‘Twas the season
Woosh! There went 2011! December turned out to be a crazy busy month. Not that I’m complaining. It was filled with wonderful things; I just couldn’t keep up. There was:
My birthday and Dan’s birthday - both on the 1st. We didn’t celebrate much, but we did enjoy this simple chocolate cake and a nice hike with Hazel and friends in Duke Forest.
The Girls on the Run Reindeer Romp - Hazel’s first 5k! It was a little more like an obstacle course than a running race trying to navigate the jogging stroller through a ton of young girls, but it was fun to get out there as a family and to support a good cause.
Our 7th annual cookie swap! I made these cookies with dried cranberries and white chocolate, which were very yummy, but my favorites were the pumpkin gingersnaps. Also, the roasted red pepper-cilantro-almond pesto I pulled from Dana Treat was a real hit. If you’ve got a food processor, and you’re looking for an easy, delicious appetizer, this is it!
For better (my waistline) or worse (my tastebuds), we were actually surprisingly successful in getting people to take cookies with them so that we had less than a dozen left at the end of the party. Maybe next year we shouldn’t push quite so hard! ;-)
Our 10th annual Raleigh Ringers holiday concert. It’s hard to believe we’re old enough to have done something for ten years here in North Carolina, but it’s our oldest holiday tradition. This year, we were lucky to enjoy the Raleigh Civic Symphony Chamber Orchestra as guest performers.
Several white elephant gift exchanges, including one at work that actually had good gifts, including this photo mobile, which I think will be an excellent dose of life in cubeland for 2012!
A very fun Hanukkah present from Uncle Aaron and Aunt Caroline.
Three fun filled days in Indiana with both Aunt Whitney and Aunt Kelsey in from the west coast.
Tons of delicious food, including Hazel’s new favorite - smoothies!
A festive Christmas Eve, catching up with the Gettelfinger family, which concluded with a raucous ukulele Christmas sing-along. It’s tough to get cousins from all over together at the same time, but it was so worth the effort!
Christmas morning with gifts a plenty, and lots of love to go around.
Continued Christmas celebrations!
A chili supper, where my Cincinnati chili went up against my aunt Jan’s white chili, and everyone was declared the winner with full bellies all around!
A fun trip to Cincinnati, including a chance to see old friends, check out the Children’s Museum - which might possibly be the craziest place to go at the end of everyone’s winter break, but was still loads of fun and yielded this cute little video.
Also, we got to hang out on the top floor of the Garfield Suites Hotel in a suite that was just about as big as our house and had an awesome view of Cincinnati!
A long, but uneventful drive home, where Hazel thankfully slept several hours more than she usually does. Heck, we were all a little tired after such a whirlwind month!
More photos in my Christmas Flickr set.
