On the First Week of Christmas...

Christmas is my favorite time of year. Its not the presents that I get excited about though...its everything else--going home to visit family, making (and eating) delicious baked goods, caroling, watching Christmas movies, listening to Christmas music, and of course decorating Christmas trees. We got to decorate TWO trees these year. For Thanksgiving we went to my in laws and the Saturday after Thanksgiving, we all bundled up from head to toe, crammed into the truck, and voyaged out into the cold to find the best Christmas-y Christmas tree we could find. We ended up with a GINORMOUS tree (I'm telling you this thing was a monster) and Marc and my father-in-law had to cut off about 6 feet before it could come into the house...still leaving 12 feet of tree. 12 feet! (If you want to read an extended version of this story and see pictures click here.You'll also see me sporting some REALLY stylish camo...)We all pitched in to decorate this monster of a tree that evening. I felt like Clara in the Nutcracker with a tree of that size...never in my life have I ever decorated a tree so huge! Anyways...a week or so later, Marc and I decided that our apartment needed some holiday cheer. So we went off to the wonderful world of Walmart to purchase an artificial tree (we figured it would save us money in the end even though we both love real trees). After some adjusting, it was looking pretty good and it was prelit which I loved. Next we had to decorate it. Walmart had an assortment of inexpensive ornaments so we gave ourselves an ornament budget and picked out some of our favorites. But we didn't have an angel or a star to put on top! So this past Saturday, when I should have been doing homework, I made this. You can get the pattern here. I think it turned out really well and it's a lot easier to make than it looks. The other exciting thing that happened on this first week of Christmas was the First Presidency Devotional. Last year, Marc and I went up to Salt Lake to watch the devotional live. My brother-in-law, Collin, and a date were there too. After the devotional, walking around a glimmering Temple Square is where/when Marc popped the question. Luckily I was smart enough to say yes. LinkIt's been a whole year since he proposed, time sure flies when you're spending it with the love of your life.