Cookie Exchange Fail

I wont bore you with the details but I will share with you my latest adventure in dabbling in the domestics.
Huh...
Anyways.
Twas our annual Cookie Exchange Christmas Wrap party.
Many moons ago the party started off as a Christmas wrapping party. We would bring presents to one location and use each others wrapping paper and bows and wrap our gifts together. Later we added exchanging cookies into the mix. Then as the babes were born, one by one we stopped bringing our presents to wrap and just brought cookies. This year one person brought stuff to wrap and we just watched her wrap whilst we ate cookies. 
Looooooooooooooong story short, I wanted to make these:

I know I know...not a cookie. 

I ended up with this:

One of my "friends" was so offended she took one home in a separate container from the rest of her exchanged cookies so as not to contaminate the proper cookies. 

Eh. (Shoulder Shrug). I got to take home more cookies than everybody else. MERRY CHRISTMAS SUCKAS!!!

HO HO HO! 

My Favorite Christmas Commercials

Ah Christmas commercials...
Some of them just make me happy. Is that weird?
For instance I get that "ITS CHRISTMAS TIME" feeling the first time I see this commercial:

"We Wish You a Merry Christmas" is also my favorite Christmas song.

I also like this one:

I cant quite pinpoint why I like this commercial so much. The music, the drama, the thought that Santa is running late and needs to make a quick stop at Target...I just like it all! 

And then there is Target Lady. 

I miss her. Now they have those two tweeny type people. Not as fun. 

Whats your favorite Christmas commercial? I wanna see them!

Oh Untraditional Christmas Tree

Tis the season to bring stuff out of storage. 

This Christmas we have a very stuffed living room. 

We have a Pac n' Play and a baby swing and a baby play mat and a lil' kitchen set and lots o' toys all taking up lots o' space.

I had to put my beloved papasan in storage a long time ago. 

In case you didnt know we live in an apartment and are looking for and praying for a new home.  I am a stay-at-home mom so that makes home buying a little more difficult. 

All this to say, there is no room for a Christmas tree this year. 

At first I was bummed about this. 

Christmas without a Christmas seems very sad. 

I thought about how this might be the first Christmas Em remembers and there wont be a tree. 

After a brief mourning period and some prayer I decided its not so bad. 

I am going to have a Christmas tree. But it will not be the traditional type of tree at all. 

After searching the interwebs I found lots of different ways we can have a tree and still be able to walk around.

The Christmas tree decal. 

We have a ton of wall space because I keep telling myself this is our last year here in this apartment (its been 8 years) and I cant commit to a wall color or wall hangings.

src

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pier one

Or we can go with some tree wall art. 

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But you cant really put any presents under the wall art. 

We could go with an actual tree that is just a little different. 

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This one just makes me sad

The Half Tree
Sold at Target

The Skinny Tree
Sold at Target

And lastly the recreatable tree. 

I can have a tree that Em can decorate over and over
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I can draw a Christmas tree on our sliding glass door window. 

We can have a chalkboard tree.
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After thinking about it, I decided we will do the following:

~The tree decal

I already bought and will have it up soon. 

~The Felt Tree

I'm gonna buy the felt this week and have IT up soon

~The Window Tree

This will prob be done this week and redone many times until Christmas

~And lastly

the spinning tree. 

I saw it Target and had to get it. Its pretty small and will go on our coffee table and Em can play with it lots. It was on Sale!

So instead of being sad that we are not going to put up regular fresh tree this year and dress it up with our ornaments, I'm going to be happy that we have 4 trees and hope that it is a fun memory for Em too. 

Stay tuned for pics!

Happy Hawwoween

That's how Em says it, with her little fingers wiggling by her face in a sort of a whisper. She makes me laugh a lot.
This year I decided she will be dressed up as Abby Cadabby for Halloween.

I love that I get to choose her outfits right now ;)
I "made" her costume this year. Made is in quotations because I barely did anything.
Here is what I did:



1) I took one of Ems super fancy dresses that she got from her grandma.

2) Then I took one of stretchy head bands and cut some tulle and threaded and tied to the bottom row of the  headband. 

3)Then I took the tulle/headband/skirt and slipped it over the dress. 

4) Then I made some pom poms from yarn.

5) I pinned and clipped the pom poms to Ems puffy pony tails on top of her head. Put some dollar store wings on her (which we got for free from a b-day party). And Alakazam...Abby Cadabby!

During the judging Em refused to stand in line. 

This is how Em looks often. So pleasant. 

We went to a party last week and a barn party over the weekend before Sandy hit. Trick or Treating is going on today...but its kinda cold out and I have the new LO now. Hubs has to be at church, so I'm not taking Em and the baby trick or treating by myself. I will say I feel some  guilt about this.
But I tell myself this:
1) She doesnt know what she is missing
2) She cant have all that candy (mom can but shouldnt)
3) Im not sure she will have fun. She hates being made to be social. It takes her a while to warm up and relax and so walking up to several strange people might be a little overwhelming for her and us.

So BACK-OFF MOM GUILT! I will not have it!
Happy Hawwoween!

Fathers Day DIY

I am a little late in posting this but here is what Em and I made dad for Fathers Day.

Fathers Day gift. Some nice words and pics of tot doing "Daddy-things"

Pretty easy and very inexpensive but cute I think and dad can hang it in his office.
Basically I printed out the "daddy words" from a link I got from Pinterest. And then we took a bunch of pics of Em doing "Daddy-Things" i.e. playing guitar, wearing a tie and boots and his infamous Yankees cap.
Then we used little picture holder place holders that people use for scrap-booking and stuck them on to a piece of black construction paper. THAT'S IT!

Christmas Bulb Wreath

This is one of my first DIY projects and it turned out BEAUTIFULLY if I do say so myself. You can see some of my other DIY projects here. Some are successful and some are...well, you take a look yourself. 

Basically I just bought some cheap bulbs from KMart and Walmart and some yarn. I hot glued the yarn and ribbon to the bulbs. I went through a lot of glue and yarn. That part probably took the longest, but I just did it while watching XMas movies. 

I bought a styrofoam circle from Michaels and found a round metal circle just chilling in our church's Youth Group room. You can find all kinds of weird stuff there. 

I started with the largest bulbs and hot glued them to the styrofoam circle first. Then I moved on to the medium sized bulbs and glued them to the inside and outside of the largest bulbs on the circle. 

Next came the smaller sized bulbs...I just kinda filled in gaps and moved things around to where I thought it looked best. Last came the tiny bulbs and I glued them in as filler. 

Lastly I glued my random metal circle to the styrofoam circle so that I can hang it. Im sure you can find ACTUAL wreath building material at Michaels. 

I LOVE color, but whats fun about this project is that you do an infinite amount of color schemes. 

So happy wreathing and happy XMAS! 

10 Chocolate Covered Dishes for Valentine's Day

10 Chocolate Covered Dishes for Valentine's Day - Technorati Lifestyle

In 2011 I posted a little article for Technorati for Valentines day. You can see it on the link above. 

Valentine's Day is drawing near.

 In order to prepare, I Googled “Chocolate Covered…” and then went through the alphabet to see what a Google search would return in the search bar.

For example I typed, “Chocolate Covered A”
Google search returned the following:

Google returned some traditional and some very strange “Chocolate Covered” searches. I came across Chocolate Covered Jalapeños, Chocolate Covered Locusts, Chocolate Covered Ants, Chocolate Covered Saltines and even Chocolate Covered Xanax. Each letter offered me something chocolate covered except the letter “Z”.

I “researched” and “experimented” with what I thought were the top 10 “Cho-Co’s” (my slang for “Chocolate Covered”) treats you can make for your sweetie this Valentine's Day and here are my top 10. Keep in mind I am not a cook or a food critic. I am just a lady that loves chocolate.

1) Cho-Co Strawberries.
A traditional Valentine's Day treat. Easy to make. Aesthetically pleasing. You really can not go wrong with this Cho-Co. Except I did…be sure to use FRESH strawberries and not frozen strawberries.

2) Cho-Co Potato Chips.A Fun Treat. I like the mix of salty and sweet together. They also give a satisfying “CRUNCH” when you take a bite.

3) Cho-Co Peanut Butter Balls.I think everyone loves the combination of peanut butter and chocolate. You can present this treat to your love and say, “We go together like Chocolate and Peanut Butter.” It’s cheesy, but so is Valentine's Day.

4) Cho-Co BaconI was not excited about making this “treat”, but for the purposes of research I was completely committed to doing so. That is, until I got home and realized I forgot to buy the bacon. There was no way I was turning around and going back to the grocery store. Its way too cold and this dish seems, to be frank, a little gross. However the recipe is VERY popular, so maybe I’m missing something…like high cholesterol.

5) Cho-Co TwizzlersThis Cho-Co treat is super-fun and different. I really enjoyed this making this one.

6) Cho-Co BananasFor this recipe I cut the banana and inserted toothpicks. This way I got more chocolate per bite and it is way cuter in bite size form.

7) Cho-Co Coffee BeansThis is for the caffeine-addicted couple. The two of you could cuddle up on the couch and pop in a movie and pop this treat all hours of the night.

8) Cho-Co GrapesYou can have a Cho-Co Fruit Platter and serve these with Cho-Co bananas and Cho-Co strawberries.

9) Cho-Co Gummy BearsThis was a throwback to my generation. I love gummy bears and sang the Gummi Bears theme song in my head as I dipped their little bodies into melted chocolate. I think that may have happened on an episode.

10) Cho-Co OreosThis is for the chocolate lover. Some of the cookies broke as I tried to cover them in chocolate. Just put the broken bits back in place and set them in the fridge and the milk chocolate will hold the pieces together. These were my personal favorite.

Here is a picture of my final product. Some Cho-Co treats aren’t shown because they didn’t quite turn out. (i.e. Cho-Co strawberries and bacon).

Whatever you make, make it with love and it will be successful.
Happy Valentine's Day!