What Was I Doing New Year's Eve?

For as much as I love a good celebration, I will admit that sometimes my favorite New Year's Eve tradition is to stay home alone and wrestle closure on the old year and pray in the new. It's true. There's something spiritually pivotal to me about that practice.

But this year Faith asked if I had plans, and since we rarely get to spend time together anymore, I decided to hang out with her for New Year's Eve! We decided to be silly and purchase garish Hawaiian shirts at the Goodwill...and go with a theme. We began the evening with dinner (chicken puffs, BBQ weenies, and grape kabobs).
I read that eating twelve grapes on New Year's Eve is supposed to bring you good luck for the next year. While I don't believe in luck, I figured twelve grapes came close to satisfying a food group, right?

After dinner, we went to see the movie New Year's Eve. I haven't been to a movie in probably two years! Then, since we'd missed doing so earlier, we drove through the walkway of lights in Marion (as is typically our tradition each Christmas) and we came back to my house. Faith brought her daughters' grass skirts, and they were a little short (and not nearly big enough around the middle) for us but they did provide atmosphere for a photo opp!

(No, I'm not really giving birth to a cat as it looks like there...)

I mentioned yesterday in the weekly recap that I wanted to make 2012 time capsules based on an idea I found on Pinterest. No idea what will go in there as the year progresses, but to start things off, I had a movie ticket stub...and then we sat down to answer some 2011 reflection questions I found on this blog. I can't wait to read/reanswer them in a year!

My time capsule! Just need to add a picture to the top and it can be declared officially done and ready to accept the memories and treasures of 2012!

By the time we finished answering the questions, it was almost midnight, so we had our dessert (a way-too-rich crock pot brownie gooey goodness with ice cream on top)...tracked down the Rockin' New Year's Eve coverage on TV...opened the sparkling grape juice...and broke out the party blowers. In a dejavu moment (we'd just seen the 2012 countdown in the movie), we counted down and scared the living goodness out of the cat. (Not gonna lie - that was kinda funny.)

See? Everyone got in on the festivities!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!! (And a free new year public service announcement - Hawaiian shirts are the least slimming prints on the planet.)

And because we love to continue celebrating...we took the party outside! SPARKLERS!!!!

I don't believe I've ever before stood in my backyard at midnight wearing knee high boots, a grass skirt, a lei, a wool coat, and a bright purple antennae-laden headband, but why not begin the year with something new, right?

We couldn't feel our fingers by the end, but it was so fun!

When the festivities ended, I crawled in bed and ended 2011 with a beautiful chat with God. The perfect end to a year filled with good memories...and a great God.