My Dad...

Dad,

Miss you today, third one without you but feels like only the second one. You were the glue to this family, miss you tons today and wished I could have been more preparred to live without you. Your grandson is thinking about taking Underwater Basket Weaving 101. Love you Dad and hope you and both Grandmas are celebrating!

I know you have been smiling down on us. Thank you for all of the wonderful Christmas' you provided for Bill and I when we were growing up. Many special memories! Thanks Dad!

On my wishlist....

You guessed it, TOE SOCKS! They are so comfortable and as you can see, my one and only pair is defeating the purpose, so we will see if Santa is nice to me...

Christmas Fun Links

To have some Christmas fun, go to this link called Portable North Pole TV. Anyone can fill out the info. and send one to anyone else. For instance I sent one to my 6 year old daughter, it allows you to enter their info and one thing that they want for Christmas, you can select if they were naughty or nice, enter your email and then you will be sent an email message with a link to the video of Santa talking to you from the North Pole, this is SUPER cute!!!! You can also send one to another adult in your life. As a joke you could select naughty list for them. http://www.portablenorthpole.tv/home

The second fun link for you is http://www.noradsanta.org/en/ you can track where Santa is. You can watch short video clips of where he is. This is super cute and educational as far as geography and landmarks are concerned. It is also fun to watch the world fill up with presents. It was fun for my 6 year old and I to watch him get closer and closer before she went to bed. Don't worry he doesn't come until around midnight!

Hot Cocoa In A Bag - Last Minute Gifty- Tutorial

If you need a super EASY gift for teachers, friends, neighbors etc. The Hot Cocoa in a bag is for you. It does require one hardship though, going to the supermarket at a very busy time of year. So here is the tutorial for you...
Materials Needed:

1. Frosting Piping Bags 12in (12 to a package) Wilton found at JoAnn Fabrics
2. Holiday Twist Ties (Found in Candy Making Section)
3. Mini Marshmallows One Bag (makes 12 bags)
4. Mini Chocolate Chips (Bulk Section of your supermarket) 6 large scoops
5. Spice Drops 12 in Green and Red or whatever color you wish (one scoop in bulk section)
6. Large Swiss Miss Hot Cocoa Container in the Hot Cocoa isle of your supermarket
7. To & From Label stickers (optional)

First take the piping bag and fold it over about 3-4 inches. This helps prevent hot cocoa dust to get on your marshmallows.

Put a 1/2 cup of hot cocoa mix in the bag. Plus a bit extra if you wish. I actually did two 1/4 c. plus a little. It doesn't have to be perfect.

Add approximately 1/4 c. of chips. Or more, just for fun.

Add a generous amount of mini marshmallows 1/2 cup.

 Add a green, red, or whatever color gum drop on the top (just for fun and color). Give it a good twist, your marshmallows will smoosh a bit but that is ok. Some of the Internet instructions call for a clear rubber band, I just used twist ties on mine and they were fine. Add your twist tie and you are DONE!!! You can add stickers or To:/From: labels if you like.

Reindeer Girl :-). She will take these to school to give out to the principal, VP, secretaries, special area teachers and so on. I like this whole idea because it helps to teach my 6 year old how to give. I hope to raise a child whom is both a good giver and receiver!

Our final stash looked like this. And yes she did have to take them ALL to school and pass all of them out!

Fabric Card Tutorial

Holiday Cards made with fabric, tutorial:

My crafty chica friend Ramona, whose blog address is on the right side over there...came over to craft with me and we made fabric cards. She saw the idea at a craft show and figured out how to do it. So without further ado, she and I will share with you too...

Materials you will need:
Scissors,
Rotary cutter (optional),
Self healing cutting mat (optional),
Christmas material or any festive material you wish to use,
Heat and Bond fusible paper, (available at JoAnns)
Blank cards, (available at JoAnns)
An Iron

Step One: Cut out cute little pieces of fabric.

Step Two: Cut out the Heat and Bond fusible paper to match the back of the fabric - you want to be precise here, so that the paper doesn't stick to your iron.

Step Three: Take the fabric face up with the Heat and Bond on the bottom and stick your iron on it for TWO seconds (it doesn't take long!). IMPORTANT - In both iron steps you don't move your iron around you just hold it still.

Step Four: Peel off the back of the paper, you have now made what I like to think of as a "fabric sticker" and you are now ready to put it on a card.
Step Five: Then you iron it onto the card for about 10 seconds. Remember to hold the iron still.

Step Six: Go crazy embossing, decorating and embellishing :-)

Ramona made this one, the Snowflake in the middle is embossed.

I was having fun with some curvy fabric that I used my rotary cutter to cut out with. These are not yet finished, I plan to stamp and emboss some sayings on these as well.

Ramona made this one.

Christmas Vacation Photos

Becca on carousel at Chuck E Cheeses, Nana's front yard, pics of Megan, Becca and Ashley, teaparty in Nana's playhouse, Nana and Grandpa with their grandkids.

As promised...

My Christmas Present from DH was a.....

For those of you whom aren't familiar with this; it is a crafters dream machine, it die cuts letters, shapes etc. in different fonts and has many other capabilities. I had to figure out how I was going to adhere the letters on the pages because some of them are too small and skinny for a tape runner or a glue stick. I found a great product at JoAnn's is is called a Zig two way glue pen by EK Success and it is a fine tip, like a marker, pen for gluing - very cool and works like a dream. Although I haven't had much time to play play play I did get that figured out so I am ready for next time. This machine has so many capabilities for card making and scrapbooking I am really looking forward to what I can do with it.

The guy in the big red suit....

As close as my dear daughter would get to the man in the big red suit.

Candy Canes...

This is the photo I am entering on Polka Dot Creations, red color challenge for this month. I have never entered a contest before. I am still working on how to take photos of my work, I am not sure if the photo does it justice or not. The Polymer Clay Candy Cane Ornaments are made with of all things a cane, the stripes are from a cane I made. My Candy Cane ornaments go well with my gingerbread ornaments, see them at this post: http://abbett2.blogspot.com/2007/12/gingerbread-man.html

Bloopers and Blizzards

This was an ominous sun in the middle of the day, I took it through the window so the screen is showing. They are forecasting a MEGA amount of snow for tomorrow (Sunday). People are going nuts at the grocery stores here today!! I didn't have to go to the grocery store today, however I did have to go to the Post Office (lucky me) and no it wasn't to mail Christmas Cards, it was to mail work stuff. I think I was the ONLY person in line, not mailing something for Christmas. The line was crazy long, but it wasn't too bad about a half hour or so. They are saying BLIZZARD like conditions for tomorrow. I am glad I got my work stuff mailed out so I don't have to travel on Monday.
Did I mention that we celebrated Christmas today with A. and with my family? This is a picture of A's loot. Blooper: A. was opening a gift from Santa which was a book for the LEAP Pad and well, I said "Wow, mommy put a lot of tape on that!" Daddy gave me a look and I realized my blooper, I was laughing, so the book turned out to be from Mommy and Daddy. Ya know Christmas is where you hang your hat. Even though it wasn't technically Christmas Day, with all of our traditions it felt like it. It was nice.
Cool pic, I got my Mom in the mirror and my daughter looking at my Mom's Christmas village. My Mom is showing her which house is which.
Decorating a cookie for herself, that red bottle was GONE after about three cookies. Note: She has her pirate dress on again.

Still to come.....drum roll please......in a future post I will tell you about what I got for Christmas from Dear Hubby. It is a crafters dream.

Gifting

Have you ever watched two, two year olds exchange a present? My DD (dear daughter) and her DF (dear friend) exchanged a gift today. My DD is about 8 months older than her DF and that makes a difference when you are two. My DD hid the present behind her back, which she has picked up somewhere lately that this is what you do when you give a present, you hide it behind your back. Then she attempted to give it to her DF whom didn't grab it to open it. Her DF started walking away from her so, she decides to open it herself! (what a trip!)

Have you ever played hide and seek with a two year old? That is a trip too!

Tomorrow we celebrate Christmas in the morning and afternoon with our family. Our favorite book lately to read to DD is Froggy's Best Christmas Ever. (Click on the title to go see it at Amazon.com)

Let it Go, Let it Go, Let it Go....

Sung to the tune of Let it Snow....
Ladies, this goes out to all of the Moms and women I know whom are trying to get ready for the holidays. As you know this family had a rough November, it was two steps backwards for us with having a sick daughter. So needless to say I had to prioritize, I was behind in my work and that had to be a priority, I wanted to get up at least some of my decorations for Christmas, plus we are going away for Christmas, so getting presents ready, wrapped and shipped, the shipped part and some of the wrapping hasn't happened yet. AND I will probably not be sending out my Christmas Cards this year, which is very unlike me, however a few years back I also didn't send them out and well to be honest with you it is a good way to get crossed off of other people's lists, so next year I won't have to do as many - you should try it sometime :-). I see tons of creative projects online that I would love to try however now, it just is not the right time for me. My advice is to all of the women that are stressed out right now.....just....let it go. Your health and your families health is all that really matters. Be thankful for that. Plus did I mention that my house isn't as clean as it normally is, oh well. If I get my work done I can relax more when the Holidays do arrive, so that has to be a priority for me right now. Happy Prioritizing to you and Let it Go!

Timber...

Luckily our tree didn't do that today. We had a great day! We didn't go to church today. We decorated our tree in the am. We cleaned and did laundry for the week ahead. I recently got a sizeable travel check and John and I have been kicking around ideas of what to do with it. Technically it should have gone on the credit card. Well I suggested to John that we go to Target with it and get everyone a special early christmas gift and some other stuff that we just plain needed, like socks. So we went and Target is a great place! I got my Allison Krauss CD and I already listened to it, it is great, her style is so unique and relaxing. Ashley and I got new socks and Ashley got a new Christmas Dress to wear during our celebrations, it is so cute, I love having a girl when it comes to clothes and dressing them! I wanted to get Ashley a new DVD of the Wiggles but Target didn't have any which surprised me, however they did have a musical CD of Wiggles music so we snacthed that right up for her. She has already listened to it twice!

This year I thought I would help out by putting the lights on the tree, usually John does this for me. I tested all of the strands and each worked, of four total. I put them all on and plugged it in and sure enough one of the middle strands was out!! Don't you just hate it when that happens? Well, John was able to fix it, as he does most things around here. I don't know how many times I've said to A. during the day, Daddy will fix that when he gets home.

Above are pictures of Ashley putting a star on top. It was entirely her idea, we usually put an Angel on top but I liked her I idea and I think it looks nice, so we'll keep it. The other picture is our refurbished frosty, he has been a snowman twice. He is now on stilts. :-)