hi and bye, christmas!

Millie's first Christmas(es) have come and gone...a lot more quickly than I would have liked, to be honest! And then some more days came and went and now it's practically next Christmas, so I guess I'll get around to blogging about it. Maybe.

We spent Christmas (and the surrounding days) with my family in Augusta. It was relaxing and fun and exactly the break I needed from regular life. We got to spend time with both of Millie's cousins (on that side) and all of my siblings and it was truly just perfect. There were presents and FOOD and naps and church and FOOD and friends and my dear mother even introduced us to a little something called Fireball Whisky and...yeah. My mom. Bless her. (Not gonna lie though, it was good.)

Lucky for you, I didn't get that many pictures. But we did get a few sad attempts at family pictures on Christmas morning.

Millie didn't really understand Christmas this year-- the true meaning or ANY meaning, ha. She wasn't even overly impressed with playing with wrapping paper or boxes. But it was still awesome times infinity having her there.

Carley agrees- Millie is the best! And the most kissable!

I got matching PJ pants for the ladies since (one more time!) being twinsies is the best way to show you love someone. We all have twinsie pants, so we all love each other!

My SIL Emily, my mom, me, my sister Sarah

 You may notice that my sister cut bangs so that she could look even more like me. And it's not just a coincidence that hers look like mine. For one thing, she's the one that cuts my hair...so she knows exactly how to make bangs like mine. And then she confessed that when she was trying to figure out something new to do with her hair, she just pulled up one of my pictures from Facebook and copied my bangs exactly. Her philosophy was that if that style of bangs looked good on me, they'd look good on her. And I agree! But what's funny is that when I walked in my parents' house for the first time on Christmas eve and she was sitting across the room, I had the WEIRDEST first (tiny, fleeting, ridiculous) thought/out-of-body-experience- I was like but I'm over here! How am I sitting over there, too?? OH IT'S SARAH, DUH. It was weird, like she stole my identity or something. 

Also, we were both wearing black and white striped shirts at the time and BOTH of our husbands (on separate occasions) confused us and went for the wrong sister/wife (SISTER WIVES!!! YESSSS!!!).

Anyway, sorry. I'm done talking about how awesome it is that my sister wants to be THE MOST TWINSIE EVER WITH ME.

Now I'll talk about how we are equally weird and decided that the best thing to do (besides being twins, obvs) was to take a big ol' family bubble bath with the babies on Christmas night. 

Now I'm going to do my part to keep us looking twinny and make my teeth blindingly white like hers...

Please check out that look Laney is giving Millie. Ummmm...you've got some bubbles on you, cuz.

Our post-Christmas days were spent hanging out, watching as much of the Harry Potter marathon on ABC Family as possible, going on lots of walks, and eating. Sadly, we didn't bust out the Fireball Whisky again...much to my mom's dismay, I'm sure.

Mommy can't be bothered to put a bib on her little slobber monster!

 Millie did bust out her unicorn shirt, though, because she is fabulous like that.

I guess her mom is boring or something?

On Saturday Matt and I ran out to a few stores and found ourselves overcome with hunger. We decided to stop and try a Turkish restaurant we've never been to before. You could opt to sit at a regular table or A TINY TABLE CLOSE TO THE FLOOR WHERE YOU SIT ON CUSHIONS!!!!!!!!!!!! Guess which one I picked.

Ding ding ding, tiny floor table! I mean...why sit in a normal chair when you can lounge? Exactly. The food was awesome, but mainly I got to sit on the floor and it was spectacular. There were also travel brochures for Turkey and now I have a serious burning desire to plan a trip to Turkey. It seems like all you do is lounge around in hot springs and eat yummy food at tiny tables...so basically, see ya there next summer. Has anyone actually visited Turkey before? Is it as fabulous as I'm imagining? Do you think Millie would like it? Keep in mind how much she loves baths...I feel like six hours a day of hot springs would be right up her alley.

On Sunday we returned back to Athens and real life. We met some of my favorite people on earth (friends from high school) for dinner in a nearby town and Millie proceeded to have her first night of LOSING HER MIND NONSTOP AND CAUSING A HUGE SCENE FOR HOURS ON END. It was special. I'm blaming constipation, the weird lighting in the restaurant, and probably the time change (from November, remember?), too. Maybe it's catching up with her finally? Anyway, luckily these were the kind of friends who don't judge or desert you when your child acts insane, so I'm thankful for the chance to spend time with them. ALSO, and extremely importantly, Matt and I listened to about 6 episodes of Serial during our drives this weekend. It is amaaaaazing and if you haven't heard of it or started listening...DO IT. 

Monday was back to work. I eased the pain by being lumberjack twins with Millie.

What's that they say about the family that lumberjacks together...oh, okay, nothing. Well, maybe that family also gets to have fires together. And Millie would approve of that because homegirl is all about some fire. Candles, fireplaces, bonfires...we have a true flame aficionado on our hands. (True story: she even put up with TUMMY TIME, a.k.a. the devil's game, this weekend because my mom put her in front of the fireplace to do it. Fire overcomes tummy time hatred- truly, this is powerful stuff.) 

We celebrated Christmas with Matt's family on Monday evening and were showered with even more awesome gifts and food and Ulta gift cards (or maybe that was just me...). They say babies develop and change fast and it must be true- between Christmas day and Monday (what, four days?), Millie became fascinated with the bows on presents! So...yay! She was pretty happy to sit there playing with the ribbon and bows, so that was fun to watch.

Our first Christmas as a family of three was absolutely perfect. It's funny how times and days like these- the ones I've been imagining and anticipating for so many years- can feel simultaneously magical and completely ordinary. And I like that. Most of the time, things just feel right. Normal. Like I'm living the life I'm meant to be living- it's not terribly special or unique or glamorous, it isn't all sparkly and picture-perfect- but it's just truly, deeply satisfying. All aspects of it- from helping my baby open gifts as we sit by a blazing fire on Christmas, to the hour I spent pacing the sidewalk in front of a restaurant where I was supposed to be hanging out with the friends I haven't seen in years- all of it is in some way so incredibly right...it's just weird. And great. And now I'm going to stop rambling. Have a great almost-last-day-of-the-year!