So This is Christmas...

Decking the halls, silent nights, home alone.  I love every aspect of Christmas.  I was chomping at the bit to be able to listen to Christmas music and it was all holiday tunes all the time after Thanksgiving. The entire season just makes me happy.  Regardless of how many hours I work (a lot, Christmas parties ya'll), or the crowds, there is peace and happiness in each and every day.  I love watching the generosity and truly taking time to reflect on the year and on the blessings we have.

Luckily Steve is a fan of the season as well and was willing to get out and make our house look festive!  He is an expert light hanger and get them pretty darn straight. We don't quite have enough lights for our new house, but it looked pretty good!

I think it is easy to let the hustle and bustle of the season take over and too easy to go into stress mode.  This year I really didn't stress. We got our shopping finished early and Steve may or may not have wrapped all of our gifts.  (Um, yeah, he is pretty amazing.) I was able to enjoy my fuzzy wuzzy feelings and really reflect on what the season is all about.  (Cue the voice of Linus and his Bethlehem monologue.)

Mornings

Mornings are kind of my favorite.  I know, hear me out.  I love to get up before the sun (I am making it worse aren't I?), read my bible (sometimes), go for a run and see the sun rise on a brand new day.  There is something refreshing about a fresh start and a clean slate.  (Well kind of clean.)

 I would love to say that mornings are always this pleasant and that my kids always wake up sunshiny but that would be a big fat giant lie.  The honest truth is, though I do love mornings, when the alarm goes off I don't want go get up. I don't want to read, I don't want to run (especially in the cold) and I don't want to get two kids ready for the day.  That moment, when my bed is warm and the sky is pitch black I just want to curl up and stay in my cocoon for the rest of the day.  I hit the snooze for a minimum of 30 minutes before dragging my self out of bed.

 Most mornings I feel just like this:

 But I drag my happy a*% out of bed and feel so much better for doing it.  Fresh, especially cold, air feels good in your lungs and there is a sick satisfaction at finishing a 6 mile run before 6:30 in the morning.  The kids are not always easy to get up and don't always like what we have for breakfast.  Ok, if we are being honest, I may cook breakfast one day a week.  That day they may or may not eat the turkey bacon, sausage and egg whites I make them.  (Umm, feed those kids real bacon you say?)

In fact, the happy dappy breakfast you saw above could be completely interrupted by a milk spill, which could lead to fits.  I also learned that milk drips thorough the slats of a farm table right onto the floor.  Clean up fail.

The alarm will go off, the fits (and battles of wits) will happen and my kids aren't always going to like what I feed them, but I am thankful for every day the alarm wakes me before a new dawn. A new dawn and chance to struggle through this motherhood thing and trying to be a wife who doesn't just put her pajamas on when she gets home and goes to bed by 9pm. (That second one I may or may not be failing miserably at.)

I will try to embrace each new dawn, even if the embrace is lackluster and with a lot of muttering and know that after running awhile, it will feel good.