Christmas Eve Traditions...The Stockings Were Hung...and Happy Birthday, Chelsea Noel!

Good morning, all!  What a beautiful day here in California--it's pretty cool outside, but the sun is shining, and all is sparkly and bright!  Can you believe it's only 2 days until Christmas?!  Pretty amazing, yet here it is!  Hope we're all ready!

Yesterday was my oldest daughter Chelsea's 20th birthday--20!  I can hardly believe it!  Really...she was just a baby yesterday...

We were looking at our family scrapbook yesterday from 1996--my youngest, Annie, was just a few months old, and my family was complete...we were enjoying the photos of Chelsea's 7th birthday, so I thought I'd intersperse a couple of then and now shots...(hope you don't mind the family stuff...there's a card in a minute...stick with me!)

Chelsea getting a little present-opening help from her Auntie Becky, cousin Lyndsie on the right, and our red-headed Sarah...

...and now.  She'll be mad at me for posting this...no make-up!  I think she's just  beautiful though!

And how about the cake?  Then...

...again with some help from cousin Lyndsie and Sarah...love how they're all gazing at the cake in different ways!  My Sarah's little face there makes me realize why I love Cupie dolls so much!  What a Cupie face!

...and last night...happily contemplating 20 blazing candles on her cake!

Here's a little card I made yesterday...Chelsea gave me a few of her birthday minutes so I could selfishly make a card...my fingers were just itching to create something!

I had so much fun with this one!  Love this sweet little image from Crafty Secrets' "Christmas" Images & Journal Notes booklet!  It just reminded me of my three girls...then I thought of making some stockings to hang alongside the image, which I topped with a little Liquid Applique' for some fluff on top--love it!  A little gold Stickles on each one for my girls' initials...

...some lace, ribbon, tiny rick-rack trim...more beautiful paper from Graphic 45's "Christmas Past" collection...

...I made my own saying on the computer with one of my favorite fonts--"Craft Roman"...

...and we can't forget the glitter!  Love that Martha Stewart "White Gold"--just shimmers like crazy!

Been thinking alot about our family's Christmas Eve traditions.  Our dinner tradition is funny...I grew up in a suburb of Cleveland, Ohio.  There was a large Polish influence in the area...probably still is!  One Christmas Eve, we had kielbasi, pierogis and sauerkraut for our dinner...not sure why.  We loved it so much, we had it again the next year, and the rest is history! 

To this day, each and every one of my siblings and myself have this as our Christmas Eve dinner...our spouses have graciously conceded to this tradition--thanks to you all!

The other thing we do each and every Christmas Eve is a little family "program"...something that must be done before children are sent scurrying off to bed before Santa comes.

My dad would always gather us in the living room and he'd choose one of us to read the account of Christ's birth from Luke chapter 2 in the Bible.  We'd always act out the Nativity if we had enough children around, or the little ones would act it out using the homemade Nativity set my Mom had made.  Here's a bit of  1996 to illustrate again...

Next, the silly part!  Sometime...about 30 plus years ago, we were introduced to a poem by Ogden Nash called "The Boy Who Laughed at Santa Claus".  Dad read it one Christmas Eve, and again--it stuck!  We got this most wonderful book one year, and now each one of us has a copy for our own families, pulled out lovingly each and every Christmas Eve...

Trust me, it's hilarious, and your family will love it!  The dad of the family needs to read the poem, but all the dad's do as my dad has always done...the family all knows the poem so well, that he'll leave off the end of every other line or so of the poem, and the family all shouts it out together--so much fun!

Here's my Dad reading "Jabez Dawes", as we've come to call the poem (the name of the boy in the poem)--love you, Dad!

Next comes someone reading Clement Moore's "The Night Before Christmas"--then it's off to bed for the little ones, and off to work for all the Santas!

Isn't it funny about traditions?  Sometimes we can't even remember the moment they start, but something magical happened once, and they become part of the fabric of your family forever...just wonderful!

Thanks for letting me share all of this with you today--hope you're still here!  My, I've been long-winded lately!  Here's hoping you fill every minute of the next two days before Christmas with wonderful family memories, traditions, good food...and maybe some new traditions will pop up unexpectedly, and oh, so magically!

Merry Christmas!

Snowmen on My Mind...

                                                            (Image from Girls at Heart--thanks for sharing!)

Happy Saturday, everyone!  Hope this last Saturday before Christmas finds you all happy, healthy...and not TOO crazy! 

We're having a fairly quiet day here...the girls had some friends over last night...one's still here...just some movies, games, and lots of cookies!  Also made some yummy maple/oat/white chocolate chip pancakes this morning that were pretty tasty!

I haven't posted much this week--sorry!  It's been pretty busy here...I know we're ALL busy right now, so it's okay!  Family comes first, right?!  My daughter came home from college on Wednesday, and we've just been having fun ever since!  Here's a photo I shot of her at Buco de Beppo's where we stopped for a delicious Italian lunch after the airport on Wednesday:

Isn't she beautiful?  I just love this girl of mine!

I have just a couple of things to share with you today--I'm woefully behind on my Splitcoast challenges, but got caught up somehow yesterday!  Here's my first--the challenge was simply to do a tag--don't know why it took me so long!  Darlene was the host of this challenge--thanks, Darlene!  Here's what I came up with:

The image is from Crafty Secrets' "Christmas" Images & Journal Notes booklet--I just LOVE this snowman!  Added some twinkly stars and the "Make a Wish" sentiment from their  "Lucky Wishes" stamp set.  Love those retro stars!

Some red pom-pom trim, Martha Stewart "White Gold" glitter...I used Rangers' Distressed Vintage Photo, Fired Brick and Peeled Paint ink...and that's it!

Next, the challenge this week on the Craft Secrets' Forum at Splitcoast is hosted by Pammyjo--to use mostly white on our cards.  This was a toughie for me--I like lots of color, so I fudged it a bit--sorry, Pammyjo! 

I used PTI White cardstock for my base, and Crafty Secrets printed paper from the "Classics" pack (I think!), which I punched with a Martha Stewart punch along the edge...a paper doily, some white lace, Kraft satin ribbon (SU!)...

...the adorable snowman image is from CS' "Christmas" Creative Scraps, and the chipboard frame is from their "Sweetchips Mini Frames & More" set...some thick, chunky, snowy glitter, diamond glitter and MS "White Gold" glitter, "Antique Linen" distress ink, and some old pearly white buttons, and we're all done!

Oh!  Almost forgot my new toy!  Tim Holz' fabulous clear "Crackle Paint"--what fun to use!  It has a brush built-in to the lid, which makes application SO easy!  I used this on the snowman image...I used my heat gun to speed up the drying & crackling process, so no waiting needed!  Can't wait to get some of the colored "Crackle Paint" and have some more fun!

A big thank-you to Elizabeth of Creative Breathing for the giveaway prize I just received yesterday!  Oh, my!  What a gorgeous creation!  She made this wonderful Christmas Countdown calendar--mostly of felt--embeliished so beautifully, and all done by hand--here are a couple of photos--these were from her blog--my photos didn't turn out quite as well!

Just look at the beautiful detail...!

Thank-you, Elizabeth!  I hung it up in my kitchen so fast!  My girls just love it--me, too!  Please visit Elizabeth and see all the other beautiful things she has to share on her lovely blog!

Just to close out the day, I found a couple of silly little photos from my Christmas past...

...not MY best photo, obviously!  But, I do think it's rather hard to make a busy toddler hold still on Christmas morning, don't you think?!  I love the tree, however...the sweet gifts, but especially my beautiful, young parents--what a perfect image!  I still have that sweater my mom is holding--was made for me by my great-grandmother...

Here's me a couple of years later in line to meet Santa--remember those little mesh stockings with goodies inside?  This was at a church Christmas party, and they'd done a little play with all the children being different toys in Santa's workshop, I believe.  I was a little German doll...love the smirk on the sweet little "Indian" girl next to me!

Well, off to make some new Christmas memories with my family!  We're still busily addressing Christmas cards, making cookies...have a pile of games on the table my girls want to play all together--oh, my!  It IS the most wonderful time of the year!!!

Have a beautiful Christmas weekend with your families--don't miss a moment!

Ever Just Have One of Those Days...?

How is everyone today? Hope the day is going well! It's COLD here in California--central California, anyway! This morning, while taking my daughter to school, the car thermometer showed 31 degrees--WOW! That's really something for here!

It was so frosty, that it actually looked like a light dusting of snow on all the roofs and lawns...never seen such a uniform covering of frost--we just decided to say that it snowed--it looked like it!

So I had to take a photo or two of this very ironic scene...

Big, fat, luscious roses covered with ice! It's hard to see the ice crystals on the roses, but you can see it one the ground around them...

Most of the ground was much whiter than this--these were just some of my fattest roses, so I had to show them off, as I'm sure they're my last this year!

This looks like dew drops, but it was frozen! Hard to capture it just right...oh, well!

So, like the title of today's post says...it was just one of those days today! I've got lots on my plate this week, (don't we all?!) and was trying to juggle that plate with way too many things balanced on top of it--and it all just kind of fell around my feet today! Nothing horrible...just trying to finish decorating the house, getting things ready for a weekend Christmas party, cleaning, and a few projects...these things shouldn't be attempted all at once--don't try it!

I'm actually not complaining--just laughing at myself today! I had to sit down and make something just for fun, and this is what it turned into...

Just about says it all, doesn't it?!

This is from Crafty Secrets' "Domestic Goddess" Creative Scraps...was still sitting on my table from yesterday, so I thought I'd use it again! (Note to self...gotta clean table, too!) Love this chartreuse metallic rick-rack trim...definitely useful for a bright, retro-style card! Love that bright pink gingham ribbon, too!

So, come on over for lunch, okay? I'll clean off my table and get cookin'!

That's all for tonight...just wanted to check in and see if everyone else on the planet was sane today except for me! I'll be back tomorrow...calm, cool and collected with something pretty!

Just to close off, found a couple of my favorite photos of all time this week--these are of my beautiful oldest daughter, Chelsea, far away at college...I felt these truly expressed my feelings about this day...

This was at my husband's sister's wedding...need I say more? It was time for her special picture with the bride and groom, and this is all we could get out of her!

This little baby of mine will be turning 20 years old this month...my, how time flies!

Have a wonderful evening!