Material Girl

Though I am living in a material world and I am a material girl... I love home-made gifts. SERIOUSLY - nothing better than a home made gift.


I got this very cute ornament of my little nephew - a photo of him on his molded hand print. Thankfully, my SIL is super creative and knows that I treasure these ornaments.

How cute is Ella? I usually get ornaments each year - these are my absolute faves for this year. Ella also started saying - HO HO HO - Merry Christmas (which comes out like kissmiss)

Another ornament that happens to be a bit older - This guy is my mascot from my Alma mater - University of Redlands - GO BULLDOGS

Another very special ornament.

Duane's parents dog passed away, last year shortly after Thanksgiving. D had the honor of accompanying Button's during her final moments and her passing. I purchased a little ornament last Christmas when her passing was still quite fresh in our minds and hearts.

Cool hand made Christmas, our title for this year. Did you know when you have a clothesline, you are supposed to have something to hold the pins in, so they are handy. Nope, neither did I. I know it looks like a cute little dress but it's really a cute little pin holder for my clothesline that is supposed to go up next Spring.

My MIL has a friend back in Wisconsin who sews these by hand. I love the print of the fabric.

Like my Irish flag in the background?

Best home-made gift of Holiday 2009

A photo collage of my niece and nephew in the shape of a wreath.

There were a few other gifts such as the Wii, the Roomba-iRobot vacuum and the running watch I have been wanting that made there way under our tree this year.

One less thing to do - our robot will now clean our floors. Now if only we could get one to do the dishes and laundry.

We had a few very unwelcome visitors that took residence (HAHAHAHA - not referring to my inlaws) in our kitchen for the past five days. I have killed so many ants that I fear they will come back in the middle of the night in attack my brain via my nostrils and ear canals.

Our new(Wii-friendly) living room configuration

There was one Wii-related injury and of course it happened to my MIL. C'mon, you knew that was coming right? While bowling playoffs she decided to take her shoes off, keeping her socks on and ended up sliding on the carpet doing the splits and resulting in a pulled or torn hamstring. OUCH. It was painful to watch and listen to.

While we were happy to see my in-laws, we had no idea they were going to stay through.THE.ENTIRE.HOLIDAY. Yes, they just left this morning. They stayed with friends of theirs who happen to live across the street from us so while we had limited privacy in the evenings, we were basically together 24/7. Oh, joy. I knew I had a spa appointment scheduled on Friday with a good friend and I nearly wept when she called to cancel early Friday morning. I contemplated on going by myself however that seemed rude. Bye - I'am off to the spa and no one else is invited.

When my in- laws pulled their car out of our driveway this morning I thought there about some award, I am sure there is one out there that I should receive for not going completely bat-shit crazy after spending so much time with two people in a limited space. We did have some great moments and I am trying to really concentrate on those instead of the others (many, others). For instance, it was great to have our tire guy so happy to see her when we stopped in to have him look at what we believe is a very slow leak. He pushed us to the front of the line and we were on our way in 20 minutes (and 15 bucks later).

Well, that is all for now - I am off to go play landscape architect and clip ideas for our outdoor living space that we plan to start working on soon.