Merry Christmas from the Calkins Family

It is that time of year again! While the girls celebrate Christmas with their Mom in Texas, I stayed at home to ensure Santa visited our house (spoilers: he did!). The girls and I will be going to Walt Disney World and Universal Studios Orlando (and the Wizarding World of Harry Potter!) at the end of January, so we are still going to get in a vacation together after the holidays. As is now the tradition, I wanted to post our Christmas card and Year in Review for our loyal readers.

Not bad for a lack of a professional photographer

Even though we are apart for the holidays, the girls were excited to spend time with their mom’s side of the family (The Familia) and it gave me a little time to recharge before our vacation in January and my last field exercise at Fort Campbell in February. Absolutely cannot wait for them to get back though, as well as to spend the holiday season with them next year.

Thanks for checking in on us. From our family to yours, have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Cheers!

Halloween 2023

Since I got back from Romania, the girls and I have yet to spend a big holiday together (unless of course, you count… Labor Day?), so Halloween was our chance to get back into our holiday routine. First it was the cookie party, but now it was time for the main event. From picking out costumes to decorating the porch to mapping out our trick-or-treating route, we were definitely ready to have some fun together as a family. In tacit acknowledgement of how far behind I am in posting, here is the 2023 version of the Calkins Family Halloween.

They did not need a sugar-high, because they both dressed up as characters who are insane

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Merry Christmas from the Calkins Family

It is that time of year again, and after being apart for Christmas in 2022, we are finally back to our routine and traditions this holiday season. Personalized ornaments. Advent calendars. Christmas cards. We were absolutely not planning to take this holiday season lying down… unless it was for family pictures. So from our family to yours, Merry Christmas!

“Yes, the wind blows a little bit colder, And we’re all getting older.” – Anna (*Frozen II*)

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4th Annual Halloween Cookie Decorating Party

While being deployed to Romania from October 2022 to April 2023, the girls and I were unable to partake in many of our annual holiday traditions. One that we missed the most was our annual Halloween Cookie Decorating Party; we also missed the Christmas-version, but you will not see the post for this year’s event for a couple more months. With the girls and I about to enjoy our first Halloween at Fort Campbell, it was also a great opportunity to invite some friends over for some fun with cookies, frosting, and sprinkles.

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Walt Disney World Vacation – Travel Back to Arizona

With our days at the parks over, it was unfortunately time to leave Walt Disney World and head back West. The plan for our final day was to relax, get some last-minute shopping and activities in, and maybe sample a few more sweets before we left. With the day’s events already planned out and our transportation to the airport secured, it was time to have a carefree day before we said goodbye to our Disney vacation.

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Walt Disney World Vacation – Hollywood Studios

After the slight letdown that was our Day Three at Animal Kingdom, it was time to ramp the intensity back up at the final park of our trip: Hollywood Studios. Last time we were here, most of our day was spent on character experiences, which really was not an option this time around due to COVID protocols. This year, the girls were all about the thrill rides, so it was going to be less of a stroll through the park and more of using our time efficiently. But with Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge and Toy Story Land ahead of us, we were all anticipating having a good time. Remember when I said that Magic Kingdom was going to be our best day? For once, I was happy to be wrong.

A Jedi can sometimes see into the future and I definitely picked the right shirt for the occasion… just saying.

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Walt Disney World Vacation – Animal Kingdom

After coming off of our best day so far on our vacation, we were headed into our third day at the parks and would be visiting Animal Kingdom. It was bound to be a little bit of a drop in excitement compared to the Magic Kingdom, but none of us were prepared at how far that drop would be. But we kept our heads held high and tried to make the best out of it.

And even before *Encanto* hit Disney Plus, they were already in love.

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Walt Disney World Vacation – EPCOT

After our terrible travel day and a half day enjoying the resort, we tried to right the ship during the first park visit of our vacation. After a full night’s sleep and a morning of going over the day’s initial plan, we were ready to go to EPCOT to get our Walt Disney World (WDW) Christmas vacation back on track.

Papa was very disappointed that the “EPCOT Ball” was not a golfing simulator

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Walt Disney World Vacation – Travel to Orlando

For our vacation this year, we decided on going to Walt Disney World (WDW) for Christmas. The girls have been very excited about the prospect of going back for a while now, but last year was just a little too hectic for everyone to try to squeeze it in. Since we were not going to visit any of my family for Christmas and my Mom is a Disney fanatic, Grandma and Papa decided to join us on our vacation. At the time we planned and booked the trip, the Delta variant was subsiding and the WDW parks were still limited to around 70% capacity, so it seemed like the perfect time to try to get in a family Christmas Vacation in with Mickey and Minnie Mouse in Florida.

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Merry Christmas from the Calkins Family

It is that time of year again and we are in full holiday mode. The Elf on the Shelf has been active, the ornaments and stockings have been hung, and the sugar cookies and gingerbread houses have been decorated. Aside from putting up Christmas lights, we went all out again this year in bringing out the holiday spirit as we celebrate our last Christmas on Fort Huachuca (during this tour, at least).

But it is a pity that we are moving away from our amazing photographer of the last four years

As per the usual, it has been a busy year in the Calkins Family and we are very much anticipating some rest and relaxation at Walt Disney World during our vacation starting tomorrow. Afterwards, the girls will be staying at their Great-Grandmother’s house for Christmas (she guilt-tripped me until I said yes) while I get caught up with the post-leave mountain of work. While we may be off the net for a while, I will be back to posting about our continuing adventure soon.

Thanks for checking in on us and we hope that you and your family have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Cheers!