A Little Bit of This and a Little Bit of That

Well it has been a while since my post. So here goes:

New year's res - since I have been working out of my home now means I am home more and so are the boys which equals an endless amount of house work. So I signed up again for fly lady reminders (http://www.flylady.net/). I had done this several years ago but I hated getting all these emails so I stopped. I still retained some of the habits though (like timing yourself, shining your sink etc) but I needed some more help. If you sign up make sure you set the Yahoo emails to daily digest so you don't get tons of single emails. I pick and choose which ones to read. I do like how I can use a timer and quickly clean parts of the whole house and then focus on "zones" each week. I am hoping it sticks this time!

New shows we are into - I know it is old and off the air but we are hooked on Veronica Mars! It's a pretty clever show and it has some actors we like in it. Plus we like guessing the outcomes of the mysteries she has solves.

This is old to but we started watching The Office reruns over the holiday. Actually I started and then Matt heard me laughing in the next room so he checked it out too. I am not a sitcom person but these are cracking me up right now! Timmy's favorite character is Dwight - now that is a SCARY thought!

As far as on the craft scene I made these:

and these:

It has been stormy here and our power was out for 6 hours. We didn't realize how unprepared we are for emergencies until yesterday when we could only find one flashlight and the candles we had were all scented and not very bright! Thankfully we already had dinner plans at my friend Marion's who fixed a great meal and then we all talked for hours - mostly laughing at her and her husband's funny stories.

My neice Hannah was over for 3 days and that was a lot of fun. We cropped at Suzy's and it got me motivated to finish my 2007 Christmas layouts. Then when I put them in my album I realized I had not done 2006!! I also learned that texting is it when it comes to "talking" to your friends. She would whip out her cell and be punching away randomly throughout the day. So I am trying to sharpen my texting skills! :-P

Here are some photos from Christmas!

Yes we did finally put up our Christmas tree! I love all the handmade ornaments from the boys and the photos that are on the tree!!
Legos and Bionicles were another big request this year. The boys got exactly what they wanted!! Look at all the cute crafts I got at the craft exchange my friend Sylvia organized. They all turned out so cute and we all had fun hanging out at MegaByte. I think we are all making Sylvia organize another one next year!!On Christmas day, we went to Matt's sister's for dinner and gift exchange. We always have fun hanging out! She decorated the table so nice and we had popper and favors to open. The poppers were filled with gold paper crowns that we wore proudly and a prize. The favor was a cute tea pot timer that I am already using! The boys cousins Luke and Michaela got to come home with us and spend the night. Michaela and I made a felt pillow. She designed and I sewed it. I also was inspired by her cute hat so I made a bunch out of fleece! Luke requested a black and red one!

Can you believe it?! We STILL do not have our Christmas tree up. With Matt being gone last week driving a 24 foot Uhaul full of my grandmother's and our furniture back from the East coast and then one of us being gone almost every night of the week, it still hasn't gotten done. Hopefully this weekend.

But I am still getting into the holiday spirit! I got together with my secret buddies on Monday to "reveal" ourselves. We had been sending gifts to our buddy every month for a whole year! It was so fun to see who our buddy was. I had no idea Camille was mine. She even had her husband hand deliver the gifts at night which threw me off completely.

Then on Thursday I got together with my tennis girls and welcomed back Linda, our coordinator who had been out for a long time with her father who had died. I made tennis ball ornaments for each of the ladies which just look like green balls because I could not find yellow shred anywhere! It is so funny to see us all dressed up and not sweaty and in tennis gear. I love them all and so glad I get to hang out with them.

Tyler got a ribbon this Friday at school! He is the cutest! We are so proud of him and his brother who are both loving their school.

Another craft! This garland was made from 3" square chipboard peices that I covered in red paper. I used my Crop-o-dile to punch holes in it (love that tool) and strung them together with green and red polka dot ribbon. I used the Cricut - All Mixed Up font for the letters. Simple! I am making some "retro" stockings that will be red and white so I think it will be cute when it is all together!

O button tree, O button tree....



Here is another craft for you - button trees! You take a styrofoam cone shape and a ton of buttons (really I think about 300) and use pearl straight pins to attach them. I added ribbon on top because I thought it made them look cuter!

Tank Tour!

Ok so most people cut down their Christmas trees this weekend. What did we do? Go on a tank tour! I had heard about it from a friend who found out about this guy who lives in the Palo Alto hills and has the largest tank collection (yeah the guy is RICH). Anyway he offers tours to people who contact him (he does no advertising). So we booked our tour and WOW were we amazed. This man seeks out tanks all over the world and restores them. He has an engineering shop with engineers who work on the whole process and then when the tank is restored it gets moved to these huge display rooms. Our guide Mike is a freelance writed and he gave a great 2 hour tour. He not only shared the history of each vehicle but the realities of war and what it was like to be a "tanker".