Farewell Holiday Season!

Well, the holidays are finally over, and it's time to take a deep, relaxing breath before my final semester of college (well...my final semester to get my second Associates degree that is) begins. Graduation is in May, and while I'm not done with school, I am ready to start working as an interpreter! I still want to get my Bachelors degree, because while having two Associates will be nice, I'd really like a heftier degree. Plus, if I ever want to become Nationally certified, I'll need a Bachelors degree.

We've had so many family get-togethers over the last couple of months, including the release of Mockingjay Part 2, my birthday, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, and my mom's short visit. With all of those special occasions came so many opportunities for me to cuddle and love on my baby niece!

Those of you that know me at all, know that I am a bookworm. Also, you should know that the Hunger Games series was one of my favorites, and that my sister-in-law and I forced our husbands to accompany us to the midnight premiere of all the movie adaptations thus far. Chelsea was worried about how this year's tradition would hold up, seeing as Ellie's due date was just 2 short weeks before the movie's release. Baby Eleanor ended up being born only one week before Mockingjay Part 2's release, and the new parents did well being away from their week-old baby for a few hours!
As was the tradition, Chris, Chelsea, Kalen, April and I went to watch the final installment of the Hunger Games series. It was bittersweet, and I had mixed emotions about the movie since I felt like it strayed quite a bit from the book. But alas, it was still a good night and I enjoyed the time spent with family. We've all agreed, however, that now we need to find a new movie series to replace The Hunger Games so that we can keep up the midnight premiere tradition!

The Saturday after our trip to the movies brought my 25th birthday, where we all met up at my wonderful mother-in-law's home. She baked me a scrumptious strawberry cake, and cooked up some tasty manicotti. I got to spend time cuddling with sweet Ellie Lou, and also played some card games, and Pin the Tail on the Donkey with my older niece and nephew.
We enjoyed some time together, relaxing, playing games, and chatting for several hours.
It was a great way to spend my birthday. I truly couldn't have asked for better company to have spent my birthday with!

Thanksgiving rolled around shortly after that, and I just so happened to be off of work!

Hubby signed us up for a 5k that morning, which he ran and I walked. He has been training diligently for several physical events, including a half-marathon (which his mother will also be participating in) and a Half Ironman in Arizona this summer!
In September, Chris finished an aquabike (the swim and cycling part of a triathlon...though I like to say he did a triathlon because he ran several meters to cross the finish line), and now he is on to bigger and more challenging events! So the 5k we did together was nothing but a blip in his accomplishments for the year.

But alas, we participated in the 5k Thanksgiving morning, and then drove down to have Thanksgiving dinner with my step-mother-in-law's family, as we do almost every year. Again, I enjoyed my time with family, but I had to spend most of it seated, as I hurt my foot somehow and it hurt to walk on. Since I wasn't doing much moving around, I got to hug on Eleanor some more. I did have to share her, though, since a lot of the family hadn't met her yet. Of course I didn't want to share her, but I'm not that greedy, and I know that my family loves her just as much as I do.

My mom usually visits every year in the winter, and this year was no different! Unfortunately, she was only here for an extended weekend, but it was still great to see her!
We went to several different restaurants around the house that Chris and I had never been to before, and they were delicious!
We also took my mom to see the Chickasha Festival of Light, which was nice, but it was too warm! I know...how dare I be complaining about warm weather in the winter, but it made it so hard to get into the Christmas spirit! I didn't even want hot chocolate, and I always want hot chocolate when I see Christmas lights!

On the Saturday of my mom's visit, Eleanor turned one month old. Chris, Mom and I drove to Chelsea's house for what was going to be another get-together including Chris's mom, stepdad and April, but their hot water tank caught fire and so they decided to stay home and monitor it. I didn't blame them, and felt better with them staying home. They were able to put out the fire before any serious damage could happen, but it was still scary!
I brought my SLR camera to Chelsea's and took some Christmas pictures of Eleanor, as well as her one month pictures! She was a little fussy at first, but after she ate she was a very happy baby.

I could stare at this beautiful face all day!

 Mom's trip ended too soon...as it always does.
The weekend after her visit, I took Chris to see Penn & Teller at Winstar, and he was so incredibly excited!
I don't really like big, showy, Vegas style magic, but Penn & Teller were fantastic (though I suppose after being in show business for so many years, what else did I expect?)!!!! They even explained step-by-step how to do most of their tricks, and it still blew me away.
Chris knew that typically after their shows, Penn & Teller would hang around to take pictures and sign autographs. Chris brought a playing card, hoping that they would stick around after the show like they usually did and sign it for him.
They did, in fact, stick around, and we got pictures, plus the card autographed.

I had to work Christmas Eve and Christmas Day this year, but I got to celebrate a little bit.
After work on Christmas Eve, I drove down to my mother-in-law's house so that we could wake up at her house on Christmas morning and open presents, as we've done for the last two years.
We ate an early Christmas lunch and celebrated Jeanette's birthday, but then I had to leave so that I could go to work. I hated leaving the festivities so early, especially since I'd been so lucky as so have spent so much time with family recently, but that's part of working at a casino; you have to miss out on a lot of family events.

New Year's Eve, however, was not one of those events!
I was off, but unfortunately, Chris was not. I didn't have any plans on going out and really celebrating the New Year, but I did want to spend it with someone and not by myself.
Chelsea and Kalen were kind enough to let me spend the night at their house, and they even made me a delicious dinner of pork chops, mashed potatoes, corn, and black eyed peas. I had never eaten black eyes peas before, but I'd heard that you're supposed to eat them on New Years Eve or New Years Day. They weren't bad...they tasted more like flavorless beans.
Since I was at their house, the new parents took advantage of me playing and cuddling with Ellie and took down their Christmas decorations while baby was preoccupied. I didn't mind at all, and even got to share my first kiss of 2016 with a happy little baby!

Now that things are calming down, I'm slowly starting to get back into a semi-regular routine, and have even started a Couch to 5k program. I hate running, but it's good exercise and I'd really like to get back at least to my weight when I got married. It's not that losing weight is a New Years resolution, because I've been working on it for a little bit now...but I'm going to be trying a little harder now that the holidays are over. I gained back everything I had lost thanks to my family's delicious cooking.
Plus, Chris and I are supposed to do another 5k in March, and I said I'd run that one with him.
Yeay being healthy!

I hope your holiday celebrations were full of love and yummy food!
And I wish the best in 2016!!!