christmas decor tour: the foyer

I decorate super early. I do. And that's ok! And it's ok if you don't do it till after Thanksgiving or on Christmas Eve or not at all, I don't care! But for me? I like to get it done riiiiight after Halloween ends. It is no small feat, typically taking me 5-6 days to get it all up and everything. So it is worth it to me to stand against all the judgement because once December hits I can relax and just enjoy the holiday season. So. Anyways.... it brings me joy and every room in the house should have twinkle lights in my opinion. From now till March, at least.

Up first, the foyer! A lot has changed in how I decorate for Christmas over the years, including the addition last year of this gorgeous foyer tree! It's the only flocked one I have and I just love it. See also the bunch of trees up on the foyer ledge. I tried to keep my crazy hidden from my neighbors for a few days but once that ledge is decorated the Christmas cat is out of the bag....

trick-or-treat night

Our town always has trick-or-treat night on Halloween, school schedules be damned! But this year the weather was supposed to be quite nasty and so after much debate on social media and what I can only imagine multiple nasty phone calls to the township it was rescheduled for the following night, a Friday. Annnnd spoiler alert, the weather would have been nicer had it not been changed. Because Friday? It was so so cold. All the layers. 

Because of this change in schedule we also were missing my brother and  his family as they already had plans Friday. So missed they were! We had dinner as we do beforehand and then it was time for the donning of the costumes! When I think back to the first few Halloweens and then compare to now, wow! How much has changed! How much easier it is now and so much more enjoyable! I don't have to psychically dress each kid! As much as I lament the loss of babyhood there are some perks to be sure!

so what’s new with you?

October was like, the fastest month ever can we agree on that? Baseball and field hockey (well, one league and then we started another. And basketball here soon.... Letty is doing all the things) finished up last month and we have been slowly reclaiming life as we know it... with Girl Scouts and Cub Scouts and church and so on. So you know, still a lot.

a second grade field trip

Having two kids back-to-back in grades is starting to really throw me. Not to mention the weird parenting time warp thing and I'm all sorts of confused. Didn't I just have a field trip to Zoo America? Like, yesterday? It sure feels that way. And yet here I was, again, with a child, heading on that bus to Hershey.... to the zoo. 

Slightly different of course because instead of having a group of girls to watch I now have a group of boys. Only three, thank the heavens. And they are such good boys too so that helps. We had some time to kill before the nocturnal animal program... during which we wandered around and tried to stay as bundled as possible because goodness it was a bit nippy. The boys especially liked the spiders and snakes of course! What is not to love! 

The show was the same as last year, the skunk of course got huge squeals out of the kids. And then it was time for us to shiver and eat our packed lunches before heading home!

pumpkin carving night

Last week we all got together as an extended family for our annual pumpkin carving night! The kids act all cool like they actually do the carving and well, they don't. Except Letty, she went totally off the grid and made it up as she went. It sure helped too that my mother had emptied out all the pumpkins before hand for the kids. No messy hands for her grandchildren, no ma'am! David wanted to do a ghost but didn't want to touch a knife or a saw and Dominic wanted Jack from Nightmare Before Christmas because he is a boy obsessed but again, he didn't touch the knife. Another year in the books! And of course a whole lot of these photos are my sister-in-law's.