Today I want to share a quick, super easy, three ingredient appetizer! If you need an app to have on hand this week or to bring with you on Christmas Day, look no further  

Sweet, cheesy deliciousness

• Lay out dough and cut into 3×3 inch squares, and press into a muffin tin.
• Cube the cheese and place one cube in each square.
• Top with a dollop of cranberry sauce.
• Bake for ten minutes in a 400 degree oven.
• Serve warm

I never thought Friday would come, this has been such a long week!!

3. Anyone else still need to wrap presents? I pulled everything out the other night, but still have not wrapped a single thing! The underneath of our tree is looking very sad

She has so many Christmas related outfits, she’s been wearing one a day this whole week

I’m very excited to be participating in this link-up and giveaway, so if you are here for the first time, welcome! I hope you’ll stay awhile Don’t forget to join our giveaway at the end of this post! Thank you to Amy at The Charming Blog for hosting!

I’ve waited pretty much forever, to have my own little family to enjoy the holidays with. There is something amazing about celebrating holidays with a little one … everything is so much more fun and exciting! Gracie will be 8 months this year on Christmas, so I know she won’t really understand it, but it’s important for me to start fun, family traditions now.

Here are some traditions that we plan on starting with our family:

{yearly ornaments}
Each year, buy (or make!) a new ornament to put on your tree. My boss gave me the idea of getting an ornament every year for Grace. The ornament could be in her stocking, or advent calendar or as a present – but the ornament always represents something she loved or did that year. Her daughter is now grown and this is her first Christmas out of their home, so they plan on giving her all of her ornaments to have on her own tree. This year, we got Grace a “Baby’s First Christmas” ornament with her name and the year 2014 on it and we also got her one from our trip to South Carolina. Keith and I have ornaments for every year we have been together too – our first Christmas, the year we got engaged, got married, bought a house and were pregnant I love seeing our milestones on our tree.

{advent calendar}
I ordered the following advent calendar from etsy. I’m so excited to fill up each little bag with a treat, a note or a fun activity. Since this year Gracie is too little to really understand, the activities will be more geared toward us as a family. Since our mantle is for stockings, I’m going to hang this across our front window. You can include candies, small toys, headbands (for Gracie of course!), lottery tickets (for dad!) as well as activity ideas like decorate the tree, make hot cocoa, watch “Elf” or do something nice for a neighbor. The possibilities are endless and they can be adapted as your family grows and changes.

Advent Calendar

I’m all about supporting small businesses wherever possible, and there are many shops on Etsy that sell these but I also found a couple that I love from Pottery Barn Kids and Target.

{family photos and christmas cards}
I am a huge sucker for Christmas cards. I love snail mail in general, but I especially love snail mail in December! Every one that I get goes on our fridge. I usually start planning ours early (like before-Halloween-early!) and I have them addressed and mailed by December 1. I am slightly behind this year because we went away, but I’m okay with that because it is going to be our cutest.card.ever.

I’ve purchased my Christmas cards from several websites, but my favorite is Simply to Impress. They have beautiful designs, great prices and fast shipping.  You can find a couple of my favorite designs here and here.

And just for fun ….

From our first Christmas card – 2010

to this year! Christmas 2014

{gift giving}
It wouldn’t be Christmas without presents!  Last year, Keith and I decided to try something new with our gifts for each other. We each drew six scrabble tiles from a bag. Those six letters represented the gifts we would get the other, but the catch was each gift had to begin with a letter you drew. It gets a little tricky when you get “x” or “z”, but it just means we have to get really creative! This year we aren’t going crazy with “big” gifts, and will likely just do stockings – but the rules still apply

Also along these lines, we have both created Amazon.com wishlists. You can add items to it from any website, and then share it with family and friends. We use it all year long for birthdays and other events, but it really comes in handy this time of year when everyone is asking “what do you want for Christmas?

{family activities}
December 6th we are taking Gracie on her first ever Polar Express ride! I am so excited to do this with her every year, wearing new Christmas pjs and drinking hot cocoa There are several other places in New England that do the Polar Express, as she gets older we are looking forward to doing the one from Edaville Railroad in Hopedale, MA and the original Polar Express out of Jefferson NH.  If you live in any of these locations (or nearby) and have gone on them, please let me know your experience! Other activities you can do might be Tree Lighting Festivals, or going to visit Santa.

{the meaning of Christmas}

We love everything about Christmas, but it’s very important that we take the time to teach Grace the true meaning of Christmas, faith and family. I hope that we take every opportunity to share with her the Christmas spirit. Maybe this means doing a random act of kindness, helping someone in need, or donating our time or resources. I want her to know how truly blessed she is, and do what she can to pass those blessings on to others. Our church puts on a beautiful Christmas Eve mass, and we are really looking forward to sharing that time with her, celebrating the birth of Jesus.

What kind of traditions does your family have? How do you plan on keeping or adding to these traditions over the years? What does Christmas mean to you?

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