wishing you all a joyful 2013

caught in freeze-frame

I have almost twenty days off from work and already it feels as if the time is half-way gone. As always there are plans but my brain seems to prefer to huddle under thrifted blankets on the sofa. We've had rain off and on and so the light is waning and with it goes my productivity.

It hasn't been all lazy-laziness. I have vacuumed up more ants than you would want to see in one place. I also took the holiday decorations down and hit the post office to mail some etsy sales. In regards to those darn ants it seems they are a bit booze happy as I just discovered a new party of them hanging out with the creme de cacao. Oy!

I have now since lost the thought I was going to write about so I leave you with some happy mossy bark because that is how I roll....

boxing day shop update

Why oh why does it take so long to add items to an online shop? I have much planned but managed to add a happy handful of new vintage items to the scrumdillydilly shop. Take a gander, won't you please? Happy boxing day! 

the day after christmas

I had tremendously unpleasant dreams last night. All. night. long. Dreams where I needed to hide myself or hide a son I did not have from a very bad bad person who came to kill on Tuesday evenings. In the dream it was a given that could not be thwarted and so I tried to create an illusion of no child being in the room with no actual place for hiding. It was a horrid, horrid, dream and almost impossible to wake up from. How odd on the eve of Boxing Day to carry such tremendous woe.

I don't know what was up. Christmas day spent with family was joyful and quiet with a lot less fanfare than usual (in a good sense). Perhaps we were all still reeling from the various sick that seemed to wallop us all but our day was spent in good company with more cheese, more noshing, more sweets than we took notice of. There were many rounds of exquisite corpse, this time with both words and drawings, there was hot apple cider and vernor's and foam darts flying overhead and underfeet and much, much, laughter with maybe a grump tossed in to keep it real.

My nose, thanks to another round of meds, was in tip-top working order and so I was able to smell the piney pretty of the Christmas tree, the spicy happy of the nutmeg in my egg nog (which was then added to my coffee), the richness of the breakfast quiche and the crispness of the cold air outside with a highnote of log fire. The nephew a-go-go was a hoot with his excitement in the odd bits and pieces that were gifted to him and everyone spilled over with giggles and sighs. I laughed many times and yet I felt overwhelmingly sad and I do not know why. I can speculate, sure but it was odd and disconcerting to feel my eyes well up suddenly and for no reason and to catch my breath and shake it off. So, so, disconcerting and odd. I spoke out about it and the mama a-go-go said she felt melancholy as well and then the sister a-go-go said Christmas makes her fel blue too and we sat there all quietly, a little confused, a little humbled, a little closer to ech other than before.

And then we went back to our exquisite corpses full of funny drawings and flying donuts and the nephew's propensity for turning our silly sentences into a scene with an alien or robot in it.

The evening ended with a rainstorm and yet another round of cleaning up the ants that have invaded the tiny casa.

The rain has retreated a bit and another round of ants has been dealt with and I am huddled in the chilly casa under a thrited quilt waiting for some sun, warmth or light to filter in so I can clean up the messy mess. Happy boxing day!

diy cupcake liner tree

This nifty tree can me whpped up in time. Make a whole forrest of pretty! Details over at the 'do!

last minute cookie gifts

So, you made three dozen of your famous holiday cookies and want to gift them to friends and family but want to shy away from the classic tin or gift box. Jar them up! If you are a canner, crater, hoarder or hipster, you are sure to have a jar or two flaoting around. Bell jars are awesome but I prefer to reuse the mister's almond butter jars as they are slightly wider in diameter and have a larger opening for cookie cramming. I find that cookies made with a small cookie scoop are a perfect fit for the jars.

Pile your cookies int oyour jar, add the lid then top with a gold foil doily tied with a legth of vintage trim and you are good to go! 

Happy Holidays!