Crafty Tuesday

I am frantically finishing up aprons and supercapes to get orders out the door before Christmas. As well as doing a few Christmas gifts of my own – so not a lot to show this week. But I think I can safely show our Christmas card from this year. Most of them have trickled out of the house and hopefully found their way to their destinations.

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When Emma saw the front of the card she exclaimed, “Mama! How did you find Mickey’s kind of writing?”

I promise it was a totally legit (free) font that I downloaded. I wanted to keep with the “all things Disney” household we have going on right now.

Have a fun (crafty!) Tuesday…

Sunday Love.

I was just thinking I’d post a list of a few things I’m loving this rainy, cozy Sunday – but then I put up some of my favorite December photos on the ‘ol Flickr account and realized this can’t be just a “list” post. I have some favorite photos from the last few weeks that need to be in Sunday Love, too.

I LOVE rainy, rainy days. Even though our roof is clearly not equipped to handle the deluge of rain we have been hit with, the rain makes for some lazy days. (We’ve found 4 leaks so far – thankfully 3 are just in the garage. And doubly thankful that there are really only 5 days a year we need to really worry about leaks.) But these lazy days have been much welcomed, and needed, in our house this weekend.

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I also LOVE the rain because it feels a little more holiday-like. It might not be snow, but it feels a little more like Christmas.
And is a bit more chilly – so we get to wear cute hats!

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I LOVE those chipmunk cheeks on Addie up there. And LOVE the Disneyland churros that her cheeks are stuffed with.

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I LOVE soccer. But I LOVE the fact this is our first weekend with no soccer since September. We had a soccer party last weekend and closing ceremonies – check and check. Emma received the “Golden Goalie” award from Coach Alain. She really loved playing goalie (I think because she didn’t have to run – clearly not my kid!) but it is very nerve-wracking when she is in the goalie box. too much pressure for Mom!

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I LOVE being the assistant coach for the soccer team. There is not nearly as much stress, or work, as there is with the head coach, but I still get some of the glory and to hear Emma say, “Thanks Mama for being my coach this year.”
Yeah, that makes it worth it.

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I LOVE that all of the school obligations are completed. Christmas programs, Christmas presents for classmates and teachers, and Christmas parties are all successfully planned, executed…and over!

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I LOVE that our house is finally decorated. We seemed to do it in bits and pieces for most of December – but it has been proclaimed “as good as it gets.” And at night when the house is all picked up, the trees and candles are lit, the fireplace is burning, and there is the smell of pine and cinnamon throughout the house…that is pretty much my definition of heaven. (Mmmm…the eggnog & Bailey’s. That is a pretty nice piece of the puzzle, too.)

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I LOVE that I have environmentally conscious girls. I swear Emma demanded that she and Addie sit and cut up the netting that came on our Christmas tree before I could even suggest it – “so the fishies and birdies don’t get caught in the net!”

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I LOVE that our Christmas cards are out! I can probably safely share them tomorrow. But here is a shot from the tail-end of our photoshoot. See? They don’t always tolerate Mama’s photo-taking.

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I love that Daddy has a fun, new job that caters to the whole family (and friends!). At the tree-lighting ceremony at the studio we got to sled in the snow (yep! real snow!), meet Goofy, and meet some of the animators for Tangled. I don’t know who was more excited the kids – or Mommy.

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I LOVE that there has been a sort of backlash to the whole politically correct, “Happy Holidays” movement. We are watching football and one of the announcers just wished all of the troops a “Merry Christmas.” I’ve been consciously saying “Merry Christmas” to everyone I meet, as well.

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I LOVE Amazon. Amazon prime and free shipping have accounted for nearly 80% of our Christmas shopping this year. Even though I love wrapping gifts and have had to begrudgingly rely on friends wrapping gifts for me (or will be wrapping like mad when I get to Michigan!), there really is no better deal around. Plus, no waiting in line at the post office.

And lastly, I LOVE that we are in such a good place right now that we can truly enjoy all the sweetness that Christmas brings this week.

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Crafty Tuesday

Here I was all ready to break out some photos of our Boutique and other craftiness from the past two weeks or maybe a sneak peek into our Christmas card, but then we opened our mail. And, um…wow.

Yeah, our stack of unfinished and un-assembled Christmas cards? They don’t hold a candle to what we found in our mailbox today.

They are works of art. All courtesy of (and copyrighted by!) Nana.

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Seriously. These photos don’t even begin to do the cards justice. They are all hand-painted and assembled by Nana, with some help from her elf, Papa.

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This one was Em’s – I LOVE the birdies!!

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And, Addie’s. She nearly wet her pants when she opened it…”Awwwww! And it has a cat, Mama!” she screeched.

And this is only three of them. All different, all assembled with care. I think she does like 100 of them or something. Yes, I think we may have to award her the Crafty Award of the Week.

Anyone else have some Christmas crafts they can share? Please post your cards, so it will force me to feel guilty and assemble mine and get them in the mail. K? Thanks!

Falling off.

Wow. When I fall off the blog bandwagon – I really fall off, don’t I? A few times over the past month I felt like I not only fell off the wagon, but was trampled under the horses hooves, too. But we are all still here, and all still doing surprisingly well.

I know that there is only one more week (4 1/2) days of school before winter break, only 13 more days until Christmas, and 14 more days til we go back to Michigan. I also know that my Christmas cards are piled on the dining room table waiting to be assembled and sent out and I just finished my Christmas gift spreadsheet this weekend …as in jotting down ideas…not actually purchasing any of it. We have another Christmas program tomorrow, two Christmas parties on Friday, a Brownie meeting and we are going caroling this week. And everyday it seems my list just gets longer and longer.

So what am I gonna do?

I’m going to Disneyland!

J.’s Christmas party – where they shut down the park for the evening for the cast members to enjoy – is tonight! And we are going. Without children! So I’m excited about that.

And it is Christmas. The most wonderful time of the year. And, honestly…it really has been most wonderful. While we should have been Christmas shopping and making out our cards this weekend, we instead went to soccer closing ceremonies and did a little sofa shopping. We did find a Christmas tree that we all love – and I even gave in and put colored lights on it, much to the delight of Daddy and the girls. We managed to find MORE decorations for the outside, we seem to be slowly adding each and every day to the amount of festivity in and around our house. We went to see our very sweet friend Yvette in her musical theater production of Bah Humbug! (It was so cute and now Em wants to do musical theater next year, too. Of course.)

I love Christmas every year, but this year the girls really get it and are so excited about the little stuff – the advent calendars, Christmas caroling and the Christmas decorating. Oh, they are still very concerned with presents, don’t get me wrong, but the other stuff – the meaningful stuff – seems to be taking a little bit bigger role this year. Which is such a nice change.

And I think our “if it gets done, it gets done – if not, oh well” attitude is working. Even if some stuff isn’t getting done, other stuff is – like just chilling and having dinner with Uncle Jeff and Aunt JB and then watching the Amazing Race finale last night. (Yeah, Nat & Kat!!)

And in the end, I think that that “other stuff” is way more important anyhow.

Dipy Week #46 ~ White

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We don’t have any of the WHITE stuff, like Kimberly here. But looking at her photo I can appreciate the beauty of snow – from the comfort of our own warm courtyard, which is where I shot my photo the other night.

I think you are either a WHITE Christmas lights or a colored lights kind of person. I definitely fall squarely in the WHITE lights camp. I think they look like stars and are just so pretty. Although I’m sensing some dissension among the ranks when I keep hearing how pretty the colors are.

As long as I can – I’m pulling for WHITE though.

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Hosted by Megan and Hip Momma

Dipy Week #45 ~ Busy

Our Team Up Thursday is a little late today because we both are BUSY!

It’s the most wonderful time of the year – I so love the holidays. And this year I am determined to enjoy each and every day of them.

Although I have been a sewing fiend this week, I’ve treated myself to a few nonfat peppermint mochas (like the “nonfat” is fooling anyone), had the Christmas music channel on all day – all week, and have generally been very laid back about the busy-ness that is descending upon our life. I’m only one woman, and what gets done, gets done. (My new motto!)

I’ve decided I’m going to choose to embrace the BUSY and at the same time try to slow down the holiday a little bit so I can enjoy it and remember all the real reasons we celebrate Christmas.
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Hosted by Megan and Hip Momma

Crafty Tuesday

It has been all sewing…all the time for the past week around here. So I’ll make this extremely quick, and I can get back to it.

Excuse the photos, of course, I just took them and they are horrible quality and flashy. Well, like I tell the girls, “you get what you get and you don’t have a fit!”

Last week’s pillowcases are this week’s pillowcase dresses ready for the boutique this weekend.

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Well…most of them, there is a stack over here that are in various stages of production, but by this weekend we will have probably close to 3 dozen dresses.

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We are also working on some other iPhone holders and aprons too…basically we are just getting what we can done, and going with it. We found out that this boutique is MUCH larger and a MUCH bigger deal than we thought. Soooo…there is that. But like I said, we are just going to get what we can done.

Some other things I worked on this week. J.’s old sweater has become a new bag for me – which I took all over Disneyland and LOVE. (The outside is J.’s sweater, obviously. He doesn’t wear crazy bird print sweaters.)

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Someone else likes it, too. (And she is sporting ‘hair by Addie’ today. Hmm, yeah.)

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She also likes the apron we made for her friend Emma.

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I have a few extra of these cupcake tea towels that I am going to make into aprons, too.

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What crafty goodness do you all have for me today? I will need a sewing break soon, I’m certain.

A little good luck/love note.

Not that he needs it, (the luck part that is, everyone needs the love!) but J. starts his new job today. We are so very proud of him. And especially thankful that he is highly employable so we can enjoy living where we do and I can enjoy staying at home and being a soccer mom.

With that said, I am so happily sending the girls back to school today after their week off. We had a great week, but it is time for them to go, ya know what I mean? They need them some learnin’ so they can be smart like their Daddy.

Good luck, Daddy!

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We love you.
~ All your girls