Happy last day of 2025! Which seems insane because it felt like the first few months of the year draaaaagged on. I’m hoping to have a full 2025 recap up next week; this post is for the month of December, like normal on the last day of every month. My plan for New Year’s Eve is probably being in bed by 10:00 pm—I doubt I’ll be able to make it to midnight. Hopefully everyone else has super fun plans!
Giants/Patriots game on MNF: Josh, his dad, his brother, and I went to Gillette Stadium earlier in the month for the Monday Night Game. It was very cold, and the Giants lost.
We hosted our 3rd annual holiday party! This was a tradition we started a few years ago with Josh’s friends. Everyone brings something for dinner, an appetizer and/or dessert, and then we eat and hang out. Nothing super fancy, but it’s the one time a year we actually host people. And I always make personalized favors that double as place cards on the table.
McCray’s Holiday Light Walkthrough: After missing this last year, we were so excited to get back this year. It’s a farm in western MA that strings up a TON of lights on their property, and you can walk through it all. We made sure to get the spiked hot chocolate before heading in. Every year, the light designs and themes change, so it’s fun to see what’s new; part of the walk goes onto the farm’s mini golf course, so you get to walk the entire course through more lights.
Christmas festivities: Josh’s dad’s side of the family always has a big party the third Saturday in December, and his mom’s side does Christmas Eve, so we were at both of those. On Christmas day, I went to my parents’ house in the morning to open gifts, then we went to my cousin’s house for lunch (or like the “holiday dinner” I guess). Josh and I met back up at home later on for dinner and just hung out watching football, which was a good way to end the day. Bonus: We got to celebrate our niece’s first Christmas! She’s nine months old now, and Josh and I basically stole her at all of the parties.
Miscellaneous:
- Can I make it just ONE winter break without getting sick?! I managed to get some sort of cold right after Christmas, and as I’m writing this today on New Year’s Eve, I’m feeling like I’m almost at the end of it. But jeezzzz, I’m so tired of this. I am grateful it’s nothing like how I was sick last winter break, but still—I’m over this.
- My total books read this year sit at 82. My goal was 60, which I hit back in September, but I was hoping to use some of my time off from work to tie/exceed my all-time total of 84 during 2020. SO CLOSE. (Also, don’t ask me how I managed to read 82 books this year.)
What I’m Watching
TV
- The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
- Law & Order
- Law & Order: SVU
- Baylen Out Loud
- NCIS
- NCIS Origins
Netflix
- Missing Dead or Alive (S2)
- Owning Manhattan (S2)
- Sean Combs: The Reckoning
- With Love, Meghan Holiday Edition
- Owning Manhattan (S2)
- A Man on the Inside (S2E7-S2E8)
Peacock
- The Traitors (S2E1-S2E4)
Hulu
- Abbott Elementary (S5E1-S5E7)
Disney +
- The End of an Era
- A Very Jonas Christmas Movie
HBO Max
- White House Plumbers (E1-E3)
YouTube
- CohhCarnage Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 (Episode 44-70)
What I’m Reading
- The Black Wolf by Louise Penny: 4 stars
- It’s Different This Time by Joss Richard: 4 stars
- What Kind of Paradise by Janelle Brown: 5 stars
- If It Makes You Happy by Julie Olivia: 5 stars
- I Did Warn Her by Sian Gilbert: 4 stars
- Last Night Was Fun by Holly James: 4 stars
- More or Less Maddy by Lisa Genova: 4 stars
Strikeouts + Sprinkles 