Mele Kalikimaka- it means we hope you come and visit soon ; )

This year Christmas was full of several new traditions for John and I, and many fewer miles traveled. It’s crazy how we have come to miss those long hours in the car driving between Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not the traffic we miss (we get more than enough of that here) we miss the adventure of the open road, new music, and plenty of time to just drive and talk.

This was our second Christmas as a married couple, but the first one where we really had money to get each other gifts. It’s not really about the things we got or the money we spent, but more about being able to treat each other with those gifts.

It’s been such a blessing to have two incomes again. (In our first year of marriage we only both had an income for 3.5 months.) Aside from what we got for each other and our immediate families we did send out a few small packages to friends. Here’s my little Christmas elf working hard on the ornaments we made and sent out. 

 In our efforts to get ourselves into the Christmas Spirit when its sunny and 80 degrees outside we decided to go with a real tree this year. With the help of some of my favorite DIY blogs we outfitted the tree with all homemade ornaments. Our living room has taken on a monochromatic blue scheme so we kept the tree to shades of blue and white.

 It was such a relief to finally get all of the gifts packed up and ready to be mailed!

Aside from gifts, we sent out a Christmas card that John designed:

 Well wouldn’t ya know after I came home and showed the boy that cool O’clock watch I found a few weeks back he was just as thrilled about them as I was… so thrilled in fact, that he bought us both a few. (sort of a Christmas present to ourselves, from ourselves?)

Just in case you were wondering- when you are supposed to be taking pictures like this:

and instead take a picture like this:

 the appropriate reaction will most likely be something like this:

Followed by a swift kick in the pants!

In case we haven’t overloaded you with pictures this post, we’ll leave you with our newest and most enjoyable holiday tradition. Christmas Eve homemade sushi!

 So we got a little carried away with all the rolls we wanted to make… good news is leftover sushi is just as good the next day!

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For those of you that stayed with us, here’s a few sneak peek pics of our apartment, and some proof that I’m becoming fully domesticated :)