Christmas Traditions

December 17, 2016

I think one of the hardest things Paul and I have had to navigate in marriage is the holidays.

Now, because I know my own parents and my in-laws read my blog, let me clarify what that statement entails. 😉

(I promise it’s because we both LOVE YOU ALL AND WHERE WE COME FROM!)

We LOVE the holiday season and spending it with our families. The hard part has been meshing traditions from two completely separate families that we cherish so deeply without killing ourselves in the process. If we tried to please everyone, follow every tradition we love, and do EVERYTHING exactly as it was before we got married… we wouldn’t be able to enjoy the Christmas season as much. It would feel more like a long checklist of “must do” instead of “want to”. Mixing the old with the new, all while creating our own traditions together has proven to be a hard task! I can’t expect Paul to want to do Christmas EXACTLY how I did it growing up, nor can he expect the same of me. And, despite the wish deep, deep down in my heart to run out of my bedroom with my siblings while Mom and Dad video tape us with the Camcorder every year still… I know that I can’t and won’t do that really ever again. (Paul probably says “Thank God” to that.) The holidays as a married couple means picking with my husband what we want to do for our own family traditions, keeping our time together at Christmas sacred, and even though it’s just the two of us for now, creating a magical time of year for our future family. It means compromising, mixing and meshing, and putting together a tailor made Christmas season for us inspired by both of our backgrounds, loving the traditions each of us grew up with.

The heart of all of this is Paul is now my family. That’s so hard to grasp. (Even three years later!)

Creating new traditions is a hard transition. But, it’s also so much fun.

This is Paul’s and my third Christmas married, and every year we add something new and change things up.

This year, we added something that both of us have always wanted to do, but neither of our families did… a real Christmas tree!

We forced ourselves to wait until the day after Thanksgiving to put up our tree, mostly because tree farms aren’t open before, and took our parents and my grandma and grandpa with us to our first tree farm adventure. NONE OF US had EVER been to one before. Isn’t that crazy?! I got to watch us all trek across acres of trees that, after a while, just begin to look identical and you get a little flustered because you aren’t quite sure what you want. It’s a big decision, picking out a tree! We placed moms and grandmas at potential contenders so we wouldn’t forget where they were/wouldn’t lose it, and my daddy, hubby, and grandpa walked around pointing at different trees commenting on how straight the trunks were, if the pine needles looked healthy, and if there was only one single branch up the middle…I learned a lot. You see, my dad was a forestry major in college at Texas A&M, so… my daddy knows a thing or two about trees. After what felt like forever, we assembled our ladies who were scattered across the farm and announced that we had found our tree. The Morrison family Christmas tree. It no joke was so magical. We turned on Christmas music while Paul played lumberjack, sawing our tree down, and my dad waited to catch it at the top. I don’t know what it was about it, but seeing the two most important men in my world chopping down a tree together was one of my most favorite memories to date.

Too sappy? (Insert ba-doom-cha drum for punny joke.)

If you love Christmas Vacation as much as we do… perhaps you also just thought of the line “Little full, lotta sap.”

We rode a hay ride together back to the headquarters at the tree farm, and my heart was so happy. We all talked about how each year we have to get a picture, and watch as the group of us changes. New little ones, and others who have left us. It was truly one of my happiest memories to date. I loved every second. I took note of every smell, every sound, every moment I could. I squeezed each person multiple times, just so I could feel their warmth, smell their scent, and soak in every bit of this time together.

This is by far my favorite tradition we have created over the last three years. I know with every fiber of my being it is one that will stick for… forever.

This Christmas we will do Christmas Eve services with Anchor, something new and something I am so excited for. Then, we will come home to have a special dinner. I grew up with lasagna every single Christmas Eve for dinner at a beautifully set table by my momma. The last three years we have done rosemary lamb with risotto and brussel sprouts. But, who knows. Maybe this year I will do lasagna like momma did it. Then Christmas morning, the two of us make french toast casserole, open up gifts together, and Facetime our families who live far away.

We have a hard time holding off on Christmas movies (year round, if we are honest), but White Christmas and Christmas Vacation are held with high regard for ONLY ACTUALLY DURING CHRISTMAS TIME. (Post-Thanksgiving!)

December is when we first started dating (so fitting for us) and this month is our 5 year anniversary together, so we are recreating our first date tonight, which was driving around Grand Prairie for a Christmas Lights tour and drinking hot cocoa while listening to Ella Fitzgerald’s Christmas album. I wish I remembered the exact date.. but I believe it was the 15th!

Fun Story: For our first date, I was super nervous I was going to come home (like every other date) and be over it, and have to break it off the next day. But, I prayed for God to do something really special if this was someone I was supposed to be with. (And I REALLY wanted it to be.) At dinner, we went to Spaghetti Warehouse, when it was time for our bill our waiter came over to tell us someone anonymously had actually paid for our whole meal. I took this as the special sign I had asked for, and knew pretty quickly after that Paul was going to be my husband.

We love the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, and go every single year the first week of December. It kicks off our Christmas season. Once the DSO happens, it feels like Christmas is officially here.

Mulled wine is basically on repeat throughout all of December in our household.

Christmas is the best. Traditions are beautiful.

Another new tradition that I look forward to every year, our Christmas photos. And, of course, Hannah of Cottonwood Road Photography didn’t let us down with this year’s. I am still actually trying to pick my jaw up from these. She is so talented, and somehow captures our personalities so well through a camera lens.

My dress and cardigan are all from Landry Kate! Isn’t it the cutest?! If you haven’t been into LK or shopped online with them, you’re missing out on an amazing curation of C-U-T-E clothing.

Merry Christmas, y’all. So grateful for you this Christmas season.

xoxo- Han

Christmas Time at The Morrisons

December 8, 2016

Y’all, if you haven’t caught on, I pretty much live for a small selection of things in life…

My hubby and Christmas time absolutely, 100%, without a doubt take the cake, though.

Top. Of. The. List.

Well, and Jesus goes of course without saying. But, I will say it. Jesus is number 1, which is why I love Christmas so much!

Paul and I met around Christmas time, and our first date was looking at Christmas lights. It was love instantly. 😉 Except, actually. But, not JUST because of Christmas lights.

Paul and I LOVE Christmas. I know this sounds stupid, and looking at it in hindsight, I really don’t know how I DIDN’T put this together… but for the longest time, I watched Elf year round. Obviously it took place at Christmas time… but I thought it was just a comedy… at Christmas. My roommates in college corrected me and I try (try, keyword) to watch it only after Halloween now… 🙂

Anyways, all this to say, Christmas means a lot to me and decorating my home for it is one of my favorite things to do. I love everything about Christmas. I had such magical Christmases growing up, my parents truly made it so special, and I have carried that magic on from childhood to adulthood. I love that Christmas gives us all permission to revert to our youth a bit, and follow traditions that nobody knows why they started or why we still follow them, but it’s too late to stop now anyways. I love the songs, I love the cheer, I love the joy, I LOVE giving gifts, I love receiving gifts (it’s my love language), and I love being with my family.

Paul and I went to Target and Home Goods to deck out our home this year, and we are so pleased with how it all turned out. We gave ourselves a budget, and got SO MUCH for our money with it between these two places. (This is NOT an ad for either, they just seriously were great!) Our tree, which you can recreate by shopping my Christmas Shop, comes mostly from World Market and Pottery Barn. We did a real tree for the first time ever this year, and LOVE IT. I will share more about that later. 🙂

Thank y’all for inviting me and Paul into your life. We love you so deeply, and love sharing life with you. Merry Christmas, from the bottom of our hearts to yours. Here is a little tour of our home at Christmas. I hope it gives you ideas for your own homes, and that you can create a magical space for yourselves (without breaking the bank!).

xoxo- Han + Paul

All photos by Cottonwood Road Photography for The Cake by Hannah

Picking Your List of Counsel

August 22, 2016

Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed. Proverbs 15:22

This morning, Paul and I woke up at 5:22 AM to a once again sick doodle. (Poor baby.) We know you shouldn’t change your dog’s food on them without a transition time, but we bought a small bag of food from Whole Foods two nights ago, because we knew we were out of food at home and definitely knew we were beyond exhausted. We just wanted to get home and into bed so we could finally sit down for the day. We grabbed the food and said ‘we will give her this, and then buy her big bag from Costco tomorrow’, all unfolding in aisle 8 at Whole Foods. This was the worst idea ever. My poor Presley has been sick as a d-o-g, and every time she gets sick I have this overwhelming sense of regret and guilt because it’s all my fault. Trust me, I know we did it wrong.

This is nothing to do with today’s post, but that’s what woke me up today at 5:22 AM. So we went ahead and rolled out of bed to our dimly lit living room, cleaned up doodle, and got to our quiet time before what felt like anybody else was awake in the surrounding 10 miles radius. No cars driving by, no dull rush from the highway on the other side of our complex. Complete silence. Then in the middle of our quiet time, a ginormous THUD came from our closet and I legitimately thought someone was hiding in our closet and about to kill us. Alas, it was just our huge tub of probably about 50+ books scattered across our floor. This has been my morning, and it’s fairly irrelevant except to invite you into Paul’s and my life haha. This is to give you a great visual picture of our current setting, that’s all. BUT, to the point, I read my devotional this morning and it was called PUSH. It gave me the scripture above and challenged me to write out my “wise counsel”. When Paul and I got married, we got marriage counseling from a couple who stand as wise counsel in our life. We read through a book with them, and met for dinner a couple times a month to hash out things we were not seeing eye to eye on and getting over all prepared (as best you can) for life as a unit in just a few months. Part of this counseling was choosing people we trust and feel comfortable with the other going to when we are in turmoil, frustrated with one another, or just need advice that we can’t give one another. This select, special list are people that we can share anything with- our deepest struggles, our frustrations with one another, and our fears. Because, though our spouses are our confidants and best friends, sometimes we need to step outside of our tunneled perspective that exists between just the two of us, and ask for wiser counsel to speak into our situation. We have had moments in our marriage that we are at a complete dead end, and we will not find an exit on our own. Rather, we will continue in the round about we are driving on, and keep missing the turn out because we cannot seem to find a common ground.

This list will shift with life changes, season changes and circumstances. But amongst our list is parents, peers, pastors, and superiors. So this morning I wrote out my list of wise counsel in this season of life, from peers (friends in the same life stage as you) who I know can give me biblical viewpoints and wisdom, to wise women in my church community (superiors), to my pastors, and of course our parents. These are people who I trust to speak into me, who know me well, can encourage me, rebuke and refine me, prune me, and guide me. They are people I respect as wives, as business leaders, as moms, as my spiritual guides. This is the list of people that, if in a situation you are told you are wrong or should look at something from a different angle, you listen and value that especially so because it’s coming from one of your people on “the list”. This doesn’t mean discount completely anyone who gives you advice or says you should work on something that isn’t on the list, but you take it with a grain of salt. You give this list of people access into your life in a special way that others do not get. Not because you are selfish or don’t want to be transparent with everyone, but because life shouldn’t be lived with a million people offering you advice that you take action on. These people are who you have decided to entrust with the nitty gritty details of your life. Everybody in the world, no matter how great their intentions, cannot and should not help you with the nitty gritty. These are the people who, if something terrible happened, would step in and act as your sanity and guide you in decision making.

So I made my list. It consists of 10 people, 9 not including Paul. Paul loves the people on my list, and I love his. They are people I trust, and he trusts mine. If you put someone on your list the other doesn’t take their opinions seriously into account to speak into their lives or situations, then it’s pointless and you actually lose your spouse’s trust a little. The best part was Paul guessing every single one of my list without me prompting him or telling him. That is called being known, y’all. Marry your best friend. It won’t disappoint. Paul then created his list, and I guessed it 90% right… I guess Paul is the better spouse 😉 Or I am just far more predictable, a lady of routine and predictability, and I am a-okay with that.

I encourage you to make your list today, whether you are single or married! The list is so important. Pick people who are in your day to day in some way or another. This doesn’t mean literally close by, but people that play a role in this season of life. I will say it again, this list will change depending on your season of life and the circumstances which you find yourself in. Happy list making!

Kill your Monday today! Make it so great, love people well, and be kind.

xoxo- Han

Carley, The CRV

June 28, 2016

Yesterday- after six months of sharing one car, borrowing other people’s cars to get us to work on opposite ends of the metroplex, leaving an hour early so that we can drop each other off where we needed to be before being where the other needed to be to then swing back around and pick up later, and saving every single dollar we possibly could- we paid cash for a 1999 black CRV in impeccable condition that I have fondly already named ‘Carley, The CRV’. She has a window that sticks, a door that can only be locked manually, and a questionable stain on the back left passenger’s seat, but I freaking love her. Some of you are probably thinking to yourself, “You must be kidding. You have saved up for six months to put all your cash into a 17 year old vehicle?” Sure, it’s totally not what most would do. It doesn’t follow the social norm of getting your first “adult job” followed by your first adult car purchase, with which will come that first big adult car payment, right? It’s different than most expected for us to do. Understandably, I get that you might be thinking, “what the heck?”

But, listen to me and hear me out, and perhaps I can even talk you out of your car payment, too.

At least for now.

We have all fallen into this social norm of being in debt, and if you ask me, it’s pretty silly. Now hear me out, having a car payment isn’t a bad thing. Having a mortgage is a wonderful thing. If you have the surplus and are in a position that you feel comfy taking on the next big step, that’s awesome. I am not speaking to that. I am speaking to this lifestyle of trying to be in a spot we just aren’t at yet all for the sake of feeling good about what we have. This is especially so in Dallas- the city of “$30,000 Millionaires”. (<<< That’s a thing, y’all. A show was even going to be made about it, which is just so embarrassing.)

The best thing Paul and I have ever been told is to live simply now so that we can live lavishly and more comfortably sooner than the rest.

I have needed some serious heart surgery to get to the point I am at as I write this out, but I can assure you that it feels awesome. To be debt free is extremely important to me and Paul. Being debt free for us is separated into two categories: School Debt and Stupid Debt. School Debt is inevitable, unfortunately. I am in way more school debt than I ever thought I could possibly be, but it gave me a degree and at the end of the day, school was an investment. That is something I am paying as much as I possibly can toward every month, but even still, I will have that on my back for a long time. Debt is debt. But, Stupid Debt is spending money you do not have on things that ultimately do not matter. Paul and I got into Stupid Debt right after we got married. It took just one credit card for just a couple of months to ruin our credit and get into a rut. In our defense, we were so broke that buying things on a credit card was kind of our only option. Comparatively speaking, our stupid debt also isn’t even that crazy, but it’s still debt and we have been crippled by it while trying to pay it off, pay rent, and pay off school in the midst of a million transitions. Oh, and eat. That’s important, too.

So when we found ourselves without a car unexpectedly at the end of January, we had no margin to work with to take on a car payment. We were still trying to catch up on mistakes we had made previously. Our only option was to change up life drastically and start saving every penny. Our savings for a house turned into savings for a car, which was already our leftovers from a very small margin, and then, if there was anymore leftovers, that could spill into our “home fund”. Luckily, moving to McKinney meant way cheaper rent simply because of location. The rest, we’ve had to work hard for. We had to start taking the long way home to cut our toll bill back $100 every month. We had to start sitting down and say “do we love it?” Almost every conversation ended with, “do you want a car and a house, or do you want this?” Eating out became “let’s just go get drinks” or “let’s drive around and look at houses”. Life changed, but I am so glad it did. We are well on our way to being home owners and “Stupid Debt” free. We didn’t get to buy an awesome new car yesterday, yet we feel on top of the world. (Believe me, I really wanted a decked out 2017 Jeep.) Paying for our bills and paying off school loans on time every month is working our credit back up, though, and a home isn’t a complete fantasy anymore.

It’s actually realistic, and I can kiss goodbye to apartment living soon (fingers crossed).

Working hard, saving up, and having no car payment is the best feeling ever. Being able to pay for Carley without a co-signer or taking out any loans of any kind that would, ultimately, hurt our chances of buying a home in the next year felt so liberating. Sure, Carley isn’t my Jeep I desperately want nor is she a Range Rover, but I am proud as I’ll get out of her. We poured blood, sweat, and tears into that thing.

Being intentional

I have thought a whole lot this past week about intentionality. I want to be intentional in my marriage, my finances, my health, my friendships- this is really hard to master. Time is hard to get a hold of. I honestly feel like time is out of control and somehow every week I find myself on the sofa Sunday night in a haze thinking,”My gosh, how is tomorrow already Monday again?” I have failed at being intentional in all of these things- even in just the last six months. Buying this CRV is, and will be, a constant reminder of what it means to be intentional, though. We had to be intentional with our money to be able to buy this, we have had to choose to be intentional in our patience to have a second car again in a way that would keep us on track to have a home. We want a home to have a better space to host family, friends, and our Young Adults group from church. We want a home to be our first wise investment. Having a home ultimately points back to our desire to be intentional with our relationships and our finances. This means being intentional with my money today, getting out of debt and having no car payment gets me one step closer to my dream farm I want to buy for my whole family to live on.

Yes, my dream is to live on a massive piece of land in a dolled up farmhouse with goats, cows, doodles, and chickens. And, I want to be able to buy land big enough for my parents and in laws to build on, too. And my parents have a crazy awesome dream of owning an event venue up here. (Trust- we have talked through it all haha.) This is what keeps me going, though! Investment real estate in Mckinney as a side gig sounds pretty awesome, too. Just call us the Chip and Joanna Gaines of McKinney. 😉

All this to say, everything Paul and I have chosen to do in the last six months circles around intentionality in all things. To be intentional is to think beyond what is right in front of our faces.

Being intentional in all things, not just our finances, is wise, but it’s certainly not easy. It’s not the norm. It’s not “sexy”. It’s not always immediately satisfying. But, I encourage you to write out what things you want to be intentional with in your life. Then, write out your dreams and goals, and align what you can be intentional in to make those dreams and goals come to fruition.

Keep your eye at the end goal, and that will affect what decisions you make right now. Again, I can tell you that getting to my point of view on intentionality in our finances hasn’t been easy. If you have questions about living debt free or getting out of debt, I would love to hear from you! Not gonna lie, I will share this because the timing is impeccable, but as I am writing this, Paul just ran our credit scores and they have both gone up hundreds in the last three months. We just almost died from shock and excitement. I promise, be intentional now and you won’t regret it.

Love y’all and happy Tuesday!!

xo- Han

A Staycation for Two at Four Seasons Dallas

June 12, 2016

Note, our stay at Four Seasons Dallas was not and this post is not in any way sponsored. This is me sharing about my vacation, something we saved up a long time for and spent our own money on, just because we had such a great experience and think you should know about it. **

This past weekend, Paul and I went on our first resort vacation ever. Which I can now say was the first of MANY. I have to admit, though our honeymoon two years ago to NYC was incredible, it wasn’t luxurious. It was an adventure and I wouldn’t trade it for anything, but this… oh my gosh. Our stay at Four Seasons was by far my favorite hotel experience ever. I jumped on fluffy beds, ran around our private villa in a white robe like superman, and ate food delivered to me in bed just because I could. I read Shauna Niequist on my private back porch, played board games on our bed, and was given the best service I have ever received from any hotel or restaurant of any kind. Paul and I both had never been to anything like this, resort or all inclusive-type place, and believe me when I say we didn’t take one single second for granted. I think I gasped and said “thank you Jesus” every other sentence. We can’t say enough how satisfied with our choice of Four Seasons Dallas we feel. It was the perfect spot to kick off my birthday week and celebrate Paul’s graduation at such a wonderfully ran resort. To the staff and leadership of Four Seasons, BRAVO. There is a reason you are continuously voted a top world-wide business and rated by Fortune a top 100 business to work for. You can certainly see in your staff that they are well-taken care of.

I was a little nervous about a resort stay, because I didn’t fully know what to expect. I didn’t really understand how you can be entertained for an extended amount of time within the gates of one place. WELL, I will tell you.

What To Do at Four Seasons Dallas:

First off, the pool. We spent HOURS out by their Agave pool + bar. The kindest wait staff will approach you regularly, making sure you have everything you want. Their food, though pricey for poolside, was so good. This is no fast food french fries and burger. They also were so helpful with both Paul’s and my food allergies- preparing food specially for us. Their drink selection, particularly their margarita, was both tasty and extensive as well. You could spend your entire vacation here, and it’s worth the stay.

The Well & Being Spa- oh my lanta. I could have spent hours in this spa if I didn’t have a husband waiting on me. The spa feels like stepping into another world. It’s luxurious, peaceful, and exactly what you would hope for a spa to be. Full with a sitting room by a peaceful water fountain, a whirlpool, as well as saunas… it has everything. The staff was incredibly sweet, one noting that Paul and I carry “happy vibes”, which I was very thankful to hear. My masseuse was incredibly talented. I somehow got the most requested masseuse on staff, I definitely didn’t mind, for my custom massage. For a custom massage, you tell your masseuse what parts of your body hurt or you want focused on, and she will spend the next 55 minutes working on those spots. I said my headaches, hip flexers and knees from years of dance are what bother me the most. She maneuvered and replaced my limbs + joints to their proper placement. She knew that I sleep on my right side from simply looking at how my clavicle laid, showing this spot a lot of attention to relieve tension and stress from my right side. She added life back into my very tight hip flexers, and she realigned my left leg. (I can now do a full squat without any pain in my hips… after just one session! *Insert praise hands here*) All the while, though it might sound the opposite, this all felt spectacular! I left feeling so at peace and as if I gained ten years of life back. The massage was both corrective and luxurious. I would LOVE to go back for a facial and manicure/pedicure!

LAW Restaurant- this is the on-site sit down restaurant at Four Seasons Dallas. Guilty: We went both nights for dinner, and were not disappointed. We were quite fond of our sweet waiter, too. He was so great! (Everyone at Four Seasons truly seems to love their job, and that makes such a difference in your experience.) LAW’s food is not only bomb, but they have one of the most extensive wine lists in Dallas. As you can imagine, I was quite stoked about this fact. The restaurant looks out over Agave Pool with the beautiful award winning golf course, host of the Byron Nelson, just behind it. It is picturesque and you definitely forget you’re actually just outside of Dallas.

I highly suggest the lamb chops and roasted cauliflower with a glass of their Malbec for dinner. For an appetizer, don’t ask questions, get the bacon. GAME CHANGER.

The Sports Club is as impressive as the rest of the resort. The workout facilities, tennis and racquet ball courts are available to hotel guests, and you can reserve spots in private classes alongside Club Members. I took an Anti Gravity Yoga class with Meg, and I believe I found yet another workout I am obsessed with. Meg was fun, a good teacher, and also made me feel very safe whilst dangling upside down from a piece of fabric. THAT takes some serious talent, you know? I unfortunately forgot my own tennis shoes and socks, so I didn’t spend as much time in the Sports Club as I had hoped, but even still, it was so great.

The Golf Course, you can either pay to play the entire course or you can hit at the driving range. We didn’t golf this time, but we did take a romantic stroll along the golf course at sunset, and it didn’t disappoint. It truly is breathtaking. We had about a two minute romantic sit at hole 16 until a straggling group of golfers came over the hill to our romantic hole. We had to run half in fear we would be in trouble for sitting on the course and half in fear of being hit by flying golf balls. It was awesome.

Room service, I already mentioned getting to eat in bed, but, y’all, order breakfast in bed and coffee for two, and don’t forget to order the flourless chocolate cake with raspberries for take-out from LAW. There is just something more special about eating chocolate cake at 10 PM in bed. (SO.GOOD.)

Whether you are looking for a romantic getaway like us or a family vacay, Four Seasons is such a great choice. There are options for everybody! (There is a whole family and kid’s section that, obviously, we didn’t go to. BUT, we did walk by their pool and it looks so fun!) They have a movie night at the pool on Fridays during the summer, so we walked by to check it out briefly.

Come ready to relax and unplug. Because the staff is so incredible, you seriously don’t have to worry about a single thing. Come ready to indulge in good food, get spoiled, and be sure to have plenty of cash on hand to tip. 😉

We are BIG believers in date nights and getaways. We get just as much as anyone that money can be tight, but prioritize both of these things. If you are a Dallas-local like us and/or can’t get away for a week from work, this is SUCH a great option for you. Likewise, you can EASILY spend a week here.

See you again very soon, I am sure, Four Seasons!