Wonderful Christmas in SoCal

Ever since moving to Northern California I have gone home for Christmas every other year. This was my every other year and I had so much fun! I love being home for Christmas and my twins love seeing their cousins and playing with the kids their age.

The weather was awesome, as always and it was just a shame I could not have stayed down for at least two weeks. I did not go to any big name places on my Christmas vacation, but spending time with my family was all I needed. I mean, I grew up in SoCal so I was not really missing out on anything big, but it would be nice to go to Disneyland with my twins since they have never gone. I mean, it costs like $93 each to enter the park now. What would be cool is if Disneyland went back to buying a ticket packet where the "E" ticket was the best ride. My "E" ticket was always for Pirates of the Caribbean.

Oh but I digress....

Let's see, my whole family had a Christmas party at one of my cousin's homes, I had Christmas Eve at my sister's home and Christmas Day at my parents home. It was Christmas, Christmas and Christmas. My twins are so blessed, indeed. My twins are so blessed with love from their Nana and Papa and Auntie(s), Uncles, Daddy and Mommy as well.

Yeah, this was one of the best Christmas'  I have had in a long time because I was able to see all my family in one location.

 

Christmas is here and so are the lights

Last weekend my hubby put up our Christmas lights. I just love them. They are the white ones that look like icicles. I just love these and they come in blue or multi colored too. Ever since I was a kid I have had Christmas lights on my home. So, now that I have twin girls, it is just so cool I get to put lights on my home for them now. I think we began putting Christmas lights on our home when they were four years old. Before the age of 4, they probably would not have appreciated the lights as they do today at age 7.

This is not my home, but you can see how cool these icicle lights are on any home. These are great lights because they can be used all over your home and they really look like icicles from the street.

 

In the past couple of years these icicle Christmas lights have been all the rage, but now there are the oh so popular LED Christmas lights. LED Christmas lights come of white, multi color or sets of red, blue, green, orange, pink and so much more. These LED lights are the most popular string lights because they can be used year round too. Even though they are awesome for Christmas, these can be used year round for inside your  home or on your patio. I use LED string lights on my patio awning and I love them.

 

There are also a variety of shapes for LED lights like stars, pine cones, snowflakes and a lot more.

If you have never heard if Color Wave LED lights, they are designed with the newest technology for seasonal and commercial usage. LED lights are so cool because one color fades into the other as it changes to a new color.

 

 

If these new Christmas lights are not your thing, there is always the traditional incandescent lights, craft lights, lights for weddings, patriotic lights, mini lights, battery operated lights and a lot more.

 

The skies the limit today for all the Christmas lights you can look at and choose from. String lights are fun for decorating any space in your place. Bring some colors into your space as they hang from one end of your door to the other or over your windows.  

Twins In Ballerina Costume Photo Shoot in Backyard

Before my twins were playing in the falling leaves, I wanted to take some photos of them in their ballerina costume. I was not sure if there would be group photographs taken so I took some myself in my backyard. The reason I took these photos was to add to my annual calendar for myself, Mom and Dad, husbands parents and GG Fiddner.

There are leaves all over the ground and I had them against the fence seperating my neighbor and myself. Some photos are candid and others are not. I also wanted to take these photos so I could have one of the photos added to a canvas. I have one canvas photo in my hallway already, but want to give it as a Christmas gift to a family member.

These are some of the photos I took of my twins in their ballerina tutu costumes for The Nutcracker recital.

 

 

I just love these ballerina tutu costumes. They are just adorable and of course the pink is such a great color.

 

Twins Jumping in Falling Leaves

I love when the leaves start falling. The leaves have been falling for over a month now and they are finally beginning to fall down faster. Some leaves are brown and some yellow. A lot of the leaves are bigger than my hand. They do not look that big from on top the tree, but when they are on the grass, they are pretty big.

Anyway, on Monday I had be twins raking the leaves, as they love to do. Then they jumped in them. They love jumping in the leaves and throwing them in the air and just playing in the leaves. Well, I think they like fighting more than jumping in the leaves, but raking and jumping in the leaves is fun too.

So, if you know me, by now you know how I love taking photographs of my twins. This is my backyard photo shoot with my twins jumping and throwing falling leaves into the air and just having fun. If we lived higher up, foothills maybe, my twins would love the snow. I am NOT a fan of snow. Oh, I love looking at it, and singing about it, but cold weather, NOT a FAN of and snow is cold.

Well, without further ado, here are some photographs of my twins playing in the falling leaves:

 

Twins in Ballerina Costume for The Nutcracker Recital

My twins have been practicing since September for their Christmas recital in The Nutcracker. This performance is through Starlight Studios. I just love watching my girls practice and they are doing so well. Their performance is next week. For the past two weekends, they have been dancing downtown and at a senior living facility in town.

These performances are wonderful because it gives them the chance to remember what they have learned and "give back to the community" with their talents. This is the first time my twins will have been in a Christmas recital and I am so excited it is for The Nutcracker. I have never seen The Nutcracker live before, in fact, my twins and I are going to see it at our cities theatre this weekend. I can not wait. My twins and I have watched three shows on Ovation since yesterday.

Today my twins come home from school with an ad for The Nutcracker performance dowtown. So, I had to reserve seats for the three of us. My twins are excited we are going to see The Nutcracker to. This performance, I think, is performed with children, not adults, though. This is fine with me because my twins will be more interested in the performance.

Well, here are some photos I have taken of my twins from their ballet class this season:

 

 

 

I was going to upload a video I took, but it is taking too long to upload, so here are some cute photos I took of  my twins.

 

 

 

Dr. Jim and his sidekick Bob

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of © Blue Shield of California for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

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