December Daily Days 18-21

Happy Wednesday and Happy New Year's Eve!!! I can't believe it's the last day of 2014!!! I feel like we just did this!! The years are going faster and faster as I get older!! Time needs to slow down a little!! I wanted to hop on early and share 4 more days from my December Daily chunky mini book!! Today I'm sharing days 18-21.

Day 18: I must have been living under a rock because I had seen a lot of cards, notebooks, and other stationary items from Rifle Paper Co all over my instagram feed and found out that they're flagship store and production space is local!!! We took our dog Daisy to get groomed near the shop so we stopped by for the first time ever on our way to pick her up. I took a quick picture, which I attached to the back of our holiday card (used some strong adhesive) and snagged a business card...both while I was being checked out! Used a to/from tag from the Studio Calico 25 days class printables to type up the story! I just made it relevant to the page by covering up the to/from part of the tag!!

Day 19: One of the gifts my husband got for his birthday was How To Train Your Dragon 2. To say he LOVES those movies would be an understatement. He couldn't wait to watch it so we broke it out!! Took a selfie of me and our new cat laying on him at the end of the movie. Love this page and the memories it holds!!

Day 20: We don't have any human kids but we do have 4 furbabies. One of my favorite photos from a few years back is one of our little family the December before we lost our first dog, Apollo that following June. I am so thankful to have taken that photo!! This year, I knew with 3 cats it would be impossible to have everyone in one picture, so I suggested a selfie with each of our "kids" to my hubby and he was completely onboard with the idea!! I made sure to add the ages of each baby so as we look back we can get a sense of time. I'm already excited about doing this again in 2015 because I can't wait to see how much our newest addition has grown, considering he's only 2 months old!!

Here's how days 19 and 20 look in the album.

Day 21: Crazy Christmas Cookie Baking day!!! I hate to cook but I LOVE to bake!! This year m hubby was able to help and I loved that we were able to do this together this year!! I took a photo of the tray of cookies we kept home. The rest went to work with me the next day!! We usually keep a small sample of each cookie to enjoy!!   We made a lot of cookies and fudge...it took pretty much all day...but I LOVED every minute of it and will do it again next year in a heart beat!! The opposite side of the page is another 3x4 card from the Studio Calico 25 days class kit. I just altered a page protector so the card wouldn't slip slide around!! I ended up adding a circle label to the outside of the page, which you'll see on Friday when I share the last 4 days of this chunky little mini book!!

I'll be back later to share our New Year's Eve selfie for wordless Wednesday!! Do you have big plans for tonight?? I have to work today but I'm off in plenty of time to go out and celebrate a little! Hope you get to as well!! Until next time...thanks for stopping by!!
deb

December Daily Days 14-17

Hello and happy Tuesday!! I can't believe that 2014 is almost done and in the books. I'm looking forward to all that 2015 might bring...the hope and promise of the new year is always exciting to me!! I'm not sure that I'll get my December Daily completely shared before the calendar turns over, but my plan is to get it all completed and shared before the week is over!! I love the project every year but I'm usually really ready to be done with it be the end of the month/year.

Today, I'm bringing you 4 more days in my little mini album. I swear, I am over the moon in love with the size of the album I'm using this year. It's quite a chunky little book already and I've still got 4 days left to complete!! But onto the project for today...

Day 14: Finally getting around to getting a photo of our big fake tree and mantle!! This year my hubby wanted to just use the white and blue lights on our tree. I would have preferred many more lights and mixing in the multi-colored lights, but we did that this year, so we went with what he wanted!! Kept it simple. I'm sensing  theme about our Christmas this year!! I also finally used that wood chip I had been hoarding from one of my Studio Calico kits!! I pulled the twine out of the top of the page protector and stitched around the entire page protector to keep the chip stable.

Day 15: Used the back side of the wood chip for the date again. Put that together before putting it into the page protector and stitching it in place!! This day is all about a tradition that is unique to my hubby and I, not a tradition we brought into our little family from the traditions we each had growing up. Every year, the local fire department comes around the neighborhood with the lights and some sirens blaring, with Santa on a trailer being towed by the last fire pick up truck!! I LOVE this every year and get so excited about it!! There was one year that I had to work late when they came around and my hubby recorded it on his cell phone for me!! That's how much I love this little tradition. But thanks to Timehop...we think we've got it narrowed down to when they will be around next year, so I know to make sure I don't have to work late!!

The photos aren't stellar or award winning, but they are a perfect representation of the tradition!! Just a simple gold label with typed writing on the grid photo. Super simple!!

Here's how days 16 and 17 look in my book.

Day 16: We might put up our big fake tree every year but we get a real wreath for our tree. I love smelling it every time we go in and out the front door!! But since we live in FL...flip flops can be worn when going to pick out said wreath...in December!!!

Day 17: Included our holiday card for this year, but since it was an 8x4 card, I had to get a little creative to include it. I folded the card and created a spot for the writing...which was about how much I loved our card photo this year!! And yes, I did get them out pretty late, but they arrived just before Christmas!!!

I included a tab on the end to encourage flipping it open to see the actual card itself. I punched holes right in the card using a page protector as a template. Love that I included the card again this year. I did it last year too!! Will be fun to look back on these in the coming years and see how we've changed!!

I'm getting to the point where the pages don't lie flat or open enough to photograph the days inside the album!!! Did I mention how much I love that it's getting filled and chunky!! So many memories in this little book!! Happy, merry memories!!! I'll be back tomorrow with 4 more days to share!! Until then...thanks for stopping by!!!
deb

st. paddy's day

St. Patrick's Day is by far my favorite holiday partly because it's NOT over commercialized and partly because of the beer!! I'm a Guinness drinker at heart so I'm all over this Irish holiday. It helps that I'm part Irish too!!

We've learned over the last several years to celebrate with a meal at the Irish pub either the day before or the day after the actual DAY because Irish pubs are just TOO crazy for our taste on the actual holiday!! The last few years, we've stayed pretty close to home and celebrated at a pub called Hagan O'Reilly's. This year we decided to change things up and hit up Raglan Road at Downtown Disney. Our reservation was at noon and there was live music and dancing almost all day!! Was the perfect way to celebrate!!!

 

 

Of course we finished the day off with Shamrock Shakes and a goofy "kiss me I'm Irish" selfie!! So love this holiday and I'm already looking forward to celebrating next year!!

Hope you have a Happy St. Patrick's Day!!!
Thanks for stopping by!
deb

Happy New Year

Hello 2014!!

Here's to a healthy, happy, and prosperous new year! Thanks for stopping by!
deb

Family

As I mentioned in my last post, this year was the year of family!! Both of our families were completely, 100% together, on one of the BIG holidays this year...and we managed to get pictures of them both to record for all time! His family was together on Christmas. My family was together on Thanksgiving!! That one is also knows as the BEST SURPRISE EVER!!!

It all started back in 2012 when last minute (talking late October here) I sent me sister an email to find out if that was the year her family would spend Thanksgiving with our parents. If so, I would get plane tickets and fly up to surprise them. It was, however, the year they would spend with her in-laws. So no surprise in 2012. I put it on the back burner as an idea for 2013. Then flash forward to March (2013) when my sister sent me an email about whether or not Mike and I would make a trip north to see them, and if so did we have an idea of when (she was trying to plan summer camps for the kids). My reply on March 4th started the PLAN SURPRISE 2013. In this message I told her that we wanted to fly up the weekend before Thanksgiving, spend a few days with them, then ride with them to my parent's house the day before Thanksgiving to all spend the holiday together. Because of my work schedule, we would have to fly home on Thanksgiving day, but because my parent's were already planning week vacation here, the short amount of time we spent there would be ok. We also knew that my niece would have school early that week and my sister would likely be working, so instead of asking anyone to take time off, we planned a day trip via train into NYC (blog post coming soon on this)!! My sister thought this was a great idea and so the plan was hatched.

Plans didn't start to get finalized until the summer when I was officially able to take vacation and get our plane tickets. But they did get put together and we did get to have our whole family together for Thanksgiving!! Such fun to have pulled this off!!
 

It's upstate NY...so there was a good chance we would get to see snow!! I watched the weather all week before we left and kept my fingers crossed!! Haven't seen snow in a number of years!! As luck would have it...it snowed!! Was snowing so much that my parent's told my sister that if it got really bad out they didn't have to come! She knew that wasn't an option, but humored my parents anyway about it! We got to play in the snow on Thanksgiving day while the feast cooked! Snowballs were thrown and angels were made!! Loved it!!

 
I got video of each of my parents seeing us and those were awesome moments!

Dad was up first as he came outside to help bring in stuff...

Mom was up next once we got inside the house...

I love how she didn't even really notice us when she walked in the room!! This is certainly a memory I am glad to have captured!! Thanks to my friends for suggesting I get their reactions on film!!

The new year is almost upon us and I have been doing some reflection about the year we are about to close the door on. It's been a great year and I'll be back tomorrow to share some of my reflections and those moments I'll carry with me into 2014! I'm trying to get a running start with being a better blogger in 2014!! Until then, thanks for stopping by!
deb

Christmas 2013

This Christmas has been so different from the last several years!!! I work in retail and between Thanksgiving and New Year, I have been married to my job. I've always tried to enjoy the holidays as much as possible, but working 6 days a week made it very difficult! This year was different. My company changed it's direction on how it would work its employees during the holidays and I really feel like I was able to reclaim much of the holiday spirit I had lost over the last several years. There is a reason Christmas moved to my second favorite holiday and St. Patrick's Day moved to the top many years ago!! This year may have changed that...but the jury is still out because I don't know if the changes made this year will be perminent and in effect next year!! Fingers crossed!!

Christmas this year for us was pretty low key. My hubby and I don't have any kids, just fur babies. We slept in a bit until he got out of bed around 7:30a (yes, that's sleeping in for us now). When I didn't get up right away, he came running in and jumped on the bed like a little kid would do, begging me to get up so he could open a gift neither of us could figure out! By 8:30a our gifts were unwrapped and our traditional cinnamon bun breakfast was in the oven. We ate breakfast while watching Mickey's Christmas Carol (a favorite of mine as a child) followed by the Disney Parks Parade. Right after the parade we headed over to his parents house, which is a short drive away. His entire family was there including all of out nieces and nephews...13 people to be exact.

While at his parents house, he wanted to try to get a photo of his entire family. We had gotten one of mine when we surprised my parents for Thanksgiving (I'll share that story another day) so it was great to be able to capture his family at Christmas. IHis grandfather used to take a family photo every Christmas and we hadn't gotten one in a LONG time since he passed several years ago. I took my Canon and tripod over to their house to be able to get everyone in the photo.

Of course, we couldn't just do a good, everyone smiling, photo...we also had to do a funny face photo!!  Love both and it was great to get the memory captured this year...especially since it's our youngest niece's first Christmas. Honestly, it was great to get both of our full families captured this year...mine on Thanksgiving and his on Christmas!

I hope you had a very Merry Christmas and are looking forward to ringing in the New Year! Thanks for stopping by!
deb