Holy Smokes! OK, forgive the million and one pictures but we live in Arkansas and we just got 8 inches of snow overnight! That is a true gift here and we had to document it. We seriously woke up to a winter wonderland this morning!!! We have really enjoyed a lazy day of playing in the snow, eating snow ice cream, watching movies and napping! My dad came down to visit us on Tuesday and is now probably stuck here for a few extra days due to bad roads. The kids are loving having him here during this time! It is insanely cold outside but the funny thing is that Cooper and Cole could care less about that and want to be outside 24/7. We have had to make Cole come in and warm up every now and then. It has been such a fun day for all of us!!! Having snow in December is almost unheard of here so it makes me wonder what the rest of our winter will be like. If it is anything like today I have 2 kiddos who will be very, very happy.
I grew up in Michigan ... with lots and lots of snow. I never realized how special snow is until I moved down here. I miss it but only around Christmas. 2 years ago I sat down with Cole and taught him how to make paper snowflakes....and a tradition was born! It has kind of become a little friendly competition between us. Cole and I worked together and Lily and Rhonald worked together. I will say....Rhonald, the artistic one, always makes the most beautiful and intricate snowflakes! We hung them around the house with fishing line. So even though it is 65 degrees outside it looks like Christmas in our house!
The day after Thanksgiving we pulled out our Christmas decorations and got the house ready! We stayed in our pj's and listened to Christmas music all morning while we decorated. Lily did not remember the tree at all from previous years and she had a total blast setting it up! Cole, like me, loves traditions so he loved being able to tell Lily about each and every ornament. It was fun listening in and hearing him explain everything we do at Christmas. Lily hung ornaments up near the bottom in nice, neat rows! And then she would hand us a random ornament and say, "put this up high. it so special to me." so sweet! So many memories are represented on that tree...so many years of love and fun. It is like a scrapbook we pull out each year and I love it. It is very mismatched and I would not change a single thing about it.
Thanksgiving has always been a holiday that we spend with my side of the family...until this year. After inviting my family to our home for Thanksgiving we quickly found out that no one could make it this year. We ended up turning down an invitation for dinner at a friend's house in hopes of spending the holiday with Rhonald's family but that did not end working out either. So, at the last minute, we planned a Thanksgiving dinner at our house with a couple of families from church. God has blessed us with an amazing church and amazing friends and we honestly ended up enjoying one of the best Thanksgivings we have ever had! I made my first Thanksgiving dinner and it turned out wonderfully. The kids played, the house was full of love and laughter and we all enjoyed a fantastic day together. And then we enjoyed the long weekend at home together just hanging out and relaxing. We never have time like that. Normally, if Rhonald is off for more than 2 days in a row we plan to go somewhere to see family but this time we were able to just be home and it was wonderful! We ate out, saw a movie and stayed in our jammies for days! Something we all needed for sure.
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