December

 As i'm writing this, 11 days into January, the kids still haven't returned to school.  January has certainly started with a bang. We got quite the ice storm that has made a ton of roads undriveable and surrounding counties are without water.  

December was pretty awesome though, so I'll just go back to that.

Arya is taking chorus this year and they are much more serious about it down here.  They have uniforms and have to take singing tests for grades.  She had her first concert and it was amazing!

We, of course, decorated for Christmas.  I somehow completely forgot to get pics of the kids decorating the tree, but honestly, the older they get, the less of a big thing it is.  Everyone's favorite addition this year was some old movie poster prints.

We decide every year as a family what we're going to choose for the current year's new ornament.  This year, everyone picked our summer fishing trip as the highlight memory, so we went with a fishing ornament.

We had a Christmas cookie making and chestnuts night.  Our December traditions really our my favorite.

Caleb had to work on Christmas eve this year so we celebrated and did all our traditions a day early.  The kids open their stockings that evening.

And then we open our special box of chocolates and turn on White Christmas.  Caleb and I have had this tradition for over 10 years now, but it's even better with the kids being old enough to enjoy with us and they now both love the movie as well.

And then Christmas Eve Caleb had to head into work, but I got the awesome opportunity to do a ride along with him.  It was pretty special getting to spend what turned into Christmas morning with him and watch him do his job.  He is amazing at it!

We got home early Christmas morning and woke the kids up to open presents.  

It's not the crazy morning of ripping through toys like it used to be, but I really really enjoyed our Christmas this year.

I'm annoyed that this picture decided to be mostly blurry for no reason, but we went with filets for our Christmas dinner this year and we all were very happy with the decision.

And then a few days after that, sickness decided to join our household and hasn't left.  It's been a really rough few weeks.  We did our best to enjoy our New Year's Eve.

Here's to hoping January finishes better than it's started.

October/November

 October started with redecorating some parts of the house.  We have been really enjoying the changes.  We snagged this vintage buffet and it's been I think my favorite part of the redo.

Someone in this house is especially enjoying the new rug and couches

The kids got crazy amounts of candy this year for Halloween.  Casen went out on his own with friends so I wasn't able to grab a costume picture.  Arya forgot the costume she was supposed to wear at school, so her and her friend improvised.

The beginning of November, Caleb and I were able to sneak away on a date night.  

When we saw A Day to Remember was playing about an hour away it was a no brainer.  We've been listening to their music for 20 years now, which is insane to think about.

Caleb ended up snagging really close seats and it was a perfect evening.

And then to finish off the month, we made the extremely last minute decision to head to New York for Thanksgiving.  It's the first time Caleb's been off for the holiday in awhile.  We actually haven't been able to go home for Thanksgiving since I was pregnant with Casen, which was 15 years ago now.  We booked an airbnb and crossed our fingers that our car sick reactive dog wouldn't make this impossible.

I was absolutely horrible at grabbing pictures, but thankfully got a few sent my way.  So, thanks again if you were able to take pictures of this trip!

Still had to squeeze in some annual pie making at the airbnb.

Casen got to be part of a successful first hunting trip.

We had everyone together on my side of the family, I think for the first time ever. That makes 20 people in total.

And we got to spend some time with Caleb's family too.  I really wish I would've taken more pictures there, but I am thankful for the time we had.

Bowzer ended up being a rockstar traveler, which we were so thankful for.  Caleb drove on very little sleep and went right from a 12 hour car ride to same day back to a full work week of midnights.  I'm thankful he puts up with my crazy ideas, but we will be staying in for a quiet family Christmas this year for sure :)

Thanks to all the family who hosted us this year and rolled with our last minute plans!

September

 September started the loveliness of fall

And then Caleb won the coolest dad award, although I feel like he always wins that

He let the kids skip school and take them on a little road trip to North Carolina to see one of their favorite bands, Lorna Shore.

If you know our family, you know Halloween is where it's at for us, so we had to add something fun to the porch.

And then we ended the month completely emptying the living room so we could bring in all the new stuff.  

August

 August started out really really busy.  Unfortunately, Caleb was the busiest.  Most unfortunate, his really busy is usually because he has extra police officer funerals to attend that month.  

We're so proud of him.

On the 14th, Caleb and I celebrated our 15 year anniversary.  We, of course, went to Red Salt.  We also are getting to make a quick trip in November to go to an ADTR concert.  Since we've been listening to them since we first started dating, it will the perfect way to celebrate.

And then, I'm not sure how, but our summer was already over and the kids started school mid August.

Casen is in 9th grade, his first year of high school.   Arya is now in 6th grade, her first year of middle school.  They both are getting to take some really fun classes this year and are doing amazing.

And once school started, the picture taking was kind of forgotten and that wraps up the month.

July

 July was such a fun month!

As I'm writing this, the kids are officially back at school.  The summer literally flew by and none of us were ready for it to end.

We taught Bowzer hide and seek.  It is the cutest thing to watch him wait for the kids to hide and run around like crazy looking for them.

Mid July Caleb was able to get a tour off.  Unfortunately, he ended up having court basically every day he was able to get off from regular work so we weren't able to go anywhere on vacation.  We made the absolute best of it, though and created a vacation bucket list.  We kind of just listed a bunch of things as a family hoping to be able to cross off a few, but we surprisingly got to check off every single one.  I really think we may end up making this a permanent part of our summers.

One of them was go out to a fancy restaurant.  We got all dressed up and headed to the Melting Pot.

We also had play a new board game.  We got Hues and Cues and it was a big hit. We highly highly recommend if you've never played.

Family move night we got to watch the Hunger Games with the kids because now the entire house has read the books.  We also had a brownie sundae night, went to a new park and had a picnic, and the kids requested that they make dinner one night.  We all got to hang out together making chicken parm and it was really fun.

Caleb and I got to sneak away to Williamsburg for some back to school shopping and stopped at our absolute favorite restaurant we haven't been able to get to in almost 5 years.

We were not ready for the month of July to be over!