Christmas Party Weekend

Good morning, everyone!  I hope your Monday is off to a wonderful start :)

My morning was...a little messy.  I was making an Advocare meal replacement shake for breakfast this morning in one of those shaker bottles, and apparently the lid was not closed all the way.  After one pretty forceful shake, I was a chocolatey mess!!  Good thing I was already planning on getting in about 30 minutes early; despite having to change, I was still more than on time!

Good thing this followed a good weekend!  Joe and I had a few Christmas parties to go to, which made for a very social weekend.

Friday
We started the weekend much like we always do--Mexican food for dinner, then relaxing at home watching some Dexter.  We are on the 8th season, and I'm kind of sad that we're coming to end of the series!  It's a pretty good one, and I've enjoyed watching it with Joe.  Suggestions for the next series we should start next are welcome!

Funny picture from Friday: Joe was eating a "fourth meal", and we seem to have some beggars living with us!

He brings it on himself.  He's the one that always feeds pieces of dinner to the animals.  The funny thing is, I've never seen a cat beg like Pablo does!  So funny!

Saturday
As seems to be the trend lately, I began my Saturday morning with a race!  I ran the Ed Root Memorial 10K, which I've run the past two years.  I really enjoy this race, but I will say it was a tough one for me.  I'll do a full recap later this week, but I am very glad I ran it!  Great way to start the morning.

When I got home, Joe and I watched College Football Gameday, napped (well, I did), and watched football.  We were both commenting at how fast the college football season always goes by!  It's sad.  At least we have bowl games to look forward to!

It was then time to head to our Christmas parties!  First up, we went to the youth group staff Christmas party.  The youth director hosted dinner at his house to thank us for what we do with the youth, and it was a really great time!  Great fellowship, and it was my first time having a fried turkey!  It was very yummy!

After that, we went to a small Christmas get-together with some of Joe's classmates.  They are finishing their time in school before heading off to their internships next quarter, so everyone got together at a restaurant for some karaoke.

One of Joe's classmates, Adam, is GREAT at karaoke, so it's always a lot of fun seeing him sing!  I joined in on a Backstreet Boys song :)  Overall, it was a fun time, and I'm glad I got to see everyone before they leave for three months!

Side note: I cannot believe how quickly Joe's three years of school have gone by!!  It was so daunting that he'd be in school three more years, and now we're three months away from him graduating!!  Crazy!!

Sunday
We started our Sunday morning off at church!  The sermon series the pastor is doing this Christmas is called "A Baby Changes Everything," so Joe and I were joking about how appropriate that was for us.  This week, the pastor talked about Mary and how Jesus coming changed her.  It was really good!  We also sang "Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus", which is one of my favorites :)

Joe had plans with his friends, so I went home and finished up the Christmas decorating.  Our house looks very festive now!  I had an extra small tree, so I decided to decorate with my race medals (as I've seen people do on the Team #runDisney Facebook page!).

I hope it'll stay standing--some of those medals are heavy!

The rest of the day consisted of taking a walk with the puppy, helping at youth group, and enjoying the last few weekend hours by relaxing on the couch.  We played some fun games at youth group involving making marshmallow snowmen with your mouth!  Pretty funny.

And that was our weekend!  It was great to get in some social time while also having plenty of down time.  Just the way I like it :)

Question for you: Have you had any Christmas parties to attend yet?  What'd you do this weekend?