eat pumpkin pie, drink hot chocolate, and be ridiculously merry...oh and make goofy faces.

 oh, where did the weekend go? i don't know about you but it definitely went by way too fast - just like all of the food that we made for thanksgiving dinner. now you see it, now you don't. mom, ashley and i cooked up a storm, while dad kept busy decorating the yard with christmas lights. (oh but he does like to mention that he makes the coffee around here - and coffee is always a must! i couldn't agree more!). i didn't even get a full picture of the spread 'cause we ate so quickly (and the lighting wasn't being my friend - so you have to trust me that we ate well...or you can just check the pounds reflected on the scale to prove it). 

and like our family does every thanksgiving, we planned out our Black Friday to the T. yup, we are one of those crazies - waking up at the crack of dawn for deals. we aren't the kinds that camp out for nights, (i finally saw a Best Buy camp out in real life...just like on the nightly news...they are for real and even i couldn't believe these people!), but we do like to get our hands on what deals that we can and get some early Christmas shopping done. and we just have fun doing it together every year - even if we don't find anything worth buying. and i think we broke our own record this year - 15 hours of Black Friday shopping...yeaaaah, baby! 

and true to family tradition, we kick off the holiday season with blasting the Christmas music, drinking hot chocolate, and decorating the house at full force. i luuuuurve this part of the season and missed it every year when i was away from home, so i'm glad i got to experience it with my  family again. there is always a lot of laughter and sentimental thoughts that are shared during this time. 

and yes, if there was one super lame thing about the weekend was being apart from Ryan and not having Kristine (my sister) and her Ryan (her hubby) with us for the weekend, but i get to see all of them this next month, so i can hardly wait! 

like the song goes, it really is the most wonderful time of the year.

let's drink to that - hot chocolate style with extra whip cream and sprinkles on the top, pleeeeeaaase!

much love.

[happy monday, friend.]

p.s. don't forget to use coupon code CYBERMONDAY for surprise 25% off  of your entire Much Love, illy shop order!! woohoo!!