Deck the Tree!

Sorry I have been slacking with the photos this month. I'm starting to feel like Christmas is kicking my butt!! I'm normally on the top of my game, and I think I've been on track with everything...I just think I'm trying to do too much this month. My cookies have been baked for weeks, as well as the Christmas music CDs I made for my co-workers. However there are just a few more handmade gifts that I'm working on that I might have to finish in the car on our way up to Fortuna! There has just been a lot going on and I'm actually looking forward to January for when things will start slowing down.
After some serious harassment from Mrs. Hotlanta I have delivered a photo for her (and you). I will try to post again before we leave town this week, but I'm not guaranteeing anything!

Christmas Montage

Greetings! Did you never think I was going to post again? Really? Well I started to feel that way. I blame John for my lack of posting. Ok, so it's isn't really his fault, just partially.

I knew I wanted to post about Christmas before I made any other posts, however John always likes to look at the photos with me before I post them. So...I have been waiting for 3 weeks for him to have the time to look at them with me, and so far he hasn't. I feel like I need to blog about our trip North before I can blog about anything else, and since both of my parents have been harassing me about updating I knew any sort of post would do.

With that being said I am taking the lazy way out. Below are a handful of my favorite photos from the holiday season which I will comment on rather than type out a novel. (More photos to come on ofoto).

I must say that I received a ton of great gifts even before we headed north for the big celebration. My friend Sam gave me some pineapple coconut waffle mix as well as some passion fruit jelly. Let me just say that it was SO good!
See for yourself. Here is my plate:
I like everything to be separate, (syrup, jelly, and powdered sugar). I also like to have my waffles on a paper towel so it absorbs any condensation. I'm a texture eater, what I can I say?

Here is John's plate. As you can see he goes for the gusto.
Another good friend of mine, Jen, gave me homemade lumpia! I was so impressed that she and her hubby spent the time to make their friends such a unique and tasty gift. Does it mean something that they both gave me food gifts?
Here they are frying up. (Jen, I know you said we needed to deep fry them, but they were still really good this way). John added honey and soy sauce which really crisped them up as well. YUM!

Before we left town John and I had our Christmas and below is a mini still life of some of the gifts I got.
John got me a new Domo calendar, the Harajuku purse, digital picture frame and the flute playing gnome. I was totally impressed! I've wanted a digital picture frame for a long time, but it's a totally unnecessary expense. So John used our credit card points to buy it! Such a smart man. I also needed another gnome for my collection, as I have the hardest time finding cute ones. Some can look so scary!

My friend Jen also got me the Rob and Big DVD's and John and laughed so much watching them. I always forget how much I love that show. Bobby Light always does me right.

The other black purse looking item is a cosmetic bag that I got from Maggie. It's not any cosmetic bag, but a Kat Von D designer bag! (Ok, it's not a designer bag, but you know it sounds better that way). What is crazy is that I totally needed a new one, and even asked John for one for Christmas. The poor dude did get me a purse that could have been used as a cosmetic bag, but the Kat Von D bag was better. I mean it was made for cosmetics. John was a bit disappointed, so I told him to suck it up and make it up to me for my birthday.

Since I had ample time during this holiday season I wanted to make some homemade gifts. Nothing too elaborate though. I saw this tutorial on How About Orange and thought it was perfect for my level of crafting skills! My initial plan was to make about 10 frames, but after cutting a few templates I realized it was a little tougher than I thought. So I decided to make 3...however once I finished the first frame and saw how cute it was I had to make them all! Here is a photo of the different fabrics I used:
I was so pleased with how they turned out, but the magnets I used were a bit too strong. I wanted to make sure they wouldn't side down on the fridge, which I achieved, but I ripped off the magnets after I took this photo! Real nice.

For the most part we had really nice visits with both families, but man did it tire us out! We were so exhausted by the time our 4 days were up. The only real exciting thing that happened was that my sister's dog attacked one of my parents dogs. I guess if it's not humans fighting it's dogs? At least no blood was shed.

We always spend Christmas eve with my family which is nice. My mom made a great meal and then we topped it off with opening a ton of gifts. Here is John and I in our traditional holiday matching sweaters. These aren't that hideous but I had to put the kibosh on the camo/argyle sweaters John wanted to buy, as camo is not seen as hideous in Fortuna. (I'm not sure why I'm striking a model pose either).
Christmas day was spent with John's family. It was great to see the kids again, but man was it hectic! I've realized that if you aren't normally around kids, it can be kind of like a culture shock! Here is the whole clan:
We had another great meal and received many wonderful gifts. I got a much needed computer bag, and we also got a kitchen aid mixer!!!!
After all the baking I did for Christmas I was coming to the realization how much I wanted one, and the bam! Santa delivered. I know it looks white in this photo, but the color is actually ice. A 50's teal. (Since we've been home John has been a baking fool making all sorts of breads. I've been documenting so don't worry. Your mouth will be watering soon.)

Here is John and the twins:

We even headed up to Monument to check out the snow. Unfortunately most of it had melted away by the time we got there. Bow was still able to make a GIANT snowball though.
I was also lucky enough that the families let me spend some time with my old high school friends. I had the best time catching up with them. It's amazing that after all these years when we get back together it seems like no time has passed. I am so thankful for my relationships with them as I'm realizing how special they are. We have all known each other for so long it's amazing that we can still remain close without seeing each other often.

I have the feeling that they all felt the same as we've now organized a girl's weekend for March. I can't wait!

Cheese Steaks and Mistletoe

So I've decided to start with a Christmas post since it is only a few days away! We are heading up to Fortuna tomorrow hopefully around 3pm. There has been a rumor going around my work that we might get off at noon would really be great! I'm sure we would hit a butt load of traffic in the bay area though, but hopefully we would arrive earlier than midnight.

On our way up we will probably stop at our fave restaurant in Sunnyvale called St. John's. Thanks to Scotty's recommendation, we fell in love with their chicken cheese steaks. Philly's down in AG makes pretty good ones too, but I think St. John's has them beat. Plus you can't sit next to a photo of Joe Montana or Chris Mullins in Philly's. Sorry dudes.

We will also be stopping in Ukiah at The Steinbuck's for our annual visit. I'm not sure if Syd will be awake when we get there, but I'm sure her mom will open her gifts for her if she's not! (Just kidding Re!) I am quite excited about Syd's gifts this year, but I will not able to reveal what they are until later. Let me just say that she is going to be the most stylish kid in Ukiah.

We will be spending the first two days with my family, which will consist of at least one golf game for the dudes. We will also have our annual Free gift exchange before we open gifts on Christmas eve. All year you save any items you got for free and then wrap them up and hope someone will want your crap! I've got a whole hodge podge this year, however John's is quite good.

On Christmas day we will head over to John's parent's house for the remaining two days. There I'm sure it will be a total mad house with the four nieces and nephew… PLUS Molly is bringing up her two dogs. So the family has grown by 4 this past year! I really can't wait to see the twins. We saw them last month before our trip, but I'm sure they've changed so much!

So is this way too long for a blog post? Are you guys so board there's blood streaming from your eyes? Let me know by leaving a comment!

Have a great Christmas!!

**Note: I will post more recent Christmas photos soon once they are downloaded. For now deal with the oldie!