4 Days Til Christmas...

Christmas time in our house means baking up a storm and Andrew spending a lot of time at work.  "Peak Season" can sometimes be the phrase of death in our house.  Once Thanksgiving hits, I always joke with Andrew that I will see him again after Christmas.  It really isn't terrible, it just makes for a few long nights.  As you can imagine at UPS this time of year, things get a little bit crazy.  Christmas time means more boxes to ship, and thanks to the increase in online shopping things get a little crazier every year.  I think they saw a pretty big jump in volume this year from the Cyber Monday sales.  Although, this year it seemed like not only was there Cyber Monday, there were also a lot of Black Friday deals online.  Why not shop from the comfort of your home at 9:00 on Thanksgiving night rather than stand outside freezing your butt off with hundreds of other lunatics.  I use that word with the utmost affection as Andrew and I have been out there the past couple of years. 

Last year, we stood in the checkout line at Best Buy for over two hours just to buy the Harry Potter boxed Blue Ray set.  Yes, two hours, you read that right.  But, I love that set and it was worth every minute.  After we made our purchases at Best Buy, we headed over the Kohls to score a few deals there as well.  It took us ten minutes to find what we wanted and at least an hour of standing in line.  I remember being a Target and Best Buy the year before that, but for the life of me can't remember what was so important I had to get up at 3:00 AM for.  I think that might be a bad sign that it probably wasn't worth it. 

In case you have been living under a rock the last week, it snowed... A LOT.  I think we got 13 inches of snow in town.  We lost a few rather large branches in the yard, but we count ourselves lucky since a few of our neighbors lost half of their trees.  None of our branches landed on the house or caused any damage.  Although, the large branch that feel in front of the house landed where Andrew usually parks his car, so it was a good thing he parked in the driveway that night.  Someone was watching out for us on that one.  There were a lot of people that lost power, and we also consider ourselves lucky to only have lost power for a short time overnight on Wednesday night.

This was Maya's first snow, and she loved it!  She wasn't sure what to think at first, but before long she was running around like a crazy woman in it.  She was batting at chunks of snow and burying her nose it it.  Of course, she also enjoys eating the snow.  Buddy can't get in and out fast enough, we think the cold is probably a lot for his old man bones. 

Those branches don't normally touch the deck

 

Buddy and Maya armed for the cold! 

Being snowed in meant time for me to spend baking.  Really I was planning to bake anyway, the snow was just a good excuse to not go anywhere.  I knocked out two batches of sugar cookies, sour cream chocolate chip cookies, cookies and cream fudge, Oreo balls, and peppermint brownies.  Andrew had a potluck at work today, so he also made a White Chocolate torte.  Andrew and I both took some treats to work to share.  We certainly don't need them sitting around the house!   


Today, I learned a valuable lesson.  For every time I may grumble about having a car payment again, I love my Rogue and I love sitting higher off the ground and having all wheel drive.  If the city considers what they have done plowing, I'm a little concerned.  But, I had minimal issues getting around thanks to my new set of wheels!