i'm singing "frosty the snowman" in my head:)

they stole the show.

that's all there is to tell.

also,

it took me 2 hours to coax her out of her costume.

happiest little snowman i've ever seen.

deck the halls with flying ornaments! fa la la la la la la la laaaaaaa!

after a week of begging,

they found a pack of ornaments i was hiding in the coat closet

and took matters into their own hands.

i was just so happy they were doing it and not me.

and for once i didn't even care where they hung them on the tree.

who am i, and where is emily?

it was so cute.

the christmas music was playing,

the kids were laughing and having a ball.

i was feeling so proud of our little brood, and our happy little festive home.

until max and brennan started fighting about who got to put on the last ornament,

and it ended with max throwing it at brennan's face.

at which point i laughed a little bit inside b/c the shocked look on brennan's face was funny.

it was just plain funny.

and then was i was putting max in timeout,

and letting brennan put a sticker on his sticker chart,

chase quietly walked around the tree taking all of the ornaments

and their little hangers off of the tree.

#naughtylist

man does our tree smell amazing though:)

memoriesssssssss!

next on the list: THE TRAIN.

pray for us.

{insert crying laughing emoji face here. like 7 times.}

devastation at its finest

finding out you only get to eat one advent calendar chocolate a day.

TRAGIC.

brennan is convinced that aunt kelsey made them,

and declared that she was a "really great chocolate maker, 

and how did she know how to make them in christmas shapes?"

childhood. truly life's greatest season.

apology accepted.

close enough!

i call this mother nature's way of giving me an apology 

for ornery, cranky children all day on my birthday yesterday.

indeed,

quite the apology.

you're forgiven universe;)

and in the words of brennan,

"i apology accept you."

glory be,

the 1st snow of the year is always the very best.

mostly because you know it will be

THE ONLY

time of the entire snow season

where the 20 minutes it takes to get them dressed

to go out in the snow

will be totally

and completely

worth it.

because the thrill of the flakes is just so brand new.

like they've never played in it before in their entire lives.

and as i walked through the fresh half foot of snow around the back with max,

i couldn't imagine ever being sick of it snowing.

{except may is always so far away when it's januray.}

but for now,

we will just relish in the newness of it.

the official changing of the guards.

where fall hands its torch over to father christmas,

and the christmas lights on our house start to glow through blankets of snow.

like something out of a story book you've always dreamed of living in.

they maxed out at just over an hour today.

the kids in the snow.

praise the heavens above:)

it's Christmastime!

 raising snow lovers one snowy day at a time over here.

OH HAPPY DAY:)

the shiek who didn't like fog. {it's dec 2nd guys}

december 2, 1982

things to note:

1. my chubby little newborn face. squish.

2. my dad's fro and my mom's bangs. adorable.

3. my mom's homemade pink blanket, 

and the bunting outfit they brought me home in.

4. that baby basket i wish she still had.

5. grandma max.

6. my dad in his suit coat. what a classy guy.

...

see cute grandma max in her yellow coat?

that's makenzie maxine's namesake.

what a gem, that grandma max!

my mom was 11 days overdo,

and grandma max was there to see my aunt mary, 

who was supposed to be flying into san francisco the day before.

see, 

aunt mary was a stewardess for a saudi arabian shiek back then,

and he wanted to go to san francisco.

so grandma max flew out to cal-i-for-nigh-ayyyyy all the way from iowa

to meet up with her baby mary.

that was until the shiek heard it was foggy in san francisco.

as the story goes,

he changed his mind the minute he heard the fog had rolled in.

because in fact, 

a FOGGY san fransisco was not where he wanted to go.

little did he know,

a foggy san francisco is actually pretty great.

so with spirits a little down, having missed aunt mary's arrival,

my grandma max talked my very overdo mother into a glass of wine with lunch.

to relax you know,

which my mother still attributes to putting her into labor later that night.

or early the next morning,

whichever.

i only have one extra toe from it.

so on this birthday day of mine,

i'd like to say,

thanks mom,

for having me.

especially for having me early in december,

because as a kid, 

everyone knew you didn't want your birthday too close to christmas.

so here's to december 2nd

being my favorite day on the calendar.

or clock.

because OH how i used to love to look at the numbers 12-2 

 together on my little white alarm clock!

even if i don't always get my wish for snow.

{except for that ONE year when i was a kid, and i did. magic.}

100 lights short {actually it was too many}

now all we need 

is 

some 

SNOW!

:)

{i wish i may, i wish i might,

have this wish i wish tonight!!!}

note to self:

don't do the lights "heavy" at the bottom

because you'll end up a foot and a half short on lights at the top.

and by then home depot will have already closed

and you won't want to wait until monday to buy more

because it's saturday

and monday is about a million years away 

on saturday night when you're putting up the lights on your tree.

and let's be honest,

even if i did shop on sunday,

that still would have been about 12 hours too many to wait to fix this.

so to fix it,

you'll have to take down two strands of 600 lights and start over again.

and you can't just take them down

because you have to wrap them up or they'll get all tangled.

you know this because you will have already tried once to take them down without wrapping them back up,

and you will have failed.

miserably.

so finally after you've taken them all down,

WRAPPED them all up again,

and put them up for the second time,

you'll finally get it right.

except you'll have 100 lights leftover to weave back down the bottom.

how does that even happen?

i don't know.

BUT

i do know

that it's better to have some left over

than to come up short.

"well crap" 

was what i texted with the picture of my almost done tree to my parents

and siblings and linsey.

there was nothing else left to say.

and then there was nothing else left to do but get to work.

there's no other room i want to be in but the big room from now until new year's.

with twinkling all a'glow!

the most wonderful time of the year:)

"well crap"