All The Rest!

The rest of our trip was spent hanging with friends and family.

We got to visit with one of my best friends, Deanna and her hubby Kenny!

There was a little wrestling ...

Jeff took his sister Corey to ice skate...

While I visited with my girl, Evie ...

And her baby brother Ray ...

We celebrated New Years Eve with Cory and Halle' after hanging with Jeff's family ...

At some point (multiple times actually) the guys were caught planning the demise of a couple of squirrels. (remember that BB gun dad got for Christmas??) 

Dad and I ordered "lunch sticks" from Knudsens .. Which are donuts his brothers and sisters had at school growing up from this very bakery! 

Dad took me on a tour of the neighborhood of where he grew up...

Mmmmm

We ate "a" lunch stick .... God!!!! Mmmmm !! 

We taught some family about our friend Alex's breakfast shot ... Bacon, maple flavored Crown and OJ... Super fun!!

Mom, Emma and I tried out the good old karaoke at the VFW ... This was a night that was a little "too much fun". I had never done karaoke before!! So much fun! (Song: Leave The Pieces - The Wreckers)

I said goodbye to Jeff :( ... He flew home a few days before me..

We said goodbye to the tree .. And hello to a little bit of snow..

The day before I flew out I attended Jeff's Uncle Dave's funeral. I'm glad I went but it, of course was a very sad day. It was hard, because I didn't get to know him. He has had Alzheimer's the whole time I have been with Jeff so he hasn't been himself. His son shared a beautiful eulogy talking about all aspects of his dad's life and I was so grateful. In those few minutes I learned a little more about him.

I packed my (extremely heavy) bags... And hit the road ... Errr the sky! 

Detroit to Denver.

The mountains  were beautiful ...topped with snow ..

Southwest had free TV wifi streaming ... Awesome on my new iPad mini!!! (What Not To Wear)

Denver to LAX.... 

And a quick 3 hour + drive home .... What a long day ...

But I'm happy to be home with my hubby and pup!!!!! 

Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

 

[Source]

I hope everyone enjoyed their Christmas celebrations .. I know we did! 

Our Christmas morning always starts with my dad turning on all the lights, making sure everything looks nice and videoing all of it :) 

 We are spoiled rotten ... the tree and the presents are absolutley beautiful!

Among other things, Emma got a notepad and started doodling right away. I forgot how good she is.

Jimmy liked to make faces at me, while I was taking his picture. 

We relaxed and Uncle Frank and Aunt Sue came over to visit. 

 Dad got a BB gun and the boys all had a blast with it out in the backyard ...
"You'll shoot your eye out!"

Our house was trashed, we stayed in our PJs most of the day and enjoyed it.

 Over the holidays we have done a lot of driving back and forth between my parents and Jeff's parents house across town. I thought this pic would be appropriate since we drove by it at least twice a day. I love all the beautiful Christmas decorations Downtown!

Merry FIRST Christmas from the Willmans!

All the cousins with Grandpa at Ormsbus (Christmas celebration) 

Spending some quality time with Liam, digging for gold deblumes

He was so excited to play outside.

This guy loves his Uncle Jeff!

We enjoyed some time visiting at Jeff's Grandma's house ... they got out the Lego's and a good time was had by all! 

We love seeing and spending time with our nephew Liam and all of our out of town family! 

Just a little Christmas-magic-playing-with-my-camera shot for ya ;)

Jeff and Liam played with this castle, that he used to play with as a little boy. It was the cutest thing to watch.

Here's a quick pic of the cousins / siblings with Grandma before we took off.

A big part of this trip for us has been good ole' hockey! Jeff has been having a blast getting his PT in while on the ice. Ahh, the luxury of something they just don't seem to have in the desert! 

All My Favorite Things!

My first favorite thing .. Isn't a thing! He's a Jeff! He arrived safe and sound here in Michigan! I picked him up from the airport and we saw his family for a while.

But it was not until he had me stop at the closest Tim Hortons, haha. He is OBSESSED with their coffee.

Both of our families were to go to a friends Christmas party so we all headed over there. A beautiful meal was had and it was so nice to see so many friendly faces. Especially when you live somewhere different and you don't expect to recognize many people.

The next day was our FAVORITE THINGS PARTY :)

This year was our third annual and it went off without a hitch! What does that even mean anyways?? We'll... It was a blast! We had so many fun favorite things and it went so smoothly. We have it all down to a science.

Here are my favorite ladies:

I love the holidays and partied and celebrating ... Butt his party in particular. We started it instead of a cookie exchange because it is so hard to say no to 6 dozen cookies staring at you in the face... But it's turned into such a fun tradition. Now that I live out if town, it's such a great way to see all my girls while I'm visiting too!!

Here are our favorite things:

We had a blast. Lots of snacking, drinking and laughing going on at this party!!

These are the goodies I got to take away:

A garlic peel from Pampered Chref, Pine scented Yankee candle with cute matches and a MI necklace with a heart <3 

So now I have to start thinking of what I will bring to the party next year ... That's right, were doing it again next year!! Can't wait!! 

Christmas Tree Traditions

I'm so glad my mom waited for me to get here to decorate the tree. It would have been really strange to have come into her house with all the ornaments on the tree. I didn't really think about that until we were decorating it together. I'm big on traditions. ESPECIALLY at Christmas. 

We talked about our family ornaments, some older ones .. Even ones that my parents got before I was around! I love doing this. "Ohh remember ....!" It's so much fun. I love fun memories and stories. We listened to Christmas music and my a Dad fell asleep in his chair. Emma doesn't have the patience for it, so it's usually something just my mom and I do together. 

I wish my phones camera didn't stink so bad. 

A few days later my dad got out the ladder and put our star atop our tree. 

A family tradition is to use the starfish from my parents honeymoon. To me it means family and love and just that ... Tradition. It's so special to me. Jeff actually suggested that we get our own starfish and I teared up. I absolutely love that idea. And I think I fell a little more in love with him when he said it. I can't wait to make that happen.