Baby Stuff

It's crazy how much baby stuff I have so far! Yesterday, to try to motivate myself, I took everything out and spread it out on the couch. This is just the stuff I have at home, my mom and sisters have been buying stuff and keeping it at their house till I'm ready for it, which I cannot thank them enough for. As you can tell by the color scheme, we aren't sure yet if it's a boy or a girl, but hopefully we will know in the next couple of weeks. l  I have a lot of cleaning, purging, organizing, and redecorating to go before the baby gets here, and I'm trying to get most of it done before I go back to school in 12 days- YIKES winter break is too short!

Baking

My Hubby and I, between the two of us, have a very large family; so for the past three years we decided to give baked goods instead of "things" for Christmas presents. This year everyone got their own little bag (instead of larger boxes for couples / families) so no one had to share :) Each bag contained chocolate, pecan, and almond fudge, cookies and cream fudge, and little cocoon cookies. 

We also celebrate Christmas at three different houses, and this year we decided it would be nice to bring a dessert to each house! This is my grandmothers pound cake- it is the first time we managed to bake it correctly. We took it as an after breakfast snack at my mother in law's house. 

  I forgot to take a picture before we started to eat, but this is the Oreo crust, pudding pie, that my hubby made for our lunch dessert at my mom's house. (The crust was store bought, but the pudding was home made and really yummy)

Lastly, this is the white chocolate, hazelnut, pumpkin cheesecake I made for the dinner dessert at my hubby's father's family's Christmas dinner. It was a new recipe and delicious! It was fun to do all the baking, and I enjoyed spending the time with my husband, but I may not bake anything till next Christmas! 

Christmas Cheer

I love Christmas. It's taken awhile for me to love it- its hard to love the holiday when you were born the day before. I probably didn't appreciate the holiday until I moved out of my parents house. My mom is a Christmas nut, she starts playing Christmas music the moment Thanksgiving dinner is cleared from the table, she covers the house in decorations, and she loves buying presents. 

When I moved out I realized that life wasn't the same, and that if I wanted Christmas cheer in my home, that I would have to make it. This is my tree this year- its just a baby tree, but I was too worn out for much more. (This tree took me a good hour to decorate as it is! ). My hubby and I put up lights too! Those pictures will be coming soon (we ran out of lights, so we aren't really done yet). In addition to this, I am listening to a Christmas station on Pandora while I write my last two papers of the semester. Wish me luck I have two papers, two presentations, two exams, and two weeks left till I am off for break!