First Christmas

I hope that you had a Merry Christmas yesterday (or a fun, relaxing day if you don't celebrate!)

J and I spent the earlier part of the week until Christmas Eve night at his parents' house outside of Savannah. Always so relaxing when we go up there.  His parents are the best and let us open presents on Christmas Eve. His mother got me the prettiest shirts from Loft and so many other things! It was fun to see his mom's reaction to her gift, a smaller parent version of our wedding album! I'm pretty blessed to have the in-laws that I have!

Christmas Eve we made our way back to Jacksonville, to stop at my parents' house. My favorite Christmas tradition has to be our pjs. My mom gets us new ones every year and in recent years has been getting the girls matching ones too!

I would be lying if I said it wasn't a bit odd to wake up Christmas morning with J, but it was so much fun! (I wish I took pictures, but we were just too into gift giving to do that!) He loved my gifts to him (pretty sure the electric toothbrush was his favorite... he's all about the dental hygiene!) but I hit the money on the clothes and the yummy pistachios he later found in his stocking.

I think my favorite presents from J were the Michael Kors watch (finally!) and he surprised with a Pandora bracelet. My first two charms are a stack of books and cute little kitty. He's such a thoughtful guy.

Around 11 we headed to my parents' house in our PJS! I texted my mom if she minded, and she said no. SCORE! Made it that more fun to open presents in your pjs. Love this picture that my uncle took:

Not sure what's better, the matching pjs, my expression or my brother's! We got some really thoughtful gifts from my parents and my mother loved the parent album we gave her, too.

After my parents' house we stopped at our friends' house. J played XBOXone with her husband and I learned how to make this bracelet on a Rainbow Loom!

Can I just say... I kind wish I had my own rainbow loom??? Completely understand why kids are obsessed with it. Plus it's nice that one of the most popular toys out there right now is more crafty than techy.

J and I ended the night back at home where I made jalapeno poppers, bang bang shrimp and a bruschetta cheese ball.

YUM!

All in all, a pretty perfect first Christmas for J and I. :)

Thankful for a lot...

So obviously, yesterday was Thanksgiving. And just like everyone else, I had a lot to be thankful for. It was a wonderful, relaxing day spent with the people I care the most about. So my 5 for Friday is going to revolve around yesterday, even though there were a few other bright spots in my week like first grade pulling off very fun and successful Thanksgiving centers, finishing my Christmas shopping while out and about with my best friend on Wednesday, and oh just the fact that I have 6 glorious days off from school??

1. Our first Thanksgiving photo that I made my mom take. I felt really pretty yesterday and I love how the picture came out! I'm uber thankful for J and feel pretty blessed to call him my husband.

2+3. I contributed not one but TWO very yummy things to my family's Thanksgiving dinner: Boston Creme Pie Poke Cake (um divine!) and Broccoli Blue Cheese Casserole (which everyone agreed was delicious!) It's fun showing my family I do know how to cook.

4. Speaking of yummy food, my mom and dad really outdid themselves this year. Lunch was AMAZING and I'm thankful that my parents are such amazing cooks!

5. J and I decided NOT to head out for shopping. So we came home, changed into our comfy and WARM clothes. We refuse to turn on the heat just yet!

So two thumbs up for an awesome Thanksgiving, and I can't wait until tonight where we will decorate our Christmas tree!

What was the yummiest thing you ate yesterday?
Did you go shopping and find any good deals?
I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

As always, linking up with Lauren!

All About the Valentine's

I haven't done a Sunday Social in awhile, but the questions this week are fun. Hit it!

1. What was the best Valentine's Day you ever had?
There's a tie for this answer. My junior and senior year of high school. Looking back, I had an amazing high school sweetheart. Junior year, his bus was late. I'm sitting in my first morning class waiting for it to start. In he walks with a huge bouquet of flowers and a balloon. This was important, because he couldn't stand my classmates (I was in a special high school program for overachievers). He came in anyways! Later in my locker, I found a huge stuffed panda bear.
Senior year, I opened my locker to find a copy of Sweet Home Alabama. When I shut the door, he was standing next to me with a bouquet of roses. Apparently he hid behind the door near my locker, waiting to surprise me.
Like I said, in high school I was spoiled!

2. What was the worst Valentine's Day you've ever had?
 Easy. In 2010, I got dumped two weeks before Valentine's Day by my boyfriend of 2 years. Yep. Totally awful. The only positive thing about that Valentine's Day were my students. They knew I was sad about something and they gave me a huge amount of flowers, candy and cards. I have to say, if you have to be single, be a teacher. You will ALWAYS get something for Valentine's Day.

3. What did you do for Valentine's Day this year?
J and I bought all the fixin's for sliders and he came up with the idea to have bacon wrapped shrimp! It was a SUPER yummy dinner. For dessert, I swiped an amazing red velvet cupcake from the Valentine's Day luncheon at school. J sent me flowers as usual too:

4. What is your best Valentine's Day idea if you're single?
Grab a group of your girlfriends and go out to dinner and drinks together! One of my favorite college memories is this Valentine's Day dinner with 6 of my closest college friends. We went to a Japanese restaurant and had a total blast!

5. What is your favorite Valentine's Day candy?
Not candy hearts, I can tell you that! I have to say white chocolate covered ANYTHING! Last year, one of my students bought me this set from Peterbooke, this AMAZING candy store here in Jax. It had white chocolate covered pretzels, popcorn, Oreos, and graham crackers. Most delicious thing I've tasted!

6. Favorite Valentine's memory from your childhood?
Hmm. I don't have one. My mom loves holidays but never made a big deal about this one. We did always get a card and a bag of candy from her though!

Christmas fun recap

I admit I haven't been in the Christmas spirit this year. The weather's been weird and my surgery left me cranky. I've been feeling a bit bittersweet about the fact that next Christmas will be different from all my other Christmases past (even though I can't wait for my first married Christmas with J). So I'm glad that I had yesterday and today to spend with my family the way we always do:

Kicked off the holiday by rocking my new Christmas jammies on Christmas Eve. They were cute AND comfy!

Forgive the smile, my face was still aching from wisdom teeth!

Christmas morning opened presents with the fam:

Dad rocking the Santa hat... that hat is like 20 years old!

My family loved the gifts that I gave them, even though they weren't incredibly extravagant. I'm blessed that my mom and dad are paying for my entire reception, so I told them not to get me anything special, but they didn't listen:

Two beautiful shirts, a LOFT gift card, and a Kindle Fire! I'm a lucky girl. Spent the rest of Christmas in my pjs watching movies with my mom, dad, and uncle. My brother had to work (apparently people still watch the news on Christmas Day?)

Today, my brother, mom and I hit the mall in search of good deals and a good meal! I hit the jackpot:

 

I bought an adorable red blazer from Marshall's (never ever find stuff there!) and two cute blouses from Old Navy. Then I went to Loft where my mom found me a great coral sweater for 4 dollars and a pair of black crop pants for work for 14! I also ended up getting a graphic tee and a pair of jeans from there as well.

Afterwards, the three of us ate at Maggiano's. The food was so yummy. At one point I just looked at the two of them and told them thank you. My family has taken such good care of me this week and I'm such a lucky girl to have them in my life.

Off to finish watching Love Actually. I hope all of you had a wonderful Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

I woke up this morning to the sound of my brother telling me to get up. I came downstairs in my new pjs that I received last night. Opened some fun presents with my wonderful family. All the while getting teased by my dad and my mom telling us to stop and smile. Just like every other Christmas for the last 20+ years.

Dad a few years ago, laughing at my brother's reaction to his gift. 

It blows my mind that this is the last Christmas that I will be spending this exact way for the rest of my life. This time next year, I will be married. J and I will be spending Christmas morning together. Waking up together and maybe starting traditions of our own. I absolutely cannot wait for that, but for right now I'm going to enjoy every single holiday filled moment of today. Starting with chowing down on some cinnamon rolls with my family.

I hope all my blog friends have a beautiful day today. Merry Christmas to all of you!

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Holiday music makes everything feel better...

I've come to this realization:

Nothing makes me feel better than jamming out to some holiday tunes. Except maybe a cuddle session with J. :)

My kiddos had resource all afternoon and I canceled my grade level meeting to give my team even more time to get stuff done before the holidays (my boss gave us a half day yesterday for the same reason!). Even though my throat feels like it's on fire, I decide to set my Pandora station on my phone to my *NSYNC Christmas station.

And wouldn't you know it? Even though I felt like poo all morning and was worried I would waste away the afternoon, I still got a ton accomplished. I have to give all the credit to the Christmas music. So here are some of my favorites that came on:

"Last Christmas" the Glee version. To be quite honest, all of the versions of this song rock, but this one is definitely my favorite.

"My Only Wish This Year" by Britney Spears. I totally danced around my filing boxes while listening to this one. I think if my VP had walked in she would have died of laughter for sure.

Yes, I know Chris Brown = major douchebag. But this became my favorite version of "This Christmas" before he let it be known that he is a class A jerk. Love some R&B Christmas songs for sure!

Okay, so the ENTIRE *NSync Christmas album is my go to holiday album. I actually need to download a copy, because my CD is so scratched some of the songs don't play. But "All I Want is You This Christmas" is the one that I always hit repeat on. Something about harmonies, the lyrics and the music just screams Christmas to me.

There you have it. Pandora totally knew that I've been bummed that Holly on SiruisXM has been straight up lame lately, so it came through and played my favorites. Now I still feel sick, but it's a happy sick! What are your favorite Christmas songs?

Where did November go?

Guys, my lesson plans are blowing my mind right now. Why? Because of the date on them: Lesson Plans Week of December 3rd. DECEMBER 3rd! What in the world? How on earth is it already December? Crazy!

But I must say, I'm extremely excited that it's December. Just like a lot of other people, this my absolute favorite time of the year. I'll even post a cheesy Christmas pic to prove it to ya.

Adorable right? My mom used to make us take these every other year until my junior year of high school. My mother is the queen of Christmas and I'm pretty sure she is exactly where I get my love of the season from. I mean, look at her Christmas tree:

Yep she's definitely where I get my love of Christmas from. I love Christmas music (my kids' thinking music at school last week was from the Nutcracker!). I love anything peppermint. I love baking. I love spending time with my family and giving them gifts. In fact, I kind wish I could them all their gifts right now, but I'll wait. :)

I'm really bummed that I had a massive headache all weekend and wasn't able to put up my Christmas tree with J. Hopefully we'll be able to do that tomorrow. I like going to his apartment and seeing the tree all lit up next to the window.

What's your favorite thing about December?