the weekend of Christmas kick-off

We had the best weekend.
It was the perfect mix of relaxing enough and accomplishing enough and just hanging out together.
Five days of that and I'm not ready for a regular old Monday...

Thanksgiving was nice.
I got up early and put a turkey breast in the crockpot. Read a super simple idea somewhere about simply rubbing the turkey with onion soup mix (outside and under the skin) and sticking it in the crockpot and oh my gosh it was sooo yummy! I put a few pats of butter in the bottom of the pot along with a few sliced onions and chunks of carrot for good measure, turned it on high for an hour and then down to low for 7 more. It was by far the easiest turkey I've ever made and it was soooo tender and moist I couldn't believe it. I also made this stuffing (YUM), simple mashed potatoes, these sweet potato chips, homemade cinnamon applesauce, fresh green beans, honey wheat rolls and another batch of these for dessert. (I can't get enough of those!) It was a really, really good meal if I do say so myself.
We spent the rest of the day watching the parade, of course some football, and playing games together.

Friday we did a bit of shopping. We didn't get up early for any insanity, but headed out about 9am to check a few things out. Went to Walmart and Target and surprisingly, they were less busy than any old normal day. And we still got what we wanted!
We made a stop at a donut place for breakfast and then hit a couple more stores real quick before heading home for another lazy afternoon.
We had some new friends over for dinner that evening and to watch the Oregon vs. Arizona game (they just moved here last year from AZ). The kids had a great time playing and we had a great time chatting and it didn't hurt Ryan's mood that the Ducks won. :)

Saturday morning I headed out for a little more shopping solo and returned home to grab Ryan and the kids, headed out for lunch and got our Christmas tree. We spent the afternoon putting that up and getting lights on it and I worked on a few Christmas gift projects.
Sunday was just more of the same; we were knee deep in Christmas decorations, the kids decorated the tree, I got started on Christmas cards... finally feeling like it's the season!

I was feeling a little scroogey about the holidays this year... I still feel so unsettled in this house and this city, I've just been craving normalcy. And the holidays -especially in a new house and a new city- are anything but normalcy. I wasn't really looking forward to getting our tree or pulling out all the Christmas decorations when I haven't even really had a chance to figure out our regular house, you know? I was just starting to feel like, okay, this is how our family room will look and this is where this furniture will go and so on and so forth... and here comes a big ol' tree rearranging the family room and tubs of garlands and candles and stockings and wreaths to displace things. I was not excited about any of it.

But turns out, Christmastime is Christmastime and my hesitation didn't last long. Once I got started on gift making and Christmas card assembling and tree lighting, I can't stop! Now my head is full of things I want to do and I want to do it all now! A gingerbread house, a countdown garland, sugar cookies, wrapping presents, making teacher gifts, more, more, more.
I've officially been bitten by the Christmas bug and I wish the month of December was twice as long!