Showing posts with label ~Christmas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ~Christmas. Show all posts

Monday, January 7, 2013

Christmas 2012


  I have been really struggling to keep regular posts happening and this one is no different. It doesn't help that my blog was hacked twice and I had to take some extra time to implement some added security - then to top it off I had to move a bunch of files (over 2500 of them) and most of them were images - needless to say I now have a whole bunch of missing image links on posts that pre-date March of this year. I am in the process of adding them all back in but it is very time consuming and doesn't leave much time for new posts. Before it gets much later in the year I thought I had better take some time to get my Christmas recap post done!
She Loved Her American Girl Doll from Santa....

The morning chaos....with over 10 people it is bound to get crazy!
Other than the weather (usually cold and rainy) I love everything about Christmas, from the decorations to the food and most important the gathering of family. We missed my hubby's parents this year since they were not able to make it and my sister was not able to come up this year either, but my immediate family plus my Mom, Dad, Grandma, Brother and his daughter were able to make it.

My house has morphed over the years into the gathering place and I love that! Christmas morning is just the four of us (myself, hubby and two daughters still at home) plus the dog and the cat. We spend the morning opening our gifts for each other and the gifts that Santa has brought and then we enjoy our traditional Christmas morning cinnamon rolls.   Early afternoon brings the arrival of my Son and his Wife, my parents, my grandma and my brother and his daughter for gift opening round two. After that chaos is over we move on to the Christmas dinner which is usually ham and scalloped potatoes plus all the side dishes. We usually have so many cookies and homemade candies that we let those be our desserts.
My daughter in law and I (my attempt at taking our picture)


Of course our dog did not want to be left out of anything....

 A wonderful time was had by all - it was loud, it was chaotic and it was family - it was perfect......

Thank you for stopping by and peeking into my world.

Friday, December 30, 2011

Gearing Up for the New Year......

Christmas 2011 - typical gift opening chaos!
2012 is just right around the corner - the older I get the faster the years seem to fly by.  I am not sure if it is that I am busier or if it is just that I appreciate what life has to offer more so than I did in my younger years.  Upon reflection 2011 was a pretty good year - full of both ups and downs and I think the trick to having a successful and fulfilling life is how you handle the down times.  One of my personal "downs" for 2011 was when my Grandma had a heart attack.  It really made me realize how fragile life is and to appreciate each and every day as a gift from God.  Grandma is still with us and as feisty as she can be at 85 with a heart condition.  She is still the family matriarch but I see how the individual family roles are starting to be re-defined and re-distributed.

2004 - from left to right:
My Sister, My Mom, My Grandma, Me holding my youngest
and my oldest daughter in front.
Growing up I remember always going to my Grandma & Grandpa's house on Christmas Eve and they would come to our house Christmas morning.  Then it morphed into going to my parents house on Christmas Eve with my parents coming over to my house on Christmas morning.  Now we have settled into the routine of staying at home during the Christmas season and our house has turned into the gathering point.  The roles within the family may have changed, but the one thing that is and always will be is the family being able to get together no matter whose house we may land in.

Christmas 2011, from left to right:
My Grandma, My Mom, My Dog Bella & My Dad
I love that my house has turned into the "family" gathering point and look forward to many more years of family gatherings......

Monday, December 26, 2011

Our Christmas in Five Photos.....

The cookies were put out and the note written to Santa

Santa came during the night!

Mom was up first and made breakfast....cinnamon rolls (shown) and breakfast burritos - yum!

The kids open up the "best present ever" - an X-box Connect & game that Santa brought!

We managed to actually get a quick family photo - yeah!
Still need a photo with the whole family though!
A wonderful time was had by all, this Mom is worn out and still not recovered......maybe I'll be recovered by New Year's Eve - one can only hope!  Thanks for stopping by and sharing our Christmas memories.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Wordless Wednesday ~ Christmastime!

Christmas 2003, myself and my two girls at a Christmas Party!
Christmas morning 2006 - this was one of the few times that the whole
extended family was at our house to open gifts on Christmas morning ~
normally we have a couple of different "gift opening" sessions.
Christmas morning 2009
Christmas morning 2010
Coming Soon.....Christmas morning 2011! 
Thank you for stopping by and peeking into our past Christmas memories!

Monday, December 19, 2011

And the Stockings Were Hung By the Chimney with Care......

The hubby declared that my mantle just didn't look like Christmas without the stockings in place.....I searched high and I searched low and finally found enough 3M hooks and sticky tape to hang up all eight stockings!

Dad's, Mom's, Big Brother's, his Fiance's, Big Sister's, Little Sister's, the Dog's and yes even the Cat has a stocking!  Mom & Dad's stockings are the dark colored ones!

I was a little nervous about hanging these up as we had an "incident" last year with the 3M hooks.  Don't get me wrong ~ neither the hooks or the tape failed, but rather our paint job failed!  When we painted our mantle we did not clean the surface first so apparently the paint did not adhere as well as it should have......if you look close you can see the patch job in the center.  A large chunk of paint peeled right off along with the hook that was holding up last year's decorations.

We have since been able to determine that just because your house is new and the paint is fresh you still need to prep the walls to remove any accumulated dust.  We live in a very "dusty" area so we are pretty sure that the dust was to blame.  It looks pretty now, but when Santa visits he will have to leave the filled stockings on the kitchen table right next to his half eaten milk and cookies!
Merry Christmas!

Thursday, December 15, 2011

Almost a "Date Night"......

My hubby and I got an "almost date night" last night!  We both got off work a little early, went to our local fast food joint, planned our Christmas shopping strategy while we were eating, left and then spent the next 3 hours on shopping!  Time alone with hubby (plus the hundreds of other shoppers).

I have to admit that I was surprised at how little traffic there was both on the roads and in the stores!  It seems to me that the stores were much busier in past years.  I know it was the middle of the week and there are still 10 days before Christmas, but I expected more people.  What has been your experience this year with your holiday shopping?

The other thing that I noticed was that the toy department seemed a little "slim" this year in comparison to previous years - in fact I don't think that any extra toys were brought in like the stores usually do.  What I did see was an expansion of the holiday decorations, pre-packaged gift sets and candy.  The electronics department was definitely into the holiday spirit and seemed to feature more than the usual array.

Merry Christmas!
Now for some more of my decorations!  This is the setup that I did on top of my buffet.  I am currently using the buffet as a sofa table (due to space restrictions), but I think it turned out pretty nice.  As with most of my decorations each piece has a little story!  The two Santa Claus figures were a gift from my Paternal Grandma & Grandpa.  They are both deceased so these pieces bring back some wonderful memories.  The little Green sleigh was passed down to my by my Maternal Grandma - she's now 85 and as feisty as ever!  I got the snow bear at my youngest daughter's school Harvest Festival - I won the silent auction for the basket of Christmas goodies.  The large snow globe was a Goodwill find and features the nativity.  The Nutcracker was a gift from my MIL and the reindeer plays music and was a hand me down from her also.  The really tall Santa (all you can see is his legs) was another Goodwill find!

Wednesday, December 14, 2011

The Nativity

Below is this year's nativity scene ~ the actual set up changes just a little bit each year but the main pieces are always the same.  The actual nativity always seems so dark so I tried to put up a string of lights - it looks pretty good when it is lit up, but not so much for these day photos.  I had to use colored lights since I was all out of White lights.  I will have to catch some after Christmas sales this year to pick up a small strand of White lights just for the Nativity.
The nativity scene below was from 2007  - I actually like this display much better than this year's display, however the large angel has gone missing and the small white tree currently resides in my oldest daughter's room - complete with decorations.  I have several of the single pillar candle lights but they are currently in various windows throughout the house.

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

A Child's Christmas Village

This is what Christmas and holidays are all about......I got ready to type my blog post today knowing that I would use a couple of the photos I downloaded yesterday (showing off some more Christmas decorations) and I discovered this photo on my computer
At first I was wondering where did this come from and then I remembered that my youngest daughter had been "helping" me with the Christmas decorating.

She had taken a bunch of the decorations and arranged a whole village on the kitchen island.  Then she proceeded to narrate a whole story about what she created.  I didn't realize she had taken a photo ~ but I am so glad that she did, now every time I see this photo I will remember this special moment we shared together exploring her Christmas Village...... 

Monday, December 12, 2011

My Christmas Mantle

One of my favorite things to decorate is my fireplace mantle......

In my opinion, my Christmas decorations would not be complete unless my mantle was decorated.  The mantle I have right now is really narrow so it is somewhat of a challenge to decorate it!  Our previous house had a wooden mantle that was about 7 inches deep so I had plenty of room to decorate it.  I decided to not fight the size of my mantle and just keep the decorations simple.  I really like how this year's mantle turned out!
They are not turned on in this photo, but there are White lights woven into the greenery.

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Past & Present

This post was originally published last year and rather than do a new one for this year I thought I would just share this again. The ornaments that are shown here are on the tree again this year and continue to be family favorites. As you can tell from the images, photography is not one of my strong points. I am hoping that Santa will bring me a new point and click digital camera this year and if not I might just have to start using my oldest daughter's camera!

Our tree is primary done up with Red & Silver and I will be taking some photos of it later today along with photos showing off some of my other Christmas decorations.  I have gotten quite a bit of inspiration this year from the various blogs that I follow so the decorations this year are slightly different than previous years.....the family seems to like what I've done and the youngest is happy now that Santa Claus can visit since the house is decorated!
One of my favorite ornaments.

My cat's new favorite spot.

My hubby bought me a whole set of Thomas Kincaid ornaments,
Snowmen & Santas!

From Christmas Past, this was on my hubby's tree when he was a boy.

Christmas Past, a set of these ornaments were on my Grandma's
tree every year. I used to love laying on the ground
and looking up at them.

Handmade by me, while in MOPs.

A little tree bling and my girls initials.
One of my most precious treasures - handmade by my oldest daughter.

Another precious treasure handmade by my youngest daughter.

Thursday, November 17, 2011

Christmas - Homemade with Love!

One of our "homemade" creations!
This was made by my youngest daughter
(with a little help from Mama)
Whenever possible I love to make homemade presents, crafts and goodies - especially during Holidays!  In my mind there is no better time than Christmas to do so!

I recently found a great resource site which is chock full of Christmas Crafts and all things Christmas.  You can download their Free Ebooks without having to register, check them out at www.AllFreeChristmasCrafts.com

I am a pretty simple person so I like the craft projects that I can get done in a day or less (I am also impatient and want it done now).  This site seems to be full of quick projects and looks like there are plenty of projects that you can do together with your kiddos (the best kind in my opinion). 
Homemade ornament - this is one of my favorite Treasures!

Sunday, December 26, 2010

Christmas - The Day After

Christmas Phase I - Santa was here!
It's the day after Christmas - a day filled with cleaning up little messes here and there, helping the kids put together any new toys that escaped yesterday's marathon assembly session and in our house it is a day of leftovers and relaxation!
More "evidence" that Santa had visited!

All is quiet in our house this wet winter morning, it's 8 am and everyone except me is still sleeping, the dog has been out for her morning constitutional and even she went back to bed.  As I write this post, I am surveying the aftermath of yesterday's festivities and deciding whether or not I will truly relax today of if I will spend the day putting the house back in order!  Right now the pull of another cup of coffee is strong, but I seem to lack the energy to get up and go make a fresh pot - if my current energy levels are any indication it seems that my house will stay in it's present state at least until tomorrow.....

Saturday, December 25, 2010

Countdown to Christmas: Day 25

He is here!

Luke 2:1-22 (New King James Version)

Luke 2

Christ Born of Mary
 1 And it came to pass in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2 This census first took place while Quirinius was governing Syria. 3 So all went to be registered, everyone to his own city.
4 Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, 5 to be registered with Mary, his betrothed wife, who was with child. 6 So it was, that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered.

Friday, December 24, 2010

Countdown to Christmas: Day 24

Christmas is a time of getting together with family and sharing good food, laughs, love, togetherness and gift giving.  Christmas just wouldn't be the same if I did not have my family to share it with.  Both my sister and my brother are out of town this year so they will only be with us in spirit as we celebrate Christmas.

Christmas morning at our house is spent opening the socks that Santa has filled and the gifts he has brought.  Only myself, husband and daughters (and our furry friends) will be part of Christmas morning at our house.  At some point during the day my husband's parents come over and we celebrate with them.  Christmas dinner this year will be ham, potatoes and all the extras.  My adult son, his fiancee, my parents and my grandma will join us for dinner which will be followed by more gifts, more eating sweets and phone calls to my brother and sister.

I am so thankful that I have my family around especially at this time of year, I know there are many out there who are not so blessed.....special prayers will be said for all of those who are not so fortunate.


Thursday, December 23, 2010

Countdown to Christmas: Day 23

Bella and I.
I am really looking forward to this year's Christmas since we added two furry friends to our family this past year and it will be their first Christmas with us.

I have it on good authority that Santa Claus will even be bringing them a few presents!  Bella Ruby joined our family at the end of January, we got her from our local animal shelter and she quickly became a part of our family.  We have twilight fans in our family, thus the name Bella.  The vet put her age at around 2 years and she is a Beagle Pit mix weighing in at about 50 pounds.


Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Countdown to Christmas: Day 22

My house isn't properly decorated for Christmas until I pull out my snowman collection.  I have snowman ranging from small to large like the one above - he stands about 2 feet tall and greets people as they come into the house with various sayings like, "Come on in, it's cold outside!".  I am not sure how it happened but most of my snowmen decorate our main bathroom, I think the only place in our house that escapes the Christmas decorations is our master bedroom!

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Countdown to Christmas: Day 21

In our house we always have some kind of Advent calendar during the Christmas holiday, some years it's just a matter of marking the days off of the calendar and other years we buy the advent calendars that have the chocolate hidden behind each window.

Last year my husband's parents gave us a bunch of Christmas decorations, but since we already had our house decorated we put them away for this year.  Several of the decorations now grace our house, including a new advent calendar which is designed to be used every year.  So here is our "new to us" advent calendar:
I had to do a close up so that you could see that first thing we did was loose the number one, thankfully the calendar came with "blanks" so I was able to create a new #1.
Merry Christmas.....only four days left!

Monday, December 20, 2010

Countdown to Christmas: Day 20

I think I mentioned before that Rudolph is one of our favorites, this snow globe is also a bank
Somewhat to my husbands dismay, I am a knickknack kind of person - which is a pain when it comes to dusting, but I like to look at them and remember the story behind where I got them. 
Synonyms to knickknack: bauble, curiosity, doodad, gaud, gewgaw (also geegaw), gimcrack, novelty, ornamental, tchotchke, trinket
Because I like tchotchkes, I like to collect various groupings of items, including Christmas themed items, so today I am going to introduce you to my Christmas snow globe collection (well some of them anyway).  I like to look at snow globes because they seem to have a magic in them....a tiny world contained within a glass ball.  I guess I probably have an over active imagination to enjoy such things, but that's me and who I am.  So without further ado, here are some of my Christmas snow globes.

Sunday, December 19, 2010

Countdown to Christmas: Day 19

A special thank you to my husband this Christmas season!  Last night he took us all on a Christmas excursion that was enjoyed by all.  Let me premise this to say that when I first met my husband some 18 years ago, he was kind of Bah Humbug on the whole Christmas experience, which needless to say has changed over the years!

So we all piled in the van about 6 pm and took a drive to a local church that was having a live nativity.  The kids and us got to pet the animals and see Jesus, Mary, Joseph and the Wise men.  On our way into the church we were greeted by the Innkeepers wife and we got to hear the story of Christmas from her perspective.  Upon entering the church we were greeted by the smells of fresh coffee, hot chocolate and cookies which were free for all.  My youngest also made a Christmas ornament which now resides on our tree.  In addition to all of that the church ladies had made and were giving away hats with sizes ranging from the smallest to the biggest.  We each took our time choosing the perfect hat!

After we left there we drove to James Street Estates, a retirement community in a manufactured home park.  Every year they decorate their homes and invite the community in for vehicle tours.  There are always many oohs and aahs when we take take the tour.  By the time we were done we were all hungry so my husband took us all out for Chinese food.   After dinner we took a final drive through our old neighborhood to see the Christmas lights.  On the way home we sang Christmas songs primarily lead by my youngest daughter, who had her own version of quite a few.  We did create a version of the 12 Days of Christmas that featured fast food......

Again, no photos for this post as my hubby took the photos and I have not gotten the camera from him to download the photos......

Merry Christmas!

Saturday, December 18, 2010

Countdown to Christmas: Day 18

Santa Paper 2006
Santa presents!  Every year without fail Santa visits our house and fills up the stockings with little wrapped gifts, candies, fresh fruit and nuts and he leaves new presents under the tree.  Now, we can tell at a glance when Santa has been here, you see Santa Claus doesn't have the same wrapping paper as everyone else!  All of the presents from Santa Claus are wrapped in special "Santa Paper".  The paper many vary from year to year, but it always features Santa Claus and all presents from Santa are wrapped in the exact same paper.
Santa Paper 2007

Santa Paper 2009
I remember once my son said the following to me "Mama, I KNOW that there is a Santa Claus because you don't have any wrapping paper like that!"  He (my son) was old enough that he had helped me wrap some of the relative's presents that year and he was also old enough that he was starting to look for reasons to "confirm" his belief in Santa Claus!  The innocence of youth is something that I helped my kids to hold on to as long as they could as it is a precious and wondrous thing.

Merry Christmas