Who else put Christmas decorations up the day after Thanksgiving? I had no hesitation with this. Christmas time is the happiest time of the year. Although the weather begins to cool down and snow might fall here and there, the whole month of December is filled with love and magic.

I haven’t taken pictures of my interior decorations so I will make a separate blog post for that, but outside we put white lights around our porch and the rock wall in front of our house. We also placed an inflated Mickey Mouse and Olaf in the front yard because who doesn’t love Disney characters?

This Christmas Day will be quite different for me. I don’t live at home anymore, so I won’t come down my stairs with my brother at 7 am to a completely present-filled room, with the tree all lit up and my parents, excited to see our reactions when we open every gift. This year I’ll come downstairs at 7 AM with my boyfriend and puppies to a present-filled room with the tree lit up. The two situations sound the same, but emotionally, they’re very different. Normally I have my whole family there with me – my brother, my dad and my mom. Now I’m with my second family. It’ll be weird, but both situations will be happy ones. That’s all that matters.