Happy New Year

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I know I’m so behind on this post, but I wanted to wish you all a happy new year!  Thanks for reading along as I ramble about the random things in our life.  I didn’t really get on the new year’s resolution train, but the one thing I do want to be sure I do this year is take time off from work.  I’m at the point now that my vacation time is lost because I have so much of it that haven’t used.  So, time to fix that. 

Also, 2011 is going to be a very good year.  We have a lot of exciting things going on.  We will welcome a new baby nephew, attend a couple of family weddings, turn 30 (for me), take some vacations, continue to work on our house, and talk about starting a family.   And, if it were up to me we’d also talk about getting a new pet, but Sean vetoed that idea. 

What are you excited about for 2011?

Christmas Love

Wow, it was a GREAT Christmas!  I got some really nice things, and I feel very lucky.  I also got to spend the holiday with family.  Sean and I went to Dallas to spend the weekend with my family and I gorged myself on more tamales and queso than I want to admit.  It’s our Christmas eve tradition and I look forward to it every year.  I only wish that I brought some of them home with us.  So, curious about what I got?  Well…I got this great necklace from Stone and Honey:

A Snuggie from my brother. 🙂  Which, I could not wait to use as soon as I got back to Austin.  I only wish that my dogs had one too.  And, a visa gift card from my brother.  Always appreciated. 

A  French food book.  Mmmmm

A brand new chair for the living room!

And….well….um…I got a camera too. 🙂  We returned the necklace, and got this instead.

I also got some great stocking stuffers too.  Overall, it was a really great Christmas.  I hope everyone else got what they wanted too.  What was your favorite gift this year?

Gifts for the Office

I always struggle with what to get people at work.  I don’t want to spend a ton of money, but I still want to get them something cute.  And, I like to get everyone the same thing, but since there are guys and girls in my office, sometimes it’s hard to figure out a gift that everyone will like.  

Well, this year I decided to get them some mugs and mint hot chocolate.  But, I tried to get a little creative with the packaging of the hot chocolate.  I started with some clear ornaments that I washed out:

Then, dry thoroughly.  Afterwards, I started to fill them with the hot chocolate powder.  You can make your own flavored hot chocolate.  But I took the easy way out and bought some mint hot chocolate from Target.  Also, I had to improvise because I don’t have a funnel, so I rolled up some paper:

Then, I broke a piece of a mint chocolate candy cane and stuck it inside. 

I also made a cute little tag to tie on the gifts:

And, for easy transport, I stuck them inside the mug:

Ta da!  What do you get for the people at your work?

Ornaments

As the packages of things I’ve ordered online start to stream in, I’m reminded that Christmas is just around the corner.  However, unlike last year, this year we have a tree and other decorations that also keep me in the holiday spirit.  We avoided the stores the weekend after Thanksgiving, but the one store we did go into was Target because we knew that we needed a tree.  Since it’s our first year having a tree, we had to start from scratch except for a few ornaments Sean’s mom gave us over the years, and some ornaments I received from co-workers.  This meant that we could pick any color scheme we wanted.   We decided on red and gold because it’s timeless and I figured I wouldn’t get tired of it in a few years and want to start all over. 

We bought several different varieties of red and gold and hurried home to set up our tree.  We went the cheater way with the lights already on the tree, and it made things so easy.  But, I do really miss the pine smell of real trees.  Anyway, we got to work and ended up with this:

So not the best picture, but I swear it’s cute!  And, we still need a tree skirt, but for our first tree, I think it looks pretty good.  Here’s a close up of some of my favorite ornaments:

Remember those guys from Thanksgiving?

And, an ornament to represent my bee moniker, Mrs. Fro Yo:

And, my all time favorite, one that I MADE!  It was my first experience with sewing and ornament making, and I think it turned out pretty cute.  Now I want to make tons more!

Here’s how he looked after I cut him out and before I started sewing:

And then finished:

Granted he looks a little dog-like, but I still think he’s a really cute elephant. 🙂 

If you want to make your very own ornament from these templates, download them from Fellow Creatives:

Aren’t they so cute?  I never could have made mine without the template!

A Not So Christmas Wreath

So, I knew that I wanted a wreath, but I wanted something a little less traditional.  Well, Morgana of Fellow Creatives posted this wreath from Pickles and I was sold. 

The felt was an unlikely choice, but the colors were beautiful.  I knew I had to make one of my very own.  I rushed over to the tutorial, but it involved sewing, and that wasn’t going to happen for me, so I chose my own route. 

Here’s what I used:

• Poms in all different colors
• A styrofoam circle
• glue gun

I started in the center and just slowly worked my way around gluing, sticking and then moving on.  I tried to vary the sizes and colors as I went along.

I know it doesn’t look like much yet, but it gets better…

Molly was curious about what I was doing, so I let her try it on:

Then, I was all done, but I thought it needed something else…

So I added a ribbon and hung it on our door:

Ta da!  For about $6 I had my very own wreath.