This little pixie elf is making me smile today. Hillary’s blog always makes me smile. When I can get to my felt again, I want to try my hand at making a little version of her for myself.
I know she would cheer up any little place she rested and I bet she has plenty of pixie dust hidden up her sleeve for a little Christmas magic!
Be sure to check out Hillary’s gorgeous website Wee Wonderfuls and book!
I am longing to be crafting. I have a special little project that I need to finish before Christmas.
But with the cottage packed up at the moment, while some work is completed, I can’t get to my sewing machine. In catching up with The Purl Bee, I came across this:
What a fantastic idea it is! And, no sewing, so I can make it, if only I could get to my felt…
Click on the image below to learn how to make a candy cane garland for yourself.
Yesterday, was St. Nicholas Day. Some of my most cherished childhood memories come from this day. We headed out into a very frosty wintery wonderlandy Monday morning to catch our bus to school. It was just too cold to be out, it was a morning to be snuggled in bed with hot chocolate and Christmas music, but off to work we went.
I headed up to my cupboard and once I dumped my stuff on my desk, I began to start taking down signs that were posted on Friday about classroom changes. As I walked out onto the landing of the back stairwell to remove my last sign, something flew up out of nowhere and perched on the ledge that leads out to the conservatory.
It was a fat little robin red breast. We chatted to each other for a few moments and with a little turn of his head he hopped along the ledge and disappeared through the elfin sized gap, where the new building meets the old and flew away.
Thank you, St. Nicholas, for you know how much I love British robins and how much more I wanted to be cozy in bed yesterday morning, that little present made me smile all day!
What could be better than real frosting piped high on a cupcake or swirled around the edges of your Nana’s famous Marble Cake?
I think the next best thing could be this adorable set of frosting brushes from the lovely Sugar & Meringue! These would be perfect to decorate homemade labels for the Christmas cookies or other sweet treats you might be giving away to friends and family. Enjoy!
(Click on the image to go to her site, where you can download this set. Tag used in first image is a Pugly Pixel Freebie)
I opened my e-mail yesterday and a note from my adorable sister popped up. She had seen something and said to me that this looked like the kind of thing I put on my blog.
Well, I clicked on “The Little Things” and watched it and watched it again and she was right! I just love the polar bear! But, even more, I love her thoughtfulness! What did she send me? Just watch below:
I wish that polar bear would visit this week and tip a little box of snow on us, I could really use a comfy, cozy, hot chocolate drinking snow day!
Oh, the lovely, lovely postman put this, through my racing green door this morning and I have never been so happy to get something in all of my life.
I have a terrible sinus infection and have come home a bit earlier from work and am now cozied up in bed listening to Christmas music, drinking hot tea and pouring over this:
HEAVEN! My fingers and toes are crossed for snow tomorrow, then I can stay in bed and look at it all over again!
Where has the year gone? I cannot believe that as I woke up this morning, we entered into one of my most favorite times of the year; the season of Advent. The 24 day build-up to Christmas! It is time to get out my Christmas Pixie, Eglantine. Alas, we are going to be having some work done at the cottage and I won’t be able to decorate as normal.
I have looked and looked at old-fashioned paper and chocolate Advent calendars, but non were beautifully decorated and were not anything I wanted in my house for the next 24 days. Since most things will have to be packed up for the moment, I wanted something small, maybe even transportable.
In looking at “One Pretty Thing”, I happened upon this:
What a fabulous idea I think this is! This is the perfect Advent calendar for grown-ups, or to mail to a college student or a friend. What a cute idea!
Read the whole post here. Happy First day of Advent!
(All images copyright My Little Mochi)
We are just a little over a week away from Thanksgiving. Not a holiday here in England, but we still celebrate it in our little cottage. There is something to this time of year, as we approach Christmas, there is just so much more hustle and bustle and everything takes on a more frantic pace. There also seems to be something in the air lately, everyone seems to just be fed up!
Maybe, it is because evening crawls in sooner and with less hours of daylight we feel pressured to complete more tasks than usual. Maybe, it is simply the pressure the media puts on us, there is not one store I have entered lately that is not stock piling their Christmas displays or has already decorated to the nines. It seems that as we approach Thanksgiving there is more pressure than ever.
Thanksgiving, can be a stressful time for many, you are possibly dealing with family that you would prefer not to see, you are anxious that your turkey will turn it out just so; the new bride cooking for everyone for the very first time. All this pressure, seen and unseen, seems to mount for everyone and comes to a head.
I think, of all the Christmas gifts, I have to buy and what seems like no time to do it in. I think of all the things I have to do at home and only the weekend to complete everything. I feel the pressure, that Thanksgiving seems to be the “hurdle” we have to get through on our way to Christmas, and once Christmas comes we can all sit back and take a breath.
I refuse to look at holidays like that. I want to enjoy them for all that they are, I want to soak up every drop of time I spend with my family. I want to simply take a breath and be open to just being, not be pressured by society to have everything just so and by a certain date, I am willing to just take it as it comes and drink in the moments as they present themselves. Because, I believe that I am where I’m supposed to be right now and I will come to it with not only an open heart but a grateful one!
(Image by Craftily-Ever-After)
The lovely Serena of The Farm Chicks has published another beautiful book, this time a Christmas one. I love books, the feel of them, the delight in turning the page and feeling the paper on your fingertips, the smell of them; old and new.
This was a book that was delivered to my racing green door, now decorated with Indian Corn for Autumn, that I wasn’t sure I wanted to open. The vibrant colors were so charming set against my crisp white tablecloth, I wanted it to stay that way, but my fingers got the better of me and as I peeled back the covers I was not disappointed.
Each page holds a treasure of delights, from stories, to recipes, to decorating ideas. It is filled with mouthwatering images so gorgeously displayed. There was, amongst it all, one section that caught my eye as I thumbed through the pages and that was an image of a tag poised over a page with the words, “It’s the Thought that Counts” held within its round frame.
When giving or receiving a gift, that is a statement that I truly believe in. Anything given with love and from the heart is a gift worth receiving and I’m telling you this book, which is beyond enchanting and filled with all the coziness of Christmas, could only be given with love. If you don’t have it already, I hope you are lucky enough to have Santa leave this under the tree for you!
Serena is having a virtual book signing party tomorrow, Friday November 5th, so be sure to take a peek, it is a great opportunity to do a little Christmas shopping and give someone a gift there is no way they wouldn’t be smitten with that in their little mittens!
We loved the “I Spy” series of books in our house when we were growing up. One of my absolute favourites is the “I Spy Christmas” book. This was a book that was pulled off the shelf, time and time again, to find the items listed in the rhyme, or to make up our own and search endlessly for them.
Walter Wick, created the series and here is a page from this beloved book:
On his website he states:
I Spy Christmas is the second book in the I Spy series and still one of my favorites. For this photograph, I found an old window that was just the right size to fit the page. Some of the dolls are my wife’s childhood toys. Others were borrowed from neighbors. I dressed the set like an old toy shop window. The snow and frost is of the type sold in Christmas shops.
His images are magical, a glimpse into childhood memories. He has created the perfect scenes, this shop window for example, is the Christmas window that you want to press your frosty nose and mittened hands to, staring at everything inside, with so many choices that you are not sure what you are going to put down on your list to ask Santa Claus for.
Here are the before and after images for the window scene that was described above:
At home there are always Christmas in July sales, parties, little get-to-gethers. I love Christmas, in fact I have been listening to Christmas music a lot lately on a fabulous online radio station I found and as crazy as it seems, listening to that music, made me sew up the rest of my bear and bunny order, even faster. The more I seemed to sing and hum to those jolly jingles, the more time just seemed to fly by along with my fingers….
(All images are copyright Walter Wick)