Five on Friday: Christmas Edition

It's so hard to believe Christmas is LESS than a week away!

One
Last weekend I finally sent out our Christmas cards! There are so many cards that are adorable from Minted but I couldn't bring myself to pay ~$50 for 30 cards. (Please let me know if you know any tricks to make them affordable!) Stephen's pretty savvy with Photoshop so I figured he could so a small design on our cards but after finding out if we printed them, we'd have to cut them all and buy envelopes, we scratched that idea. I found a Groupon for Staples photo service and we decided to pull the trigger - $10 for 50 5x7 cards with envelopes. We figured even if the design isn't amazing, that's a great deal. When we went to pick out our cards, we realized you could upload a design! So Stephen ended up designing our Christmas cards and I love the way they turned out!

Our 2014 Card: Front

Our 2014 Card: Back

Since I wasn't blogging last year, I thought I'd share our 2013 card. We got this one from Walgreen's... old school. I was surprised they had some more modern designs and it wasn't too cartoonish.

Our 2013 Card

Two

I am so thankful that today is my last day at work until 2015! Hello Christmas Vacation! Soon we'll be heading down south to spend Christmas with Stephen's family. I've never spent Christmas not with my family so this is going to be a huge adjustment but I'm excited to spend time with everyone and see their traditions! Since we won't be home to celebrate Christmas, Stephen and I are doing Christmas tomorrow. I'm looking forward to spending all day in our pj's, celebrating our Savior's birth, doing lots of cooking, watching movies and opening presents!

I'll be doing a lot of this the next few days!

Three

I feel like I'm running out of time to watch all the Christmas movies we usually watch. Stephen said we didn't have to watch them all if I didn't want to but I don't want to not watch them and once December 26 rolls around get all sad because I missed out this year. Thank goodness for no more work, we're going to have to have some Christmas movie marathons the next few days ;)

Four
Ever since I can remember, my mom has always done a little something for the mailman, garbage men, etc. around Christmas. Usually she makes them something but now with how the world is, it's better to buy something packaged and wrapped. I wanted to continue that tradition with my own family so last year I saw this picture on Pinterest and wanted to recreate it as a little Christmas gift/pick-me-up for our mailman. This year we bought him m&ms again but used a label from the Chex Mix gifts I made. We got a Christmas card from the mailman thanking us and he remembered we gave him m&ms last year too! I thought it was so sweet and wanted to share that even the smallest things, can lighten someones day.

Apparently this is for "Thank a Mailman Day" but we altered it for Christmas. I also failed at getting a picture of the one we made for him. via

Five

I have been in a baking mood and have been baking all sorts of goodies. I have decided to make some Christmas Crack to bring with us to my in-laws for Christmas. They're super easy to make and you can't stop eating them - hence the name. Hopefully everyone enjoys them, but if not I'm sure Stephen and his brothers will devour them in no time. 

via