Friendship

It’s amazing how a friend can do so much for your soul.  Sometimes you don’t talk about anything important.  Sometimes you don’t do anything exciting.  Sometimes it’s just a phone call or an email or a card.  Sometimes it’s a lunch or a dinner or an amazing text when you need it the most.   Sometimes it’s just a few moments that remind you of how blessed and appreciated you are. I’ve learned that the most amazing friends can light up my life like nothing else.

A great friend can help you forget your troubles for awhile, make you laugh, share your happiness, calm your nerves, instill confidence you didn’t know was there, and just remind you that someone cares and is thinking about you.  They may not have all the right words, but they try.  They may not understand your decisions but they support them.  They make you laugh, sometimes until you cry, and they bring out the silly side of you that you’d never show anyone else.

I’ve been thinking about all the amazing women I’ve spent time with lately that have truly lit up my holiday season in only the way a friend can.  Whether they are near or far, old friends or new, I hold them in my heart, thank God for sending them to me and pray that I can be to them what they have been to me.

"A friend will strengthen you with her prayers, bless you with her love, and encourage you with her hope." - unknown

Resolutions

I’ve never been big on New Year’s resolutions or waiting for a new year to start something.  I think if you’re going to make a resolution to change something there’s no reason to wait for a new year or even a new week.  I was super unmotivated the past few months and unfortunately I didn’t devote much time to myself.   Somehow I found my motivation (not sure where it was hiding?) and I’ve been doing things lately that I wanted to for awhile.  They sound little, but to me they are big because I’ve put them off for so long!

I feel like 2012 is going to be amazing.  I hope/think there are some exciting changes coming soon and  I’m excited about so many things.  I’m not waiting to make changes, but I am using the new year to recommit myself to these changes.  That sounds just like the whole new year’s resolutions thing I was just complaining about huh?  Without further ado, here’s what’s on my agenda starting last week, yesterday, and right now to be continued into the new year:

· Focus on being healthy.  When I eat healthy I feel better and I look better.  When I work out I feel better and I look better.  I’ve found TONS of amazing sites on Pinterest with healthy recipes I can’t wait to try out.  An added bonus – eating healthy at home means my wallet actually gets a bit fatter.  I do want to lose weight, but my focus is just not on the weight, it’s on being healthy.  I think people get too easily sucked into “diets” that promise a quick fix, but they don’t learn anything.  I’m aiming for healthy, which in turn should lead to this but in a realistic and maintainable way.  I’ve already written out a huge list of recipes to try out after we get back from our Christmas vacay and I’ve been working on my cookbook binder which I’ll share with you soon.

· Get REALLY organized.  I’m pretty darn organized in general, but we all have those closets, rooms, drawers, etc. that are anything but.  I spend too much time sorting through papers, picking up little things laying around the house, and spending time on things that aren’t that important.  I recently took a trip to The Container Store and stocked up on some unique things to do just that.  I’ve started this on a smaller scale….a couple baskets in the entertainment center, a mini closet overhaul, and a pantry reorganization.   I’m always shocked at how much happier I am when I’m done.  I LOVE organizing and I LOVE repurposing and beautifying spaces, however I just didn’t have much time to devote to this for awhile and things have gotten a bit out of control (by my standards anyhow).   Specifically the office needs to be beautified and the file cabinet needs a major overhaul.  The “workout room” is a bit scary and is where all the “I have no idea what to do with this” boxes have accumulated.  If it’s in a box then it’s most likely not that important.  The garage just has all this stuff that needs to be sorted through, reorganized, and some things sold.  The linen closet could use some help.  Little things, but they make a huge difference.

· Spend more time being crafty.  I don’t mean crafty like scheming, but crafty as in creative!  I bought myself a cricut die-cut machine LAST black Friday and I didn’t touch it much last year.  I did use it to make cute gift tags though and it reminded me how amazing this thing is!  I have a bunch of pending projects I can’t wait to finish (or start!) and I’m excited to post them when I’m done.  For me it’s really a matter of having the materials, ideas, and sitting down to actually do them.

· Scrapbook.  This gets its own category because it’s been FOREVER since I’ve actually scrapbooked.  I haven’t done a single thing this year.  That’s just plain horrible!  But I’m going to get out my scrapbook stuff once my office is beautified and go crazy with my craftyness.  That sounds scary when I put it like that but trust me, I’ll be awesome!

· Save more.  Who isn’t looking for ways to save these days?  We’ve found a lot of ways to cut back whether it’s through coupons, more movies at home and less out, eating at home more, cancelling cable, or watching all those random purchases that add up.  I’ve been getting lazy with comparing grocery ads but after Christmas I’m renewing my commitment to being more frugal!  There are so many resources online that it’s just amazing.  Pinterest is giving me great ideas of projects with things I already have.  Coupon sites compile deals for me.  Foodie sites have given me tons of recipes which are much more budget friendly than eating out, not to mention that the ones I keep are usually healthy!

· Devote more time to my faith.  I’ve come a long way in the past year.  The Walk to Emmaus challenged me to start participating in my faith and taking an active role instead of a passive one.  This year I want to do more reading, studying, and devote a little of set aside time to pray.  I can use all the guidance I can get!

· Spend more QUALITY time with Mr. C.  This means more playing games, laughing, checking things off my 101 list, snuggling, watching old movies, doing puzzles, making breakfast, taking day trips, walking together, and playing with our two furballs and less time making sure the house is clean or the other million practical things that can sometimes take over our lives.

This year I’m focusing on what really matters – my health, my family, the friends that make life worthwhile, my faith, and my life being in order (as much as possible anyhow!).

What are your resolutions for now, tomorrow, or beginning the new year?

2011 Christmas #1

We’ll be spending Christmas with my family in Nebraska, so last weekend we celebrated with Mr. C’s family.  The only thing better than Christmas is TWO Christmases!!!

Saturday was baking day and although I’d love to post some pics, our photographer (Mr. C) didn’t do so well and had to be fired from his job due to not actually taking any pictures while we were baking (he did manage to take about a million picture of my beautiful table setup though).  Baking day never goes as planned.  I always have a million and a half recipes I want to make, usually half of them being things I’ve never made before.   This year I was a bit smarter and decided to not quadruple all my recipes.  I seriously made like six batches of sugar cookies last year.  It’s great when I’m mixing up the dough, but not so much when I’m cutting tons of shapes out and then trying to frost about a million cookies.   Downscaling my baking made things much more manageable this year.

I’d love to show you pics of what I baked, but I packed it up and distributed it to some lucky (I hope they feel lucky anyhow) family and friends this week in the hopes of getting it out of the house so I wouldn’t devour it all. Christmas just isn’t Christmas without baking goodies for other people.  That must be a quality I got from my grandma :)

Saturday night we had soup, the best crockpot apple cider, and opened gifts.  I love watching people open their gifts, more than I really care about mine usually.  This year I thought we did pretty wonderful at figuring out something special for each person and everyone seemed to love what we picked out for them (either they loved it or they are GREAT actors/actresses).  We followed up the gifts with a game of Scene It, the comedy edition.   My team lost (I should mention it was 2 against 3….), but it was so much fun and I actually knew some of the answers!   Christmas Eve has always been my favorite part of Christmas because it’s low-key, relaxing, and just a time to enjoy being together.  Saturday night was just that and I loved it.

Sunday was the big meal.  I have never in my life made a turkey or ham on my own.  I make meals with chicken breasts (primarily ONLY chicken breasts because it’s less yucky to touch), beef, fish, and this past year I made some pork for the first time EVER!  For our Centner Christmas I decided to make a ham.  My friend gave me a wonderful recipe for the glaze and told me to glaze it with homemade glaze in the crockpot.  It turned out so amazing and I was quite proud of myself!  We had quite a feast –  http://whatsgabycooking.com/thyme-and-honey-roasted-carrots/">thyme and honey roasted carrots,http://whatsgabycooking.com/chipotle-mashed-sweet-potatoes/">chipotle mashed sweet potatoes (a huge hit!),  twice baked potato casserole, green bean casserole, cooked cranberries, rolls, deviled eggs, and of course the ham. 

 Yum! 

It was a great weekend with wonderful food and company.  Now I’m prepping to go home and celebrate Christmas with my family!  Sooooo excited!!!!  Actually, I was supposed to be asleep tonight by 9 with laundry done, everything packed, and the house getting a light cleaning before we take off tomorrow.  It’s now 10:30 and I’m waiting for the laundry, still not packed, blogging, and so hopped up on caffeine that I’m not sure I’ll even be able to sleep.  This is another tradition, although every year I tell myself that this year will be different! Oh well!

I hope your gifts are wrapped, your goodies are baked, you’ve found some time to relax and remember what Christmas is all about, and you’re looking forward to Christmas and time with loved ones as much as I am!

Happiness

Sometimes we overlook the little things that bring us joy.  Sometimes we miss out on moments of happiness because we’re too busy to realize we’re in them.  Lucky for us, we have a couple furry creatures that remind us to slow down and enjoy the moment.

This weekend we took Coconut to a “green” (it was really brown) area of our neighborhood and let her run around.  I sat at one end of the grassy area and Mr. C sat at the other while we called Coconut’s name.  She ran back and forth between us, almost knocking us both over a couple times because she was THAT excited.  Mr. C got some great photos of her.  The look on her face is pure happiness.  With the busyness of the Christmas season, we all need to take a little time to do something simple that makes us remember what life is all about and count our blessings.  For me, ten minutes in the park with my happy puppy and smiling husband were a great reminder. 

    

Wrapping it up

I love wrapping presents.  This past week our dining room table was full of wrapping paper, tape, boxes, bows, and tags.    I have a lot of fancy sparkly gift tags I usually use but this year I was feeling extra inspired and decided to do things a little differently.

I broke out my Cricut die-cut machine and some colored cardstock to make some letters of various sizes.   I then used a black ink pad to distress the sides of the letters.  This was a bit difficult for letters like S that had a ton of curves.  I started out using the inkpad directly on the letter cutouts but it was hard to get everything and it was a bit messy.  After googling how to distress corners, I picked up a tool which had a felt pad I inked and then used on the paper.  This produced a softer, more speckled effect and allowed me to get in all the nooks and crannies of whatever letter I had printed.  Both ways have their advantages so I did a little of each and some letters had both techniques.

I then hole punched the letters and attached the first letter of a person’s name to a gift instead of using a tag.  I love the way they turned out! Here’s a couple of my favorites.

Unfortunately too many of Mr. C’s family members have names that start with the same letters so I had to write their name on the back of the letters to avoid confusion.  Next year I’m hoping to get really fancy schmancy by making my own bows from ribbon, but I’m very happy with my name tag upgrades this year!  

A Magical Time of Year

December is notorious for being a crazy busy month.  My planner sees more action this month than a couple of the other ones combined.  I LOVE this time of year.  The warm glow of the lights, the familiar music, the cheesy movies, the parties, baking, shopping, the time with family and friends,…..  Christmas has always been a magical time of year to me.  It’s by far my favorite holiday. As I’m typing I’m sitting on our couch listening to Christmas music, smelling my cinnamon Scentsy bar, and surrounded by the glow of the Christmas tree and the million other lights I have plugged in.  It doesn’t get any better than this.

If I could live in the North Pole with Santa I would be the first in line for that.  THAT’s how much I love Christmas.  With that being said, it goes without saying that I tend to get a little excited/crazy this time of year and possibly go a bit overboard.  I have so much fun decorating the house and I even managed to tone it down a bit this year but still love it.

We’ve decorated a tree or two outside before but this year we decided to go all out.  I strung the lights on the trees and bushes while Mr. C worked on the lights around the roofline.  Of course although I tested ALL the lights first, somehow the one strand I didn’t have plugged in the entire time decided to go out at the top and bottom of the tree.  It’s just lovely how that always seems to happen.   I haven’t been motivated enough to fix it at this point….I’m just hoping no one notices.  The rest of the lights look pretty darn good though if I do say so myself! 

With the outside looking good, Mr. C and I put up our gigantor tree.  We got it on sale (major sale!) one year and love it, but it’s a bit large….like 9 ft. large.  It’s okay, it represents my gigantor Christmas spirit!  Decorating it with Mr. C is one of my favorite traditions.  He says I’m “picky” about ornament placement but I consider it “strategic”!

Remember Oreo, our electrical cord obsessed?   This being his first Christmas he though it would be fun to chew the branches and see if he could digest the lights.  We doused the bottom layer of the tree in bitter apple spray and kept the ornaments up a little higher than normal.  Luckily that’s stopped him for now although he’s now decided that the tree was put up with the sole purpose of being a protective spot for him to lay and hide from Coconut after he swats at her tail.  We’ve been lucky so far in that I’ve come home to an in-tact tree everyday.  I’m just counting my blessings on that one.  I won’t mention that we can’t actually put any of the presents under the tree….

In addition to the huge tree we also have this one which looks a bit smaller every year.  This one holds our special ornaments – from our childhoods and those that represent our milestones.  Every year my mom buys me at least one to represent something that happened that year.  I LOVE going through the ornaments because they all bring back such special memories. 

So that’s what I’ve been up to instead of posting on here.   I hope you’re enjoying this time of year as much as I am.  I’ve been getting a bit crafty with my gift wrapping but that’s for the next post :)

Black Friday Love

I’m sorry I’m a bit late in my Black Friday post, but it’s been an extra busy week! I got some understanding/inspirational/thankful/loving/all-around-good feedback from the previous post and I’m still happy with my decision to post and that I FINALLY wrote something. The previous few posts had been written ones I had “banked” but never posted, so the last post was truly the last writing I’ve done for much too long. I’m getting back into writing though (FINALLY!) and should be posting like mad soon. Or just regularly maybe?
I LOVE Black Friday. One year Mr. C and I decided to stop at Target quick for a Christmas tree and luggage set before taking off for California on Black Friday. Our quick trip wasn’t really that quick as you can probably imagine. That was our first Black Friday and we’ve been going ever since (having learned much from that first one). I used to go out the day after Christmas because everything holiday related is 50% off and you really can’t beat that. I’d make a list and strategize where I was going once the doors opened. Mr. C would get the cart and I’d take off to load my arms up with stuff until he got there. It was the best. But then Black Friday happened….and it was even better.
I love how excited people get and the ridiculousness of it all. Of course I also love the deals! We’ve never bought anything huge like a TV or the things you hear people break out in riots over. Usually we’re looking for movies and maybe a couple gifts. This year we bought flannel sheets (which I’m loving because that means I don’t have to crawl into a cold bed), a throw I’d been eying, a couple kitchen products that were uber cheap, a flash drive, and some gifts I of course can’t mention on here! Nothing big though, and it wouldn’t have been the end of the world if we didn’t get it on sale. We missed out on an external hard drive because we just couldn’t bear to wait in the long line at Best Buy.

This year was a bit weird due to stores opening at midnight.  It actually worked better for us because once I'm asleep it's not too fun to wake me up at 3am so I can go shop.  NOTHING sounds too important to me at 3am once I'm snuggled in my bed.  It was a big magical though to see the huge crowds out and about, shopping as if it was a Saturday afternoon when in fact it was 2am.
Following tradition, we waited in the Target line. I LOVE target. I love the atmosphere when everyone is waiting in line, joking around and keeping each other company. We heard multiple horror stories of the scene at Walmart hours earlier and how the cops were called. THAT is the part of Black Friday I do not like, or understand.

When the doors opened everyone was fairly calm. When I was stuck on one side of never-ending carts and Mr. C was on the other (think of it as being on opposite cliffs with a huge drop in the middle), a nice man stopped, smiled, and let me sneak through. This is the kind of Black Friday shopping I enjoy. It’s a bit crazy, but people are still decent. They don’t push each other down or pepper spray anyone, and everyone talks to complete strangers while waiting in line to pay.
After Target stop #1 we went to IHOP for the best breakfast ever. My extreme hunger may be what caused me to think it was SO amazing, but seriously it was great. We hit another Target (stop #2 out of 7 stops in 2 days in case you were wondering…we have bad memories and had to keep returning for like one thing every time or trying a different location), Best Buy, and then rested up before heading out later. It was a very odd feeling day but so much fun! I hope you got everything you were looking for without encountering any pepper spray!