Winter Holidays, 2019

LOL WHAT IS THIS. I never blogged the holidays?? I found this on my blog dashboard and died a little. It’s almost Memorial Day and I’m finally blogging about the Christmas holidays, I think this is a new Low? But you know what fuckit, whatever. It was started and I’m gonna finish and I have real decent content on deck I swears.

Anyway. Blessings to you dear readers, as the holiday pretzel smiles upon you.

Guess what! Attended the Stoughton Fire Truck Parade, as is tradition. Not sure how much longer we’ll be hitting this up, so I took lots of pictures. We scored a window seat at the Brewery so were able to wave at Santa from the comfort of a toasty warm restaurant like some fancy rich person.

After watching the parade and finishing our meal we finished our evening like any other fancy rich person: we hit up St. Vinnys for some thrifting fun.

Bought some cool 1970s strawberry-decor dishes, a Doctor Zhivago-esque muff, and a bunch of weird vintage holiday stuff (including an old apron NEW WITH TAGS dated 1958) so: no regrets.

Also this year: got a gingerbread kit that included ninja cookie cutters. Couldn’t pass that up, clearly.

But don’t let that gingerbread fool you, oh no. We had a really, REALLY mild early winter.

In fact, at one point we took the kiddos down to the park and we needed no coats whatsoever. ‘Balmy’ does not even start to explain it. Record warmth, in fact. I mean, not like I’m complaining. If there is one thing that sucks the life out of me, it’s the frigid temps of a Wisconsin winter. So unseasonable warmth, I’m down for.

(Even though it doesn’t exactly feel Christmas-y when you don’t even need a jacket, lordy.)

We took our holiday trip to Chicago a bit late this year.

Usually we head down right after our Thanksgiving trip, but the weather was so mild (going before we put on the snow tires is the name of the game here) so we put it off until riiiiiiight before Christmas.

Still did not disappoint, in fact it was rather charming to be there right at the end. Might make this a Thing, in fact. Next year we’ve talked about maybe (IF THERE’S A COVID-19 VACCINE THAT IS) booking a hotel for a proper Overnight and adding in a few other cool Chicago Holidays traditions.

Good god, but there were stuffed animal chickens just littering the Gift Shop everywehre this time. I had to drag this kid away.

So – we’ve been to the MSI a million times at this point, yeah? But it turns out: there’s a tiny corner that is “Old Timey Chicago” and we’ve never found it until this visit. Scott and I could not stop laughing about it. It’s a tiny corner but still exciting to find something new. Including a Berghoff storefront, which was a favorite spot when Scott and I visited Chicago, and we loved going there (and its Oktoberfest!) before it shuttered in 2006.

Back to the usual museum stuff.

I appreciate that Pete’s list includes “go skydiving” not once but twice.

Museum snow!

Moose stole my jacket on the way out.

Off to find some dinner.

Rev Brew has always been a favorite, our comfort spot in Chicago. We stopped here once again.

I heart Logan Square.

Oh man: if I miss any place in self-isolation times, it’s Chicago. Linus even came across some old prints I have from a 2013 trip to Chicago and he insisted we hang them over his bed.

Anyway. We got back and it was immediately Christmastime and here’s our living room.

And here’s Halle Berry.

And Moose and his beloved Sheepy stuffed animal (fun fact: I told him that when I was little I had two stuffed animals named Bunny-pie and Lamby-pie and he’s insistent that I show him pictures of them and I’m not sure pictures even exist, which kinda bums me out tbh).

The Nintendo Switch gift went over well.

You guys that’s it! That’s all I got! We rented movies, opened gifts, hung out, and had KC BBQ for dinner.

Also we had Tom & Jerry cocktails – I bought the batter from a local grocer. I am just not a hot-cocktail kinda gal? but thought I’d give it the old college try anyway. Verdict: kinda weird, kinda gross. Welp, we tried. The quart of batter (minus a few tablespoons we dipped out of it) is still in our freezer. I guess we’ll try again next year.

Happy May, friends! Another post coming soon, promise.