favorite 10 posts of 2010

1. Happy New Year
2.  Our new place of residence
3. gold
4. rainbow
5. finished mini quilt
6. chair
7. my first 12of 12
8. finished pillow
9. Bahamas
10. One Happy Girl

Wordless Wednesday

Christmas presents

for Christmas I made some camera strap covers for a few people as well as a cute little pouch for 2 of my sister-in-laws.  I made a little notebook too but I have no pictures.  Tutorial to come!  (one of these days)

Merry Christmas

I know I posted this back in December of 2008- (wow! I didn't realize I have been blogging that long) but I really needed to post it again because it describes the birth of our Savior so beautifully.


"There was one word that describes the night He came - ordinary. The sky was ordinary. An occasional gust stirred the leaves and chilled the air. The stars were diamonds sparkling on black velvet. Fleets of clouds floated in front of the moon.
"It was a beautiful night- a night worth peeking out your bedroom window to admire- but not really an unusual one. No reason to expect a surprise. Nothing to keep a person awake. An ordinary night with an ordinary sky.
"The sheep were ordinary. Some fat. Some scrawny. Some with barrel bellies. Some with twig legs. Common animals. No fleece made of gold. No history makers. No blue-ribbon winners. They were simply sheep-lumpy, sleeping silhouettes on a hillside.
"And the shepherds. Peasants they were. Probably wearing all the clothes they owned. Smelling like sheep and looking just as woolly. They were conscientious, willing to spend the night with the flocks. But you won't find their staffs in a museum nor their writings in a library. No one asked their opinion on social justice or the application of the Torah. They were nameless and simple.
"An ordinary night with ordinary sheep and ordinary shepherds. And were it not for a God who loves to hook an "extra" on the front of the ordinary, the night would have gone unnoticed. The sheep would have been forgotten, and the shepherds would have slept the night away.
But God dances among the common. And that night he did a waltz.
The night was ordinary no more. "
-Max Lucado


Merry Christmas!! May God always dance among us. 

25 days of Christmas

I just discovered this now.  Its 25 days of free Christmas songs from Amazon. Go ahead and download them if not for this year for next.  Merry Christmas!

Wordless Wednesday (a day late)

an eventful Sunday

We had an eventful day on Sunday.  After church, we had some relaxing time and then prepared for some friends who were coming over for dinner. Of course, I forgot to take pictures with James and Sarah as usual, but we had a fun time.
We decided to try to make this for Sarah.  It turned out great, except for when I decided to place my finger too close to the needle.  It broke and the tip went straight through. Pretty fun.

Then,   we discovered that the roof in our garage was leaking. And ruining all of our storage items there. Great. We spent until midnight trying to clean it up and somehow patch it until our landlord fixes it.

Jake was outside on a ladder in the freezing cold rain storm and then the hail.  It was definitely an adventure.

We are now very grateful for renters insurance and hoping that it is fixed soon.

Sugarplums

I was desperate for an idea of a cute easy treat for my party last week and saw this.  I really wanted to make something like this but had no time.  What can be easier then dipping a marshmallow in chocolate?  this treat turned out really cute. Similar to cake pops, they are more about their cuteness factor then the yumminess factor.  But I really liked how they turned out. Since I decided to make them at 11:30 pm while I was Wal-Mart, I went with green candy melts since they didn't have blue.

Wal 

Need a quick treat? Try them out.  And may visions of sugarplums dance in your head.

success!!

I had the 12 days of Christmas party this week and it turned out really fun.  Every one that came told me "I'm really glad you did this".  And I am too.  I'm glad I got over my insecurities and fears and invited them over. Many of the ladies that came I have never had over and it was fun to chat with them and learn more about them. It was also fun to see everyone's creativity.  And of course, I intended to take pictures, but didn't remember until afterward.

Jake enjoyed the leftovers. 

Christmas music- some of my favorites

My favorite Christmas songs tend to be a little different than others, so I figured I would post some of them.   Not all the youtube videos are great, but you can get a feel for the music








Hannah already posted the new Coldplay song- it is wonderful.






Jake especially likes the Mercy Me Christmas album:


I grew up with the Oak Ridge Boys Christmas album so I love it!

What Christmas music do you love?

December 12of12

I missed the reminder on Sunday since my phone was on silent, which means I didn't do my 12of12. bummer. But, after church I spent most of the day with my sewing machine and ended up taking a few pictures anyway. They all look like the picture below :).  I am giving several handmade gifts this year and am excited but also nervous of how they will be accepted by a few.

I am actually very proud of myself for making one of the little gifts.  It was an idea that I saw on etsy and I experimented with trying to make it work. For me, that is big because I usually just follow a tutorial that is already out there. I will be posting the steps on here soon so you can see my finished product. Remember- I'm still a beginner though!!

wordless wednesday

Look to the Light

Let us all look to the light this Christmas.  I love how the model in the video talks about what how coming to Christ is a change of lifestyle also. So many people think that members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints because they keep the Sabbath day holy or because they don't drink, dress modestly, etc.  But really, coming to Christ is a change of life.  For all of us, since we can all improve and come to Him every day.

a vacation from my problems

Ok, not really. I just had to use the title- can anyone guess what movie it is from? It's a classic.

Need a hint?  It's the same movie that has this quote:
"There are two types of people in this world:Those who like Neil Diamond, and those who don't. My ex-wife loves him. "


I don't really have a ton of problems like Bob Wiley, but I was thinking of how I want a vacation where I don't go anywhere. I want a vacation with work off where I can sew all day and then work on everything else I have on my to do list. 


I am so excited to have a week off of work over Christmas and be with family, but all of my projects will stay here in Utah and they aren't really the type to take with me, which made me wish for a vacation like this.  I know it's not realistic. Perhaps it's just a matter of organizing my time better. How do you do it?

over scheduling and festival of trees

Last Friday we drove down to go to Savior of the World with Jake's family. Since we try to limit the number of times we go down (during November and December it feels like every week) to save on gas money, time and feel like we actually have a home in Logan, we often try to squeeze everything in when we go.
This time was no exception. I had heard about the Festival of Trees but never gone, so we decided to stop by.  Then, I planned enough time to be able to stop and exchange something at LOFT before heading to the conference center.  After realizing that we were supposed to have dressed up, we ran around trying to take care of that.  I got a cute new outfit out of it, but the stress wasn't worth it. I think we decided that we will now be leaving a nice outfit at Jake's parents since it is the 3rd or 4th time we have done that.

But, the festival of trees was fun. We didn't see it all, but I had really wanted to see the tree that my Aunt worked on for a friend in their church congregation who is going through cancer.  My Aunt has had cancer recently as well, so it was very kind of her to work on it.

If Jake and I had $500 to spend on a Christmas tree every year, it would be so fun to buy one from Festival of Trees since the money all goes to Primary Children's and your tree comes already decorated.  It's fun to see the variety. Some of them were super gaudy, many had a theme, but they were fun to look at.

the snowman tree my Aunt helped with


and some more trees

a sewing theme!

groovy!

Don't worry, i will spare you the pictures I took of all the quilts there.  But, because I "bleed blue", I had to take a few of these:

My new goal for drives down to civilization(j/k) is to not over schedule.  We'll see how it goes. Hopefully it will reduce our stress levels.

one happy girl.

Tonight I am one happy camper.


Do you know why?

Jake bought me a new sewing machine for Christmas!!!
Since we are going to Colorado for Christmas and there's no way we are going to take it over wrapped on the plane and then back to Utah, I got it today and I get to use it early. I can't even contain my excitement!!!

I absolutely love my old machine.  My wonderful parents bought it for me at a garage sale a few years ago and it works great.  From what I have found, it is from the 60's and is still going strong. The best part about it is that I still have the instruction book and everything that came with it.  It even starts out with "Dear Homemaker"

I'll most likely still be hanging onto this one since it is so awesome, but I am so excited to have a newer one to learn on.  And it is fancy.  It is a Bernina 350 Patchwork Edition and isn't even a sewing machine at all. In fact, in the manual, it calls it a "Sewing computer".  And it is.  Jake was even excited to try it out and see its features- what can I say he is a computer guy.  It has 85 different stitches and a basic alphabet. Pretty cool.

I don't really deserve it because I'm just a beginner, but then I don't really deserve the amazing husband that I have either.   Off to play on my new "computer".   I have many Christmas gifts planned if I can just get them done on time...

wordless wednesday

plans for next year

What goals will you be setting for yourself next year?  I have a lot of goals, but I am going to sit down, go through them and organize them and make sure they are realistic so that I actually get them accomplished. I want my next year goals to be like the Happiness Project. And I'm going to start by having one word that will set the tone for next year.  I have many in my head and am not sure what it will be, but I think it will help me focus on my goals.  There are a few here for inspiration.

What about you? What are your plans?

Savior of the World

On Friday night, we drove down to Salt Lake City to see Savior of the World with Jake's family.  It is a wonderful performance that touches my heart every time I see it. I am so glad Karma planned ahead and got the tickets- because I totally didn't even think of it this year!!

I love the song that Zacharias sings in the performance.  Elisabeth asks him if he has given up hope. He responds: "Hope, no, but my demands yes." And then he goes on to sing "I'll give God forever..." What faith, to give God forever and to always hope that He will answer our prayers even though they may not be according to our demands.

It also struck me once again what an amazing woman Mary was.  She had such faith in the angel's words.  I doubt she fully understood how everything would work or the gravity of it all, but she trusted in the Lord and replied "Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to they word." (Luke 1:38).

I want to have more faith, to trust in my Lord as Zacharias and Mary did.  I am going to move forward, trusting in God's timing and never giving up hope that he will answer my prayers.

A Christmas of Thanksgiving

I want this year to be a Christmas of Thanksgiving for my family. Care to join us?

gift exchange

I mailed my gift for the exchange last week.   I received my gift this week and was so excited to open it!!
She was very thoughtful and knew I have a party coming up so made a gift with that in mind.  (Thanks Katie!)

she sent me some fun holiday coasters, a great recipe and a festive apron!

I sent her a camera strap cover:

and a little pouch that was a complete experiment.  I didn't take a picture of it, but Katie has one here. I'm glad I did the exchange, it was fun to [meet] someone new and push myself into making something new too.

tree

Wednesday night we went to get our Christmas tree. Since I grew up cutting our tree in the mountains every year, I am still not used to driving to a store to get it. But, I checked out the forest service website and there are no places to go close by so we didn't have many choices.

Pictures in our life are pretty boring at this point- its hard to get a picture of the two of us and Jake hates asking someone to take it for us.  (I guess we need to add a third person or something.) But for the mean time, enjoy the pictures that I post constantly without people.

The finished tree.  We decided to switch off lights on the tree. Last year it was white, so this year it is colored.  All the decorations are up too. Its beginning to look a lot like Christmas! 

stranger

Yesterday I went on a short walk to take some pictures to help Jake with one his classes. As I was walking down the sidewalk with my camera around my neck, I passed a small business with a kid outside shoveling. He stopped and started talking to me and showed me the cool fort he had made- "I spent the last 2 days making it!" and promptly asked me- actually, it was more of a command- to take a picture of it.
As I was standing there taking a picture of this stranger in his snow fort I kept thinking "I hope his mom doesn't come out here"  I'm sure I looked like a creeper taking a picture of a random little kid that I do not know, but I promise I did it on his request.

maybe one day he will find his picture on my blog. or maybe not. 

back to reality part 2

Thanksgiving night we went and saw a movie. Unstoppable is very good - I would recommend it if you like action movies. 

Then, we were sitting around deciding if black friday shopping was worth it or not and Jake somehow started looking at flights to Colorado for the weekend.  So... in a huge moment of spontaneity we went. We decided to surprise Mom and Dad.  It was 11:30 when we bought the flights. We needed to be at the airport at 4:30 the next day. We drove into Colorado, got to the house at about 8:30 and Mom and Dad weren't there.

So we started texting to see if we could figure out where they were. And we did. We found them right as they were leaving Wal-mart. I ran up to my mom and wish I had my camera. It was wonderful. 

We spent the rest of the weekend hanging out with them.  

We did some shopping

cut the Christmas tree

put up Christmas decorations

and laughed so hard on a night out with my sister and her husband.  

What a great weekend.  We came back to reality and have so much to do. 

The weather in Colorado was so nice. It was sunny and warm and there was no snow!! It was hard to come back to the freezing cold. 

The funny part is that we go back to Colorado in 3 weeks. Oh well, it was totally worth it.

 my beautiful mother

No, this is not the Christmas tree. This is the small tree they put in the basement for the grandkids. 

 the strong men

the strong men with the stronger  wimpy girl.

It was a FABULOUS weekend. 

back to reality

I've been gone since Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful, spontaneous, whirlwind weekend, but we are now back to reality.

Thanksgiving was great. We drove up to Midway to have dinner with the Perschon side of the family.

We had yummy food, pie, and some cute turkeys

I was grateful that my only contribution was the cranberry sauce.  Otherwise it may not have turned out as good :) 

We saw some beautiful scenes on the way down to Riverton after dinner. 

We stopped by my sister's to wish them a happy Thanksgiving and then headed on to Riverton to hang out with Jake's family. 

I hope you had a wonderful day too.