Christmas with the Cashatts

This year might have been the most "celebrating" of Christmas I've ever done in my life. The entire month of December was jam packed with holiday cheer!

The season started with The Cocktails' Winter Concert. My friend Elizabeth accompanied me. And while, as you can see from the picture, they didn't actually sing that many Christmas songs, it had that wintry feel.

Our "official" kickoff to the season was going to see Glorious, which is the modern worship style Christmas program at Shandon Baptist, our home church. The songs didn't quite seem as "modern" as they normally are, but it's always a fun experience.

We attended two non-family Christmas parties this year. At Jay and Alison's, we got to see some of our upstate friends, learned how to play Mexican Train Dominoes, and won 90's Trivial Pursuit! (Thanks to help from Michelle and Tara.) At Magan's, we were serenaded by Joel and Reid, and will probably never listen to "Bad Romance" or "Tik Tok" the same way ever again.

One of our favorite things is going to see The Lights Before Christmas at Riverbanks Zoo. We've done this ever since we started dating, so it's a special tradition for us. I love the musical Christmas tree! We also took an evening to just ride around Columbia and look at some specific neighborhoods and houses that have beautiful lights.

I went down to Myrtle Beach for a couple of days to see my mom and brother (who was visiting from Oregon). I also got to see one of my bridesmaids Holly (first time since the wedding!), where we had a three hour Starbucks date! That same day, Mom and I went to see "The Muppets." Boy, did that make me nostalgic for my childhood. As soon as we got home, I went digging through the record collection and found these gems:

 And somehow, this record player, which is over 20 years old, still works... Go Fisher Price!

When you get married, you essentially double the amount of family holiday shindigs you will be invited to. We are very lucky in the fact that the majority of our families live within forty-five minutes of our house (minus Mom and Troy of course). For us, that means six Christmas events just for family! This year, so far we've attended four, with one more to go. My favorite parts are Secret Santa gift exchanges (won some lovely B&BW soap this year!) and playing board games.

Christmas music and Christmas movies are a staple of our celebration each year. I love Hanson and Mariah Carey's holiday songs, while Jamie prefers David Crowder. We have many of the same favorite movies though, as we usually watch National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, How the Grinch Stole Christmas (the cartoon), A Charlie Brown Christmas, Elf, Four Christmases, Love Actually and The Holiday. I also am guilty of vegging out in front of Lifetime or ABC Family during the holiday season.

My favorite gift we gave this year was to Jamie's parents. It was definitely the most creative, which is why I like it so much. Unfortunately, I have to give that credit to Jamie :-)  They really love the dipping oil that comes with the bread at Carrabba's, so, we tried to recreate that for them. Here is the recipe we used:

• 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper
• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1 teaspoon dried rosemary
• 1 teaspoon dried basil
• 1 teaspoon dried parsley
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon minced garlic
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/4 cup Spanish extra virgin olive oil (or as needed)

And the finished product (sorry it's sideways!): 

That about sums up our Christmas season this year. Looking forward to 2012!