Merry Christmas, Fab 5 and the final Ornament Challenge Photos...

First off...MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! I hope that everyone is having a fabulous holiday! I know that we were up early with the kids and that presents were open in mere seconds (Okay...minutes) and then it was pancakes for breakfast. Blaine and I have now moved on to champagne and the final installment in the Harry Potter movies.  A definite lazy day ahead of us as the kids are busy on the Wii.

So...where should I start? I owe a few final pictures of ornaments - so I think I will start there.

Day #21 - Our beautiful peacock. I love this ornament and the photo does not do it justice.

Day #22 - Leonardo da Vinci. We picked him up after seeing "The Last Supper" in Milan.

Day #23 - Cheers! Um, yeah...no explanation needed.

Day #24 - A slice of pizza. This is usually our Christmas Eve tradition - which may seem funny to some. But, on a typical Christmas Eve we have pizza and snacks and watch movies. It's just what we do!

Day #25 - My American Santa. He's new this year to the collection and was picked up at Silverado a few weeks ago. He's just beautiful and his colors are quite vibrant.

Moving on...Fab 5. I think this will be a slightly extended version as I haven't done a Fab 5 in about 10 days. There's been lots happening in the last few weeks leading up to Christmas - which has made the time pass quickly.

1. Grayson's Concert. Yes, my youngest joined the choir this year. I had quite the little laugh when he first told me he was joining in the fall, but we had a chance to watch his holiday concert and the littlest dude did a great job! (All the kids did!) 

2. Impromptu Cocktails. After the choir performance, we had an impromptu get together with a few friends. Some drinks and snacks and lots of smiles before everyone headed their separate ways for the holidays.

3. Jingle Run. The PTO at our school sponsored a Jingle Run - which was a lot of fun! Kids ran 1K, 2K, or 3K and everyone received jingle bells and cookies and cocoa. Some kids even won prizes for costumes! It was a nice event during the final week of school and had a lot of participation.

4. Grayson's Fairy Tale. Grayson's class has been studying fairy tales, myths, and fables. Each child had to practice re-telling a fairy tale as if they were directing a play with the students in the class being the actors. Grayson was chosen to re-tell his fairy tale before his Christmas party and I was so happy to be able to see him. He has always struggled with his writing, but he did a magnificent job retelling the story - he spoke clearly, and remembered all the parts and directed his actors well.

5. Classroom Christmas Parties. Both boys have fantastic teachers this year and fantastic room parents. They each had wonderful Christmas parties that involved Secret Santas and lots of food.

6.  Dinosaurs. We took the boys to see the big dinosaur exhibit which has been here in Poland for the last few weeks. Both boys gave us some grief about "having to go" see this, but once we got there and they could see how large they were and watch them move - well, they were impressed. (And it's getting harder and harder to impress them!)

7. Hangar 646. Manuela invited us to join her crew at Hangar 646 during the first week of break and the boys had a blast! Grayson decided he needed to try the ramp and after working up the courage to finally go down, he conquered that beast! He's already asking when we can go back! Caleb had great time on the trampolines and particularly enjoyed being able to dunk!

8. Christmas Eve. We had the pleasure of spending Christmas Eve with the Wagners and the Grahams with Aimee and Troy acting as our fabulous hosts. That's one thing about the ex-pat world, even if you're far from family, friends are always close at hand - especially at the holidays. We had a wonderful evening with great food and beverage, good conversation and lots of laughs. 

9. Christmas Morning. We told the boys they couldn't get up until 6:45 a.m. and sure enough - they arrived in our room at 6:45 a.m. Even though they "know" - they've had plenty of Christmas spirit this season and were sweet enough to let Blaine and I open the presents they had purchased for us first. Then, they dove into  their presents like wild monkeys. But, we did good! Everyone was happy - new headphones for Grayson and Nintendo DS games, a GoPro for Caleb and Wii games, plus a bunch of other stuff. There was lots of smiles and happy boys who repeatedly thanked us for all of their gifts - which makes it worthwhile. (Blaine and I skipped buying each other presents this year because what do we really need? We will surely buy things in London and I'm much more excited for the travels and things we will do than any present under the tree at the moment.)

So there you have it! It looks like it's a Fab 9 for this week. We will spend the rest of Christmas Day drinking and eating (Isn't that what everyone does?!)  and then head off to London tomorrow morning. We have a packed week ahead of us and I'm sooooo excited!! Get me outta here!

Once again, Merry Christmas everyone!! The blog will return post-London!

Ornament Photo Challenge Days 18, 19 & 20

Falling a little behind...Whoops! The pix made it onto Instagram, but I forgot to put them here! Oh, well, I shall catch up today!

Day 18 - This Santa came from Hong Kong. I'm not quite sure why I picked him up, but he just called to me! So home he came!

Day 19 - Our golf bag. We've had him for a while now. Blaine had a small tree with all of "his ornaments." We eventually got rid of this small tree and then all of his ornaments joined our family tree. Since we all kind of have the golf bug in our house - this seemed like a good one to photograph.

Day 20 - Memories of Singapore. We spent several weekends in Singapore while we were living in Malaysia, but this may be the only ornament we have. I'll have to scan the tree again and see if there are any others.

The kids are officially on vacation. We've had a great relaxing weekend and we're looking forward to Christmas later this week. And of course, heading off to London. Blaine and I spent the morning planning our time and buying tickets to get us to the Harry Potter Studio and up on the London Eye! It's going to be a super busy few days, but we're ready! Hope your holidays are shaping up to be all you dream of!

Ornament Photo Challenge Day 16 & 17...

Yup...another day with two photos. I've spent the last three days in the kitchen baking cookies...and more cookies...and fudge...and cookies. And, I'm done. I told Blaine last night that I didn't care to bake another cookie until 2016. And it is due to cookie baking that my photo didn't get posted yesterday.

Day 16 was this little penguin! I can't remember where we purchased him, but I do love him. He clips right onto the tree (like a lot of our bird ornaments do) and he seems to watch over all of the other ornaments.

Day 17 is a remembrance of a quick trip to Savannah. Blaine and I made a flying trip to Savannah while we we in Myrtle Beach and had a fun day exploring this city. Lunch at Paula Deen's (We even got to meet the Deen Brothers - Paula's sons) and strolling the picturesque streets were a couple of the highlights.

Tomorrow is the last day of school for the boys before Christmas break. Today they both have class parties (which is where a big chunk of my cookies are going) and a final family Polish lesson for 2015.  We're winding down quickly!

Ornament Photo Challenge Day #15 and Fab 5 Tuesday...

Okay...so I'm going to bring you the Fab 5 today - since I missed last Friday. And, I'll bring you another one on Christmas Day. We'll just skip this Friday completely and then, hopefully, I'll be back on track!

Today's ornament for my December Photo Challenge is this little bottle of nail polish. I think I chose it today because I just painted my nails red for the holidays and I'm madly in love with my new OPI matte finish top coat. That, and my nails have always been this girly-girl thing I do!

The last 10 days have been fun-filled. Everyone is in the holiday spirit and we've enjoyed spending time with family and friends. (My mom and dad left this morning after a very quick visit!) So...let's see if I can get you caught up on what's been happening.

1. Dinner, Drinks and Desserts. We had a great Friday night two weeks ago that involved dinner, drinks and some yummy desserts with good friends. You can always count on this group for plenty of laughs. 

Blaine introduced us to a new song he heard on the radio and we started calling ourselves "The East Clubbers" - which is really not appropriate at our age - especially since I haven't seen a club since one fateful night in KL which involved bottles of vodka and Thai hookers. Anyways, here's the song and video and you can just have a laugh with us! (Yes, this song plays on the local Polish radio station.)

2. Date Day and Mockingjay. Blaine and I managed to sneak in a date day, too! This included Christmas shopping, coffee, the final installment of the Hunger Games and a quick dinner. 

3. Silverado and Lunch. We made it to the Silverado factory store to purchase a few Christmas ornaments last week, too. They're all hand blown glass ornaments and while my tree doesn't really NEED any more decorations, I couldn't resist bringing a few home. And, we had lunch at this Korean/Sushi restaurant close to Wilanów Palace - where I had my first taste of kimchi since leaving KL. Yummy! Need to take the boys there so Gray can get some kimchi pancakes!

4. Dunkin' Donuts. Well, the new store has opened here in Warsaw and I had some happy little boys last week as they chowed down on their donuts. Dunkin' Donuts was here in Poland for a while (I believe I read until 2002) and then they left. Now, they're back. Blaine went and braved the line last week and surprised the monkeys! It won't be a regular thing, but it's nice to have a little taste of "home" sometimes.

5. My Parents. As I said, my parents left today, but we had lots of fun while they were here. We visited the Wilanow Palace, had family dinners, shopped, visited Krakow, had an impromptu concert at school and shared lots of laughs. I'm so glad they were able to visit at this time of year! It will make the next 6 months go quickly until we return to the States. (Yes, I have our tickets booked to come to NY! We arrive June 15th and depart August 18th! Let me know if you want to come visit so we can put you on the calendar!)

So...here's some photos from their time here!

A little concert while touring school thanks to the kids' music teacher

Dad toured a Cargill plant while mom and I shopped

Mom and I hit Zlote Tarasy to shop

Family Dinner at Pomidoro

On the train to Kraków

Nana and Poppy and the kiddos

Kraków

Carriage ride in Kraków

Grayson and the Mirror Man

Kraków

Kraków - The boys 

Christmas market in Kraków

A kid's got to eat

Our laugh of the day at the Kraków Christmas market - Crocheted thongs

Tired and heading back to Warsaw

Dinner in Old Town

Old Town Warsaw decorated for the holidays

So there you have it! I hope all of your holiday preparations are going well! We're in the homestretch here. This is the last week of school. We're busy baking cookies for classroom parties. We have a school concert tonight. And, all of my shopping is finished. Just some wrapping left! Enjoy the remainder of the week everyone!

Ornament Photo Challenge Day #14

Today's ornament was (obviously) purchased on one of our trips to Walt Disney World. We each have one of these that hang on the tree. I remembered we went to the shop that makes them at Disney and we got one of the last few that they would make for the day! Phew!!

Ornament Photo Challenge Day 12 & 13

Since we were in Krakow all day yesterday, I didn't have tome to post my ornaments. But, seeing as we've spent the last few weeks exploring Christmas markets - it seems appropriate that we show photos of some of our finds!

This one we bought yesterday and it depicts a szopka which is a Krakow Christmas tradition. You can read about szopkis here!

This ornament we picked up in Dresden a few weeks ago! It depicts a schwibbogen. You can read about these here.

Hope you have had a fabulous weekend!