christmas sacks

For the past few years I have tried to keep Christmas gifts as simple as possible around our house.  The kids draw names among themselves and buy one $20ish gift for whomever they picked and the hubby and I usually buy each other one gift and then I do stocking stuffers... an ornaments, chapstick, mini flashlights, gum, lotion etc.  I also like to throw in a few inexpensive, individualized gifts, maybe a book Micah has wanted or a new Redskins jacket to replace the one that has been worn virtually every day since Max received it last year.  Since these gifts are too big to fit into the stockings, I was looking for an alternative when I came across these bags online.  I loved the idea, and figured it shouldn't be too hard to make my own version of the Christmas sacks.

I just happened to have 4+ yards of white canvas in my fabric cabinet, exactly enough to make 6 large sacks.  (fold the 60"w fabric so that salvage ends meet and cut 24" wide.  Sew sides of bag together and box the corners (I cut 3" squares for my corners) I left the salvage edge exposed and sewed a casing with some red and white fabric about 3.5" down from the top then used ribbon for my tie)

I did a little more research and found these printable iron on decals - exactly what I was looking for!
I love how they turned out and the kids loved them too.  For those of you who don't sew an alternative to making your own bags is to buy white pillow cases to iron the decals on to and just tie the sacks closed with some ribbon.

a thrill of hope...

THE WEARY WORLD REJOICES!

Merry Christmas from our family to yours!

christmas tree hunting

We had really hoped to go cut a Christmas tree at my Mother-in-laws tree farm while we were in Maryland but after much discussion we decided that trying to tie a tree on the roof of our van (which does not have a rack on it) and driving 200 miles was going to be more trouble than it was worth.

This was the first year (but I am sure not the last) that the whole family was not there to pick the tree.  Our schedule has been filling up quickly and I knew if we waited for the whole family to be available we might never get a tree, so Thursday night, while Regan was at Gymnastics, we we headed to Home Depot hunt down the perfect tree. 

The tree went up and the light went on as soon as we got home...

but it took a little longer to actually get it decorated!

i didn't mean to be gone so long!

We spent 10 days in Maryland just before Christmas.  I had planned to blog while we were there, but then it didn't happen and when we got home, on Christmas Eve, I got sick... and then the rest of the family got sick, and then we all got sick again, and some of us got sick a third time, Ugh! So, a month later we are all finally feeling better and I am ready to start blogging again! 

Here are just a handful of photos from our time in MD...

Tommy came along with us and got into all sorts of trouble at Grammy's house.  Here he is hanging with the Ladies in the doll cabinet :)

Emmy loved to climb up in this rocker. I have countless photos of her sitting in it.  The painting in the back ground is one my grandfather painted of my dad sitting in that same rocker when he was a boy.  Because of where the painting is hanging it was hard to capture this photo the way I really wanted to... 

There is much debate about weather Regan looks more like me or her father... what do you think?

No bathtub at Grammy's, but the kitchen sink is plenty big enough :)

There were lots of presents...

And a whole day spent with the family.  This is all the Grand kids.  We are finally adding some more girls to the group with two of my nephews getting married this summer!

We spent an afternoon decorating ginger bread houses with good friends.

The month before we left for MD was a whirlwind of craziness, so it was really nice to relax and visit with family for a week... and then spend some more time "relaxing" when we got home and all had fevers :)  More about our extended winter break soon! 

bummer

I just got back from the fabric store a little bit ago.  I bought something like 26 yards of Christmas fabric for two craft parties I am trowing this month.  We will be making fabric covered wreaths (a quick search on Pinterest will give you all sorts of inspiration for these wreaths).  Next I get to cut all this fabric into 2 inch strips and press them in half :)

So, here is the bummer... over the weekend I made up a sample wreath and was planning to sit down tonight and make some more flowers to put on it, but, long story short, the wreath got dropped one to many times pre-decorating and when is slipped out of my hands this afternoon and hit the wood floors this happened :(

So,  now I've got to get another wreath and start all over.  Well, at least I am getting some good practice at wreath wrapping :)

finally found some time to sew for my own family :)

After a week of doing pretty much nothing, I finally dug into my stash last weekend to work on some projects I had been planning for my girls since the summer!  These corduroy skirts were supposed to be for the fall... well, at least I finished them before summer!

I fell in love with this fabric when I saw it in my friends stash.  I ordered a yard for myself, but couldn't bare to cut it up, so I paired it with some cozy minky and Made Emmy a blanket.

Things have been so crazy the last few months I keep sewing new things and forgetting to photograph them... like the ornaments I made for the kids for Christmas. They are all packed up now, but I do have this picture I took awhile back.  The squirrel and the raccoon were for the boys and I finished up these dolls and made them into ornaments for the girls. 

Just for fun, Max and Micah dressed up when we went to see the Hobbit last weekend- Micah was supposed to be one of the dwarfs, Ori (although he's not too convincing- he needed a bit more hair, I  think) and Max was Bilbo (he even wore flip flops and painted hair on his feet with Regan's face painting set she got for Christmas). 

more of tommy's mischief

I started off so well this month, and then the craziness of two craft show and traveling the weekend before Christmas hit and one the many things that didn't get done was blogging!  Anyway, I couldn't leave you thinking that Tommy was still stuck in our copier, so here are the rest of his hiding places :)

so far this week...

Tommy discovered the copier the other night.

Last night I let the kids eat my gingerbread house...

This is what it looked like before...

 

and after.  They were bouncing off the walls after dinner!

To make up for his earlier mischief, Tommy helped my sew some aprons last night...

Here are some of the ones I am working on for my last craft show on Saturday. 

The holiday craft show season has been fun, but I am ready for a break for awhile!  Maybe I will actually get some of that sewing on my personal "to make" list done!

catch up

Here is where the kids have found Tommy 3 of the past 4 mornings (I totally forgot, and left him sitting on the shelf Sunday night, oops!)

There has been a little bit of running around and a lot of mess making around here the last few days.  I am sewing aprons for my last craft show this Saturday, as well as trying to squeeze in some Christmas sewing.  I keep meaning to take pictures to post, but it just has not happened.  I am also trying to decide what to do about the fact that Blogger is not allowing me to upload my pictures without exporting them from iPhoto and making them smaller... my non-technically-savvy-self is dreading the idea of trying to move my blog, Why can't Blogger just work the way it is supposed to?

I am off to hide my elf!  Maybe one of these days I will actually have something interesting to post!

tommy and emmy

Why is it that Tommy is still smiling, even when he's all tied up and held at gun/sword point?

It's been awhile since I shared a picture of this  cutie.  She's 4 months now.  She is the happiest little girl ever, always quick with a smile :)

advent

Looks like Tommy found our new keyboard... too bad it wasn't plugged in :)

In addition to the fun of hiding our elf, Tommy, we have a few more things that we are doing to celebrate this advent season.  Every night after dinner we light our advent wreath and read a chapter in Jotham's Journey.  This, I think, is the most important part because it is what reminds us why we are celebrating this season.  We are celebrating the best gift ever given in the history of gift giving- Jesus, our Messiah. 

The boys used the boxes from our Playmobil advent calendar to make their own Lego version...

It is the nativity scene.  Each box contains another item to add to the scene.   I love this!

And, lastly, I couldn't resist this cute little advent count down.  I picked it up while we were in Maryland at the little Swedish shop down the road from my mom's house.  The hedgehogs at the bottom are my favorite part :)

elf spotting

I had hoped to post about what our family is doing for Advent this year (besides hiding this silly elf) but it just didn't happen today, hopefully tomorrow!

happy 10th birthday, Micah!

Micah is 10 today!  My little boy is growing up!  He's saving $ to buy a kindle (he LOVES to read!) so there were not a ton of presents this year, but he did get a pocket knife (and a couple things from his siblings too).

In other news, we got our Christmas tree last night and I guess Tommy (our elf finally got a name) couldn't wait to start decorating and got tangled up in the lights!