Hi everyone! How was your holiday? I hope it was filled with love, laughter, giving, receiving, and all that good stuff 
My holiday flew by at warp speed, and I’m definitely feeling the post-Christmas blues now. The only thing lifting my mood a little is the fact that I have a fabulous New Years Eve party to look forward to. I’m also trying to appreciate the time I had with family, rather than be sad it’s over.
I have lots to recap about so without further ado, let’s rewind to this past weekend.
Sunday was time for baking, cleaning, and prepping for Christmas Eve, so I spent the day at my parents’ house helping out. My mom hosts Christmas Eve every year, which is the “old tradition” in our family. I contributed raspberry cheesecake cupcakes, snickerdoodles, and of course molasses spice cookies.
I highly recommend that snickerdoodle recipe I linked to above. It was my first time baking them, and they were a huge hit. I had many requests for the recipe!
I had some little helpers by my side in the kitchen all day too
Christmas Eve
I woke up on Monday morning and had to get some work done. Boo! I couldn’t motivate myself to work a full day, so I put in a good 4 hours and called it quits. Then I got ready, made a green smoothie so my spinach wouldn’t be wasted, and packed my presents to head back to my parents’.
Everyone in my family goes to church on Christmas Eve. After the service is over, we all get together at my mom’s house for appetizers, dips, and desserts. It’s a casual night where we exchange some presents and play games!
That dip on the left is a roasted red pepper dip. My God, cheesy and delicious.
I didn’t take too many pictures (and the lighting in my parents’ house is terrible anyway) but I did capture a few moments.
Matt joined us on Christmas Eve too, and was a total hit with the family After an epic game of Scattegories, we all stayed up late watching Christmas Vacation.
Christmas
I couldn’t believe it! Christmas morning I woke up to a couple inches of snow on the ground! I can’t remember the last time we had a white Christmas. It was wonderful.
This is where I start to fail with pictures. I didn’t take any of our Christmas morning, opening presents and stocking stuffers. I was in the moment! I’ll share more about my gifts in a later post.
After opening each other’s gifts, we all got ready and drove to my grandmother’s for a Christmas brunch. This was a “new tradition” for our family, and I think it might be here to stay!
My grandma had everything set up so adorably! And the spread was fantastic. Ham, bacon, eggs, bagels, toast, homemade banana bread and scones, fruit, coffee, juice. Everything you could ever want for breakfast. And don’t forget the Baileys 
We stayed at my grandma’s for a couple hours, enjoying time with family and exchanging presents. Then it was time to hit the road and head to the Cape to see my mom’s side of the family. They had driven up from Long Island so we wanted to spend some time with them before they left. We got there at about 5pm, and were welcomed with a huge turkey feast.
And everything was homemade! Turkey, cranberry sauce, glazed carrots, stuffing, sweet potatoes, squash, turnips and carrots, mashed potatoes, and green bean casserole. I love this meal. Everything was incredible.
After dinner we relaxed for awhile, and ended up watching Ice Age 4. It was the kids choice, but I honestly think I liked it even more than them! Haha
Then it was time for dessert. My family went a little overboard!
Can you tell a love for baking runs in the family?
After dessert I enjoyed a glass of wine, some spiked eggnog, and some more Scattegories fun.
My family stayed in a hotel for the night since we weren’t up for the 2 hour drive home. Plus, we wanted to see more of our Long Island family on Wednesday.
Wednesday
We all slept in on Wednesday morning, then decided to stop for breakfast at a quaint little restaurant before meeting back up with family.
I ordered an egg white omelot with bacon, onions, tomatoes, and cheese. With a side of homemade raisin toast and homefries. Exactly what I was craving!
I ate about half, then we spent the day with family before heading home in the late afternoon. I wasn’t back in Providence until 6pm last night, and was welcomed with a freezing cold house and no hot water. Lovely.
Me and Matt had plans to exchange Christmas gifts anyway, so I drove to his house for some much needed hot water.
He ended up really liking my gifts! I got him a Patriots picture for his “man cave” and Toy Story 3 because he’s weirdly obsessed with Pixar movies.
He was totally sweet, and bought me a stocking filled with chocolate, flowers, wine, and a perfume set I wanted And his mom bought me something too! An adorable scarf, which was totally unexpected. Now I need to figure out something for his family…
After exchanging gifts we enjoyed our bottle of wine and chocolate. It was the perfect way to end the busy Christmas season.
Questions: Tell me about your holiday! Do you get the post-Christmas blues?