The holidays are in full swing and we have been busy enjoying this festive time of year.  To celebrate Aspen’s Gotcha Day (the day we “got” her) on 12/12, we drove down to Grand Prairie to see the Prairie Lights.  It’s a state park full of Christmas lights that you drive through slowly, car lights off, windows down and unbuckled!  Aspen thoroughly enjoyed sitting in the front seat with me and not in her carseat.

The lights were cool, but Brad and I were more impressed with the park itself and can’t wait until Spring to go back for a camping trip.  The lighted path ends up at a parking lot where you can get out and partake in some more activities.  Aspen loved riding a zebra on the carousel.

We went inside a big tent to check out what was going on in there and lo and behold, it was Santa!  At first I didn’t want Aspen to see him because 1) she had been saying for weeks that she was scared of him and didn’t want to see him, and 2) she was in her pj’s.  Brad convinced me that it would be cute and Aspen decided that she wanted to take a picture with Santa.  She was really brave and told him that she wanted a bike, and then said, “he’s so nice!”  The picture is adorbs but you’ll just have to trust me.  It would take too much effort to scan and upload it, sorry.

Then she wanted to ride the bears and it didn’t take much to talk her daddy into it.

We had a great time ooh-ing and ahh-ing at the lights, but most of all just spending the evening together. 

The next day was fun-filled, too.  Aspen and I went to Northpark mall to see the train display with my mom, Katy, my sister, Libby, and a niece and a nephew.  The kids absolutely loved it and us adults were happy to donate to the Ronald McDonald House, in which it benefitted.

Kylie, Hudson and Aspen.

Hudson is obsessed with Thomas the Train and could have stayed in that room all day.  Here’s Katy holding Kylie up to see the Washington, DC part of the exhibit.

We would have stayed longer than the hour or so that we did, but the mamas (and aunt and grandma) got hungry and we get grumpy when we’re hungry.  You don’t wanna mess around with hungry Maxwell girls, just ask our husbands.  Oh, speaking of Maxwell girls, look what I found in the train display.

After lunch, Libby and Hudson had to leave and I had to check out H&M.  You don’t drive all the way to Dallas without stopping by one of your favorite stores.  It would be like going to Hershey without eating chocolate.  Brad wasn’t thrilled to see shopping bags when he got home, but I blamed it on my mom and Katy who forced me to make a purchase.  Then I took the little girls out to a sitting area to hang out while Mom and Kate shopped.

Aren’t they the cutest?!  I love those smiles more than Bon Jovi and Starbucks combined.  I feel so blessed to have a sweet, fun family that I love spending time with.  Making memories with them is priceless and really is what this season is about for me.

I woke up last Friday morning so excited about my weekend staycation with the hubs, I sang “Staycation’s all I ever wanted” a la The Go-Go’s all day long.  I met my parents for lunch and they took Aspen home with them for the weekend. 

Here’s what the car looked like packed for our whopping two nights away.

First things first, I got my hair cut, which was about 6 months overdue.  It felt so good to get a new do and the bonus was getting to catch up with an old friend that I hadn’t seen in a long time.  Then I did a little shopping, picked up Brad from work and we headed to our hotel in downtown Fort Worth.  Our first festivity for the weekend was Brad’s company Christmas party at Lucky Strike.  We had so much fun stuffing our faces, chatting with friends, and of course, bowling.  I even got a couple lucky strikes!  Get it?  The name of the place…haha.

One of my friends that I grew up with, Courtney, works at the same company, so it was fun getting to hang with her. 

We are laughing hysterically because the guy taking our picture was wearing a baby blue tux, a top hat, and cracking jokes about his mustache.  After the party, we headed back downtown and stopped to take a closer look at the lighted trees on the corporate grounds of Chesapeake Energy.  In a word, they are fabulous.

Saturday, we slept in a little bit, had breakfast, soaked in the hot tub, and had lunch at one of our favorite restaurants, Daddy Jack’s.  Their clam chowder is out of the world.  Then we went to our church’s Christmas musical which was brilliant and amazing.  I loved every second of it, great job, Gateway!  After the show, we rushed back downtown to claim our seats at a sports bar and grill to watch the UFC fights.  My husband might have a bit of a man crush on Frank Mir.  And I don’t mind one bit.  We’ve been fans of his for a few years, but if we hadn’t been already, we would have been after his incredible win on Saturday.  It was fun!  We did a little walking around Sundance after the fights.

We offered to take a couple’s picture in front of the big tree, and they returned the favor.  After the woman took our pic, she said to look at it to make sure it was okay.  We were silent.  Partly because we didn’t know what to say, and partly from trying not to laugh.  Here’s the shot she took.

She definitely got the tree in it.   Here we are back at the hotel, which had beautiful winter decorations.

 

We had a wonderful weekend of Christmas fun and quality time spent together.  A big thanks to my parents for keeping our little maniac, who had a blast with her Mamo and Pop Pop.  Next up on the holiday to do list- I have got to watch some Christmas movies!  I still haven’t watched Christmas Vacation yet this season.  It’s a shame, I tell ya!

The holiday season is in full swing and this weekend was cram-packed with plenty of Christmas cheer. We got off to a nice slow start staying home Friday night and watching a Christmas movie. Saturday, we both woke up in a git ‘er done mood so we both worked on house projects right away.

I sanded doorways in our master bathroom that need a fresh coat of paint and I did touch up painting in our hallway.

When the baseboards were changed (last year), some of the wall was damaged so we had a few places with these texture patches that needed to be painted. After a year and half, Saturday was the day.

Meanwhile, my hubs cleaned out our gutters, put up the Christmas lights and dug up a large dead bush in the backyard. Here he is dressing up the front porch with some garland.

After all our projects, my in-laws came in town and I helped them do some Christmas shopping at the mall. Which was crazy packed, but I didn’t really mind the crowd. I’m a professional shopper so I am not easily intimidated by large numbers of people scrounging through the same clothing racks as me. BRING IT ON.

That night, Kyle and I headed to a Holiday Housewarming party just down the street and celebrated our friends first home. Speaking of night, how cute does our little house look?

Kyle did a great job once again! Lonnie and Cindy stayed the night at our house and we all went to see the Christmas musical at our church Sunday morning. It was crazytown amazing!

To wrap the eventful weekend up, we had Kyle’s work party Sunday night. I give it 2 thumbs way up.
Here’s why:
1) it was in a neighborhood about 20 minutes from our house that is gated and only has humungous houses in it (I mean the Jonas Brothers have a house in that neighborhood)
2) the food was outstanding
3) the peeps he works with are fun and cool
4) oh yeah, we won an iPad 2!!!!

Crazy fun and busy weekend right?

You may have noticed that we updated that picture of us over there –>

What you don’t know, is that it took way too many tries just to get a decent shot that we could sport on the front page of our blog.  Part of it was us just being silly and not being able to stop laughing.  Part of it was that we had no idea how to pose with it not looking awkward or creepy.  After this little photo shoot on our parents’ back deck, we had more outtakes than not, by a long shot.  

Don’t be fooled by Katy’s sweet smile, she’s mean.  Half of the pictures are of her punching me.  Sorry about the flared nostrils.

This is our “Don’t mess with me and my cooking utensils and paintbrushes” look.  We bad.

Watch out, out-of-date or colorless walls, we’re coming for you!

In case you are wondering, Katy is blowing the smoke from her pistol hot roll brush.  Which actually, I should be doing because I’m the blazing fast painter.

I don’t know who’s bright idea it was for us to sit in tiny plastic chairs, but it looks as though I’m the guilty one and Katy is so kindly pointing that out.  My cute slippers from Old Navy made it in another post.  I literally wear them 24/7 while I’m at home.  And the award for Most Creepy Picture goes to…

Apparently we thought it was funny by the looks of our scrunched up eyes and see-down-our-throats big smile.  We just don’t know how to pose without looking ridiculous.  “Just. Act. Natural.”

Nope, that didn’t work either.  Oh well, we had fun pretending to be models for a few minutes.  Outtakes are usually the best part of a movie or reality show anyways, right?  Anyone seen any good ones lately?  The best bloopers are from Step Brothers, Anchorman, or anything else Will Ferrell.

The new year is coming quickly and sometime between the holidays, parties and family events, Kyle and I always sit down and talk about what we did in the past year and where we want to go in the new year. It may sound cheesy to you, but we love taking time to recap what has changed in our lives over the past 12 months and talk about what we want to work on and accomplish the next year.

One area that we always go over is our finances. This past week we were talking about goals for next year and changes we want to make to our budget so I went ahead and entered next year’s numbers in our Davis Budget.

Below, is the budget template that I made for us. It’s a simple excel sheet with formulas to give monthly subtotals for each category. For us, we need to be able to easily see what we make vs. what we spend so we will stay on budget. This little doodad helps us.

The next best way to spend what you should and save what you should is using a cash system. I know, bummer. It’s a pain but there is no better way for us to really know where we are spending our money AND have control over it.

Here is my wallet.  She’s cute, but she can get me into trouble fast when I’m using my debit card. There’s no pain in swiping that card over and over, so to the envelope system we must go.

I needed extra motivation to commit to the envelope way of life, so I made them cute. Deep, right? But it is true! If I’m going to have to pull out an envelope and pay with cash, I may as well make it pretty to look at. Here’s where these tags come in.

I used those cuties to label each of the envelopes that have to go in my wallet. I have more envelopes to cart around than Kyle because for some reason he’s not into carrying a murse. (man purse)

To figure out what needed to be paid for with cash, we looked at the areas we tend to go over budget and broke the news to those budget categories. “Hey, Eating Out, your officially in the ‘cash only’ category. We love you too much. It’s not your fault, it’s ours.”

 They all took it well except Katy’s Clothing. Wow, she’s a pain.

Thankfully, she got on board once I made her an adorable envelope all her own. Here she is now hanging out with her other Cash Only friends.

Our hope is that the pain of seeing the cash slip away with each QT drink and 50% GAP sweater will keep us on budget. Here’s to 2012! Dave Ramsey would be so proud… ehh probably not. He’s really intense.