Post-Christmas Post

I hope anybody out there reading this had a very merry Christmas! We certainly did, even though the weather declined to participate in the festivities this year. We are now happily savoring a wonderful, laid-back stretch of time off between Christmas and the new year. 

Before we move on from the Christmas season and into 2022, we have a lot to get down for the record. Apologies in advance for how long this post is going to be. Non-HI3 stuff first, so if you don't care about that, feel free to keep on scrolling.

Santa and Mrs. Claus visited our neighborhood again this year a week before the big day. A walking Christmas tree and gingerbread man joined their entourage this year too.

Charlie the horse pulled their carriage again. =^)

The week whizzed by, and before we knew it, it was Christmas Eve!

We didn't leave Santa quite this many cookies, but we do still put out milk and cookies, as well as baby carrots for the reindeer. (This year's were more like toddler carrots. You're welcome, Rudolph.)

That snow from the carriage pics had long disappeared by Christmas Eve, and no snow magically materialized by morning this year.

Christmas morning: cloudy, 40's, and a little drizzle. 

...and this is what we woke up to 2 days later. *Sighs* 

The usual Christmas morning present explosion under and around the tree

Nala enjoying one of her new toys

The winner of this year's prettiest present award

Mom's impressive Christmas haul! Family members went overboard this year. Nearly everything on her Amazon list showed up, as well as quite a few total surprises. A few notes: 

- that's a Hufflepuff badger from Build-A-Bear at the top middle. (He's adorable, and Hufflepuff is Mom's favorite Hogwarts house.) 

- the white blob under Rainbow Fish is an impressively vacuum-compressed comforter for Mom's bed. Her current horse one is so well-used it's sadly coming apart. 

- the Great Lakes shirt says, "Always Fresh, Sometimes Frozen" 

- Santa brought the unicorn mosaic sticker book

As you may have noticed, a few of Mom's gifts were actually for us! We will have even more Disney princess dresses to choose from next Halloween (or whenever we just feel like channeling our inner princesses.)

Lily as Elsa

Bethany as Cinderella

Both of these came with matching sparkly shoes!

Felicity in Courtney's Care Bear pj's, complete with matching scrunchie and fuzzy socks

Ever since American Girl came out with these pj's for their 80's doll, Mom's looked at them fondly in the catalogs we still get in the mail. (Even though Mom was not an 80's kid, she's loved Care Bears since she was little.) Grandma decided to dish out the big bucks to not only gift her the pj's, but also the adorable sleeping bag, pillow, and mini Bedtime Bear. <3 So generous!

There were only the 3 outfits to model, so I took a pass, but here I am with the cute bird stuffie so you can see it closer up. It's a Northern Mockingbird. =)

And now for a HI3 update. On Christmas Day, we did not have much time to play HI3, and the few fjord highlands wilds we did find were unmemorable, nowhere near as cool as Barleda (the enormous brindle savanna wild we found last Christmas). We did get to see some fun Christmas decor while selling the unmemorable wilds, though.

Wow, this Christmas tree is about as loaded with gifts as our real-life one was! 

Christmas Eve was another story! We found three 13.1 hh wilds that definitely deserve mentioning.

First to be caught was this maneless badlands pony stallion:

Even bald, I thought he was really cute! I especially liked his big head with that tiny star.

His genetic stat total was high, and he was brave with above average stamina.

He was pokey, though, and the ornery streak continued. 

He was on his best behavior while Pepsi was riding him - no bucking. We were not fooled.

The next 13.1-hander was a long-bodied buckskin with dainty head and legs and lovely white markings:

Her genetics stats were also pretty high, and the ornery streak was finally broken!

Pepsi seems a little less awkward on this one. =) Too bad she is so skittish.

While Pepsi was taking Millennium for a brief spin, shortly after we took the screenshots above, horsie sense activated and led us to our final 13.1-hander:

Even in the semi-darkness, we could tell what this was going to be: our first ever pale zebra!

Her genetic stats didn't tank, and she's not ornery, lazy, or a stubborn leader!

We knew immediately that she was a keeper, even if it will take a long time before we can ride her without being bucked off constantly. <3

Thanks, HI3, for making our Christmas Eve a little more white (and cream)! We've named her Peppermint, which easily won out over Eggnog. 

Speaking of peppermint, I will leave you with one final screenshot from our Christmas morning. We thought it was cute how well this giant candy cane happened to coordinate with Adelaide's tack. (Adelaide was our lucky mount for the big day.)