Documenting

I just want to document these last couple things for Christmas. Promise this is the last of it. ;)

Each year Kevin takes his clients gifts for the holidays. Normally, I'm usually in charge of sprucing them up to make them look festive. I was so busy this year that I didn't get around to it, so Kevin took it upon himself to pick out the baskets and bows. He put both baskets together all on his own and they turned out great! I was quite impressed.

This deserves some documenting, does it not?! ;)

The other thing I wanted to share was this card/picture holder I found at Pier 1 for only $10!!! I had mentioned before that I wasn't sure how I wanted to hang the Christmas cards we've received. Well, this works so great. I like it so much I'm going to keep it up year-round and put coupons in it, wedding invitations and any other things I don't feel like magnetizing to the refrigerator.

Here it is without anything on it. I love the rod iron.

And here it is with all of the Christmas cards we've received this year! I've loved every single one that we've received from family, friends and my bloggie friends! :)

Oh! And the last thing that I wanted to share with you all is a picture of Kevin in his finest Christmas gear. He attended an Ugly Christmas Sweater Party a few weeks ago and I die laughing every time I see the pictures of him from that night. He's wearing fake glasses, he combed and parted his hair, and he's sporting an epic green turtle neck with a holly leaf on it, along with a white cardigan.

Bless his heart!

That is all.

The Joys of Gift-Giving (and Receiving!)

I wanted to do a little recap of some gifts I made, and also of some great gifts I received. I loved all the gifts I got, but there's some I especially want to document.

This year I wanted to keep the gifts kind of simple. They mostly consisted of putting something in a frame. I made the following for my...

Mom

Grandma Ruth

MIL

I framed this photo for Kevin, his grandfather and his brother. It is a picture of them at an airshow that their grandfather took them to and Kevin and Matt are looking up at the sky to watch the show, while their grandfather is looking down upon them. Love it!


And here are some gifts I received...

My MIL got me these adorable Christmas dishes. I've never had Christmas dishes before and I absolutely love these!!!




My MIL also gave me a gift card to Kohl's and Target. PTL because I am in desperate need of some new work clothes since I've lost weight. With some of the Kohl's card I purchased these beauties...
I think I had my old tennis shoes for a ridiculous number of years; like four or five years. Pretty pathetic. These new kicks make me feel like going for a run! However, I'm not sure I'm that ambitious with the exercising. ;)

I spotted this necklace at Pier 1. Who knew they carried jewelry!? I sure didn't. So mom got it for me as a birthday gift. I *heart* it. :)


Mom and Dad got us these big coffee mugs. They're great to have right next to our Keurig (that we love!). Wanna know something funny? I ended up getting these exact same mugs and stand for Mom for Christmas! Ha! What can I say? Great minds think alike! ;)


BFF Michelle got me this adorable apron from Anthropologie. It's in my favorite colors of red, black and white. Unfortunately, this picture does not do it justice. She knows I enjoy baking, and this is the perfect thing! It's my very first apron!


Mom got me a white scarf, and Kevin's aunt got me the prettiest blue scarf. I love me some scarves! BFF Maygan got me the cutest necklace that is grey. Loves it!


And of course I can't forget about what Brother got me :)

Woo hoo!

Very grateful for everything this Christmas season,

Christmas Love

We had a wonderful Christmas this year! It was so great to spend quality time with each side of the family.

I was going to split this post into two separate ones, but the new year is literally only one day away and it just doesn't feel right to me to be posting about my Christmas a week after the fact. ;) So I'll try to condense this as much as possible.

Thursday (Christmas Eve Eve): I ended up taking this day off at the last minute, and I am so glad I did! It was nice to get the last minute things done before my family came to town. Mom arrived on this day and we went to lunch and did some grocery shopping for our Christmas Eve dinner. Brother showed up later that night and I can't really remember what we all did for the remainder of the evening. Ha! I think we just watched Christmas movies and headed to bed early.

Friday (Christmas Eve): Mom and I woke up at 7:30 and headed out to some stores. We managed to go to seven different stores in two hours and we completed our Christmas shopping by 10 that morning. I was quite pleased. :) Unfortunately, it seemed like it took us twice as long to wrap all the gifts that were just going to get unwrapped later on that night.

Dad arrived that afternoon and we all just pretty much relaxed and enjoyed each others company.

Mom made an early dinner of enchiladas, homemade Spanish rice and refried beans. It's not really your traditional Christmas Eve meal, but it tasted amazing!

Oh, and I also enjoyed some champagne. I can't leave that out! ;)

After dinner we opened our gifts. None of us really went overboard this year, which was actually nice.

Dad handing out the gifts (it's tradition). He's also wearing his new robe that was so soft!

Kahlua wanted to pose with the new sweater that her Grammy got her for Christmas!

Brother posing in his Christmas gifts (beanie, new robe and a new jacket over that).

Saturday (Christmas day!!!): We all got up early and were on the road by about 9:30 to head up to Kevin's family. I was really looking forward to this because not everyone had met yet. It couldn't have turned out any better! Everyone got along beautifully and my family had such. a. fun. time with Kevin's family! Kevin has a very large, close family. I also have a very large family, but we're not very close because everyone lives pretty far apart. It was nice to enjoy Christmas with our soon-to-be large, extended family. Lots of pictures from the day...

Kevin's grandpa, Joe, Kevin and his brother, Matt, opening their gifts I gave them.

Joe was trying to dress Kahlua up in a rather large Santa outfit. Ha!

I love my MIL's Nativity scene.

Kevin's family has a tradition that after the Christmas dinner, everyone participates in a gift exchange. Each person brings a gift and we all gather around in a circle of his grandparents' living room. We start off with our own gift (that's wrapped) and his grandmother (Helen) will read "The Night Before Christmas." Every time she reads the word and we past our gift to the person to our left. Seems easy enough, but with 20+ people there, and the "ands" sometimes coming right after one another, it can get a little confusing. Plus, some of us have consumed our fair share of champagne and wine by this time - so the confusion is understandable. ;) After the story is over, we go around the circle and open our gifts then each person gets two chances to steal a gift. It's really a lot of fun.




This year I ended up with this:

This is a wooden Bob Marley head. Ha! Each year this is included in the gift exchange; kind of as the "gag gift." It usually also has a $20 bill taped on it too for the recipient. Pretty much every one in Kevin's family has ended up with the Bob Marley head, and since I'm going to permanently become part of the Pino/Kozar family soon, I thought it only fitting that it be my turn to be the owner of the Bob Marley head for a year, until next Christmas. It's been in the family for quite some time.

Sunday: Mom and Dad headed back home and Brother and I stayed with Kevin's family. We played Taboo (which is so fun by the way!) and had a really relaxing day.


And that pretty much sums up our Christmas. I feel very blessed to have such a wonderful family and soon-to-be family. I already cannot wait until next Christmas when Kevin and I will finally be a married couple, and maybe even have a little bun in the oven (God willing)!

I hope you all enjoyed your Christmas as well!

Twenty-eight Years Young!

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a great Christmas! I have a lot to post about but I'm going to break them up into the next three days so I don't bore you all with useless information and pictures. ;)

Yesterday I turned 28 years old! I cannot believe that I'm now only two years away from 30; and to be honest, I'm really looking forward to my 30's. But for now I'll enjoy my last two years of being in my 20's while I can. :)

Sunday night a group of friends and Kevin and I met up for dinner to celebrate my birthday a couple days early. It was great! Here are some pictures from the evening:

Kevin, Kyle and Quinn

Breanna and her new fiancé , Kevin. They just got engaged a couple weeks ago. Very excited for them!

Erica and her handsome hubby, Shawn.

BIL Matt and SIL Courtney.

Brother and Me!

Me and Kev

Great girlfriends!

It was a great night, and I so appreciate everyone who came!

Since yesterday was my actual birthday, Kevin did a great job of spoiling me. Over Christmas he kept telling me that he got me a really great birthday gift, but he wouldn't give me any sort of hint as to what it was! I'm not very good with surprises seeing as I'm very somewhat inpatient and all. But eventually I got through my work day (yes, I had to work on my birthday - bummer!) and when I got home he had my gift nicely "wrapped" in a gift bag and once I opened it I laid my eyes upon this beauty... *angels singing* *harp music playing*

The iPhone 4
{via}

I was so surprised and excited that I got this as a birthday gift. Kevin did a pretty good job of keeping it a secret, up until I got a text on my old phone yesterday afternoon from AT&T congratulating me on my new phone purchase. Haha! Poor guy. But he did good. I had no problems setting it up and it runs beautifully. Compared to the dinosaur, first generation iPhone I've been using for the past three years, this one seems to move at the speed of light! Ha!

Kevin also made me a great dinner last night and even cleaned up the kitchen afterwards! :) Thank you for making my birthday special, Kev! xoxo

I got some other really great gifts as well from friends and family, but I'll be doing a separate post later on about some gifts I received over Christmas and the birthday.

It was a great birthday and I felt very special to have received so many birthday wishes via Facebook, Twitter, text and by phone. Thank you to everyone for those! God is good. :)