Merry Christmas!

Merry, Merry friends!!

I'm officially on Christmas Break & soaking up every precious moment of it! B is off work, too, from now until the new year! We have a total of 14 nights together...it's almost too good to be true!

My sweet view last night :)

We're hosting my family's Christmas at our house this year & our first guests, my BFF/sister/cousin Erin & her hubby Ryan, arrive tonight!! We've shopped and cleaned and prepped and we're so excited!!!

And on the 26th, we're Michigan bound to repeat all the fun with B's family!  Dog, presents & all :)

I hope you get everything you hoped for & more for Christmas!  And that you get to be with the ones you love the most!

I'll be signing off from now until the new year, so I wanted to wish you & yours a very, very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!

Christmas Card Carousel 2012

Merry Christmas friends!!

I'm linking up once again with Faith's blog for her 5th Annual Christmas Card Carousel!  You can see last years post with our 2011 and 2010 cards here.

Our card is from Jessi at Naptime Diaries print shop.  And I just love the finished product, sweet & simple :)

These two festive cuties aren't on the card, but wanted to be sure to wish you a Merry Christmas as well!!  

I finally got all the cards printed today {I've been uh...er...behind this year!} & they'll be in the mail tomorrow!

And since I can't send one to everyone, consider this our virtual Christmas Card, from my family straight to yours!

Wishing you a Very Merry Christmas!!

Lately: 'Tis the Season

'Tis the Season y'all!!

To be busy of course!!  And since I'm a little behind on blogging, again, thought I'd do a little Lately Christmas Edition post to play catch up!

'Tis the Season to Travel - Last weekend we flew up to Michigan for B's Work Christmas Party!  We had such a good time with everyone!!  B's company sure knows how to throw a party - this year was themed 'A Country Christmas' complete with line dancing & a photo booth!

Photobooth fun!

'Tis the Season for Ornament Exchanges - Last week, I went to 2 fun ornament exchanges!!  

My ornaments ready to be exchanged!
{And the pretty glitter tags Andrea & I made!}

The first was a Charlotte Blogger Girls Ornament Exchange!  Classic Annie was so sweet to organize it all!  We met up at Aria for dinner and drinks.  It was so fun to see some great blog friends again & meet some new blogger girls for the first time!

All the girls {minus Rach who had to get back to her baby girl!}
See Annie's recap to get the links to each girls' blog!

The second was an Ornament Exchange with some girlfriends from school!  My friend Lacey hosted us at her house & she had quite the spread!

And each calorie was was so worth it!  ;)

I brought a Ham & Pineapple Cheese Ball that I've made several times before, it's super easy and super yummy!  {Recipe here}  I didn't take any other pictures the whole night, just enjoyed hanging out with some sweet teacher friends outside of school for a change!

The new pretties that adorn our tree!  :)

'Tis the Season to Induldge - The party spread in that pic above is exactly what I'm talking about! The Holidays come with eating, there's just no avoiding it :/  I'm trying to be as "good" as I can, my breakfasts, lunches & dinners during the week are still Paleo, but all the snacks at school and the parties - I still have to indulge a little!

'Tis the Season to Enjoy - I'm loving all our decorations!  My pillow covers finally came in and I've finally gotten to some gift wrapping.  Only a few presents left to be bought and a handful left to wrap!

Alien eyed Berkley & presents under the tree!!

'Tis the Season to Celebrate - Tomorrow I'll share with you our Christmas card {even though they have yet to be sent out!!  Grrr...that's another story!}, B has 3 workdays this week & I'm down to 4, then we're both off for almost 2 whole weeks!!  Friday, there will be much cleaning and baking going on :)  Family starts to arrive on Saturday, as well as our dining room table {finally!!!}, and I'm excited to celebrate this wonderful season!  So much to be thankful for this year!

Time to curl up on the couch and enjoy what's left of my Sunday night!  Merry week before Christmas, friends!!

Friday's Letters

Dear Friday, It never fails,  you're just as wonderful each week!  It's rainy here today & I'm looking forward to making a hot dinner and curling up on the couch to a movie!  Dear Michigan, We're jet settin' to your neck of the woods tomorrow for B's work Christmas Party.  I'm excited to wear my new dress, red cowgirl boots, and get my line dance on.  Apparently, the theme this year is "A Country Christmas"!  I'm ready to show these Michiganders how it's done ;)  Dear Christmas Cards, We've yet to decide on a picture for you so unless we get one this weekend, we're sunk!  Maybe we'll just send out a picture of Berkley.  He's pretty darn cute!  Dear Instagram, You're probably my favorite form of social media, but this parody video that my friend Ashley shared with me makes me pee my pants laughing!!  Literally.  Ok not actually, literally, but it's hysterical!  Half of it describes pictures I'm completely guilty of posting, but I'm totally ok with that.  Go watch!  Oh and you can follow me @mrsshuck on Instagram :) Dear Husband, I'm really glad you didn't need your appendix out last night, or anything else remotely serious.  You make even a triage room in an ER fun!  I love this life with you! xoxo

Grab your pin & link up with Ashley!  Happy Friday friends!

Christmas Craft Wine-o Wednesday!

Happy hump day friends!!

It's been a super busy front half of the week, so I gladly welcome the half way point!  To celebrate, my friend Andrea's coming over & we're having our 1st Annual Christmas Craft Wine-o Wednesday!!

via

If you know me, you realize I'm really not crafty at all, so this may very well be the 1st & last annual Christmas Craft event!  Haha, but definitely not the last Wine-o Wednesday - let's be real, I'm really good at that ;)

We're going to attempt to make fun Christmas glitter tags, much like these...

via

...using fun Christmas colors!!  We plan to blast some Pandora Christmas Radio, maybe watch the Yule Log, indulge in a glass or 2 of wine & relax!  Amen?  Amen!!

Hope your week is going swimmingly.....I'm treading water and reminding myself...

via

;)

Our 2nd Year in Pictures

Now that's is two weeks past our anniversary, I thought it was high time I get around to blogging Our 2nd Year in Pictures!  Whoops!

I stole this idea last year from Megan over at Tales of the Trees and wanted to make it a yearly tradition.  You can see last year's post (2011) here.  So to keep the tradition going....

Our 2nd Year in Pictures

December 2011
Cheering on the Panther's on Christmas Eve

January 2012
Playing around with our favorite app one lazy weekend night :)

February 2012
Date night!

March 2012
St. Patty's Day Bar Crawl

April 2012
Spring Break Cruise - Schooner's Wharf, Key West

May 2012
Memorial Day - Post Run, headed to brunch :)

June 2012
Folly Beach Weekend Trip!

July 2012
Carolina Beach - Family Beach Week

August 2012
Boat Cruise on Lake Michigan

September 2012
Asheville & Biltmore for B's birthday & Mama Shuck's visit :)

October 2012
Halloween!

November 2012
Cheers to 2 years!!

And here's to infinity more!

Love you B!!

Random Musings for Your Friday

Happy Friday there, friends!!  It's crazy how my alarm isn't as terrible on a Friday morning and how much a tall skinny vanilla latte can perk me up :)

This Friday means I'm down to 14 school days before break!  And counting.  I have A. LOT. of work to complete in those 14 days.  My break will be well earned!!

Last week, the rug for our dining room arrived & our chairs arrived this past Wednesday!!!  Now all I need is our table :)  Here's a little sneak peak....

Oh, so...

via

Can you believe it!?  I'm so excited!  I love December!  I hope to see some snow like the above picture at least once this winter, maybe even have a white {after} Christmas when we're in Michigan!

Most of our decor is up & we're starting our Christmas shopping tomorrow!  We have a long list to tackle, so I'm excited to check some things off the list!  Then we're celebrating a friend's birthday out to dinner & taking Christmas card pics on Sunday!

Love, love, love this season!  Merry, jolly, happy holiday season, y'all!!

The stockings are hung...

...by the chimney {because we actually one!} with care!

Even Benson & Berkley have a stocking :)

Thought I'd share some of our decorations that have gone up so far!  If you follow B or I on Instagram, you've probably seen quite a few of these, but since it's our first Christmas in our house, I wanted to be sure to document it all!

We picked up our tree this past Sunday from a stand not too far from our house after a disappointing selection at Lowe's.  This was our first real tree since we've been together/married, so we were pretty excited to pick it out!

We bought a stand & got her all set up!  She was quite a beauty even without decoration!

Later that night, we got her all decked out!

Love!

Sweet boy posing!

And sneaky boy photo bombing!  Hah

I'm loving the mantle so far, I just need to figure out out to get some lights up there!  The wreath & vinyl sign are new.  I was unsure if the wreath would be big enough, I think I need a bigger one, but this one will do for this year!

Our big Santa!!  He looks so great on our front door!  Love driving home to it each day :)  And probably my favorite new decor....

Love this colorful, cheerful print and the new frame!!  I try to abide by all of Buddy the Elf's rules this time of year, so I thought it was totally appropriate ;)  I printed one off & sent it framed to my Aunt Stacy!  She shares my love for Buddy!

Once we get our dining room table, I'll have a little more decorating to do!  I'm so excited to create a pretty center piece and see the dining room come together!  I'll do a post once all the furniture is here.

But for now, friends....

Celebrating 2 Years

This past Tuesday, November 20th, Brandon and I celebrated 2 years of marriage!

Well actually, sadly, B was traveling for work, so we didn't exactly celebrate on Tuesday.  But we definitely made sure to celebrate this past weekend!!

Marriage is hard work and we think every year definitely deserves being celebrated!!  Just as we had a big party & celebration to start our marriage, we've decided we always want to stop and make a point to do something special with each passing year.

Originally, we thought we would always take a trip together, maybe far away, maybe close to home, but that'd we'd always go away together.  We went to Asheville last year to celebrate our 1st anniversary.  This year we were hoping to go to Nashville, but with all the logistics of Thanksgiving and what not, a 16 hour drive round trip didn't seem so appealing anymore.

We decided to have a 'staycation' if you will.  Since we live out in the 'burbs now, we planned a fun day of activities & an evening away in our first home, downtown Charlotte!

We started off with a relaxing couples massage and then made our way to one of the best BBQ spots in Charlotte, Mac's.  We watched some of the Michigan game and then shopped small at the Canine Cafe and Good Bottle Co for treats for Berkley & Brandon :)

We decided a few weeks back that this would be the perfect occasion to get the ring finger tattoos we've talked about getting from time to time.  Before, we hadn't really planned what we'd be getting, we just knew it was going to be on our ring finger.  So we started researching ideas, paid the deposit and there was no turning back!

I'm sure many people probably think we're crazy or stupid or have jinxed ourselves for getting a ring finger tattoo, but we are loving our new outward symbol of the inward commitment we made 2 years ago :)  Everyone doesn't have to agree, or understand, and that's fine.  But it was such a fun thing to decide upon and share together!

We ended the evening enjoying an awesome dinner at 5 Church {highly recommend y'all!} and a few drinks on the way back to our hotel!  It was such a fun and memorable day celebrating our marriage!

Here's a few pics celebrating year 2... 

Cheers!

Getting nervous about the tattoo!  Ahh!

Just started!  Our tattoo guy, Christian

B's turn!

Taking it like a champ!

Finished product!!

His & Hers

OOTN

Rooftop pics before going out...same spot as our rehearsal dinner!

The good, the bad, the happy, sad, ups or downs, I wouldn't trade them or want to face them with anyone else!  Here's to many more years of happiness together!!  To the moon, B!