Oh Christmas Tree! || 2019 Christmas Tree Hunt

The day after Thanksgiving we headed out on our annual Christmas Tree hunt! Each year we head up to Greenbluff to cut down our tree. We made our way up to Hansen's Christmas Tree Farm for bonfires, s'mores, tree hunting and hot cocoa on Friday.

This is the best farm if you have little ones. In addition to having the bonfire and s'mores set up right at the entrance, they have free hot cocoa and allow the kiddos to pick an ornament off a tree inside and take it home. Lincoln (and now Finn!) look forward to this every year.

A ton of photos from our day are below!

Thanksgiving 2019

Time is flying! I cannot believe next week is Christmas already. With Thanksgiving so late in the year this year it feels like we are rushing through the holidays. I wanted to make sure and recap our Thanksgiving before jumping in to all the festive fun we've been doing over the past few weeks.

We held Thanksgiving at my parents house again this year, with each of the siblings contributing to the dinner. We had all of the classics but ended up missing out on rice dressing this year due to a little mishap in the kitchen. But, Thanksgiving continues on and it's a fun story to tell for the future! Long story short after whipping up a batch of rice dressing and trying to take it out to the garage, it dropped and shattered all over the garage floor. I'm sure the squirrels enjoyed the leftovers!

We started out our day with the Manito Turkey Trot. We had good intentions to try and do the entire 3 miles but with little ones it was difficult to finish so we cut out about half way through the walk/trot. My little brother and sister Amy and niece Ocean couldn't make dinner this year, but we still had a full crowd between my sister Sara and her family, my cousin Jake and the Alexanders. My dad also had to work late this year, so he missed out on round 1 of dinner but made it home in time for seconds!

It felt different this year with so many of us missing, but it was still fun, festive and nice to spend time with family.

Santa! I know him....

I couldn't let a day go by without posting this year's visit with Santa! Don't let this photo fool you, little Finn lost it about 30 seconds after this photo was taken...but I'll take what I can get :)

Only 12 days till Christmas!

Gingerbread Buildoff 2018

Holiday traditions are my favorite and the Gingerbread Buildoff supporting Christ Kitchen is one of the most fun! Each year a select number of bakeries and chef's create gingerbread masterpieces. The viewing takes place the second Sunday in December down at the Davenport Grand Hotel.

In addition to viewing, families can purchase mini gingerbread house kits to build on their own. It really is the most fun activity for the kiddos. This year we brought our friends Zeke and Morgan and followed up the Gingerbread viewing with hot cocoa and french fries in the hotel restaurant. A tradition, I hope to repeat for years to come. Below are a few fun photos!

Thanksgiving 2018

Thanksgiving 2018 was another one for the books! It was Finn's first Thanksgiving and the first time the Alexander's hosted. We had a small gathering this year, just my parents, my sister, Amy and our little family of four, but it was quaint and cozy and full of good food.

I had prepped all week so the morning was laid back. We had picked up a gingerbread Turkey from Trader Joes for Lincoln to put together in the morning and then we made pumpkin spice chocolate chip cookies to deliver to our local fire station. Lincoln was so excited to drop off cookies and they took him back to see the big trucks and flash the lights. We didn't snap any photos, but you can be sure fun was had by all!

After that we headed back to the house to put Finn down for a nap and prep the appetizers. My parents came over a little after 11 to start the festivities and we had appetizers and mimosas all morning and afternoon while watching football.

We are pros at eating for the holidays so of course appetizers ran all the way into dinner. We sat down around 4:30 for dinner and after stuffing ourselves completely, we settled in for our annual Christmas movie marathon. Finn thoroughly enjoyed his first Thanksgiving and got to participate in all of the tastiness as well!

Both Kevin and I have been home for a long weekend so I've included a few additional photos here as well, including our holiday Christmas box that helped us kick off the official Christmas season. This year's box included Charlie Brown's Christmas movie and The Jolly Postman book, along with our annual family Christmas jammies!

We decorated the house yesterday, but have yet to go chop down our tree since Thanksgiving is so early this year. We're headed up next Saturday to tree hunt!

I hope everyone had a very Happy Thanksgiving! It's the most wonderful time of the year!