The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

I love this time between Thanksgiving and New Year's. From Thanksgiving Day itself, with all the food and wine and relaxation, through the whole month of December, with the lights and anticipation and music everywhere, I adore it all.

I found the motivation to put up the Christmas decorations on Saturday (after finishing Landon's shutterfly photo book! and starting the first page of Claire's...). The kids LOVE them. We read "The Night Before Christmas" and when we got to the line "The stockings were hung by the chimney with care" Landon exclaimed, "our stockings are hung there too!!". What a coincidence.

We picked out our Christmas tree last night. Landon was very proud of our selection.

Claire just ran around and giggled and then gave me about 25 kisses when I picked her up. She's very into giving kisses right now, complete with a little smacking sound. I love it.

The weather FINALLY decided to let go of summer and the temperatures dropped to an appropriate 50 degrees yesterday. We went for a bike ride while it was still in the 40's and this is how Landon prepared:

Cowboy boots, blue pants, justice league t-shirt, green jacket, Ironman gloves, Spiderman mask, and, of course, the green shark helmet. He assured me he was very warm.

here to save the day, or, maybe rob your house

Claire did not have the benefit of the Spiderman mask and squawked several complaints from her stroller when the winds kicked up. I blame the fact that she was born in Austin and not Chicago. But as long as she wasn't being forced to go on walks in 40-degree weather, she was her adorable, delightful, entertaining self all week.

All in all it was a wonderful, restorative 9 days off work for me (3 vacation days has never stretched so far!). I loved being with the kids so much. I loved watching them play together, eating dinner together at 5 (JP worked all weekend, but he did it from home), and gathering on the couch in pj's- with everyone bathed and the kitchen cleaned- to watch old claymation Christmas movies at 6:30. I'm not sad to be back at work today- in fact, I felt more enthusiastic about work today than I have in months (it helps that I can now play the Frank Sinatra holiday station on Pandora, oh that makes me so happy), but it was unreservedly wonderful to spent the last week solely as a wife, mom, daughter, niece, granddaughter, amateur chef (I cooked a giant brisket!), and creator of photo books.

Now, on to the next legal brief. (With a bit of cyber Monday shopping on the side.)