The Most Wonderful Time of the Year :)

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year!!

Sigh..... I just love Christmas season.... especially this Christmas. This is our first Christmas together as a married couple. I love going through all of these "firsts". Like our first home together, our first Christmas tree hunting, our first family traditions, and our first Christmas card. 

The Decor

I have been blessed to have a husband who loves this season just as much as I do. We hit up Garden Ridge like two weeks before Thanksgiving for our decor and probably had our tree up before anyone even thought about Christmas decorating. I knew this Christmas would be especially special/fun because we would get to pick out our first ornament and stockings. We had a great time teaming together to deck out our two-bedroom apartment for our first Christmas.

   

Our Old Tradition

Although this is our first Christmas together as a married couple, this is our SEVENTH Christmas together in all. From our very first Christmas in 2005, Brett and I have always had fun creating and sticking to Christmas traditions with each other. The biggest tradition that we have done every year is ice-skating. I know what you are thinking... "big deal". Well, for a 14-year-old girls it was a very big deal when my 16-year-old boyfriend took me on my first out-of-town-date to an outdoor skating rink. Over the years we have gone back to the same outdoor skating rink, eaten at the same restaurant, and enjoyed the same hot cocoa as we did on our first Christmas. Some of my favorite memories of our dating relationship happened on our ice-skating dates.

 

Possible New Traditions

This being our first Christmas as a new family, I have a few ideas for some possible new traditions that we can do together. 

1. I want to get a "special" new Christmas ornament for our tree each year and put it on the tree on Christmas morning together. Hopefully, over the years we can do this with our children one day.

2. A tradition I grew up doing with my family was watching "It's a Wonderful Life" on Christmas Eve; I want to adopt this tradition for our new family and keep it going. 

3. The past few years I have told Brett that I have been itching to     do the "Angel Tree" to bless a child for Christmas. Well, this year we did it. Brett just happens to be in charge of the Angel Tree at the YMCA were he works. How convenient, right? I hope that we can keep this up with the Angel Tree or some other ministry every year. 

Our Christmas Date 2011 

Because of our schedules and where we live, we will not be able to go back Marshall, TX for our annual ice-skating date. This will be the first year in seven years that we haven't done it. So.... we decided to try something new! (Isn't that what marriage is all about?) Brett took me to ICE at the Gaylord Texan. We got to go in the 15 degree ice show and slide down the ice slides on inter-tubes! We had so much fun. I think we will try to do something new every year since DFW has so much to offer during this Christmas season. I think next year we want to go to some kind of Christmas production at one of the churches up here. The possibilities are endless.

Merry Christmas!

Love, the Gilpatrick Family :)