work and the instructions were confused to me. I kept putting pieces together backwards apparently…so I let Brian do the bulk of the work while I sorted screws and cleaned up the cardboard and wrapping. I swear with all our recent package deliveries we have filled the recycling bin in a couple days. I have to wait until Thursday for pick up now.

              Oh speaking of packages, I got my new capris I ordered from Alo last minute Black Friday browsing online. They fit like a glove and are so cute. I haven’t bought much workout attire recently except for a couple sports bras over the summer so I am excited to have a new pair of capris. I wear capris a lot for doing squats because it’s easier to put on knee sleeves with capris vs long leggings.

              Alright so back to my much needed studying…I can’t believe this is the last week of classes for my first Fall semester of Grad school. While there were stressful times with a lot to do, I still love my program. Looking forward to some weekend mini trips for December and then spring semester will start.

 

Do you decorate the back of your Christmas tree?