Fall is here but not for long ... I hear santa's sleighbells in the distance

The colorful leaves have fallen... those beautiful Autumn days have come and gone.

This is a small road up by Northwood on Lake Hopatcong.

This is a tree in my front yard about a month ago.

Now, we have barren trees, blowing leaves, it gets dark at 5pm, and it's darned cold at night!

But wait ... in the not too distant future is Christmas! Soon Santa will be here to deck the halls and bring Christmas cheer to all the children! I have to tell you, this is my favorite time of the year and I'm like a little kid. This year is going to be extra-special because it's Julianna's first Christmas and I'm pulling out all the stops! I love decorating for Christmas and playing holiday music. It puts me in such a good mood! I love wrapping presents and giving gifts! I can't wait to bake Christmas cookies and stuff stockings. I want to bring Julianna to see the Rockerfeller Tree but she might be a bit too young for that this year.

I also can't wait until I can bring her to see the Christmas spectacular at Radio City & the windows at Macy's ... Ohhh and of course we must go see Santa at Macy's in NYC too. I remember how I loved seeing Santa there as a kid! It makes me giddy to think of all the fun holiday stuff that Brian and I are going to do with Julianna. I'm getting an advent calendar to count down the days with Julianna too! Santa is going to spoil Julianna... I know it's silly because she has no clue what Christmas is right now, but it's still fun for us!

I also can't wait to watch Rudolph, Frosty, The Grinch, A Christmas Carol, Charlie Brown Christmas, and so on ... Maybe I'm jumping the gun a little too much - not like Julianna will know what those shows are yet. But I can still enjoy watching them with her LOL (yeah I'm a horrible mom for wanting to put my kid in front of the TV)

I am listening to holiday music already and it's only mid-November. We'll be putting up our Christmas tree this Sunday due to the fact we will not be able to do it on Black Friday - I really like when the tree is up right after Thanksgiving! Yep, I am one of THOSE people! haha! I can't wait to see Julianna's face when she sees all the lights on the tree!

Any day now, I'll be dressing my daughter up in some adorable Christmas hats & outfits so I can torture her by taking 500 photos of her ... all just to find the perfect shot for our Christmas card. I have some great ideas for Christmas photos of Julianna, hopefully I should be able to make one of them work ... (if she is agreeable!)