Enjoying the Season!!

It's almost Christmas!!! We've had so much fun getting ready for our first Christmas together and are so excited we can hardly stand it! We have a beautiful 8.5' tree that we bought December 1st. Even having it on a stand with a pretty angel on top, it doesn't quite touch our ceiling! It's so lovely. We feel really lucky being able to have a real tree. It smells so nice...

We got a package from Paul's mother after Halloween with some ornaments from Paul's childhood and some that she threw in for us just to round things out. It was a very thoughtful gift and we had a lot of fun putting the familiar decorations on our own tree.

Paul strung white lights all around our front window and put them on a timer so they come on every evening and go off at night. It's really fun to come home to our lights shining in our window.

Since we'll soon be losing our friends Mike and Crystal Weber to the enticements of Corporate Kohl's in Wisconsin and student teaching for Crystal, we thought it would be appropriate to have them over for an evening before they leave. We made gingerbread houses.

We had so much fun watching them creating their cozy interior, complete with Christmas tree, fireplace and stockings (it was adorable). Then watching as their roof collapsed and was reconstructed again and again. ;-) We had the advantage of finishing ours the next day, so it was a little more secure (Paul's experience in building did help some too...). We left it with my family to enjoy.