Favorites & Life Lately

Happy Friday, friends! I hope it's been a great week for you. This one seemed to fly by at lightning speed and I know that I need so much more time for things. I decided I'm going to share some of my favorites here mixed in with a little life lately update. With the holidays in full swing and some already behind us, I really want to focus on family time. 

We have C's palate surgery on Monday and the thought of him having to go through recovery and everything again makes me anxious. He's such a strong and resilient little boy, but it's never easy to see our kids go through anything that brings them discomfort. We've also heard that the palate surgery is more intricate than his lip surgeries since those were more so primarily cosmetic. This time around they are reworking muscles and doing a lot more that will affect things long term, like his speech and sinuses. If you could keep us in your prayers for next week I would really appreciate it. 

Here's a look at some favorites and what we've been up to...

Thanksgiving: 

I know, I know, I'm wayyy behind here, but like I said, I wanted to focus on family time and I think most of us, and our readers, aren't really around during the holidays so I wanted to make sure I was soaking in all the family fun. I was really happy we were able to jump back on board with our Philadelphia Thanksgiving parade tradition because we skipped out last year since C was only two days old. It was super windy this year and they weren't even able to have the balloons up, but there was still plenty to enjoy and we all had a great time. Where we stand, we were able to be back home in time to catch the ending of it on tv and plenty of time to prep and get dinner finished.

Tree Cutting: 

The day after Thanksgiving, I know it was black Friday, but other than Eric waking up to head to Lowe's for a few deals (so adulting) we did not brave the crowds or really need anything else. We took our Christmas card pictures, that I'm excited to share, and then everyone cut down a tree from our little tree patch. It was such a fun time and I'm really glad it all worked out. I'll share more about us actually cutting our tree down and all the fun in another post. The boys helped me setup a hot chocolate bar and wanted to put out a tip jar to help raise money for us to be able to put back into planting more trees. 

Our tree might take up half our living room (it was so deceiving outside), but we are loving perfectly imperfect tree and the story that goes along with it. I completely under estimated the amount of time and work it would take to decorate a house this size and definitely need to start earlier next year. Eric will have to be on board with me breaking things out before Thanksgiving ;)

DIY Advent Calendar and Decorating: 

You might remember that I used this flea market find painters ladder for C's first birthday party. I got so many compliments on this and really like the character it has. I wanted to find a way to incorporate it into our Christmas decor. I found this mitten countdown garland and thought it would be perfect to use for this. It comes as one long strand but I just cut it up into sections and it worked out great. I made little slips to put inside the mittens that have all different things on them for each day. Some are little them stay up a little later, read the Christmas story, do something kind, bake cookies, and some of the days I have little gifts for them. I'm hoping to do a full post next season and even share some printables for you all. Let me know if that would be something you've be interested in.

So about this whole decorating thing, I LOVE when the house feels festive. Since we moved 4 days before Christmas last year (I can't believe it's almost been a year) we did very minimal decorating last year. This year I knew I wanted to go all out. If you watch my insta stories (always a HUGE thank you) then you might have seen the debate Eric and I had over how many trees to have. We compromised on 3, and a half. I say half because my little flocked tree here counts as something, right? This is a peek at our office and I really love how it came out. I went with a primarily black and white theme that features our renovated fireplace.

In Case You Missed It: 

I got my act together and was able to get three posts out this week. Look at me go! I shared more details about C's first birthday party if you want to check that out. He's so sweet and it was so great to celebrate everything about him. Our elf, Alvin, came back and we've been having some fun with him and enjoyed his welcome back breakfast. I shared a funny story on my instagram about the boys touching him and trying to get his magic back. You can head there (@beautifully_candid) to hear more about it.

Favorite Finds: 

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I think it's near to impossible not to do some sort of shopping around this time of year. I'm probably that oddball blogger that doesn't put out a lot of gift guides because there are just sooo many of them this time of year. Don't get me wrong, I love getting inspiration from my fellow bloggers, but for now, I'll leave that up to them. 

What I can do is show you some things I've recently got, and if you like any of them, then that's super cool and we both have great taste ;) 

I've been all about cozy sweaters and sweatshirts lately that I love being able to dress up or keep them casual. This HAPPY sweatshirt has been worn by me more than I would probably like to admit. It's so comfy. I snagged a few of these clutch wristlets that will be great for gifts. This black circle mirror made its way on top of our mantel and I could not love it there anymore. I had another mirror up there for the time being that I picked up on a major sale for $14. I knew it wasn't the mirror for there but for the price I was silly not to grab it. We'll save it and use it in one of our rentals. These modern stocking holders were perfect to keep the look I was going for.  The boys had these smart robots on their list and since they were on sale we picked them up for them. We had a sweater party coming up soon and I couldn't resist picking up this fun and festive sweater. I have so many people ask me where I picked up C's little beanie. It's seriously so cute on him that I got another one in a different color for him. And yes, I got with coordinating hats with him in mind. 

I hope you have a great weekend!