Holiday Crafts

I am trying to get into the holiday spirit (which is hard when its not cold or snowy) so I have been doing some crafts to try and help. Enjoy!!! (now, I know I normally post a picture and then the description, but I flipped it this time, just FYI)

Ian and I built a gingergbread house. Now before you get too excited, it was a kit, we just had to assemble it, but Ian assembled it and I decorated it. I think it turned out pretty good for our 1st one ever. Next year we decided we would try and make a more complicated, or at least, a prettier one.



As I was sitting in the waiting room at the doctors office on wednesday before my physical therapy appointment, I was glancing through one of the family magazines and saw the coolest super easy craft project ever. It was making bookmarks out of ribbons and buttons, that you would lay in the book and each end with the button would hang over the end. So I decided I wanted to make some for family & friends. I am still searching for individual buttons but found some packs at Michaels that I thought would be great to send to all my little cousins in Chicago to go along with their christmas gifts from Lisa. It was so easy and fun and I am looking forward to making more. Everyone should try this craft, all you need is a hot glue gun, ribbons & buttons, so easy and cheap!!!

Lots of Info!!

This is my 3rd post today, so be sure to scroll down and check everything out. This last post is gonna be some random stuff that didnt really fit but I wanted to let everyone know.

1st Thing:
I know you all know Im crazy and like stuffed animals and toys, but I have some super cool animals right now. They are about 2 feet tall and have a metal frame so litle kids can ride them. Last year I got Mr. Elephant at Sams Club (I had seen him a few years back but wasnt able to buy him because he was gone, so last year I saw him and HAD to have him). So this year Sams Club now has a lion, triceratops, bear and horse. (I really wanted Mr. Giraffe but missed him too, darn it) Anyway, I just got the triceratops but really wanted to call her Cera (Sara) the triceratops, not Ms. Triceratops. So that meant I need to rename Mr. Elephant, plus I still want the lion and bear, so I decided on the following names. Cera the Triceratops, Lionel the Lion, Bob the Bear and Ernie the Elephant. How do those names sound???? Any additional suggestions I am willing to listen too.



2nd Thing:
We had some crazy weather yesterday in Austin. Its been kinda chilly recently (in the 40s and 50s, maybe a high in the 70s). Anyway, yesterday it was beautiful, I had a dr appt in the morning so I didnt go into work until like noon or so. That morning I didnt even need to take a jacket, by the time I got to work it was 82 degrees. So we were sitting in the office and it just kept getting colder and colder inside and we couldnt figure out why. We found out that it had dropped about 40 degrees in 5 hours. So we all ran out to our cars in short sleeves and getting pushed across the road by the heavy wind.

When I got home we just kept hearing the wind hitting the windows and swirling outside, and the temps just kept dropping. So I was upstairs in bed reading a book and it sounded like hail hitting the windows. I knew it was raining but I didnt hear thunder or see lightning so I really didnt think it would be hailing. So I got out of my warm bed only to discover it wasnt hail, it was sleet. Turns out it was actually hailing in bastrop (where I work) and later in the night we had thunder and lightning, but more sleet than anything. There was a cover on the ground, the deck and on the roofs of the houses (even the next morning) and on my car (which was no fun because we dont have any car scrapers anymore).





The bottom line, we had a record high and a record low for the day in austin yesterday. Gotta love crazy weather!!!

Thanksgiving with the Family

Lisa, Mom and Eric were able to come down and spend Thanksgiving with us and the puppies. It was so much fun and went too quickly. We had big plans on taking picture but didnt get any before Lisa left, and the night before Mom & Eric left we hurried up to take some pictures.

Mom got some pictures from Thanksgiving day, but I dont have those so you cant see them (hey, I havent seen them yet either so dont pout).








i really wanted to get a good picture of the 4 of us to try and send in our christmas cards, but after 4 or 5 attempts this was the best we got, so no pictures will be going out in our cards unless ashley comes over and tries and can make ian smile and jaska care


I know my eyes are closed, but it was a good picture of everyone else, especially annie girl

Anyway, we had tons of fun, we put up all my christmas stuff, went shopping (left at 4:30am on Friday and didnt get home until 7pm, it was a long day). We had tons of Thanksgiving food, Ian's friend Marty come over for Thanksgiving, so amazingly enough there were 3 women and 3 men, I dont think its ever been even.

After they left I continued with my holiday decor, and took some extra ornaments and filled my pretty snowflake bowl with some extras. I think it turned out nice.



We dont have any outdoor lights or decor yet, but after Christmas we are going to get them on clearance and next year we will decorate the outside. A lot of homes in our community really went crazy so I dont want to look like a christmas poop next year again. I have big plans for day after christmas shopping, now that we have the house I want things to be pretty and match since I actually have places to display things now!!!

San Antonio #2

So back in October we took a long weekend to San Antonio (which I discussed before with the Sea World pictures). Anyway, we went and visited the Alamo and got some pictures. Its funny how we are in the middle of downtown San Antonio and right in the middle is this historic building that you see in so many paintings in the middle of nowhere. How the times have changed.




These two pictures were actually taken by our friend Pete Jones, who is now the assistant food & beverage director at the San Antonio Riverwalk Property. We worked together at Coconut Point (he was our banquet manager) and not long after we moved to Texas he did too. Anyway, the Hyatt has a VIP suite with a deck that overlooks the alamo, thats where we were standing. What a great view for a party.




Is this not the hugest cactus you have ever seen!! There were tons of these at the Alamo.