Christmas

Merry Christmas!

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I'm off to Spokane with Thomas to visit my family for the holiday.  I hope all of you have a very merry Christmas, and that the holidays are a time for you full of love, laughter, and delicious FOOD!
As a special Christmas gift this year, we managed to find our box of ornaments that we thought had been lost in our last move.  I was especially excited about it as it contained all the ornaments I had received each year since I was a baby.  In my family, each year we each got an ornament that represented a little bit of that year, and I was given the collection when I got married a few years ago.  Some are beautiful, some are funny, and some are just sentimental.
Here's a peek of our tree, and a few of the ornaments on it....

The first one was a wedding gift to us from my mother-in-law, who has hand-made these satin bells for her tree.  Each bell represents over 40 hours of work! The second was my very first ornament ever!

I was originally a music education major in college, I played soccer for 8 years growing up and refereed for 3 years after that, and I was an adorable kindergartner.

Now the first photo might confuse you, until you realize what the little red bird is- it's a kiwi!  For those of you who might not know, I am a first-generation American.  My mother is from England, and my father is from New Zealand, and so I am half-kiwi.  The second photo pretty much sums up my sophomore year of college- I was diagnosed with mono (later it turned out that it was a misdiagnosis, but that's a story for another time), and went from sleeping an average of 3-4 hours a night to about 13-14.

The final photo is my first Christmas gift from my husband Thomas.  We decided to continue the tradition I grew up with and give each other an ornament each year.  This year I got this awesome pewter camera.  Given that I have been working about 60 hour weeks all year, eating, sleeping, and breathing photography, this ornament sums up my year to a T.  Here's looking forward to another year of wonderful times behind my lens!