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Whoa. I just had 3 days of not even touching a computer. I’ve got to be honest with you, it was so nice taking a few days off and spending time with family. I had a few more Christmas posts planned but we had Evan’s family here for a few days and we had a pretty full schedule.

There is so much that goes into every blog post and they typically take about 3-4 hours to edit, keyword, SEO, proofread, add photos, make a pin for Pinterest, add those pins to a scheduler and a lot of other stuff too.

I’ve been blogging for almost a month. We launched on the 26th of November. I had been writing a lot longer than that but we decided to share with the world on that day. I’ve learned a lot in the last month of blogging and I thought I’d share some of that with you.

One major thing I’ve learned is that people are surprisingly supportive of this new journey. I’ve only had a couple of people make fun of me. I mean, who would want to read anything that I have to say? Well, it turns out that quite a few people want to read this stuff. I know, I was shocked too. In fact, I set some pretty low viewing goals for myself for my first month and the actual numbers blew that out of the water. Thank you to everyone who has read, commented, shared and re-pinned my content so far, it truly means more than you realize. I really thought it would just be my mom reading this but I have readers in 19 countries! So crazy. I love you all.

I’ve also learned that this is not a hobby. I’m in this for the long haul. I really enjoy the planning, research, and writing that goes into these posts and I plan to treat it like a business.

In the new year I’ll be posting Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays. I’ll be doing one home project a month and I’m super excited about it because in January we will be re-doing our master closet and I can’t wait to share the plans with you guys. I will also be posting some product reviews and sharing some more travel posts. I’ve got a HUGE Scotland post and some stuff from my San Francisco trip too. We are also planning our next trip so I’m sure I’ll have some posts about trip planning as well.

I thought I would take today and do a Christmas re-cap for me to look back on, down the road.

We had such a great Christmas this year. Isla is old enough to know something exciting is happening but not old enough to know what that is exactly. She did, however, enjoy opening up gifts and playing with the wrapping paper and boxes.

This is the first Christmas we’ve celebrated in our home. We usually are in Rochelle, Illinois visiting my Grandma or in Ardmore with Evan’s family.

Last night, we went to my brother’s for Christmas eve and played dirty Santa. We had a blast seeing everyone and the kids were being crazy and having so much fun together. Isla Rose really wants to run and play with her older cousins and it’s so cute.

We came home pretty early so we could put Isla to bed. She was exhausted after playing all evening. We were going to make cookies for Santa but instead Evan and I decided we would just hang out and we ended up putting together a puzzle and watching Scrooged with Bill Murray. It was nice spending Christmas Eve just the two of us. That has never happened, even when we were newly married. We have always traveled somewhere besides our own home on Christmas. We kept saying how nice it was that it was just the two of us on Christmas Eve. The house was so quiet and apparently Evan is much better at putting together puzzles than I am. It should not have been that difficult (it was a 100 piece Trolls puzzle). #parentlife

This morning we were waiting on my mom to get here to open presents but Isla made her way to the Tree before she got to our house and she saw her tricycle that Santa brought her. She yelled “Toys!” when she saw it. I’m so glad that she loved it! She hopped right on and started scooting around on it.

I made my mom the cutest little console table with turned legs and we also got her a Fit Bit this year because she loves to count her steps. I’m really excited to help her re-do her house. See the post here that I did for her farmhouse trim.

My husband got me a laptop! The old laptop I had in college died a few years ago so I’ve always used the desktop that he has in his office. Since I started blogging a month ago, however, Ev decided it was time to get me my own computer and I was completely surprised. I had no idea that he was getting me one! He is seriously the best. This is the first year that we have waited until Christmas to open our gifts to each other. He is so bad about wanting me to open presents as soon as he wraps them but this year we made it!

He also got me a new fancy camera! My iPhone wasn’t exactly cutting it, so be prepared for awesome photos coming your way soon! He got me a Sony alpha 6300. I was shocked because I hadn’t asked for one. I mentioned that I would eventually need to get one if I wanted to take better photos but I never thought he would get me one so soon.

After we opened our presents, we had my sister’s family come over and my husband made breakfast for everyone. It was entirely too much food for all of us and it was a blast. The kids got to show off their new presents and it was nice to see everybody but then have the rest of the day to ourselves.

Isla has been running from toy to toy today and throwing blocks, and stacking cups all over the place. She refused to nap because she was so excited about all her new stuff. She keeps picking up her ballerina pillow and saying “AWWWWW” and hugging it. It is just about the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. Excuse the mess in our photos. We were having too much fun making memories.

I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas! I’ll be back on Wednesday for a complete review of the Positivity Planner for 2019. If you’re going to be using a planner next year then hold off until you see my post! Really pumped about showing you guys this planner.

For now, I’ve got to go snuggle a teething baby. Wish me luck!