January=No Eating Out Month

Dave and I already have a tight budget when it comes to eating out, and we've noticed a considerable difference in our finances and our health because of it. Before Dave decided to go back to school, we were spending way too much money grabbing a quick bite to eat because we were too tired and too busy to devote the energy to making a healthier, less expensive meal at home.

These days, we have fun finding new recipes to try, and I have fun knowing that we're saving a lot of dough by eating in.

Still, it's always good to challenge yourself, so we're going to try our best to go the entire month of January without eating out. This will be tough for us, especially when it comes to feeling the pain when our coworkers go out during the lunch hour or after work and we really want to join in the fun. I think we can come up with some creative ways to hang out with our friends this month without splurging on food and drinks.

Tomorrow night is our traditional New Year's Eve dinner at Texas Roadhouse, and then it's "see ya later" to restaurants until February 1.

The In-Between

Dave and I returned home on Saturday afternoon, and I spent the next 2 1/2 days sleeping away a cold that arrived along with Christmas Eve. A snowstorm on Saturday kept us inside our warm apartment, and we spent a lazy Sunday in our pj's all day long because we didn't feel like doing much else. It was quite the contrast to the days leading up to Christmas.

I've never really been a fan of the in-between, the days following the excitement of Christmas and leading up to the New Year. To me, New Year's Eve paled in comparison to all the fun we'd had the week before. This year, in fact, I keep forgetting that we have another holiday to celebrate at the end of the week.

Instead of being sad about another Christmas come and gone now that we're in the in-between, I've been enjoying the unique time we have in this week. Dave still has time off from work, and although I'm working a few days this week, I'm enjoying the quiet at an office where at least half of my coworkers are off for the week. Our evenings have been more relaxed, too, with simpler meals and movie nights.

We'll have some celebrating to do when we welcome 2010 at the end of the week, but for now, I'm celebrating the in-between.

12 Days of Christmas-Day 12

After a lot of rain on Christmas Eve, the snow began to fall just as we began to open presents this afternoon. I was feeling a bit under the weather with a cold, so I didn't take any pictures, but below are some that my mom took. Enjoy!

My dad admiring his lint catcher for the dryer, and Nate cheesing for the camera as Kim looks on

Nate and Kim gave us National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and The Dark Knight.

After opening presents and eating some great dessert, we settled in downstairs to watch Christmas Vacation and play games.

12 Days of Christmas--Day 11

Merry Christmas Eve from the Gwynnes! We've had a lovely day so far, sleeping in, opening presents from each other this morning, eating our traditional Christmas Eve lunch at Culver's, and attending a great Christmas service at a local church.

After church, we headed down to my parents' house to spend the evening with them and exchange presents. Tomorrow, we'll get together with my aunt and uncle and my brother and sister-in-law for even more gift giving.

I'm pretty thrilled with what I've received so far. I usually forget what I've given for gift suggestions, so it's always fun to open presents. I'm looking forward to breaking in my copy of the Pioneer Woman's cookbook!

Here's a picture of the four of us from tonight. I told Dave to wear green, but I promise I didn't share that with anyone else. I guess you could say great minds think alike!

12 Days of Christmas--Day 10

Oh, wintry weather, you sure threw us a curveball this Christmas. We often expect snow from you this time of year, but it feels as if we live down south with all this freezing rain and sleet.

You've changed our plans of going to our church's Christmas service tonight and forced us to stay inside. But don't you worry, we've made plans to attend another church service tomorrow--as long as you don't stick around too long.

You may have changed our plans, but you didn't ruin our fun. We're just about ready to watch Frosty the Snowman and sip hot chocolate with marshmallows.

So do whatever you want, wintry weather. Tonight, I'll just enjoy being inside with my husband, relaxing as we anticipate the arrival of Christmas Eve.

12 Days of Christmas--Day 9

Tonight was the designated time to wrap all the Christmas presents. Hooray! I've had the habit of waiting until Christmas Eve to do this task. (For a couple of years, I held up the present opening because I was still wrapping gifts!) It's gotten better now that I'm out of college and have more than 2 or 3 days to buy and wrap all the gifts.

12 Days of Christmas--Day 8

For three years now, my female coworkers and I have gathered to watch The Snowman and celebrate the holidays. The party has been held at my friend Elizabeth's place before, but since she moved farther away this year, we held it at our apartment. In addition to watching The Snowman, we watched Father Christmas, A Charlie Brown Christmas, and The Muppets' A Christmas Carol.

And that wasn't all. We ate a delicious dinner of taco soup and made and decorated sugar cookies for dessert. It was a fun, yummy night. I'm so grateful for the friends I've made at work over the last five years.

Here's the group. I am blessed to work with people who are not only coworkers but friends.

The cookie-making process was messy, but a lot of fun.

Elizabeth decorating her sugar cookies

12 Days of Christmas--Day 7

See this stack of boxes? This stack represents hours of work put into making the contents inside. I will be handing out these boxes to some special friends at work tomorrow.


Once each friend lifts the cover and pulls back the white tissue paper, she will find one of these hidden inside.

I haven't done needlework since grade school, but this year I restarted this hobby, and it found its way into my gift giving this Christmas. I found the idea for this gift on Needle in a Haystack and thought I'd give it a try. It turned out to be a fun, relaxing activity, and I'm glad I can share the finished products with some of the special people in my life.

12 Days of Christmas--Day 6

We did some Christmas-y activities today, such as stopping at Walmart for gift-wrapping supplies and attending my old church's special Christmas service, but I didn't take any pictures of those events. (It's a shame, too. I know you would have been thrilled with pics of Walmart shopping trips. Maybe next time.) Anyway, since I don't have any "activity" pictures for you, I thought I'd share some of our Christmas decorations from around the apartment.

Remember how I'd mentioned that Dave and I love penguins? Well, my parents gave Dave this fun decoration a couple of years ago. It plays "Baby, It's Cold Outside," and the penguins dance around. If I can figure out how to upload video on here, I may post a video of it, because it really is cute.


Here are our stockings. I loved the classy silver "Joy" formation that makes up the hangars when I spotted them in the Christmas clearance pile at Target two years ago. For now, it's perfect. I just wonder what we'll do in the future if we have more than one child.
One of the benefits of marriage is gaining new traditions for holidays, and below is a new one for me. Although I grew up with the tradition of opening an advent calendar most years, my experience involved using the same advent calendar each year, which my mom would sometimes tape shut again so we could re-use it. (She was earth friendly when "being green" was only associated with Kermit the Frog.) Dave, on the other hand, grew up with advent calendars that contained chocolate in them! Last year, his mum sent over a couple of advent calendars, and this year, we managed to snag a couple from Dominick's. I always forget to check mine, so I end up with about 3 or 4 chocolates when I finally remember and catch up.
Hooray for Christmas wreaths, and hooray for wreaths that can stay up the rest of the winter! I searched high and low for a nice wreath and found this one last year. It's also a good way of directing people to our apartment.

12 Days of Christmas--Day 5

It's a Wonderful Life is one of my favorite Christmas movies. Each time I watch it with my family, we end up quoting most of the lines ("I wish I had a million dollars. Hot dog!") and singing along with George and Mary as they walk home from the school dance ("Aaaaaand dance by the light of the moooooon."). One of the local movie theaters shows the film on the big screen every year, and this year, it worked out for me to go with some friends. The woman who played little Zuzu was at the movie theater and spoke a bit before the film began. I'm hoping a trip to the theater to see It's a Wonderful Life becomes a Christmas tradition.

The theater we saw the movie in had a huge poster on the wall for the film. It was pretty dark when I tried to take the picture, so the quality isn't the best. Sorry about that.

Me and one of my best friends from college, Kara. I don't get to see my former roommate enough, so it's great when we can get together and catch up.

Mandy, Julie, and me. These two girls have been friends of mine since I graduated from college and got involved in the college ministry at my church back home. Now that Dave and I have moved on to another church, I miss seeing these girls every week at church activities.
BTW--Do you see that giant tub of popcorn? They only offered one size, so I ordered it all for myself. I barely made a dent!

12 Days of Christmas--Day 4

This year, my employer held a Christmas brunch for its staff. Egg Harbor Cafe, one of my favorite restaurants, catered the event. As always, the food was delicious! We had cinnamon roll French toast, cheesy hashbrowns, crepes, scrambled eggs, sausage, bacon, fresh fruit, and yogurt. My word, it was good!

When we were done eating, there was a trivia game. Our table was on fire, and most of us won a prize. Below are me and Leanne with the ornaments we'd won.


Here are my knitting buddies, Sarah and Sarah. These are the girls who spend the Monday lunch hour with me at Starbucks, knitting or cross-stitching, or any other type of needlework we're attempting to do.

Here's Erin and Elizabeth. There was a contest for whoever was dressed in the most festive outfit, and Elizabeth really wanted to win. She was one of the two winners. Yay!

Stephanie, Leanne, and me. I've known these girls since I started at the company five years ago.
After brunch and the trivia game, we had the privilege of watching an exclusive screening of a new video series the company is producing. It was really good! All in all, this was probably my favorite Christmas party since I started working at the company.

12 Days of Christmas--Day 3

Today may not be considered a traditional Christmas post, but I'm going to count it because I was gifted with something I've wanted for a while but never thought I'd get.

Ever since I was drawn into an infomercial about a steam cleaner for your floors, I've been secretly wishing I could get one. I couldn't justify spending that much money for something that would replace the mop and bucket I already owned, so the effort to get one was placed on the back burner.

A few weeks ago, my coworker had one of these in her office:


I asked her what it was for, and she told me she'd found it at the dumpster of her apartment complex, brought it in to make sure it worked, and took it to work to give to another woman in our department. Yesterday, when I saw that the Euro Pro Shark was still standing in her office, I asked if the other woman still wanted it. That's when I heard the answer that made my day: "Well, I have another one I found in the dumpster to give to her, so you may have this one." Yippee!

I still have to go out and buy the pads for the bottom, but I can't wait to give this a try. From what I've read, this is one of the top-rated steam cleaners. And I got it for FREE! It usually retails for $80, so I got a great deal.

Thanks, Joan, for giving me an early Christmas present.

12 Days of Christmas--Day 2

When we buy a place and have more room, I'd love to have a few trees scattered around the house with different themes, but for now our lone tree, with a hodgepodge of ornaments that carry plenty of wonderful memories, is just perfect. Here are a few of my favorites:

Dave and I like penguins, so a couple of years ago, I picked up a few of these penguin ornaments. Isn't he the cutest, most Christmas-y penguin you've ever seen?

I love to add a new ornament each year, so this was the one we bought last year on our honeymoon. We'd gone to Dutch Village in Holland, Michigan, one day, and I thought this kissing Dutch couple was a good pick for our tree. I also like that it's a shout-out to my heritage.

We received this ornament as a gift last year, but this is the first year it's being displayed. The picture was taken at my company's Christmas party last year. I would've loved to put a picture of us from Christmas Day, but I don't think we took any of just us! That will have to be remedied this year.
I'm pretty sure this little guy is my favorite ornament this year, even though he's made a couple of appearances before. When I was first in Edinburgh in 2006, I found the cutest Christmas shop just down the street from the castle. Of course, when I was back in the city in 2007, I insisted Dave and I visit that shop again, and this is the treasure I found. I love that it has the city and year on it so I'll always remember where I found my hedgehog friend.

12 Days of Christmas--Day 1

Welcome to the first day of our 12 days of Christmas. From now through Christmas Day, we'll be posting something about our Christmas celebrations this year, whether that's Christmas decorations or fun things we're doing this season. Today, we're showcasing our Christmas tree. Enjoy!

I love turning off all the lights except for the Christmas tree and enjoying its glow. The pic below is how I'd like our living room to look all the time, with the white lights giving off a magical glow.

Here's what our tree looks like otherwise. Last year, I had a Christmas tree full of red, white, and blue. This year, we went out and bought some white lights, and I stuck with my silver and red garland. I'm really happy with the way it turned out this year.

I looked and looked last year for a nice tree skirt but couldn't find anything suitable once everything had been picked over in the clearance sales. This year, most tree skirts I found cost at least $30. Crazy! Little did I know the perfect skirt was right in our living room. I used this tartan blanket Dave gave me for Christmas a couple of years ago, and it turned out great.
Ah, my lovely angel. This tree topper is at least 6 years old, and this year she finally decided that her light would burn out. I still think the angel is a nice way to top the tree, but I'm already planning to look for a replacement for next year's tree once the clearance sales begin.
The main feature of our ornaments are silver balls like this one. I like how they bring the tree's theme together and how they reflect the lights (or the person taking the picture). You'll see more of our ornaments tomorrow.