Merry Christmas 2013

I was scheduled to work Christmas week this year, whomp whomp.  I was at the hospital on Christmas Eve, expecting to spend the night at home missing my parent's Christmas party and Dave Scheer's birthday party, when I got the best unexpected Christmas present.  My fourth year Colleen pulled me aside and told me to go ahead and take the rest of the day off and Christmas too!  It made my Christmas!  Alex and I dashed off to Cary and made it just in time for dinner at the big party!  What a perfect surprise!

   

The Ecklund Christmas tree this year!

  

Christmas Eve Party

  

The girl cousins!  We left Charlotte so quickly, that I had no time to change clothes.  At least my scrubs are Christmas green.

  

Boy Cousins

Ryan and Lily ready to open their cousin exchange presents.

  

Cousin Exchange

  

  

   

Lisa, Sami, Tessa and me!

Playing the last gift.  My mom won!

  

Santa came!!

Moo always picks the big presents.

    

Our family!

Tired out from presents.

  

Mom's new jacket!

  

We are so happy that we could spend time with family for Christmas.  It was another perfect Christmas for the books!

Fa La La La La

Kate won a party this Friday night at a local piano bar in Uptown.  As part of the prize, we all got free admission and drinks for $1.  It also happened to be a Tacky Christmas Sweater Party night at the bar  We definitely did some fa la la la la-ing!

   

Our tacky friends!

  

Saturday night, we went to the Charlotte Ballet Company's Nutcracker with Kate and Sean.  We loved it!

  

 The Nutcracker!

Christmas Party Hop

Another one of my attendings had a Christmas party this weekend.  It has been fun getting to see our  attending's houses, especially all decorated for Christmas.  I had to work this weekend, but there was no way I was going to miss the Bliss Christmas party!  Alex's work had a party Saturday night at his Starbucks.  It was great meeting all of his coworkers and hanging out in the store after hours!

 

Our trophy spouses :)

  

  Me and the hubs!  I have the "gyn onc" face... tired, tired and more tired.

  

 Kate and Sean

     

My favorites!

  

 Intern Girls

  

 Caroline and Ray

Busiest Time of the Year

December is the most wonderful time of the year, but also, the busiest.  Alex and I are packing our schedules tight in order to do all of the things on our December fun list!  The weekend is over, and I am more exhausted than after a full week of work!

 

Sami was in town this weekend for the ACC Football Championship game and luckily, she had time to meet us for lunch on Saturday.  It was very nice to finally see her!

  

 Katherine and Tessie had their annual Gingerbread House Party Saturday night.  Their house was beautifully decorated for Christmas.  We had Katherine's amazing chili for dinner, but then had to leave before the contest started in order to get to our next engagement.  I hope we can compete in the house building event next year!

  

 Kaylyn and Tessie preparing the crackers!

  

 Candy Table

  

 Gingerbread house tutorial session :)

  

 One of my favorite attendings, Dr. Harrison, had his annual Christmas Party Saturday night as well.  We left the gingerbread contest and headed over to my work party.  His house was also all decked out for Christmas.  It was nice seeing everybody in something other than scrubs!

 

  

 Kate, Chancy, Robin and me!

  

 We could not stay too long at Dr. Harrison's house because we had tickets to the Duke-FSU game!  One of the amazing perks of living in uptown is that we can walk to the Panther's Stadium.  It was very chilly though and the game did not go the way we would have liked. 

  

 We are definitely not FSU fans, but it was great watching a potential Heisman play!

  

 Alex was a better sport about wearing Dook colors :)  It was a busy night, but we had a blast!  It is  certainly the most wonderful time of the year!

Happy Gobble Gobble Day!

We spent this Thanksgiving in Charlotte!  Both Alex and I had to work Thanksgiving morning, but lucky for us, there was a Regan Thanksgiving gathering in Charlotte this year!  The Shupes came over from Tennessee and Lis and my family drove down from Cary.  After work Thursday morning, my parents and I walked uptown to see the Charlotte Thanksgiving Day Parade.  It was very chilly!  After the parade, we went over to Katherine and Tessie's house for the big feast.  It was an awesome Thanksgiving!

  

A big gingerbread man!

  

 There was certainly no shortage of high school marching bands.

  

 The Charlotte fire stations had a neat display of fire engines throughout time.  This one had to be pulled by the firefighters.

  

 This one was horse drawn.

  

  

 Katherine and Tessie's house was full of yummy food!

  

 And we snacked all day :)

  

 Dinner time!

  

 

 Happy Thanksgiving!

   

Brad carved the turkey.

  

 Tessa and Lisa

  

Dessert!

Getting Into the Christmas Spirit

Alex and I rode our bikes around Charlotte this weekend to get into the Christmas spirit!  Uptown is all decorated and looks amazing!  We decided to get our tree, even though it is a little early :)  We are super excited for Christmas 2013!

  

Christmas tree shopping!

  

I liked this tree :)

  

 The clock tower on the way to my hospital with its pretty wreaths.

  

 Christmas trees at the farmers market!

  

 Our first Charlotte tree on our little car :)

  

 Apparently it wasn't so little..

  

 We ran out of lights a quarter of the way up the tree and had to go get more.  Unfortunately, you can tell the difference between the new and old strands.

  

 I spent a few hours decorating the tree and when I was finished, I filled the stand with water.  I turned my back to walk away, and this happened!  And then I cried for thirty minutes.  There were a lot of casualties.  It was devastating!  I have been collecting ornaments since I was little and quite a few of them broke when the tree fell :(

  

 Our brand new Biltmore ornament from our recent vacation was one of the broken ones.

  

 We swept up the broken pieces and started again.  The end result was just as pretty as the first, minus a few special ornaments and the star tree topper.

  

 Merry Christmas, little two-toned tree!