Baby Girl Blessing Dress

As it turns out there is a nice learning curve to sewing.  When I made this dress I had never been very successful  making anything wearable before.  According to my friend that I gave it to it has received more complements than all of her daughters other dresses.  I thought that making Vivian’s blessing dress would be a difficult undertaking but it actually only took me about two days: one to cut and sew most of it and the second day for the finishing touches.

Here’s Vivian sitting on Grandma’s sofa on her blessing day.  I really love the ivory brocade satin that I found and the gorgeous Venetian lace that I found to trim it with.  I also got creative and made a pleated bow for her head since the bonnet  seemed a little overpowering for her little sweet face.

   

Here she is with her daddy ready to go get blessed.      

 

It’s a little difficult to see the bow detail because of the lack of contrast but I’ll make another in color at a later date and do a tutorial if anyone is interested.

Here’s a pretty fuzzy though cute picture of her big brother trying to kiss her!

Valentines Dinner

I decided to start a new tradition of making a Valentines dinner for our family.  I had some incredibly (corny) funny ideas of what to serve.  First we had a salad with hearts of Romaine, then I had two Cornish game hens with rice stuffing with sautéed mushrooms and car(e)rots  with dill and to give a nod to cupid asparagus spears.  I know terrible huh?  It was great fun. 

   

12th Day of Christmas

On Christmas Eve, we wanted to thank our “Secret Elves” somehow so we made brownies with peppermint extract and ground candy-cane in them and set them on the porch with a note thanking them.  Their kind gifts they brought everyday really made our first Christmas away from family much more enjoyable as well as fun since we had something to look forward to each night.  That afternoon they left us our final gifts with the note:

“On the Twelfth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me Twelve drummers drumming!…”

This story will spread the true Christmas spirit.  Remember the Christ every time that you hear it!

A Star for the Tree..

The book “The Little Drummer Boy”

They also finished off giving us the rest of the figurines for the nativity as well as the book that the nativity came in.  I am so grateful that they shared their creativity and gifts with us!  This was a Christmas we won’t forget!

11th Day of Christmas

Here’s what was sitting on our porch on the Eve of Christmas Eve:

“On the eleventh day of Christmas my true love sent to me Eleven pipers piping…”

Pipers are scarce so we brought you their kilt, we cut and we tied and we made it a quilt.

It’s a lap blanket…perfect for watching movies as a family with! 

10th Day of Christmas

This movie is what graced our doorstep for the 10th day of Christmas along with the note:

“On the tenth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me Ten lords a-leaping…”

This beautiful ballet is a holiday treat.  Watch these Ladies and Lords as they leap on their feet!

This movie was an interesting surprise.. I didn’t even know there was a Barbie Nutcracker movie (proves I didn’t have a girl yet…).  This actually is now one of Christian’s favorite movies because he loves the prince-nutcracker-solider idea!  Who knew when I let him watch this movie that he’d start dressing up in a cape with his Bermuda shorts and winter boots on waving a sword around…

 

9th Day of Christmas

This 12 days of Christmas gift was the most surprising:   

“On the ninth day of Christmas my true love sent to me Nine ladies dancing…”

Pop yourself so corn, sit by the fire.  Watch ladies snowman dancing!  You’ll never tire!

 

I had never seen this show before but it was one of Jared’s childhood favorites.  We watched it as a family for family time.  The only thing was that Christian cried at the end.  I guess all good things have to come to an end.

7th Day of Christmas

We received a bag with a note on it and a this book in side.  The note reads:

“On the Seventh day of Christmas, my true love sent to me Seven swans a –swimming…”

 

We hope you like The Trumpet of the Swan, It’s a book about love and courage; it won’t lead you wrong!

What a great idea!  This is one of our families favorite books.  It’s a little silly but it is the first chapter book that Christian had the patience to listen to and we read it while I was sick in bed in the first few months of pregnancy with Vivian.  It is a great gift!

6th Day of Christmas

“On the sixth day of Christmas my true love sent to me Six geese a-laying…”

 

We couldn’t find geese, but their eggs might do.  Open each carefully to find something new!

Each egg had a mini ornament in them and it came with a little tree to decorate.

     

We let Christian put it in his room... so fun!

5th Day of Christmas

“on the 5th day of Christmas my true love gave to me Five golden rings…”

 

Here are five rings—they taste rather good. They’re not very healthy, but enjoy them.  You should!

 

The 5th day of Christmas we got five golden…

 

 

Doughnuts!

 

I am so amazed by their creativity!  Who would have thought up that?

3rd Day of Christmas

So we got visited again by our “Secret Friend” who is giving us the twelve days of Christmas.  This one made me even more suspicious as to who it might be.  You see, in October we had a Pumpkin Recipe Night for Relief Society and half of the treats had walnuts and/or milk (at least that saved my ever-widening figure from even further girth) so I kept turning down offers of delicious pumpkin offerings because of the ill effects both ingredients cause me and when I cheat I’m so so so sorry for it sooner and later.  Anyway, so I can have pecans which seems weird when they look so similar to walnuts but they really don’t bother me.  Remember those pecan turtles we got on the second day of Christmas?

Well, for the third day this is the note we received,

"On the third day of Christmas,

my true love sent to me

Three French hens"

 

"There is no "French" in this Little Red Hen,

Just enjoy this book and bread with your friends."

 

There was the book “The Little Red Hen” and since you can’t tell from the picture, a darling bread pan with banana bread mix attached to the bottom.  There also was a bowl of warm totally melt-in-your-mouth rolls that Jared and Christian consumed before I could take a picture (I was lucky to get one roll).  It’s amazing to me that a 29-year-old guy and a 3-year-old boy can be such coconspirators when it comes to finishing good food quickly!

The banana bread makes me wonder if it is a certain darling single girl in my ward who I was telling this story to about how Jared and Christian think they are chefs because they love to add “secret ingredients” to whatever they bake when I’m gone.  I was saying how they recently made banana bread that after they put half the batter in the pan, they filled the whole thing up with chocolate chips and then put more batter on top…let’s just say that part one of the batter didn’t adhere really well to part two of the batter and so when you sliced the bread it broke in half width-wise so the presentation wasn’t gorgeous though they both went crazy over it and ate most of it up fast. I personally think banana bread is sweet enough and I like it unadulterated from chocolate chips… at least they’ll cook!  It’s really funny what they make sometimes.

So anyway, having a box of banana bread is really making me suspicious that it’s her.  She is super creative and  teaches early morning seminary so she really likes to have fun so doing something like this seems up her ally…

The figurine included was of the donkey.  The picture’s a little blurry…blame the camera because I retook this shot a few times.

    

This speculation thing is just way too much fun and I am so touched!

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Santa Lucia Day

14On Sunday we celebrated Santa Lucia Day.  It is a Swedish Holiday that celebrates St. Lucy who helped hide early Christian’s in the catacombs of Rome and was eventually burned at the stake for her convictions.  It is said that while she was hiding people in the catacombs that when she would bring them food she made a wreath of candles to put on top of her head to see so that she could have her hands free to carry trays of food for the people.

 

 

 

The Swedish tradition is to have the oldest daughter have a wreath of candles on her head and serve breakfast to the family.  Because we don’t have an oldest daughter capable of such things (yet) we just stayed up Saturday night and made Swedish saffron buns.  They were really delicious, but I can’t believe how much saffron costs!

 

To me this holiday symbolizes the need to keep your testimony burning bright so that you are able to serve others who made need your help—even if it is not the popular thing to do and you may be ridiculed for your convictions it will truly make a difference to others and it is when we are serving others that we are really serving God.

2nd Day of Christmas

Well we were visited again by our secret friends who are giving us the twelve days of Christmas.  This time the note said:

 “On the second day of Christmas my true love sent to me Two turtle doves…”

“Last night was pears, this night is “Doves” Share these together with those whom you love.”

   

Attached was a card with a dove on it and yummy turtles which we really enjoyed.  These were made with pecans so it makes me wonder if this person knows that I can have pecans and that I’m allergic to walnuts…. it could be someone who sat by me during one Relief Society Night who felt bad for me because I couldn’t have some of the treats because they contained walnuts.  That would narrow it down!  We’ll just have to see if they give me anything with lactose…

Also included was this darling lamb figurine.  Forgive my dusty shelf….

This is so sweet of whoever is doing this for us….I hope to do something similar someday so that’s why I’m putting it in my blog… so I remember what they did and have some ideas!

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The 1st Day of Christmas

Technorati Tags: twelve days of christmas,christmas,gifts,presents

As we were trying to put Christian down for a nap after Church, we found a note on our porch that reads:

“The Twelve Days of Christmas are coming to you!  Each day on your porch there will be something new.  A gift that relates to the song of “Twelve Days,” And a part of the Christmas story—of Christ whom we praise.  To serve you it gives us such joyous delight, Please enjoy this Christmas spirit each night!”

“On the first day of Christmas, my true love sent to me A partridge in a pear tree.”

“Relax, have some fun, let go of your cares.  Snack on these pears while you try to find “pairs”.

There was a basket full of pears with a book of The Twelve Days of Christmas,

and a game of Old Maid.

There also was a figurine from a nativity included

I am so shocked that someone has been so sweet and decided to bring us the Twelve Days of Christmas this year!  I have never been the recipient of the Twelve days of Christmas and I am really surprised that someone would choose to be so generous to us and do such a thing for our family.  We really hardly know anyone in our ward so I’m really wondering who in the world/ward it could be!  Jared and I keep speculating on who it can be…  Whoever it is, they’ve really touched my heart.

Advent Stocking

We celebrate German Advent at our house.  If you don’t know what that is, it is basically the four Sunday’s preceding Christmas where you light a candle on an Advent wreath and say a little poem in German.  The first week you light one candle, the next two, and so forth as you say the poem.  Afterwards, we have a child open a gift of some sort (we usually have it be a book or something about or related to Christmas) and then we have some sort of treat.  It’s a fun tradition that my husband’s family started when they lived in Germany (where my husband was born).  Here’s the poem that we recite.

 

Advent, Advent, ein Lichtlein brennt,

Erst eins, dann zwei, dann drei, dann vier,

dann steht das Christkind vor der Tür.

 

Roughly translated it means:

 

Advent, Advent, a candle is lit,

First one, then two, than three, then four

the Christ-child stands at the door. 

 

The first year we were married, Jared was very adamant that we “Do Advent”.  I searched high and low for an Advent wreath to buy.  I actually ended up thinking I’d have to create one myself and found one at JoAnn’s that came equipped with candle holders and everything.  So, basically, anything Advent always interests me when I’m looking at new ideas of things to do.  I love the Christmas Advent Calendars that “countdown” until Christmas (It might just be my love of Chocolate).  But I found this fun stocking pattern for an Advent stocking and had to try it:

 

 

This is from the book:

The Ultimate Christmas Book: Over 240 Holiday Craft, Food and Decorating Ideas by Editors of Reader's Digest

It’s a really great book with all kinds of ideas for Christmas and even New Years including gifts you could make (that don’t look home-made.  I love it!

Halloween Costumes Plus

11After some convincing (okay begging) from my son, I broke down and made him a musketeer costume for Halloween.  I also made some extra pieces to go along with the doublet and breeches of his musketeer costume so he could dress the part when he plays prince.  When I finished my son’s costume, my husband thought it would be really cool to have us all go as musketeers since this is the last year there will only be three of us.  I agreed that this would be really fun though I had my reservations at making yet two more costumes.  Well, since my husband was willing to fit the bill, I made two more hats as well as two more tabards.  I didn’t make all of the pieces such as the doublet or the pants but I felt like it still turned out quite cute.

 

Christian the Musketeer… 

 

 

Prince Christian…

 

 

 

The Three Musketeers…

 

I think they turned out well…though I feel like I look like “the brains of the operation” with my big belly.  So, technically, there are 3 2/3 Musketeers in the picture…