It's Christmas Eve! I'm so happy today. I love Christmas Eve. We had a great day yesterday. I had breakfast with my family in the morning, and we gathered with friends for an oyster roast last night. I wore my glitter shoes and red lipstick ("Truly Red" by Laura Mercier for those of you keeping track at home. Although the recommendations keep rolling in...thanks Annie!). I got up early (as usual) and did all the dishes which felt like a little gift to Neel, since he's usually the one elbow deep in the suds.

Today my dad and I will take our annual trip to the mall to watch all the frantic people milling about. We have a last minute grocery trip and some wrapping to do. Tonight we'll have Seven Layer Salad and Grilled Sausages with mustards to dip. It's our traditional Christmas Eve dinner. Years and years ago, when my grandparents were living, we'd gathered at their house for Christmas (Neel was in graduate school at this point). My granddad, while not exactly a shut-in, was close, and on Christmas Eve my dad and I opened the door to a church friend of my grandmother's bearing a Seven Layer Salad. It was a treat we'd always loved at potlucks, but it never occurred to us that we could make our own! We've had it whenever we've been together for Christmas ever since. Tonight, after some football, we're going to Christmas Eve services with my friend Catherine tonight, and then tomorrow. Tomorrow! I always defer to Kipper on Christmas Eve. What's best? Presents or expecting presents?

I love this photo of the Parliament Building in Budapest for so many reasons. It was such a wonderful trip to an unexpectedly delightful city that I thought I'd pop it up here in honor of our European daydreams. And it was this picture and several others that made me realize that there was a dial on my camera that changed how my pictures look. Somehow the dial got bumped to "M" for a batch of photos, and I ended up with roughly a dozen over-exposed pictures of Callum and Neel along the Danube. This is one of them, although I love the muted palette. I remember saying to Neel, "What does 'M' even mean???"

Hard to believe I've been shooting in "Manual" for nearly two years now.

Don't look now...it's Christmas Eve!