Tag Archives: christmas

Marching On

What’s that? I can’t hear you. La la la la la. It is definitely not March already. No way no how.

So then, do you think it’s too late to do a Christmas recap? Well too bad. I never did quite get around to showing off our crafting efforts for Christmas 2008, which is very sad, considering the effort that we (and particularly Dermot, since I was all broken-wristed and what have you) went to. Christmas, it goes without saying, came hand-in-hand with a little bit of family drama. Gift-making and giving became the subject of argument, so I was left feeling a bit flat about the effort we had gone to. Que sera sera. I’m over it now. Much of the enjoyment is in the making anyway, I find. And I did offer to keep the gifts we had made for the prime grumbler, but that offer was (strangely) refused!

Xmas08-crafting

Our ‘theme’, if you like, for Xmas 2008 was ‘Paper’. We put together a bunch of photo albums – these are Japanese stab bound, just like the album I made for Nichola.

Xmas08-albums

These are A5 sized…

Xmas08-albums2

With black album pages…

Xmas08-album-inside

And glassine interleaves…

Xmas08-album-inside-2

We also put together some smaller notebooks, more conventionally hard-bound…

Xmas08-notebooks

Pretty pretty on the inside…

Xmas08-notebook-inside

And some more…

Xmas08-notebooks2

And I found that Gocco-ing is not so difficult with only one hand…

Xmas08-cards2

So I printed up a bunch of these notecards (graphics are from, um… Clipart.com, I think)…

Xmas08-cards

And my favouritist thing of all, some lovely bookplates (some were blank like these, others had names already printed on)…

Xmas08-bookplates

Finally, we printed up these Mibo calendars (freebie found via Steph) and had them bound at Officeworks. I love the graphics on these, not sure why we didn’t do ourselves one…

Xmas08-calendars

Whew! When all of that was done (in the two short weeks before Christmas, mostly), some of us were plum tuckered out…

Xmas08-Crafting-tuckered-out

(Not that she had much to do with the crafting, mind you. Perhaps she just grew tired of waiting for Mum and Dad to pay her some attention!)

When all of this was in the planning stages, and there were two wholly-limbed adults going to be taking part, it all sounded good. When a good slab of the cutting and binding came down to Dermot after the chair incident however, I don’t think he was so impressed. I heard a lot of ‘I told you that you should get started earlier’, I can tell you 🙂 . I’ve promised that 2009 will be my year to do all the work… so I’d better get started, hey?

Pre-Christmas Crafting

I didn’t pledge handmade this (past) Christmas, but as it turned out, many of our gifts were handmade anyway. First there were these, next up were a couple of bags for some more small friends of ours. This one:
Library bag for Mr G

using that ubiquitous mushroom fabric, was for a five year old boy, and was given as a Library bag, complete with new book inside. The other:

Bag and Bunny for Miss A

I made for his sister, who is three months younger than Niamh. The bunny pattern came from here; the bags I made up as I went along. I was quite pleased with these, and I think the recipients were happy too 🙂

Next came a wild burst of kitchen activity (mostly by Dermot, I do admit), and some playing with my new toy for labelling and packaging, to create the fabulous boxes of goodies for our families:

Christmas Goodies

All boxed up

Gocco Printed Xmas Cards

(Inside: Orange cordial, Spiced nuts, Mexican drinking chocolate, Dried Mango, Cranberry & Pistachio biscotti, Orange spiced tea blend – all handmade; and a teatowel – which we did not make ourselves!)

Finally, at the eleventh hour (the night before Christmas Eve), I managed to squeeze in some homemade goodness for my own kiddos. I finished up the stitching of ElfGirl and ElfBoy, and made them up into a couple of simple drawstring bags. In hopes of starting off a new Christmas tradition (which I kept hearing about on various blogs), these held brand new PJs for Christmas Eve. Here they are under the tree:

Xmas PJ Bags

Oh, and lest I forget, somewhere in there, I also managed to whip up Finn’s party cake:
Bowling Party cake

I made up a packet teacake for this, as everyone knows kids only eat the (hideously sugary buttercream) icing and leave the rest. For his actual birthday, I made a more grown up cake – a rich, moist, dark chocolate cake covered in ganache and silver cachous… but forgot to take a photo, d’oh!

Next up, post-Christmas crafting 🙂

Too Late?

Is it too late yet to say Happy New Year? And, uh, Merry Christmas, as well? (I don’t do ‘Happy Holidays’ – despite my pagan leanings, I’m pretty firmly in the ‘Merry Christmas’ camp!)

I kept meaning to blog, truly I did. I missed so many important moments. Here’s the ten-second run down of that-which-was-never-blogged:

  • Finn’s birthday party (Ten pin bowling, wheeee! The birthday boy bowled 96 to take the game – never mind the assistance of bumpers and a ramp!)
  • A little bit of frantic pre-Christmas crafting (Bags, bags, bags… I do promise photos, once I liberate them from the various cameras about the house)
  • Niamh deciding a week before Christmas was a good time to start climbing out of her cot, thus introducing us to a whole new set of bedtime challenges
  • Christmas itself (Cue yet another emotional meltdown from moi – 3-days of family festivities (his family/ my family/ my other family) is just a wee bit more than I can take, apparently)
    Finn turning 5
  • Finn’s NYE birthday (My boy is five! Last year Scienceworks, this year the Museum. Lots of fun, but I wish we hadn’t been so rushed)
  • NYE party and overnight stay out of town (Thank goodness – we were about an hour and a half out of Melbourne, so no overnight low of 30°C for us – we had a pleasant drop down to 17°-ish)
  • Resolution making (Yes really – me! Never mind that I apparently jinx myself out of achieving goals – I’m quite determined that two-oh-oh-eight is going to be a whole different story. Stay tuned)

So Happy New Year then. May it be a wonderful and productive one for all of us. Also, may it bring more blogging and less blah-ing for me. Back soon with those photos, and not far around the corner, a name change and a facelift.

Erm… for the blog, that is, not me 😆

I’m Off…

I had been planning to tell you of all our December goings on, but time has simply run out, and we’re off now to begin our three day spin-around-the-state. First it’s off to pick up sushi and join my family for Christmas Eve frivolity (approx 90 minute drive). Then it’s off to OtherHalf’s extended family do tomorrow for lunch (just over an hour’s drive). Back to his Dad’s for recovery/quieter celebrations (30 minute drive). Then on Boxing Day, off to my Dad’s for yet more partying (20 minute drive), then home in the afternoon (90 minute drive) to collapse and begin the recovery.

😮

One year… I’m going to stop doing this.

Anyway, it will be fun. I hope you all have slightly less crazy days ahead. Happy Christmas to all 🙂

Christmas Flickr Tomfoolery


Who’s seen the funny business going on with Flickr? Click through to see Kaitlin again, and you’ll see what I’m talking about 🙂

You too can have a (moveable, resizeable) Santa beard or hat for any of your Flickr photos by adding a note which says ‘ho ho ho beard’ or ‘ho ho ho hat’. Love it!

Um… real post later… maybe.

O Tannenbaum

Christmas-Tree

Christmas for me is always so much more about the anticipation. After 3 days of family craziness, by the 27th of December, I always have something of a ‘Christmas hangover’, and not in the normal way. Yesterday, we took down our tree – we don’t waste any time around here! Finn was quite dismayed that ‘Christmas is over’, but easily placated by a ‘sleeps-until-my-birthday’ countdown (2 more sleeps).

Anyway, for posterity’s sake, I give you… our tree, circa 2005 :giggle:

FinnWhiteBoard

Also, because I think it’s cute, and because it needed preservation (darn the transitory nature of the whiteboard), here’s a self-portrait Finn drew with his new markers from Santa:

Exchanges, Part Deux

SBEBB_RedR1

I came home yesterday to a package from Terri. Yay! Here is the lovely little drawstring bag and red scissors she sent me as part of the Redwork exchange. Yes, it’s true… I am no longer a sole-pair-of-scissors stitcher :giggle: On the opposite side she’s stitched a monogram for me. You can see that here. Thanks Terri for such a lovely gift, I really appreciate it 🙂

SBEBB_XmasR2

Also as promised, here’s a pic of the ornament Annette stitched for me – also red! And if you look here, you can see the whole bunch o’stuff! The little reindeer fellow is for Finn, who adores all things stuffed and furry, and also adores Annette, who spoils him 🙂