Long-Lost Family

My dad had told me over and over again that the next time we are in Iowa, we should stop to see his cousin Dick.  He said that Dick would love to see us and treat us like royalty.

Even though I had every intention of stopping in some day, my dad's passing made it seem like visiting his cousin was urgent. We drove to Iowa on Thursday and met Dick and his wife, Joan, for lunch on Friday.  They picked the fanciest restaurant in Ames and ordered like rock stars, telling the server that they knew the chef would meet their special requests: a spinach salad that wasn't on the menu, a half glass of wine, and a caramel macchiato that the chef had to Google to learn how to make.

They brought pictures to show us, including a Christmas card from 1987 in which I am making a terrible face at the camera, and pictures of my Grandma and Grandpa on trips to Iowa. I didn't hear too many stories about my dad, but it was fun to learn about his family.

I'm glad that we remembered to bring our camera!

Christmas Canvas

When I moved to Colorado, my (second) cousin Julia gave me a picture of the house that my grandpa and her grandma grew up in together. It's a shabby little house in Mississippi and the picture always generates questions from visitors, but I love it because it's where this man that meant (means) so much to me became a strong, God-fearing person.

That's why Nathan's Christmas gift was the sweetest, most thoughtful gift ever. He got the picture scanned in from my mom, and had it blown up on canvas.  We put it on the barn board in our bedroom. 

After we had hung it up and were admiring it, we both thought of the same saying: "You can't know where you're going until you know where you've come from."

Christmas Crafting

We got all decorated for Christmas a few weeks ago, and I realized that no one would see our festive house. I decided to invite my craftiest friends over for a Christmas craft party. Everyone brought enough supplies for the whole group and we painted, glued, and created for hours.


I love making centerpieces for our usually cluttered table. This one has lots of vases- my painted snowflake votives and other clear vases- that I filled with candles and epsom salt.

 I had to pretty-up these plastic wine glasses. Wine glass charms would have worked if I had had any, but different colors of ribbon were festive and helped everyone keep track of her glass.

 

I've always wanted to paint one of these glass blocks- the stick-on stencils were perfect!  

 

Glass ornaments with acrylic paint dripped inside makes for a cool affect. Mine is still drying and looks different every time I check on it!

I love these cute little bookmarks!  Popsicle stick, fancy ribbon, and 3D stickers to make these cute little bookmarks- so much better than the receipts I usually use.  I'm thinking this would be good for my class next year! 

We also made yo-yos with lots of fabric, gift tags out of paper bags and metallic paper, and snowflake vases. Now I have lots of projects to do over my break!

Blossoms of Light

Nate asked me if I wanted to be adventurous on Friday night, and my answer was unequivocally "no". When he told me this adventure involved walking around the Denver Botanic Gardens and looking at Christmas lights, I quickly changed my mind. I am pretty fortunate that this is his idea of an adventure.


We went to the Blossoms of Light  and bought the 3-D glasses that make every lightbulb look like a snowflake (I wore them all the way home- stop lights and tail lights were automatically festive).  Maybe it wasn't completely worth the $20 we spent, but it was fun to see the gardens at night and it was nice to do something Christmasy.

 

This picture was a long time in the making- when we were posing, a tiny toddler ran in front of us. Then he grabbed my hand. I thought it was because of the teacher-vibe I cast, but it turns out I was dressed exactly like his mom.  When he figured out I wasn't family, he screamed and ran away. At least we didn't have to Photoshop him out of the picture.

Being Resourceful- Snowflake Votives

I had about 15 vases leftover from our wedding that no one wanted to buy on Craigslist.  They're from the Dollar Store, so I can't blame them. I was sure that if I held onto them long enough, I'd come up with a use for them. I did.

Tomorrow, I'm turning those cheap little vases into snowflake votives with a few friends.  I practiced today on an old jar and this is what I came up with:

 I got foam snowflakes, metallic spray paint, self-adhesive beads, and a glittery sealant at Michael's. First, I stuck the snowflakes on the jar (that was cute in itself!) and did a light coat of the paint.  After it was dry, I did a layer of the sealant. When I was sure the paint was solid, I peeled the snowflakes off. I left one on for some texture but I haven't decided how I feel about that yet.  I added the beads as an afterthought but I like the way it turned out.

My first attempt was a fail- way too much spray paint and it ended up on the front walk (not sure how Nate is going to handle that when he gets home!) But going easy on the paint was the trick.


And my inspiration...the Yankee Candle votive that one of my sweet little students gave me yesterday.

Christmas Shopping Locally

We went Christmas shopping today, and even though I had adds and coupons for Bed, Bath, and Beyond, Target, and Bath and Body Works, we skipped the mall entirely. We decided,  thanks to Fancy Tiger, that we are going to buy from locally owned stores this Christmas.

Nate decide we should go to Fancy Tiger while we were out and about on Broadway. We walked in and they offered us PBR right away- a beer that Nate usually wouldn't drink but easily accepted since it was free. I got sidetracked from Christmas shopping and convinced Nate to try on a pea-coat style sweater- I think I can thank the PBR for that on!

We were so inspired by the things that we saw there that we went down the street to another locally-owned store, Decade. It doesn't have all the clothes that Fancy Tiger has, but there's a million little gifts that we sifted through for at least a half an hour.

We've heard that buying locally is supposed to pull America out of it's economical sink-hole, but if it doesn't, at least our family will have some clever little gifts from our attempts.