Christmas Wrap up

Merry Christmas! Oh it's been a nice holiday. Busy. But nice.

First off, I had been working for days on end. Christmas day was my first full day off in a week, and my next full day off will be January 1. So out of 14 days, I will have only 2 full days off. Ugh. It's a lot of work, but I've scheduled some me time for the first day or two of the new year. And I plan on not doing anything that I don't want to do.

Secondly, my holiday was amazing. It's the first time in several years that I had Christmas off! My work schedule is an 8 day rotating schedule, and it just happened to work out that I was scheduled to work most holidays. But I've finally come into the party of my schedule cycle where I get some of the holidays off. And it's been nice to enjoy the time with my family.

Holidays make me miss my brother and my sister-in-law. I got to talk to Nick on Christmas when he called to say hi, but it's not the same without them here. I look forward to the day when they can move back to NH and we can all be a close family again. They of course enjoyed their gifts that Ben and I had sent them. It was great to hear that they arrived and were still in good condition. I always get nervous about shipping stuff, especially with videos/stories like this one!

I worked Christmas Eve day, so after I had gotten out of work, I went home, changed and then Ben and I went to my mother's for our Christmas with her. We also brought all the professional wedding pictures so that her and Darla could see them. It was a fun night.

Christmas morning we got up and headed to my parents (Dad and my stepmom) for Christmas brunch and presents with them. My aunts and grandmother had come over as well, it was a morning full of laughs as that is typical for our family.

Christmas evening we went to Ben's mom's for dinner and presents with her. Again, it was great to see all of our families. And Ben and I were both happy that we were able to work it out. It's not easy to coordinate all those visits! Especially with my schedule.

We got home Christmas night and had our own Christmas. Very low key, as we both were just so tired from the days events and all of the traveling.

For those of you who may not know, I live in New Hampshire, that's in New England. We get snow. But this year, has been VERY mild, and such is the case, we didn't have snow on the ground for Christmas. There were hit or miss snow flurries, but nothing that stuck. When we went to Ben's mom's she had snow on the ground! Plus one for Maine! It definitely made us both feel a bit more "Christmassy" now that there was snow on the ground, as we were getting ready to leave it had started lightly snowing again. It was so lovely. Made my Christmas!

It was an exhausting day of travel, and I was so tired from all of the events. It was nice to have Monday day off so I could take it easy. We had breakfast with my cousin and his wife, I haven't seen them in years, so it was great to see them. But then it was back to home and napping before work that night.

It was great to see all of our families, but I do wish that we had more down time. I don't care to always be on the go. I am hopeful that next year we can combine some trips and condense it down. I still want the holidays to be enjoyable for me too!

My presents ranged from practical to very thoughtful and personal. They were all perfect to me, even though I didn't ask for much. All of our parents helped us out with the wedding so we weren't expecting anything really. 

Of note, this is the first holiday season where I didn't get sick. I chalk that up largely to me not being as active in the Toy Bank program that I ran for several years. In years past, I was doing so much work that I would get run down and ultimately get sick from not taking care of myself. So after a lot of thought I stepped down from managing the town's toy bank, but in the same breath I guess you could say I got a promotion of sorts. I went from managing the town's toy bank to the Seacoast wide toy bank. Which mainly I do a lot of the public relations, website and facebook stuff for. I coordinate a lot of the seacoast wide efforts and stay away from the individual towns. I enjoy the work, it gives me a wonderful sense of fulfillment and it's the truly a reason for the season for me. To take care of your fellow man.

And if you were wondering what I got Ben... tools. It's what he wanted and something I know he'll be able to put to good use. Hopefully soon one day.

I am so bummed, I forgot my camera, so I don't have any pictures from Christmas. It would have been so nice to share with you all, but I'm sorry.  I am a bad blogger.

So that is my Christmas wrap up! hopefully Santa brought you everything you had hoped for. And that you were able to spend time with your family and loved ones.