Merry Christmas

For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.

Isaiah 9:6

Almost Christmas

I am off today until January 5th!  How lucky am I?  The Girl and I are taking full advantage of some quality time.  We played babies and coloured this morning.  Soon we are off to get her hair cut and out for lunch with my girlfriend from University.  The laundry is rolling and we are starting to pack...it must be Christmas!

So while I run around and get ready for the holiday,  here is a fun little Christmas Quiz I borrowed from Casey Wiegand's blog.  A must visit blog!

1. Egg nog or hot chocolate? Coffee first, but if I've had my coffee Hot chocolate 

2. Does Santa wrap presents or just sit them under the tree? Santa sets them up ready to play with instantly...Santa does not have time to wrap!

3. Colored lights on tree/house or white? White, our ornaments are red and white.  It was Hubby and my compromise our first Christmas.  Traditional colour if it wasn't going to match my living room! :)  See our ornament disaster 2008 here.

4. Do you hang mistletoe? No...never even crossed my mind.

5. When do you put your decorations up? As soon as Hubby will let me.  Usually the weekend before American Thanksgiving...it's normal here in Canada.

6. What is your favorite holiday dish? Nothing specific...probably just the sweets.  I'm not a real foodie.

7. Favorite holiday memory as a child? When we were kids we were not allowed to leave our rooms Christmas morning until my grandparents had got there and Dad had "checked" to see that Santa came.  I remember collecting in our rooms as sisters waiting and HOPING Santa hadn't forgotten our family.  When we were given the go ahead we would march down the stairs to see what Santa brought.

8. When and how did you learn the truth about Santa? Um...probably way too late.  I think I was pretty old.  Hang on to your innocents...LOL.  Plus at our house he stops coming when you stop believing...motivation?

9. Do you open a gift on Christmas Eve? We get new "Christmas Pj's" at my parents house on Christmas Eve.  You must be wearing them when you come back Christmas day for gifts. I LOVE this tradition.  Nothing quite like the annual Christmas jams.

10. How do you decorate your Christmas tree? Red and White.  Each year I add something new.  I am slowly replacing cheap bulk ornaments with ones that have meaning.

11. Snow! Love it or dread it? LOVE it for Christmas.  If it's going to be cold we should have snow.  It's not looking good this year.

12. Can you ice skate? My entire life, used to do it competitively!  Then I married a Floridian, so it's been a while.

13. Do you remember your favorite gift? Not really, to be completely honest and rather cliche, I love buying and giving gifts.  I am so excited about what I have found or picked out.

14. What’s the most important thing about the holidays for you? Time as a Family.

Our sweet girl last year.

15. What is your favorite holiday dessert? My Mom makes mistletoe pie, a family fav.  It's a chocolate wafer cookie crust, with vanilla ice cream, and lime sherbet on top.  You can then drissle it with warm raspberries. (We all call the raspberries jam and bock it, drive my Mom and Nana crazy...it's part of the tradition).  

16. What is your favorite holiday tradition? Jammies on Christmas Eve.

Mommy and the poor sickest baby
 last year in our matching jammies.

17. What tops your tree? A star. 

18. Which do you prefer: Giving or receiving? Giving! 

19. Candy canes: yuck or yummy? Yummy!!

20. Favorite Christmas show? I have lots of favourites.  Elf, Love Actually, This year The Girl is loving Frosty the Snowman.

21. Saddest Christmas song? Don't They Know It's Christmas Time

22. What is your favorite Christmas song? O' Holly Night

Visiting Santa...again!

Last year we braved the snow and took The Boss and her cousins to get their picture taken with Santa.  Trucking two babies and a two year old through the mall was tough but totally worth it.

I'm sure people in the mall saw us coming thought we were crazy for trying this but,

 look how cute they are?

Well done 2010!

This year we braved it with a three year old and two almost two year olds, 

it should be way easier right?

WRONG???    

We decided to try it stroller-less...in and out.

They can all walk right?

A herd of turtles I tell you, and if you let go of one for even a second they take off.

Where is that speed when we're all holding hands?

We made it to Santa's village with three excited little people and two tired Mommy's.

Our adventure had just begun.

Here's how it turned out...

We started with the my niece and nephew on their own since they didn't have one of just the two of them yet.

Since this was going so well, and Santa was super helpful and cooperative, 

(haha...sense the sarcasm) 

we decided to try and add The Boss.  

I started by standing her in front of my niece, 

but she took off.  

When I caught her I tried to put her on my nephew's lap, because there was no offer from Santa, 

but she was terrified and took off.  

Don't believe me, see our family photo here.  

The whole time I was putting her in I was ducking and yelling 

"just take one".   

I wasn't looking for the best family photo ever, just proof of our years of trying.  

So, the above photo, as unwarm and Christmasy as it is, 

totally represents the mood of our experience.

Hilarious!

It will take it's place, as the 2011 memory, and wait to see what next year holds.

Never a dull moment or a wasted memory.  

Not every picture as rosy as you plan.

But a family full of love and Mommies willing to battle the Christmas craziness for a photo.

I love our memories with our family.

I wouldn't trade this picture for one with perfect smiles and children standing like soldiers.

This is real life.

Better luck next year?  

Linking here:
C.Lee

Gift Wrapping

One of my favourite things about Christmas is wrapping the gifts.  It's a chance to go back through everything you bought (sometimes I forget what all I bought) and make each package special for the person opening it.  I'm not going to lie...I spend less time on kids gifts and the gifts for men, I focus my energy on my sisters, sister-in-law, Mom and Mother-in-Law.  They appreciate it more don't they?

Lost of bloggers have posted some inspiring pictures but I have to admit I was most inspired by my cousin and blogger Melissa of Hare Styling.  You can check out her gifts and inspiration here.

I love the plain brown paper and the touches of burlap.  Just what my gifts need to help warm up my Christmas look.  If you've missed my stress about my tree and warming up my look you can find it here, here and here.

This weekend the Hubby and I set to work wrapping.  He got us Starbucks and we watched the Michael Buble concert (tevo style) and wrapped.  Nothing says Christmas like a warm drink, fun tv Christmas specials and spending time with my Man!  Our tree went from this....

To this...

I used a roll of paper I picked up at a drug store and another from Michaels.  The ribbon is also from Michaels in the one dollar bin.  A dollar right?  Loved the twine-ish looking one.  I love making bows for the girl and it never once crossed my mind to use real ribbon on a gift...duh!

We also got the coolest tags this year from our bookstore.  They look nice and also have funny sayings on them.  My favourite says "I made your gift because... I'm cheap/ I'm crafty".  You have to select the one that applies.  It has been saved for a special present that I believe was made because I am crafty, but my Brother-in-Law might argue that.  That tutorial will be posted after Christmas as to not give away the gift!

Happy Wrapping!

Linking here:

'Tis the Season....

We spent the weekend celebrating the Christmas season.

We started with our Church Christmas banquet and finished with Mr. D's work Christmas party.  

The Girl was a champ.  

Taking in all the festivities.  

Unfortunately, Sunday morning she had her little seal cough back.  

We spent the day nursing her back to health and hope she is back to normal ASAP. 

Next weekend is a busy as this weekend was.   

No time for sickness.

This year I helped with the decor for the banquet.  It's always a fun time to get in the Christmas spirit and spend time with some other great women in our church.  I'm not going to lie, I enjoy the lead up as much as the actual event.  The decorations for the banquet are always tricky.  We have next to nothing for our budget and a large naked room to work with.  The theme was "Old Fashion Christmas" so the tables were decorated with lanterns from IKEA, burlap, glittered pine cones, red ornaments and gingerbread men at every place.  

To go with the "Old Fashion Christmas" theme we strung popcorn strings on the tree.  This was a fun project.  We got a bunch of women around a table with Christmas carols, treats and lots of chatting!

My friend even convinced her husband to make a snow globe...that's right a snow globe!  This man is every DIY'ers dream!  They saw something similar at another Christmas event they were at, next thing you know he's building a better version for his wife.  Isn't it amazing?  

We also painted a winter scene (by we, I mean, I painted a few trees and the yellow windows...another one of my friends was the master mind behind this...I was impressed)  It was the perfect background for families to take pictures.  There was also a fake tree and a life size frosty made of newspaper and a white blanket.  

Here's a view with the shoes and Frosty!

Happy Weekend...

According to Forever 21 these are this weeks best buy...

I couldn't agree more!

We're heading to a church Christmas banquet tonight and Hubby's work party tomorrow night.

Wish my feet luck!

Have a wonderful weekend whatever you're doing.

Making a tree skirt...

This year I am busier than I have ever been, yet something inside of me just can't help to add more projects to the list of things I want to do.  I mentioned here how it took me sometime to fall in love with my ornaments.  This year my goal was to add warmth to my Christmas decor, and while I would never in a million years describe my decorating style as country.  I am trying really hard to add a rustic, country-ish element to my decor to add warm.  I started with my twine ornaments seen here, then added burlap touches here, and finished the look off with a tree skirt.

I was trying to think of the most cost effective way to make the skirt while keeping with a simplistic yet rustic look.  I decided to make the skirt out of a drop cloth purchased at a hardware store.  The material is thick and durable and I was able to get one 5 feet by 12 feet for about $18.  If I had've shopped around I probably could have found this for cheaper or possibly even used but like I said I am so busy right now and I didn't have time for that.  I was totally okay with my tree skirt costing $18.  I started by googling tree skirts and reading a few tutorials.  Once I got the idea of what others had done I started my own.  I measured from the centre of the tree out and decided I wanted my skirt to be about two and a half feet long.  I created two squares 5ft x 5ft and then folded them in half like a triangle and in half again, and again.  I cut a piece of ribbon 2.5 feet long and taped a pen on one end.  I pinned the other end at the top of my triangle, pulled the ribbon tight and drew my circle.  I also traced a circle at the top to go around the trunk of the tree.

Once the first piece was cut, I cute from the bottom of the tree skirt to the top and tried it around the tree to ensure I liked the way it fit.  I then traced a second piece (back) the exact same size.

I really wanted to personalize our skirt so I used freezer paper to create a stencil.  I selected a font from the computer.  Printed out what I wanted it to say and iron the freezer paper onto my skirt.  I used fabric paint and a paper towel to paint over the stencil.  I used the paper towel instead of a paint brush to get a softer look, as a pose to a thick heavily filled in letter.

Once the paint was dry I removed the freezer paper.  To connect the twine and burlap on my tree and continue with the rustic look I hand stitched a burlap star on the skirt.

Once I was finished with the front of the skirt I pinned the two main pieces (front and back) of the skirt with the fronts facing each other and sewed all the way around.  Before sewing shut the straight cut (opening of the skirt) I pinned ribbon on the inside to be used to tie the skirt shut.  I left a small whole, then flipped the entire skirt right side out and sewed the whole shut.  Took it to my tree and tied it on!

Our Weekend...

Naughty or Nice?

Are we good parents for posing with her OR terrible parents for making her pose at all?

The Girl has been loving the idea of Santa.  Pointing to things with Santa on it and talking about him, however when it came time for the annual picture she was having none of it.  She didn't throw a temper-tantrum...we've seen those and know what they look like...she instead was clinging to and clawing at Mr. D's shirt.  We decided to make it a family photo in an effort to  actually get a picture for her memories.  

Do you think if she was a little older she would have told me to forget the memories, this is not happening?

Either way, we look somewhat happy and we have year two for her baby book. 

Terror in her eyes and all!

Last year, much better if you ask me!

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