It's begining to look a lot like Christmas...

Today was a glorious day!  Full of sun and no rain (well for quite a bit of it) and I felt this energy to get everything done before this brief respite left us.  Our house has an amazing front porch...It is probably one of my favorite things about the house (besides my glorious gas range).  It has always been my dream to create a space that invites people to sit, to relax, to connect.  A space that I want to sit under while listening to the rain, or read a book, one where people stop to say hi.  When we first bought the house we didn't have anything but camp chairs to start and while in my head I envisioned a garland laden space ala Martha Stewart we had a shoe string budget last year and made due with cheap looking dollar tree crap.  Thankfully two things happened

1)One of my friend's parents had a extra set of wicker furniture they no longer wanted

2) All Christmas stuff was 90% off last January...

It was so exciting today to pull stuff out of our basement (aka the cave of no return) that I had bought, what seems like a million years ago, and start to decorate....to have neighbors walk by and instantly see that they too were infected with the holiday bug!  To see the difference in the place from just one year ago. I have been working on "simplifying" my life so having 8 tubs full of Christmas decorations seems pretty ridiculous...but for me it is so much more than a ridiculous fake village, more light strands then you can count (or unwind)...


Christmas was always a HUGE thing in my family.....it wasn't about the gifts, it was about something magical/bigger then the everyday.  My mom is a crafter, an amazing person who can see what someone else has made go right into Jo'Ann's with her 40% coupon and create it exactly, if not better for pennies on the dollar.  Growing up our home was decorated very "country" with knick-nack shelves and such.  It was always so exciting for us the friday after Thanksgiving to have my dad pull out of our attic box by box alllll the decorations for the upcoming holiday.  We would replace every little decoration with something Christmas. 
 No matter that we didn't have a lot of money it always looks like a million bucks to me....looking back I don't know if its because my mom had spent so many hours creating every item or if it was the pride she felt (well we all did) when people would walk into our home and instantly smiled.  It was a place where people wanted to be, a place that oozed love and excitement!   

It wasn't just the decorating it was also all the time spent making/creating/baking.  The little things my parents would do that made it seem like Christmas was a time anything was possible, that everyone was special and loved. We always heated our home with our fireplace and yet we would have one cold night every Christmas because we didn't want Santa to be burned!  That the cookies we left would magically be all eaten and even my dad would accuse Santa of drinking a beer. I remember one year "Santa" had brought us a big trampoline....as a kid I was amazed at how the sled could pull such a thing and much, much later I found out that my dad and his best friend had spent HOURS that night (which it was freezing rain and icy mind you) trying to put the thing together in the dark....my love and appreciation for all the "behind the scenes" stuff has only increased as I get older that is for sure.

While my parents sacrificed to make sure we got great gifts it was so much more....it was a time where there was happiness and hope. 

We don't have any kids so spending 8 hours decorating a house can seem a bit absurd.  But I will tell you driving home tonight I felt a brief glimmer of that feeling I used to get...one of love, total safety and excitement when we got closer to our house.  I felt totally humbled for a second at how blessed we are to have such a great house.  A home that we can decorate, one that we are slowly creating together, a place that people feel fine just showing up unannounced.  I am excited for the future memories as well.  I don't know what it is about this time of year but I can't help but smile and be thankful.   

Lacy

ahhh...

soooo doing this.

Most amazing card holder ever!




Excited to spend the tomorrow with loved ones.  I hope you all are warm, surrounded by laughter and copious amounts of food.

Lacy

ice ice baby.

So its been pretty cold here....Like I kinda want to die inside cold....like it hurts my back to walk outside, put at least 2 layers of socks on cold....I will have you know that I am a big wuss to these sorts of things...I am a big believer that if it is below 72 then a sweatshirt is mandated...I would never survive in any sort of real cold weather.  I have come to accept this and move on though my family in Idaho tease me endlessly.

Cold weather also brings along my biggest fear (besides random eyeballs popping out...seriously) driving in ice or cold!! I literally have panic attacks at the thought of it....not so much my lack of skills but every other idiot  out there scares the shit out of me!  Thankfully the roads have been fine and hopefully tomorrow will be more of the same.

So I recently discovered hulu plus.....

And have proceeded to not accomplish anything (besides significantly reducing my queue).....

BUT

I did complete my first batch of Kombucha!!  I bought a scoby on etsy and the lovely seller included amazing instructions.  It was a bit touch and go for awhile....I thought there was mold in it but it turned out it was just the baby forming!  I tried some last night and am really impressed with the taste...though I will be using less sugar next time....I am also excited to NOT spend 5 bucks a bottle anymore!  (which I only allowed myself one a week).  I left it all plain but am thinking of adding ginger next time...any advice/tips would be appreciated.

Currently the Kombucha is in a dark place for the next couple of days to create carbonation.  Seriously this is another project that I thank baby jesus for Google!  I seriously don't know how people survived in the past....oy.

I need to get my butt in gear and get ready for thanksgiving.  Thankfully my family does it potluck style so I only have to come with one dish!

Hello Candied Yams!!

 Hope everyone has a wonderful holiday :)
 Lacy

The crap.

The holidays are coming (as well as my birthday) and of course that makes me think about gift giving and gift getting.  In past years I have attempted to always plan ahead, make extreme crafting plans to hand-make everything..just for it to be about Dec. 20th me acting like a total bitch and like 2 crafts done.....this year I want to give myself a break and follow these rules:

1. When gift giving you only buy mass produced items when specifically requested.

2. If rule #1 doesn't apply then the next item must be hand-made or made by a local company.

3.  Each gift must have the focus on the person and NOT the price.

I don't know about you all but seriously I am soooo sick of having crap. or even 2, 3, 6 of the same items.  Why the holidays turned into a time to go into debt I don't know.  Instead of being caught up in the real meaning of the holidays, which is being with loved ones, sharing memories and laughter!

Let's just see how this goes.......................

I have also emailed my family a "wish list" with stuff following the same rules...you should of heard my explanation to my mother about why I would want a "used tea kettle from this etsy web site?"....ha.

PS does anyone else kinda want to throw everything they have all away (or recycle it) and start again????

Lacy    

Halloween

Last night we gave over 11 pounds of candy out.  It made me proud of our hot minute of community within Nopo.  99% of the kids were dressed up, extremely polite and really cute!  Learned a Martha tip as well...I used Yankee Candles (small jar kind) in our jack-o-lanterns and had many parents (as well as kids) comment on how good our Porch smelled.  Noted and Noted for next year.

On another note I am already sick of this weather....Like wanting to bash head into wall sick of it...I am ashamed to admit this...I am a native and shouldn't feel this way until at least February. I have a feeling that this is going to be a long winter.  Also the chickens have almost stopped laying, which while frustrating we did get an egg almost as big as my palm! Crazy....

I have also felt the need to make some baked goods and another necessity is roaring his big fat head...the need to work off those baked goods.....I was starting to become addicted to running though the thought of running in the rain doesn't make me want to lace up to tennies so we are going to start looking around for alternatives to help not only keep those baked goods off my hips and also help me survive this winter weather.

 Last tip of the night YOU MUST try roasted brussel sprouts...why did my mom boil them??!!?  A new favorite!

Lacy