and POOF - Christmas is over

So now life is finally slowing down!  

We don't have any exciting plans for New Year's - other than going to Zehnders in Frankenmuth for an early dinner and to look at the lights.

So let's see.....on the 13th I went shopping with my sisters & Mom.  We were at Frankenmuth then - there's a lot of little shops all up & down Main Street, then of course, there's Bronners - "The Christmas Wonderland".

We all got crowns and wore them all day. 

 Naughty & Nice - guess who bought these?
Hint - not me!

There are these Santa's in different poses on I-75 and the roads approaching the stores. 

Love them!  I was happy to see this one inside the store, since it's one of my favorites. 

Randomly Robert!

One Sunday night, Randy & I went to see the lights in Rochester - we happened to pick the perfect night to go because they were holding Caroling in the Streets and had several blocks of Main Street blocked off to vehicle traffic. 

First...a stop at Chomp for dinner.   

I don't know who creates their specials menu, but they are a magician!  

I had an autumn grilled cheese - O.M.G.  

Whole grain Ciabatta, cheddar cheese, sliced butternut squash, balsamic onions & chopped almonds.  It was glorious!   Randy had some kind of BBQ chicken quesadillas. 

Every storefront all along Main Street are covered in lights!

We ended up being more entertained by all the emergency vehicles blocking off the streets - with all their lights going. 

It's hard to get a selfie with the front of a fire truck!

It was neat to walk down the middle of the street.
I stood in the middle of an intersection and turned in a circle, making a SnapChat video!

The ladder truck was blocking the north end of town, and they had the bucket out so people could go in it and stuff. 

Santa in a hot air balloon.

I had a half day of work last Friday - a team of truck drivers came in and managed to decorate the window without anyone noticing!

I went out to do some last minute shopping.

And found a gift for me!

11:45pm Saturday night, mailing Christmas cards!

Last Saturday I had to finish up some last minute shopping and opted to go at weird times which totally paid off!  Going to the sporting goods store near the mall at 7am was ideal - very little traffic, 2 other cars in the parking lot, was able to get immediate (and cheerful) help from a lady who worked there.  In & out.  Then going to the Walmart Supercenter at midnight is perfect!  There was a surprising number of cars in the lot, but the store is big enough where we never had people in our way.  We managed to find an InstantPot!  Randy said every store he looked at had been out of stock, so this was an excellent surprise. It was the last one on the shelf AND it was on sale!  

It was actually quite pleasant & we had a good time roaming around looking at ugly sweaters & tools & stuff.  It was almost 2am when we left there!

So Christmas Eve at my sister's house.  Of course it started to snow a couple hours before we had to leave. We saw a lot of cars in the ditch and one that had taken out the guardrail.   We had a snacky dinner & played a game, then opened presents.  Once we got home we watched the Grinch. 

I woke up at 5am, so I got up and rearranged the presents to look nice & filled the stockings, then sat on the couch with a cat on my lap, looking at the tree for a while.  Then I went back to bed. 

It was a very nice Christmas - Randy got me a remote start for my car and I sure wish it was already installed!  Angel got me a new purse & some earrings.  We gave Angel the smaller TV out of our bedroom & DVD/BluRay player that we picked up a couple months ago.  We count on her being un-observant since they've been sitting on top of the dog's crate behind a basket & covered in a towel for months! Randy also got a wall-mount for the TV and installed it in her room for her.  

We were supposed to have gone to Zehnders for dinner Christmas Day, but it was still snowing and squalls were so heavy that Laurie sent me a picture out her back door where you couldn't see her barn at all!   We didn't want to risk the hour + drive so we went to a local Chinese food place instead. 

Before I left for work yesterday.....

Today it was 6*! 

Just to show that not all of my decorations are obnoxious and that I DO have some class!

I bought the Nativity set the first year I was in the Navy (aka away from my parents house) and the red scarf was a fire party shirt that I wore on duty days on my first ship. The Santa & reindeer just go well with it.

How was your Christmas?

Christmas at the Love Shaque

I may be all Bah Humbug this year, but decorating has indeed happened!  

Just don't ask me about shopping or wrapping.....

 I've shared this picture of the outside of the house already. 

But the nutcrackers have appeared!  And ya know what??  I've put close to half back in the totes and sent them back to the garage.  Where did I put them all before???

The girls.  

 The police squad. 

The Sailors (and Uncle Sam)

 Some of my favorite "occupational" nutcrackers. 

 

I love my hockey guys & especially the totem pole made of farm animals! 

Selfie with Santa at Walmart! 

So here's our Charlie brown-looking tree this year.  It's actually not bad now that we actually have decorations on it.  You can still tell how really small it is, tho.  I was really selective with the ornaments, because cats.  So a lot of my favorite, more sentimental, ornaments we taken out, admired, and sadly placed back into the box.   

On the plus side.... I'm thinking the smallness of the tree is discouraging the cats from messing with it.  I have seen naps happening underneath it, but no real evidence of tampering. 

 

 I got this from the Johnson Space Center in Houston last spring. 

 Why shouldn't a dancer be right next to a semi?

 The token "Love" ornaments, the pie lady & if you look close directly to the right of the Love - there's a spider.  Have you ever heard of the Legend of the Christmas Spider?

Because I'm married to an Arkie....

I have a special ornament tree for all of my Tim Horton's ornaments 

(and 2 from Dunkin Donuts).  

Kinda miffed they don't seem to have any this year and the DD ones are Elf on a Shelf.  

NO THANKS!

And another tree for all my Detroit Red Wings ornaments...

I thought it would be fun to link up with Terri at Our Good Life, showing off our trees.

Pop on over & check out some gorgeous trees!

Still not feeling it!

So this sums up how I'm feeling about the whole Christmas thing right now. 

I actually have a small porcelain Angel that would fit on this smaller tree perfectly - but as a joke I put this hat on it and it's stayed.  Miss Angela knows its there & is entertained by it, not sure if Randy knows....

I still don't have my nutcrackers in the house.  I barely have any shopping done. 

The snowman countdown wall-hanging is out, as well at my Nativity Scene - so that'll have to do for decor! 

However the tree IS decorated (finally! as of last night)

It's just not in this picture. 

Funny that Rusty ignored the tree until I sat down on the floor near it to sort thru the ornaments (choosing the non-breakable variety, which means a lot of my favorites didn't even get to come out ~sniff!).  Then he suddenly realized there was a soft & warm fleece tree skirt under there!  And he napped under the tree until I hung that deer ornament!  I watched him try to sniff it then his mouth opened to bite it and I told him NO!  So he kept pushing it around with his nose. 

But so far, so good.  Nothing seems to be amiss. 

This year's Asshole Santa.  The bulb is perfectly fine, it just doesn't want to stay lit. 

The last 2 years, the title of Asshole belonged to the little Santa in front. 

The final product!

Randy says the tomato cage trees on each side of the door look like fangs.  

Maybe I should hang a wreath with lights inside the door so it has a nose!

So winter has finally gotten here.  

We've got a couple inches out there already.  

Luckily powdery snow is easy to shovel! 

Saturday night was my company Christmas party.  It was nice.  It's been held the past couple years at a fancy Italian restaurant.  The food is excellent & we always get a nice bottle of red wine with a beautiful carving on the bottle. 

This year they did a raffle & I won a gift card to yet another fancy Italian restaurant.  We've never been to this other place, so it'll be a nice date night. 

The evening's entertainment was a take on the 12 Days of Christmas, but instead it was the 12 Days of Rossisms.  Ross, the owner of the company, as all these phrases that he uses all the time, so our Director of Operations took 12 (and it was tough to help her choose just 12!) and turned it into the song and recruited a bunch of us to sing it.  It ended up being quite hilarious and he absolutely loved it!

 Wednesday I'm going shopping with Mom & the sisters at Bronners ("the Christmas Wonderland").  Linda is coming by with Mom at like 7:30am and we'll go get Laurie, then hopefully be there when they open at 9.  It'll be a fun trip, I think!  Besides the huge store - the grounds are beautiful to walk around.  Too bad it's supposed to be so darn cold! 

Anyhooooo, signing off for the evening! Angel insisted on going over to the boy friend's house so I told her to take clothes, since I didn't want her out driving in this mess.  He lives in a huge McMansion on the other side of town and is an only child, so I'm 110% certain she's got her own room over there.  And I know his mom thinks she's the greatest thing since sliced bread, so I'm certain she's safe over there.  Randy's over there comfortable on the bed with multiple cats, watching TV, so I think I'll join him!