Please enjoy this photo-filled post and don't drool too much over the food.
It's been a full week since our anniversary trip, so I guess it's about time to blog about it before I forget everything. Better late than never, right? Loren and I went to Chicago for a couple days because it's been calling our names for a long time and it's not too far away from us. We had a wonderful time seeing the sights and eating delicious food and we will definitely be going back some time! Please enjoy this photo-filled post and don't drool too much over the food. Late Sunday morning, we excitedly jumped in the car and headed north! Our first stop once we got to Chicago was for deep dish pizza. SO GOOD! After lunch, we wandered around downtown, saw some sights and got a little familiar with the area.
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Friday night, our church had a Good Friday Service - the first I've been to in several years! Following the service, we walked out to this amazing sunset and just stood there for a little bit enjoying God's creative masterpiece. Loren and I made brunch together Saturday morning, and it was all so perfect! He whipped up & flipped the pancakes while I put together some Panhandle skillet dishes. Sunday morning we celebrated Christ's resurrection and gift of salvation at church, then came home to a traditional ham dinner. Sunday afternoon my sister Crystal and her family came over from Ohio to stay at Dawn’s for a couple days. Loren and I went over for dinner Sunday & Monday night and it was such a blast having everyone together! I’ve missed my sisters so much. The four toddlers/babies kept us all entertained quite well. So much commotion going on! Can't wait till our parents + all the siblings + spouses + children are all together again! I hope you all had a blessed Easter weekend with family remembering/celebrating all that Christ did for us!
This past week has been quite a blur. With a 48ish hour trip to Texas at the beginning of the week (more on this another day), it was nice to have a relaxing Christmas here in Indy with my sister and her family. Christmas Eve we went to their Candlelight Service and it brought back memories of Christmas Eve services back at home in Germany. Christmas morning we woke up (not too bright and early) to have our own little first Christmas morning celebration together before heading back over to Dawn's for the day. With Loren's help, I had prepped this amazing Baked French Toast Casserole the night before and I popped it in the oven at some point before we read the Christmas story and exchanged the gifts we had for each other. I'm looking forward to many more Christmas mornings with my man! :) At some point, we headed over to Dawn's for the afternoon and got to videochat with my family in Germany for a bit before diving into the delicious dinner Dawn made. Other than the pictures above, we were so distracted playing with the nephews and having a relaxing time that, regrettably, we didn't really take any more pictures. The day after Christmas, we headed over to Cincinnati to celebrate Christmas with Loren's side of the family. Once again, we failed miserably in the picture-taking department, but nonetheless had a grand low-key weekend visiting with family opening presents, playing doctor with the nieces & nephew, catching up, taking a Tour of Lights, playing games, watching movies, and trying P.F. Chang's for the first time. It was kind of hard to head back home after such a great week, but it's always nice to come back to our cozy little home after being away. It's so fun to have both sides of the family just a short road trip away! The Lord has truly blessed us and we had a wonderful first married Christmas.
From our new family to yours. I hope you have a blessed day and make special memories with family and friends celebrating the reason of the season.
My attempt at making burlap stockings was aided by my wonderful cousin Dennae, and we had a blast! Naturally, we had Christmas music and all the Christmas lights around the apartment on to help motivate us. Making these stockings was rather easy and here are the steps we took: 1. Using either a stocking you already have to guide or your great artistic skill, trace/cut out the 2 sides of the stocking. Dennae volunteered to cut out our stockings freehand, and did a pretty impressive job. Scissors and paper with no directed guidance can be dangerous in my hand. 2. With either a sewing machine or by hand, sew the two sides together. I don't have a sewing machine, and the only needles & thread I had were from an emergency sewing kit (I'm cheap, I know!). While there were several needles and bountiful colors to choose from, the threads were all rather short, so we had to use multiple colors for each stocking. But once right side out, you can't even tell! 3. Flip the stocking right side out. 4. Iron to smooth out, if necessary (my burlap was super wrinkled). 5. Try on the stocking to ensure it's the right size. 6. Add embellishments as meets your fancy. Apparently none have met my fancy yet. I need to find some. And that's it! Pretty Easy! My friend Danielle over at Mostly Sewing did a way better job of making burlap stockings (with awesome embellishments!!) last year with a sewing machine, so go check out her tutorial here.
Well, we got our tree! The cutest little 4 ft tree you ever did see. As we were putting the tree in the back of Loren's RAV4, some friendly man called to us, "Hey, the tree is supposed to get tied to the top of the car, isn't it? Tradition!" True, but the tree would have been lost up there and we didn't have rope. We did consider taking the tree into Starbucks with us for fun, but chickened out in the end. We want to continue patronizing that Starbucks. We cranked up some Christmas music and decorated it simply with white lights, a burlap garland, candy canes and a paper star that Loren made. We did put a few other decorations out, but maybe I will save those for another post on another day. I love Christmas!
Thursday morning after making apple crisp together (my inauguration into the "Crisp" family), Loren and I hopped in the car and headed to Cincinnati to spend some fun family-filled days with Loren's family. The amazing Thanksgiving dinner was celebrated with all of Loren's siblings, nieces & nephew, aunt & uncle and some cousins. We didn't actually get pictures of the food, because we were having such a blast stuffing our faces, catching up and playing games. But we did get some of some of the other action going on. Friday afternoon after recovering from late night/early morning Black Friday shopping, we headed out to Big Tree Plantation to hunt down the perfect Christmas tree for the Crisp family room. I had never been to a tree farm to chop down a Christmas tree before, and it was quite the fun experience, definitely worth doing again. And we found it! I love this man and am so thankful I get to spend these first married holidays with him! Friday evening, we celebrated Mom & Dad Crisp's 40th wedding anniversary with a special dinner, mainly prepared by Chefs Jonathan and Rachel (5 year old niece). It was delicious! Mom & Dad have done so much for us and there is no way we could thank them sufficiently, but it was fun spoiling them for the evening. Plus, we learned some new information about their sweet love story! Saturday we headed downtown Cincy for some ice skating (perfect ice skating weather!!), Graeter's ice cream and coffee with the siblings. Loren and I were going to head home Saturday night, but we were having such a blast that we didn't want to leave, so we ended up staying another night. We spent the evening celebrating Jeffrey's upcoming birthday, making cranberry and popcorn garlands for the tree, watching Elf and playing games. Sunday we went to church with the family then reluctantly headed home so Loren could get some homework done. All in all, the long weekend was a much needed refreshing break/vacation. We are so thankful for the wonderful family (on both sides!!) the Lord has given us and surely do not take them for granted.
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