A Thrill of Hope

here are some moments from my beautiful week of Christmas

hope you and your families had wonderful celebrations!

lots of festive headbands

helped put on a Christmas dinner party in Austin

I wore my favorite little black dress

and my headband from Oh Sweet Joy

brown sugar pecan baked brie

homemade turtle cheesecake

my first attempt at a cheesecake, so not bad!

Austin's Trail of Lights- one of my favorite things about Austin at Christmas! So glad they brought it back this year!

a very disproportional nativity scene

you probably can't tell but baby Jesus is like eight feet long

 at the end of the trail the downtown skyline is visible behind the trail of multicolored lights- it's quite a sight to behold

giant Christmas tree at the end

 I got to help put together OMBC's youth Christmas party too!

lots of love in the room :)

 we had a hilarious white elephant gift exchange

some ended up with awesome gifts

 others ended up with super scary Christmas clown figurines

And after some quick shopping in Austin, I headed to my parents' house to spend a whole week with my family! Mom hung all our lights inside the house this year and I loved it!

I attempted French Macarons for my grandma's cookie contest. They were semi-successful.

Lindsey didn't make cookies but DID make these amazing bowls out of chocolate.

I love my mom and sis. For real. 

(my dad too, but he wasn't in the truck with us here!)

We spent Saturday and Sunday at grandparents' homes- eating delicious food, playing board games, instigating trouble in our family white elephant gift exchanges, and totally forgetting to take any pictures. Oops! I had a great time hanging out with my family- it was restful and completely draining at the same time. 

We had our traditional Christmas Eve brunch and spent all day watching Christmas movies. In the evening, we sang Christmas carols around the piano and then opened our gifts. I am so incredibly blessed by my family. I loved these cute little money trees my parents put together for us- mine came complete with Starbucks and Panera Bread gift cards- for whatever had been missed :)

...and a cupcake apron!

and then we picnicked in the living room and watched It's A Wonderful Life

(ok so I'm the only one who ate on the floor- chipotle chicken enchiladas, avocado, chips, queso and salsa. so. good.)

Christmas is magical

For Christmas morning, we had planned to make some intensive, rise-all-day cinnamon rolls but after discovering we were out of yeast, my mom and I whipped up these cast iron skillet cinnamon rolls. They were super yummy!

Since we celebrated Christmas with our extended families early this year, we went out on Christmas! We bowled, mini- golfed, and played every arcade game there was :)

Then Lindsey and I spent the next day out for Starbucks and Les Mis. And we sobbed through the whole thing. :) 

It has been a beautiful break. I have a lot of thoughts swirling around, but most of all I am grateful. This was a plethora of family, food and fun after a pretty hard semester. I hope that your Christmas was just as magical, restful, and joyful.