Victoria: Our Elf on the Shelf

We have this Elf. 

Her name is Victoria, and she comes to visit us from Thanksgiving until Christmas Eve. 

She loves to have adventures...

and she doesn't look like all the other elves, because

she's a special elf (a holiday moxie doll special elf). 

What kind of adventures does Victoria have? All kinds!

AND.. there are still 10 more days of adventures to have. I can't wait to see what she comes up with next!

Cabin Fever

We have been stuck at home for almost a week. 

It has been 5 days of fevers, coughs, whininess (is that a word??) and crying. Not me - them. (ok, maybe some nights it was me). Finally, today, both of the girls are starting to feel better. We still have a nasty cough, but I think we'll be able to taste freedom... urm.. I mean, go to school on Monday. 

In our boredom today and amidst playing our favorite Christmas movies over and over, I decided to play with the camera and something I'd seen online. Enjoy!

And I may have decided to change up the tree a little. Not massive changes, but I think I like the ribbon better this way. 

I seriously can't wait til Christmas now - and I haven't even started shopping yet. Or re-designed our cards so I can order them... speaking of, I better go do that.

Contrast ... and thankfulness

This week has definitely been filled with contrast. Ups and downs, ins and outs, back and forth. Things rescheduling, running late, being forgotten and then good things happening in their place instead...

I suppose most holiday weeks would be characterized like this. People are just naturally emotional, and any household with children, well, you can just count on about 45 days of straight-jacket inducing melt-downs and seasonally bipolar behavior - not just a week here and a week there. School is a perfectly heavenly place this time of year. Even when it takes me 30 minutes to walk there in this amazing weather to drop them off.

Even the weather lately has decided it wants a part in this bipolar mood shift stuff. Just yesterday, our windows were coated with this wonderful stuff:

Only to wake up this morning to beautiful, bright sunshine (cell phone pic). It was actually almost warm walking to school this morning. I wondered for a second if the weather man was wrong. 

He wasn't. It's been an off and on game all day of this great stuff, but this time with winds involved. Yay for holiday weeks and holiday season weather! (insert sarcasm here)

No matter what else this week brings, what ups, what downs, I know that I will be able to enjoy the next few days doing what I love most - cooking, spending time with my family, and then photographing the memories of other families, too. 

Bring it on, Thanksgiving. I'm ready to just be thankful.