Vacation Video Blogging

Here is my first attempt at a video blog. I had made one video that was great but the resolution was too high and I rambled on so it was almost 400MB and was going to take 20 hours or more to upload. So it was time for a second take. Sorry if I talk too fast and if you can't see the projects. I had to keep the file small. I hope you enjoy it. And here are the projects I mentioned in the vlog. First the stuffed gnomes. They turned out really cute but doing them in miniature size was actually pretty difficult. I may make them again full sized. I especially loved Mr. Gnomes unibrow! And the cute shirts. Not perfect by any means but pretty darn good for my first try. I took a while to get use to using my machine in this way (totally free hand). Next time I may try playing around with the tension to see if my stitches are less wobbly. I used the flash so you could see the stitches a little better.

And as for my Christmas journal, it really only took about 40min on the computer to print out the photos and lists and throw it all together. Here are the contents:
-A recount of how we spent Christmas 07 (great for when I go to scrapbook it)
-Favorite recipes
-Ideas I saw or though of for 2008.
-Gifts given and received. This is great for follow-up gifts next year and not accidentally repeating anything.
-An updated card list
-Photos of Christmas decorations with notes and ideas for next year.
-2007 Christmas card and ideas for the 2008 card.
-All pages have space for more ideas.
My goal is to keep this on the bookshelf so I can add to it any time I want and so I can start preparing for Christmas early which helps me reduce stress.

Christmas Party / Greg's Birthday

We hosted a Christmas party for our communion team from church on the night of Greg's birthday. Greg doesn't like any fuss on his birthday so he was really excited for this party. He said it was great because we were having a big party on his birthday but no one was going to know it was his birthday! No pressure! I did end up spilling the beans during dessert and everyone sang to him but that was about all. It was a really nice time with about 12 people from our team. We visited, snacked, and played some board games. It was our first big party in Sunnyside and the apartment was a great spot for entertaining. My good friend Jin was at the party and was my right hand lady in the kitchen. She took some photos that night and was nice enough to send them to me. Thanks Jin and HELLO!Mingling in the kitchen.Some of the communion team ladies.Lots of yummy desserts!
Singing to Greg. Happy Birthday Baby!

I'm on vacation!

Just as the holiday madness was calming down and December was promising to be a great end to the year, a new project was tossed in my lap at work. They have decided to move our lab up one floor and gave me about 3 weeks to coordinate it all. Plus they are moving 3 labs into our old space which I was asked to help coordinate too. Needless to say I have been extremely busy the last 2 weeks. Add my nasty cold to the mix and I didn't do much else. But today I start 11 straight days away from work. I am so excited! Today we did NOTHING but lounge around, watch Twin Peaks on DVD and take a nap. We had Thai take-out for dinner and are now settling in for more tv and lounging. A perfect start to my vacation.

The Winning Photo

Almost all of my Christmas cards are out in the mail so I guess it is time to show the photo we ended up using this year for our Christmas cards. Remember that it was taken in the cemetery!We are having our first snow storm of the winter right now. They expect 2-4 inches of snow. Have a great day!

Christmas Cards Part 1

Sorry for not posting yesterday. Greg gave me his stupid cold so I have been feeling pretty lousy for a couple days. I did manage to make about 80 Christmas cards last weekend. My card design this year was very simple and was copied directly from the Dec issue of CK (a BH card of course). I made 3 batches of cards:This one was sent out to my BSF group. I shot a photo of my bible and our lesson (instead of a photo of Greg and I). I got this idea from Jeanine Hemminger who gave me a similar type photo many years ago when she was in my BSF group.This next card when out to our communion team. I shot this photo of the Lord's Supper on stage one Sunday last summer after we set it up. We are having our team over next Saturday for a party and will be giving out most of the cards then.

I haven't sent out all our friends and family cards yet but will show that one to you soon. All cards featured a photo, a scrap of Christmas paper, and some paint stamping.

Outtakes

We had a really nice and productive weekend. Well, I did. Greg was sick with a cold so he was productive at napping, sneezing, whining and making me wait on him. Just kidding, he got a lot done too in between the afore mentioned activities!

On Saturday I dragged him out for our annual Christmas photo shoot. This year we made a wonderful compromise. I got my photo shoot and he got to do it in a location he likes... The Cemetery! Hear that Tiff! We don't have a yard anymore, there aren't any nice parks around us, and we waited too long to go far off on location so we headed to our local cemetery. It happens to be a really big one with lots of really old crypts, monuments, and great architecture. Of course I can't share the winning Christmas photo with you just yet but I can share some of the shots that didn't make it onto our Christmas cards this year!
This is a classic Greg shot. Every pose he suggested had us surrounded by headstones. Not really very festive! We didn't use any of those.This shot and the first one were pretty typical. Find a big crypt or mausoleum and shoot by the front door. This one had great oxidized doors and was huge (see last photo) but the light was way too bright by this time and in this shot I didn't get into position fast enough before the camera fired. The first photo may have worked but I would have had to crop out those headstones on the right that sneaked into view.I loved the vines on this really old stone crypt wall but thought this photo was a little gloomy. Not our best expressions either.Greg loved this old iron cross in one of the doorways so we snapped a shot. Would be a good easter photo maybe.One of the really large structures we shot around. There were lots more potential places to take photos but there were many people visiting graves that day and one large funeral going on and we didn't want to offend anyone so we stayed away from those areas. Cemeteries really are nice places to visit. They are quiet, interesting to look at, and often have park areas and water features to enjoy.

After the photo shoot my buddy Peh came over and I edited my photos and we worked on Christmas cards together while watching Pride and Prejudice. It was so much fun to sit up in my studio and chat and work. More about my cards later.

The big push - Weekend plans

My goal is to have the bulk of my Christmas stuff done this weekend. All shopping done. All gifts wrapped and shipped by Monday. All Christmas cards made. I know, I dream big. Some things are 90% done and others 0% done.

Wish me luck!

Christmas Decor Part 2

Second Issue: What happened to the fire place?!
Our old apartment had a fireplace and more importantly a mantle. Much of my Christmas decorating centered around that mantle and fireplace. The new apartment has a staircase so that became the place for the mantle decorations. My garlands were easily adaptable and fit the space marvelously (hard to see but it is greenery and berries). The angel candles obviously couldn't go on the stairs so they ended up on the table instead. The other thing I used to do was frame each years Christmas photo in a small frame ornament and hang it on the mantle garland. We also hung our stockings on the mantle in the old place. I ended up hanging the stockings and the photos on the stairs and it turned out pretty good. Although I do miss my fake crackling fire!

More small details:
We hung our advent calendar and a wreath near the back door. I like this because you can see the calendar from the living room but the decorations are still spread throughout the house.

Another wreath on the front door. It is on the inside. The way our doors are set up there can't be a wreath on the outside of our door because the main front door would brush into it all the time. Therefor this wreath faces into our house.

A little tree by the phone.
Other decor not shown includes:
I had gold stars that hang by gold ribbon in the window of our old living room (5 windows). Well we still have 5 windows in this place, 2 upstairs and 3 down so I hung my gold stars in each one (love it!). They never photograph well unfortunately. We also have electric candles in 2 of the windows. I think I may be 5 single candles and place them in each of the windows. There are also some more little trees in the bedroom and the craft room. That is about it I think. Merry Christmas!

Christmas Decor Part 1

I love Christmas and Christmas decorations. I especially love my Christmas tree and its lights. As this is the first year we are celebrating Christmas in our new apartment I have been challenged to make all my Christmas decorations fit into the new space without having to buy a ton of new stuff.

First issue: Where to put the tree?
We had a few options but it is really important to me to be able to sit near the tree and its lights. We ended up putting the tree between the living room and dining room. As you can see it is too tall to fit IN the doorway so we moved it slightly into the dining room (there is less furniture in there and more room) but tucked it slightly into the corner (hard to tell from this angle). It is perfect. Plus it can be seen through the front windows from there. Here it is fully decorated and under the tree you can see a big green square. That is the album I made last year about the tree's ornaments.

Now for a couple smaller details:

My angel candlesticks, which are out all year got updated with red candles and moved onto the table where they are more visible. The little trees are from the Rafiki store at BSF headquarters. The other item is from Greg's parent's first Christmas as a married couple away from home. They sent it to us on our first Christmas. I need to find some new candles for it.

We set up our nativity on the sideboard. This year I put out a palm tree for fun (we have all kinds of weird "Bethlehem Village" things that were given to use but I like to stick with just the basics).

A couple horses from Greg's childhood are sitting in front of the TV. They used to sit on the ground in front of our old fireplace.

More tomorrow!

Early Christmas Gift

Greg and I had a very nice weekend. Probably the most relaxing weekend we have had in several months. We got a few things done but managed to have time to just sit and relax. Not to mention everything in the apartment is currently WORKING properly which helps too!

I had the opportunity to do a little baking this weekend. We had some leftover pizza dough from the previous 2 nights dinners so I made some cinnamon rolls with caramel sauce. There wasn't a lot of dough just enough for 6 mini rolls. Boy were they good and so easy to make since the dough was done. They hit the spot!

And well, since we like to eat stuff like in the picture above we decided to buy a treadmill this weekend. Now my wrapping paper room is also a home gym. We took my mom's very wise advice and found this one on Craig's list for a fraction of the cost of a new one. It was really hard to get upstairs but luckily our basement neighbor is a young fit guy who helped Greg haul it up the stairs. We have already had a couple good workouts. Hopefully this will help keep the holiday weight gain to a minimum.