If we weren't already in the Christmas spirit, this last weekend sure did the trick. It was packed full of Christmas events and activities. We didn't necessarily have Winter Wonderland weather to accompany our events, but we did have what seemed like hurricane force winds and rain. Lots and lots of rain.
The annual Coast Guard Christmas Party was on Friday night and Kolt decided that we were going to attend as soon as we made the decision to stay in Sitka for the Holidays. This party is adults only, which meant we had to get a babysitter for Brinleigh. This was our very first time going out, just Kolt and I, without the baby. Our first date night as parents. I had prepared myself for weeks in advance and surprisingly, I was perfectly fine with everything. It wasn't nearly as hard as I was expecting it to be. Since all of our friends that we trust to watch Brinleigh are also in the Coast Guard, it was going to be near impossible to find someone that I felt comfortable with, to watch Brinleigh for the evening. Until.... I realized that the Coast Guard Air Station party was on a different night than the Coast Guard Cutter Maple Party. Brilliant!
Our next door neighbors, Jon and Kelly, are stationed on the Maple and have a daughter, Mary, who is four months older than Brinleigh. We know what kind of parents they are and we really like them so we offered a trade. If Kelly watched Brinleigh for us, I would watch Mary when they went to the Maple Christmas party. Win! Brinleigh loves Kelly and her and Mary could also entertain each other for a little while as well. Kelly was awesome, sending me a picture and texting me updates until she put Brinleigh to bed. She said that Brinleigh did awesome and was so good. I was very relieved to hear that there were no problems or complications with Brinleigh, it being her first time going to bed without Mommy or Daddy putting her to sleep.
I think that waiting as long as we did after Brinleigh was born, her being a toddler and not necessarily a baby, and the fact that we were literally only a 4-5 minute drive away from home really helped us relax about the whole thing. I guess the cranberry and vodkas probably contributed a little too.
Kolt and I had a great time at the party. It was nice to get dressed up and get out for the night, have a few too many drinks, and socialize with other adults. Kolt also won the Grand Prize Raffle, which ended up being a fully paid trip to Anchorage to take a ride on the Alaska Railroad. We still have to look into everything to find out exactly what all this entails, but we are probably going to try and take this trip in the Spring or early Summer before we transfer out. We might have to pay for Brinleigh, but we are very excited to have the opportunity to see more of Alaska before we move. We were a little disappointed that we had only really been able to see Sitka while living here since it is so expensive to travel around Alaska.
Saturday morning we woke up.... hungover, but dragged ourselves out of bed nonetheless, to take Brinleigh to see Santa.... For the Second time. The Coast Guard was having the annual kids Christmas party at the air station where there was food, crafts, a bounce house and of course, SANTA! Who was arriving via Coast Guard Helicopter at 10:30am. I do believe Kolt and I deserve some kind of recognition for getting our asses out of bed and out of the house ON TIME to see Santa arrive, so we could stand in line for an hour just to have Brinleigh scream and cry as soon as she got within a 4ft perimeter of the Jolly old man (who btw, was not really an old man, it was just Rescue Swimmer, Chris Belisle.) BUT, we got the picture that we had set out to get, Brinleigh got a free book, and Momma almost got sick.
Saturday was also a girls bake day that I had planned months ago. So after the kids party, my friends, Kate and Camille and I all met at Camille's house (3 houses down from me) prepared to bake an endless amount of sweets. The guys all hung out at our house with the babies. I made butterscotch fudge, chocolate fudge topped with walnuts and chocolate chip cookies. Kate made rice crispy treats and cake pops. And Camille made bon bons and almond crescents.
Sunday evening we went to my work Christmas party at one of the restaurants in town. We were able to bring our kids so Brinleigh got to run around a little bit. She seemed to have a lot of fun and threw a fit when we picked her up to get ready to leave.
We also got a little bit of snow which always helps get me into the Christmas spirit.
I have been super busy trying to get all of our Christmas shopping done, get family pictures taken, and ordering Christmas cards. With all the bad weather a lot of my orders have been delayed and I still have yet to receive some stuff. I am having most of the gifts shipped to me so that I can put things together or because they were part of a combined order so I still have to ship things out after I get them. My Christmas cards say that they aren't even scheduled to be delivered until December 23rd, so just a warning: Christmas gifts and Christmas cards may be a bit late this year. So here's a little sneak peak of our family Christmas pictures.
