Friday Favorites ~ January 5, 2023

 First week of January in the books, check!  I am sharing a few favorites from the week....

New Year's Eve was pretty quiet.  We watched the movie Oppenheimer, ate a few snacks, had a glass of wine, and watched the ball drop in NYC.  There was a network showing fireworks from around the world and the most impressive one I saw was in London.

New Year's Day was spent at home watching lots of football games by the fire and good food.  I keep my lights on the mantle on year round and will keep my garland up until probably the end of the month.

We had ham, black eyed peas, sweet potatoes and sourdough bread for dinner.  I have so much sourdough bread, I decided to have this instead of cornbread.

Tuesday, Brook and I went to see 4 of my greats.  I didn't get a picture of my great nephew, but here we are with the 3 girls. Speaking of these 3 girls, today is this one's 7th birthday!

I love playing with these littles!

Tuesday nights at the movies has become a favorite thing.  It is discounted night here and we went to see The Boys in the Boat.  Has anyone else been to see this?  

I worked a little bit from home Tuesday and Wednesday and returned to the office yesterday.  It was good to see my co-workers again.  

Not a favorite, but this morning my youngest is driving 9 1/2 hours back to her university.  She has been home since the week before Thanksgiving, so I will miss her for sure.  Every time she leaves, it is such an adjustment.  Prayers for her safety appreciated!  I am working some this morning, then will go down to my parents to help them with housekeeping and putting away some Christmas things.  

Hope you all have a great weekend!

Currently ~ January 2024

It's time for the first 2024 edition of Currently with my friend Jennifer.  We are talking about what we are currently loving, resolving, looking forward to, doing to stay cozy this winter and cooking.

Loving

As much as I love decorating for Christmas, I love the cleaner feel with a little less around the house.  That being said, I still have my garland on my mantle and wreath on the door.  I will keep this up through the end of January probably.   I have all of my Christmas decor on the guest bed and eventually will need to put that away.  I take it down pretty quickly, but it takes some motivation to actually put it away!  The other thing I am loving are my Christmas gifts from my girls:

Brook got me this brand candle that neutralizes pet odor :).  She also got me some of these Joyspun pajamas.  I like that they have elastic at the legs, which is good for those of us who are short. 

Isabella got me this book, "Every Moment Holy", which a book of litergies and a beauty product.

The girls went in together and bought me this t-shirt, which is the number of my favorite Grizzlies player.  Here I am in front of his sign outside the arena where they play.

Holding up the number 13 with my fingers, ha!

 

Resolving

I am resolving to do better with reading, eating and taking care of myself.  These are the norms at this time of year for me!

Looking forward to

I am looking forward to local travel this year, exploring places close to home.  I also would love to take a faraway trip as well, but not sure where/when that would be.  I am also looking forward to what the Lord has for me this year.

Doing to stay cozy this winter

I am glad to have some consistent cold weather this month.  We have enough heat in the south during the summer/fall months, so I like the cold and we need it to kill the bugs before summer comes again!  I plan to stay cozy with cozy clothes, a few fires, hot chocolate and hot tea, blankets and maybe some comfort foods.

Cooking

I had a friend come over last weekend to share with me her sourdough starter since I now have a mild obsession with sourdough bread.  Brook and I made a batch over the weekend and it was delicious!  Now with the starter, I will be making a lot more of it.  

I also made some guac and chickent tortilla soup while watching some bowl games last weekend.

Enjoy all cozy things and stay warm friends!

Christmas 2023

Our Christmas was a little different this year.  Saturday, we went to lunch with my parents and then they came over to exchange gifts. Here I am with my parents:

A cute photo of my girls with my dad.

Gosh, it was so good to have my girls at home and laughing with them.  Isabella brought home this karaoke mic she got at a Christmas gift exchange and it proved to be a lot of entertainment.

Instead of spending Christmas Eve and Day with my side of the family, we went away to an Air BNB for 2 nights.  We just needed to do something different this year.

It was a cute place.

They had a tree, which I realize here it looks like only the top lights were working, but maybe I hadn't plugged in the bottom strand when taking this picture, but they did all work :).

This was where the girls slept.

Aw, there are the lights on the tree!

This was our snack collection....some chex mix, cookies and Jingle Jangle.

If you haven't tried Jingle Jangle, this is a picture inside the tin.

I made some Christmas punch.  I tried to get all no sugar drinks, but it still tasted good!  The recipe is 2 cups of cranberry juice, 2 cups orange juice, 1 cup ginger ale and 1 cup of pineapple juice. It taste really good! I made a few batches during our 36 hour get-a-way.

Since we were in Arkansas, they had the game "Hogopoly" in honor of the Arkansas Razorbacks. We played this along with a few other games.

I had made a french toast casserole in advance I brought, but my girls didn't really like it, so I probably won't do this again.  They like french toast, but have an aversion to anything called a casserole.  How did I raise these southern girls and they don't eat a casserole??

I also had made some cinammon roll muffins.

Christmas breakfast was fruit, muffins, french toast, bacon and eggs. I brought the Santa plates to use for Christmas day and Christmas pattern paper to use as placemats.

There was lots of relaxing, a little bit of tv, playing games, sitting around the firepit and time in the hot tub.  We watched the movie "Daddy's Home 2", which has become something we have done the past few years.  It is a funny Christmas movie if you need a new movie to watch next year with the family.

Even though it was different, it was so nice to unplug and have fun together.  Our family needed this.  We left Christmas Eve afternoon and came back the day after Christmas.

It is a New Year.  While I am thankful to see 2023 leave, in full honestly, I am also approaching this new year with some nervousness, anxiety and anticipation of what's to come.  2023 was the hardest year of my life so far.  I don't have it in me to do a recap, yet I do want to acknowledge the Lord has been near, even in the silence of waiting.  I am a stronger person than I was this time last year.  I know whatever 2024 brings, I will make it.  I am thankful for this community and prayers from friends.

Christmas at Work

 Christmas is a busy time at work for our organization because we host a toy drive at the hospital and a few other events.  Today, I am sharing some pictures from those events and our office decor.

My co-worker and friend I share an office space with is pretty firm on not decorating for Christmas until after Thanksgiving.  I honored her request, but then we did decorate our space to make it festive for the month.

This is my desk...

This is the tree in our space.  The other desk you see is my co-workers.  We have another tree in our entrance area.

This is the view from my desk, which is pretty simple with garland and lights and stockings.

This is in our conference room area.

We did a gift exchange among my co-workers and this Trader Joe's chocolate was one of my gifts.

Earlier this month, we partnered with the hospital and provided breakfast for families at the children's hospital and there was an appearance by Santa, the Chick-fil-A cow and others. I recruited Brook to come help serve.  Here I am with 3 of my co-workers (one was off this day).

Brook and I :)

With Santa and the cow 

Brook came back to the office with me and volunteered for the rest of the day, so it was fun to have her at work with me.

Last night, we had our annual toy drive and served dinner to families at the hospital.  It was a 12 hour day for me, but it was a good day.

This is a snapshot of serving dinner.  I am standing in the green sweater talking to a family who speaks Spanish.  I was basically trying to tell them I don't remember much of my Spanish!  My husband and daughter are in the picture and they came to help serve because we needed extra volunteers tonight. 

 

In another room down the hall, we distributed approximately 1000 gifts for kids in the hospital and their siblings.  

There is so much hurting at this time in so many ways.  Seeing the hurt of families in the hospital is one of those things and I am humbled to be able to be a small part to serve these families.  

I am wishing you all a Merry Happy Christmas weekend!  

 

Hello Monday ~ December 18, 2023

 

Good Monday morning!  Here we are a week away from Christmas.  It is still a work as usual week for me until noon on Friday, but I am still looking forward to the week.  

Last Friday afternoon, Brook and I went to my sister's house to help because she is keeping 4 of her grandchildren this weekend, so those are 4 of my greats.  Here I am with 3 of them and I love getting hugs and playing with these kiddos.

My sister is such a fun grandmother at the age of 56! She was hosting an Elf movie party for the kids that night, so we helped her with the decorations.

Friday night, we walked to the lake in our neighborhood to see the Christmas lights along the water.  The only thing better than seeing Christmas lights is seeing them being reflected in water.

Saturday morning, I wrapped the girls presents because neither of my girls were home.  I wrapped while watching the Hallmark movie "Christmas at the Biltmore". This is my favorite Hallmark Christmas movie of the season so far!

Saturday afternoon, I worked on tagging coats.  My sister and I are hosting a coat drive for the 3rd year in a row in memory of my great nephew, Callaway.  We have 76 coats collected and we will deliver them to 2 schools today.  This is such a joy to do!

Sunday, I went to church and we had a church Christmas dinner that evening.  It is always good to be with my church family.  

I always enjoy the weekend to get caught up on reading blogs, listening to podcasts, going through emails, laundry and watching Hallmark movies. 

Hope your weekend was good and enjoy your Monday festivities!