I opened this post so many times to write and then was stumped with what to put. The last time I posted was the day we closed on our house, so I guess I'll start there and give you an update as to life since that day.
Well, after we got the keys, Sam moved in a week later and is now living in our beautiful house while I waste away in my tiny apartment! Ha! May 5th will come soon, I know :) We decorated a little for Christmas but decided to wait for all the after-Christmas sales to buy lights and decor and stuff like that so we can really decorate next year for our first Christmas being married. I have always decorated a small tree for my bedroom - about 5 ft. tall - which looks huge in an apartment but now that it's in our family room, we took one look at it and laughed and decided next year we definitely need a bigger tree! Sam and I both had real trees growing up (my family went to artificial the past 15 years or so after my brothers became allergic to real ones) so I always thought when I had a house I would have a real tree, but actually Sam and I decided we like artificial better ~ we can put it up right after Thanksgiving, not worry about watering it and needles dropping, and the branches are stronger for holding ornaments.
I'm excited over Christmas break to do some painting in our house. The colors are already very neutral and lovely, but I want to do something to make it our own, so I think we are going to paint the upstairs hall bathroom and Sam's office. The office has beautiful French doors and a bay window, so a little color in there will make those features really pop. We patched nail holes in most of the rooms so we also need to do some touch up painting. Thankfully the previous owners left all the paint cans in the basement so we can match colors!
In other news, Sam got his wisdom teeth out a couple weeks ago and did great! I on the other hand passed out in the recovery room. Some support person I was! The nurse had to call my mom to come pick both of us up. Ha! I'm praying for no more surgeries for Sam in the future, otherwise I guess he will need someone other than his wife to accompany him :) I did great with the after care portion - fixing him soft foods to eat and giving him pain medication and ice on schedule, but perhaps the sight of bloody gauze hanging from his mouth after surgery was a bit much for me.
The kids at school have been sooooooo excited for Christmas. They were all convinced that as soon as we turned our classroom calendar to December it was Christmas. They didn't understand that even though Christmas is in December, you still have to wait 25 days for it. Halloween, Thanksgiving ~ no problem grasping that concept of a holiday being in the middle of the month, but Christmas was another story. When Santa didn't come December 1st, I think they knew I was telling the truth about waiting 25 days! Since I don't teach at a public school or parochial school (we are private) we are not suppose to talk at all about Christmas - no mention of religious aspects or secular ones ~ but my kids are so little that of course they want to talk about Santa. We had a "winter party" at school and I had the darndest time finding a song for them to sing that they already knew but didn't mention anything about Christmas! We finally settled on Jingle Bells and they did a great job singing. Since today is the last day of school before break, I decided to buck the system and read them the Little Drummer Boy story, which talks about a baby king being born in a manger but doesn't actually say the word Jesus :)
And that is what's been happening the past few weeks! Merry Christmas to everyone and remember to leave "Christ" in "Christmas!"
Santa brought me a new toy this year! My very first sewing machine to go in my craft room on my enormously-wonderful craft table :) While at first glance the machine looks complicated, it is actually so much easier to use than the old machines that you have to turn knobs ~ this one has a picture display of all 96 stitches, so all you do is punch in the number of the stitch you want to use and the machine automatically sets the tension, width, and length. I can always adjust them if I want, but for a beginner like me, it is so helpful not to have to worry about all that. I can simply step on the presser foot and away I go creating masterpieces! My first endeavor was a simple curtain for my craft room. It took me about 2-3 hours but there are a lot of things I learned I could simplify for next time I make curtains, but I think they turned out great and I even lined them so it would look nice from the street view. Mom will be so proud!