Just A Reminder...

One of our friends posted this last year and with a new season of hussle and bussle about to begin, I thought now was as good a time as any to post it again.

*Twas the month before Christmas*

*When all through our land,*

*Not a Christian was praying*

*Nor taking a stand.*

*See the PC Police had taken away,*

*The reason for Christmas - no one could say.*

*The children were told by their schools not to sing,*

*About Shepherds and Wise Men and Angels and things.*

*It might hurt people's feelings, the teachers would say*

* December 25th is just a ' Holiday '.*

*Yet the shoppers were ready with cash, checks and credit*

*Pushing folks down to the floor just to get it!*

*CDs from Madonna, an X BOX, an I-pod*

*Something was changing, something quite odd! *

*Retailers promoted Ramadan and Kwanzaa*

*In hopes to sell books by Franken & Fonda.*

*As Targets were hanging their trees upside down*

* At Lowe's the word Christmas - was no where to be found.*

*At K-Mart and Staples and Penny's and Sears*

*You won't hear the word Christmas; it won't touch your ears.*

*Inclusive, sensitive, Di-ver-si-ty*

*Are words that were used to intimidate me..*

*Now Daschle, Now Darden, Now Sharpton, Wolf Blitzen*

*On Boxer, on Rather, on Kerry, on Clinton !*

*At the top of the Senate, there arose such a clatter*

*To eliminate Jesus, in all public matter.*

*And we spoke not a word, as they took away our faith*

* Forbidden to speak of salvation and grace*

*The true Gift of Christmas was exchanged and discarded*

*The reason for the season, stopped before it started.*

*So as you celebrate 'Winter Break' under your 'Dream Tree'*

*Sipping your Starbucks, listen to me.*

*Choose your words carefully, choose what you say*

*Shout MERRY CHRISTMAS ,not Happy Holiday !*

Any Guesses...

About what this amazing stack of fabric is about to turn into?!?!

I'm pretty stinking excited about it!!!!!!!!!!

Sister's Brunch

Yesterday was the Annual Sister's Brunch at Darlene's cousin, Debrah's house.

I love this group of women and hate that we all only see eachother a couple times a year.

This year the little girls were old enough to have their own table!

They were so sweet and well behaved!

Last year they all showed up wearing black dresses with red flowers and we had to laugh when we walked in this year and they were all in red!

This is little Avery, who Josie calls "Angry."

The food is always so delish! Debrah does an amazing job.

The older I get, the more I cherish days like yesterday.

Spending time with other women from all different spots in life is inspiring and helps give me roots. I think women can learn so much from eachother and offer such support.

I just came to the realization of how important my girlfriends are in my life this year, and I'm glad that I finally get that about family too.

Josie got to pick a name for the awesome door prize.

And I let her come home with me even though she didn't pick my name!

For the love of sweetness!

Deborah got all the little girls lipgloss.

Josie hasn't put hers down. I should probably read the label to make sure it's OK for her to consume it in large amounts!

As these pictures show, my girl loves her some shiny lips!

Which makes for a better picture then last year I guess:

And just cause ya'll know how much I love a comparison picture:

2008

2009

Thank you again Deborah! We had an awesome time and as always, can't wait to do it again!

Getting Holly Jolly

I'll confess that I did break out my Christmas stuff on Thursday. Our Thanksgiving dinner was late in the day and JK and I were needing something to do.

But yesterday marked the real start to the Christmas fun!

You'll have to excuse my look. I used a ton of Modge Podge and obviously do not know what a "well ventilated area" is. My head was killing me.

Josie and I decided to make some cookies while we waited for Andrew to get home.

The girl likes to cook.

And yes Amber, it does keep getting scarier everyday!

When Andrew got home, we got down to business setting up our ghetto tree that doesn't plug into itself. There are a whole lotta extension cords going on in there!

Everything about last night made me over the top excited for Christmas this year.

Josie was absolutely in awe of the lights and the ornaments and the music and the bells! This will truely be the first Christmas that she will be able to take in all the excitement of Christmas and I cannot wait.

She is going to freak when we go to the Christmas Parade next weekend!

We let her go to town putting all the ornaments on the tree!

Which resulted in all of them being under two feet and multiple ornaments on each branch!

And of course, our Angel put the Angel on the tree.

I really wasn't expecting her to be so precious about everything. All the "Ohhh's" and "Ahhh's" were adorable.

I can't wait for her to really grasp the true reason for the Season. We having been talking about Baby Jesus being born and how he grew up and saved the World, but she is still putting it all together.

We are hanging the outside lights tonight and have a lot of Christmas Fun planned for the next few weeks so come back and check it out!

For now, I'm extremely late getting ready for the annual Sister's Brunch!

Let The Christmas Crafting Begin!

Ready for another super easy craft?

SNOWMEN CANDLES

It's another cheapo too. Here's what you need:

- A few empty jars, I used an old candle and a spaghetti sauce jar. Then I decided I wanted a big ole huge snowman so I made Josie eat apple sauce with every meal for a whole week so I could use that jar too!
- Some white tissue paper
- Glue
- Scraps of black and orange felt
- Tea light candles

Tear your tissue paper into strips and glue them on the jars. If the paper tears, just cover the hole with another strip.

(don't you love how I photograph white tissue paper on white sheets?!? I'm so smart!)

Then let those babies dry.

Once they are dry, cut out felt eyes and mouth and a carrot nose and glue them on.

And that's it!

Throw a tea light in each one and display them proudly! They are gorgeous at night!

Cute Enough To Eat

I hope ya'll had an amazing Thanksgiving full of food, family, and memories!

Even with all the whining I do, I am fully aware of how much I have to be thankful for.

An out of this World husband, a family that is so supportive it's scary, friends that have become more like sisters, and of course, this little turkey!

Yup, she's enough to make me hit my knees and thank the Lord everyday.

And we are thankful for my sewing machine and that I'm learning how to really use it so I can whip up cute little custom outfits for Little Miss Thanksgiving.

She was a hit at our Family Thanksgiving Dinner.

And I've fallen in love with appliques so I'm sure you'll be seeing more in the future!

Fall Clean Up

We're enjoying these last warm days of Fall. Cleaning up the yard and sweeping out the tree house.

Book Wreath

All my friends know I spend way too much time looking at crafting blogs and making looonnngg lists of projects that I want to do.

So this week I decided to actually get the stuff to make one of those projects.

Since it's Christmas Season I figured I'd better choose a cheap one from my list and this Book Wreath only cost me $2!

I followed the tutorial found here and it was super easy!

All you need is a glue gun (and glue sticks), a book (I picked one up at the Dollar Store), a wreath form (Dollar Store), and some brown paint.

My apologies to Ruth Padel and her Tiger Saving Mission. I'm sure this wasn't what she had in mind when she dreamed of people buying her book!

Rub some brown or grey paint on the outside of the book and let it dry. It's supposed to make it look aged, but I can't really tell the difference. Amy had a great idea of dyeing a few pages in tea and I think that would be really pretty.

Then just start rolling the pages and sticking them on your wreath. Living With Lindsey has a video with ideas on different ways to roll your paper.

About an hour and a half later, I was done!

I have the perfect place for it, but have to finish another project before I can hang it up.

Super easy, super cheap, and made me feel super productive!

(Almost) Wordless Wednesday

"Would you like those scattered, covered, and smoothered?"

Christmas Pictures 2009

We finally got a family picture done for our Christmas cards!

Amber came to our rescue with her new fancy camera, and thanks to my ever growing Photoshop knowledge, we were able to put a card worthy picture together!

Our first attempt was cancelled out by Ole Hurricane Ida.

Although Andrew thought we should have done our picture out in the wind and rain.

You know, since that would pretty much discribe how 2009 was for us.

Then we could have sent out an honest letter about our up and down crappy then happy then crappy again year instead of the usual Leave It To Beaver type letter that everyone sends out.

"2009 was an especially crappy year for us.
Nicole lost her job, Andrew's pay plan was cut down, and Josie hit the terrible two's."

But Amber saved our Christmas card, and instead of sending out a gloomy gloom card, we will be sending out one like this:

(Not the official card! Gotta wait till Christmas for that one!)

And it's fitting.

Since 2009, while it had it's rough spots, was a year full of fun and laughter and crazy love for our little family!