Holiday Highlights

 December 2019 was a beautiful blur! We kicked off the month with our annual trek to Christmasville and enjoyed the festivities downtown Rock Hill. Zippy and Peppermint kept us entertained each morning. Daddy helped pull off a surprise family trip to a Checkers hockey game for Star Wars night. Maggie and I went to see the York County Ballet and Eliza perform in the Nutcracker. We had a "Snowbody has Better Friends than Us" half day playdate with our QCP buddies. We attended the Lowry's Parade and helped set up for our Shiland Luminaries. Old Town Church had a special Christmas candlelight service. We went out to Mr. Tokyo a few days before Christmas and ate our weight in sushi, Aunt Melissa and Uncle Rodger hosted our family for a Christmas Even cookie decorating, puzzle playing, soup and dessert eating evening. Santa arrived with some special electronic surprises and a few themed travel gifts. We saw both sides of our families and got to celebrate each other. 

We rang in 2020 with the Casons. We had an after Christmas QCP party the weekend after. Maggie got her hair cut and straightened again by Ms. Carol (one of her favorite hairdressers ever). The kids planned a really awesome MLK Jr. House Party complete with snacks, a dance party, story time, and jokes. It was REALLY sweet and one of the best ways we've seen our darlings collaborate! Aunt Charla gave us a scare when she had a stroke and we sent her a care package to help her along her road to recovery. It's going to be a long one. The kids tried Ethiopian food for the first time. Riley was a big fan...Maggie not so much! The kids were on the same basketball team through the Oakland Baptist church team and had awesome coaches (Jason and Marsha) who really helped them develop their skills and their confidence. January 29th was Lobby Day in Columbia and I had appointments set up with Senator Climer and House Rep. Simrill. On a whim, I emailed Governor McMaster to see if he would also like to meet and talk about education issues since I would be in Columbia. To my surprise, he responded positively and we had a 20 minute meeting. He had a lot of questions and his biggest one was whether or not we still taught cursive handwriting in schools. :) We still have a long way to go with education policies and making it a priority in our state, but I was thankful for the opportunity to make my concerns heard and to help educate others.

Chris came through again with two more fantastic pinewood derby cars that he helped Riley and Maggie create. The QCP kids had a great time cheering each other on. The kids were selling coupon cards at Harris Teeter when it suddenly started snowing. That was a special treat! Wish it had stuck around, but it was gone within the hour. Maggie and Chris got to go to a Daddy Daughter dance at St. John's with a bunch of Maggie's friends. Unfortunately, she was too busy with her buddies to spend much time dancing with her daddy. Riley and I went to Lake Wylie Bowl N Bounce and did his first ever round of laser tag. He wanted to be on the opposing team and thought it was hilarious every time he got me! As an "Experience Christmas Gift", we took the kids to snowtubing in a small city called Jonas Ridge. We stayed at a quaint hotel/lodge called the Pineola Inn and ate at one of the two restaurants in town. The next day we checked out Linville Caverns. It was a lot of the fun! The following weekend, we went to see Grimmz Fairy Tales on Feb. 22nd as part 2 of their Christmas gifts. It was a hip hop rendition of stories like Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel, and Rapunzel. I loved that they had character building lessons as the theme of each one. We finished up the month by having the kids participate in Read Across America week. They loved the crazy hair day. We checked out the Art Show and Book Fair that week too. Then we brought in March by going on a family "hike" at Riverwalk.

It's been a beautiful, busy, and brilliant winter! We are looking forward to more of the same this spring!