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I don't know about everyone else, but I always feel a bit relieved when the holidays are over. Sometimes there can be much frantic activity, it can really get out of hand. No matter how hard I try, I cannot completely relax during the month of December. Yes, the holidays are fun but what a relief when they are over. No plans, no thoughts of gifts, no cards, no last minute shopping. Shew!
We did have a wonderful Christmas, though. My daughter asked for a shelf... and a Nintendo DS! (For a minute, we thought we got away easy!) She wanted the shelf to display all of her Littlest Pet Shop pets and other assorted small toys. On Christmas morning, she rushed into the bedroom shrieking "Mommy, Daddy - there's a gift beside the tree that's as big as a door!"
My husband bought the new camera we both wanted and we had fun taking all sorts of unique pictures (some of which I have posted on Sunniviews.) We had our lovely bagels for breakfast, coffee with Irish Creme and a delicious prime rib dinner. My husbands favorite gift was a radio-controlled off-road car (with a top speed of 42 mph, of which he is very excited.) He's been obsessed all week!
Some of my favorite gifts included a beautiful bird-shaped birdhouse made by my parents (see their creations here and shop here), a sterling silver ring printed with the word "DREAM", a stack of books from the early 1900's including Alice in Wonderland, The Lady of the Lake, The Song of the Pilgrim and Black Beauty, and the infamous "Looking Good For Jesus" vanilla lip-balm that claims to return lips to near virgin quality!
Of course, Dasher enjoyed his two gifts - a new bear and a frisbee! We captured his excitement on video:
And now, so quickly it seems, we move onto the New Year! So - Happy New Year to everyone, especially my dear family and new blogger friends. So much to be thankful for, so many blessings!
All of our shopping is done (for the most part!) and we've been busy wrapping gifts this week. My husband and I decided that we would invest the money that we normally use to buy each other gifts and purchase a new camera. Since we still like to open things on Christmas day, I challenged us to buy as much as we can for each other under a budget of $15.00. After his initial shock and objection, I explained that we'd just have to work harder by scouring thrift stores to find fun and useful items!
Let me just say that from now on, the thrift stores are my top choice for gift shopping. I found the best gifts for so cheap! It was unbelievable. One day I bought nearly everything for my entire family for less than $20.00! Beautiful pottery, unique trivets, books, paintings, stuffed animals, games and clothes - it was astounding! (And really, what a great way to help environment - by purchasing things that would otherwise end up in a landfill!)
Luckily, I have a pretty creative family so we also exchange fun homemade gifts. My husband makes a herb infused olive oil every year (this year is garlic, basil and roasted shallots - yum!) My parents and sister create paintings and wooden crafts and I usually do something different every year: mosaics, jewelery, hand-bound books, eye pillows with homemade sachet potpourris. One year I made decoupaged wooden trays featuring each persons favorite things. Instead of covering it with decoupage glue, I used a thick polyresin that is durable and looks like glass!
Speaking of favorite things, my mom at Donna's Art tagged me with this fun little game: "12 Christmas Things About Me Hoopla." Here are the rules:
1. List 12 random things about yourself that have to do with Christmas.
2. Please refer to it as a 'hoopla' and not the dreaded 'm' - word.
3. You have to tag specific people when you're done. No "if you're reading this consider yourself tagged" stuff is allowed...because nobody actually ends up doing it. The number of people who you tag is really up to you, but the more the merrier to get this 'hoopla' circulating through blogosphere.
4. Please try and do it as quickly as possible. The Christmas season will be over before we know it. Lets involve as many people as possible!
5. Please give Andrea some link-love as the "Hoopla-Creator".
So, here are my 12 things:
1. I love Christmas music so much, I could listen to it for weeks on end. My favorite song (among many) is Christmas Canon by Trans-Siberian Orchestra and choirs singing Christmas music always makes me cry (unless I'm the one singing, of course...)
2. I have to have a live tree every year, would never even dream of getting a fake one, and have a soft spot for poor mis-shapen trees that are left behind.
3. We make reindeer food for Rudolph and sprinkle it on the lawn on Christmas Eve.
4. My mom bakes tons of Christmas cookies to pass out to the family, just like her mom before her. I still remember my Nanny in the kitchen with tupperware stacked to the ceiling filled with cookies. She kept track by counting them all, which was always a mystery to me!
5. My favorite cookies are lemon bars and peanut-butter kisses.
6. When I was a kid, I would sometimes wake up in the middle of the night and sneak out to peek at the tree. I still remember the feeling of surprise and wonder at seeing all the gifts that magically appeared there. Christmas magic still surrounds the holidays for me and I try to create that for my daughter every year.
7. That's probably why I love Christmas lights that sparkle like stars in the dark...
8. And the hushed reverence of a Christmas Eve Candlelight service.
9. I love all Christmas movies I have every seen... Miracle on 34th Street, It's a Wonderful Life, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and funny ones like The Christmas Story and The Ref.
10. We always have lox and bagels on Christmas morning with Bailey's in our coffee.
11. My grandparents lived close to us when we were growing up and I loved that we could have three Christmas celebrations - ours, Nanny & Pappys and Grandma & Grandpas - filled with noisy, jolly family and scrumptious Christmas meals.
12. When I was younger, I ripped through every Christmas present I got with anticipation and excitement. Now I like to linger over presents and enjoy watching the reactions of family members as they open their gifts rather than open my own (which is probably why I'm always the last one to open all my gifts.)
And so, it looks like lots of my friends have already been tagged with this game, but I will go ahead and tag Shelbi at Keeper of the Chocolates (although her latest post appears to mention wonderful things in her life about Christmas.) Only 2 more days!
A friend of mine turned me on to a new website called "Elf Yourself" (sponsored by Office Max.) You superimpose your head (family's heads, cats, dogs, frogs - the possibilities are endless!) onto these dancing elf bodies. There is a snappy, jazzy version of Jingle Bells that plays in the background along with your jiggy, little elves! Once you're finished, they give you a web link for your dancing family which you can send to friends and family. As you can see, we had fun with ours. (You'll might also notice that my daughter is not wearing sunglasses - but two pirate eye patches, one with a skull and cross-bones! If you remember, we went through a pirate phase recently. More about that here...) It's really hilarious and I think our Dasher-dog elf was the funniest!
The only issue I notice with this is that it may require a lot of memory or certain plugin because I had some friends that weren't able to bring up with website. But, I think it worked for most everyone. You can insert up to 4 faces and add a personalized voice message.
Here is the link of our dancing elves and the main link if you'd like to make one of your own! If you're not quite in the holiday spirit this year, they also offer a Scrooge Yourself which looks pretty funny. I just love holidays and all these silly internet things they offer! So much fun!
(UPDATE: Apparently you need to have the most recent version of Adobe Flash to play the video...)
Every year, my office holds a door decorating contest (or cube-decorating contest for those of us in cubicles.) It creates quite a buzz with everyone discussing their new ideas for the year. This year was no different! We had Santas falling down chimneys, giant door-sized wrapped gifts, winter wonderlands, crackling fireplaces, lots of Christmas trees and plenty of festive wreaths.
I based my decorations on a quote I found several weeks ago and modified it slightly:
"A single candle can light a thousand and not be diminished... Happiness never dwindles when it is shared."
I got some large cardboard from the warehouse and cut out a giant Christmas tree. I hooked up the drill and punched about 150 holes in it to hold about 150 lights. I taped a candle light to the top and surrounded it with a golden cardboard halo drenched in glitter. I folded some bright red paper strips and made little cutout people joined by hand and foot with sparkling hearts on their chests. I used about 10 large paperclips folded inside-out to hook it to my cubicle fabric, hung some wrapping paper as my background and glued my lovely quote beside it. It turned out to be quite pretty!
This year, our judges were a group of volunteers that come every week. They are from a home of mentally challenged adults and are the sweetest, most loving people you've every met. Of course, we couldn't fraternize with the judges as they walked by, but I heard them and had to hold back the tears as they read the quote on my cube to their counselors. It was so touching! When they left, our receptionist found some t-shirts and pens to give them as a thank-you for their hard work and you would have thought she was handing out a million dollars to each of them. They were ecstatic! What a perfect group to judge such a fun and festive competition!
Anyway, we had our Christmas party a few days later and I was shocked to hear that I had won first prize this year! What an honor!
Here is a sample of some of my amazingly creative co-workers... Kudos to everyone!
Yesterday was my birthday and I tried to not mention it at work earlier this week. Only because last year, the birthday thing kind of snowballed out of control. We got into this birthday frenzy going out to eat, meeting after work or getting cards and gifts for every birthday of everyone in the office. Heaven forbid someone was forgotten. It was just crazy. We eventually just let the birthday plans fizzle out.
But, my birthday secret slipped. I really tried not to let it, but you see, it was simply an exhausting, anxiety-filled week. At one point I just happened to blurt out, "I just don't want to have to work this weekend, of all weekends - it's my birthday weekend!" Well, apparently the ears of several co-workers perked up at that comment.
So, Friday rolled around. It was a long, tiresome week. I work for a non-profit and this is the busiest time of the year. Everyone is hyped up on chocolate and coffee and feeling a little beserk when one of our colleagues bursts in the office and announces that the boss just called a mandatory meeting - quick, but important. "Everyone grab a notebook!", which translates to more work coming down the pipeline.
I grab the chocolate bowl for us and we trudge to the conference room. We're trying to organize the seating and my boss calls for someone to get more chairs from his office (our conference room is a tad small.) But, alas, instead of more chairs she comes back with more people - a group of folks from other departments! She's holding a beautiful plant and cake and all of a sudden, the room bursts out in song... "Happy Birthday to you!..."
Holy cow! My very first surprise party - and boy, was I ever blindsided! I wanted to laugh out loud, but I just happed to be trying to swallow a Hershey's kiss that I ate in preparation for bad news! How funny and bizarre the whole scene was at that exact moment.
I got a lovely card from all my sweet friends, we sat and enjoyed cake and laughed at my utter shock. Our media manager shoots pictures in the background and my boss has to pat me on the hand and reassure me that there is no meeting. Really. (I admit, I'm perhaps slightly type-A personality!)
It was crazy and funny and such a joy. I'm so grateful for such wonderful, supportive colleagues. I've already framed my lovely card and will hang it in my office to remind me that life doesn't need to be taken so seriously. Funny how that reminder sometimes comes in the strangest ways.
Thanks guys - you are all super-awesome!!
My daughter takes a wonderful clogging class at a little dance studio down the road. This is her second year. When the new season started this fall, we didn't buy her new shoes. I kinda thought she'd be okay for awhile but felt it looming in the distance. It was one of those vague things that hangs around the back of your mind like fog and never really materializes. I just kept forgetting!
Until about 3 weeks ago when she started complaining that her toes hurt. The signs for used clogging shoes had disappeared from the studio walls by then and I had heart palpitations just thinking about the cost of new ones. But I knew we had to do something - my daughter started taking off her shoes in class and was clogging in socks!
So my husband made a several calls and found a discount place south of town. Of course we got lost trying to find the it, making illegal u-turns on dirt roads and frantically getting directions on cell phones. They closed at 5:00 and we got there one minute before.
Fortunately the proprietors were an older couple who didn't mind staying open a little longer for frantic parents of a clogger! They were so nice. For 25 years they had their own clogging team that toured the east coast. With great expertise they fitted her little happy dancing feet. As a bonus, they not only had the clogging taps in stock, but hammered them on for us in the back! We were so relieved and my daughter was hopping around like a jumping bean from excitement (she does that a lot!)
With such a huge weight lifted from my shoulders, I stopped for gas on the way home. As I was standing there enjoying the crisp fall air and watching the sun set in the distance, I happened to notice the sign beneath the gas prices that usually announce the store discounts on sodas and potato chips. Here is what it said...
BUILD YOUR LIFE AROUND THOSE WHO MATTER
I took a deep breath of the chilly autumn air and said a prayer of gratitude for such blessings. Not just for the shoes or for the wonderful couple that we just met, but also for the owners of a gas station who choose to inspire rather than promote. And how amazing it was to see such true inspiration at the end of hectic day.
We had the most delightful Thanksgiving day yesterday! When I woke up, the coffee was already made. I slowly poured myself a cup, savoring every moment of this special day. My husband and daughter were playing Lego Star Wars, so I got out my beads and strung a new necklace. I checked on my blogger friends then we went for a walk.
It was a fabulous morning - the sun was shining, it was 69 degrees with a soft breeze. 
Fall leaves were floating down from the sky and spinning lazily in the street. We finally have bright beautiful leaves - golden yellows and rich reds. It was so wonderful and I got some great photos - I'll be loading them onto Sunniviews this week, the series will be called Fall Finale.
After getting ready, we drove over to my aunts house in Chapel Hill for our family get-together. It was wonderful to see everyone! The table was beautifully set for our Thanksgiving feast and the food was scrumptious. 
We had an expert turkey maker and an expert turkey carver along with all the yummy accompanying dishes: buttery mashed potatoes and rich gravy, stuffing, green bean and lima casserole, sweet potatoes, corn, a special family recipe of mac and cheese, homemade cranberry sauce and fresh rolls. Oh my, it was so good. Oh, it was so, so good. We were stuffed.
Afterwards we played cards (UNO and Euchre), told jokes and stories, laughter filled the air. 
We settled our bellies with strong, rich coffee and nibbled on dessert: pumpkin pie and apple crisp with french vanilla ice cream.
Then it was time to say goodbye and make quick plans for Christmas. As we drove home, my daughter sleeping soundly in my lap, the radio playing soft and sentimental music, my husband and mother-in-law talking quietly in the front - I watched the drying fall leaves scuttle in spirals across the highway through the dark. My heart became wide open, expanding beyond my body, beyond my soul, so that I had the most incredible feeling of love and gratitude. I closed my eyes and envisioned myself circling my arms around the whole world in a great loving embrace. And on this Thanksgiving, I was truly thankful.
From the Toymaker's November Newsletter:
Appreciation is the highest form of prayer, for it acknowledges the presence of good wherever you shine the light of your thankful thoughts.
-Alan Cohen
And so it is.
We recently went to the Whirligig Festival in Wilson, NC. My parents had a booth selling wonderfully designed folk art. My incredibly talented dad makes these great wooden marble chasers and bird houses and my amazing artist mom paints them! Their booth was called "Manspace"... (your not the boss of me!)
The Whirligig Festival started 3 years ago and was inspired by Vollis Simpson, a local artist who creates these huge, intricate whirligigs out of scrap metal. This year they had more vendors than ever.
We set up early on a Saturday morning and, since this festival is in November, it was quite chilly. But the sun was bright and the nippy wind made all the whirligigs spin with delight. Our booth neighbors included a husband and wife team selling a wide array of bright, colorful tye-dye clothing (of course my daughter had to have a zip up sweatshirt... but tye-dye looks so cute on kids, doncha think?) and an older couple selling sailboats and propeller airplanes made out of tin cans.
The hamburger joint down the street had refreshments for our four-legged friends, a real live pirate show complete with swordfighting and whip tricks played every hour (my daughter's favorite, of course), and music stages at 3 locations kept us entertained the whole weekend. As an added bonus, the had tons of blow-up jumpy rides for the kids!
We had so much fun setting up, talking to folks and demonstrating how the marble chasers work. The kids loved them and it was surprising to discover that many people had never seen a marble chaser before. Our family is originally from Lancaster, Pennsylvania - the Amish country, and we've been playing with wooden toys like this for ages. So, it was pretty interesting to see everyone's reaction.
But I will tell you my most favorite thing about the Whirligig festival was watching a local artist paint a mural of the festival on a huge canvas. He looked like an artist of old - decked out in an oversized button-down smock with a ponytail. He was amazing and it was fascinating to watch the progress of the painting.
The booth was so colorful and fun and the food was delicious. As far as I'm concerned, any festival that serves funnel cake loaded with powdered sugar and fresh Starbucks coffee is a success in my book! We had a ball...
(You can read more and view more pics from the Whirligig Festival on my mom's blog.)
Wow - I've just received the coveted Rockin' Girl Blogger award from Nan at On My Porch. Thanks, Nan! What an honor!
I told my daughter that since I'm a Rockin' Girl Blogger that she's my Rockin' Girl Daughter. Since we just happened to be watching "School of Rock" and dancing around the living room, she was pretty happy!
I'd like to pass this award on to Chocolate Girl at Keeper of the Chocolates, the best mama in the world, and Alexandra at Silver Bell Cottage, the best baker in the world.
Keep Rockin' girls!!
I have cracked the mystery of the monkey coconut! As you may have read on my State Fair entry, I purchased a scrumptious pina colada in a monkey coconut that can be used as a bank once you're finished with the drink. Everyone who has seen the monkey coconut has fallen in love with it and it now seconds as a sort of Budda in my office. Whenever we get frustrated or stressed out, we rub monkey coconuts head gently and chant, "oh, Have-Fun-Monkey-Coconut, give us patience!". MC also keeps my Zeldaloo's Mermaid company - this lovely little treasure I purchased at an etsy.com fair while visiting New York.
So, my sister saw a picture of monkey coconut and was dying to have her own. What a great Christmas gift it would make! I started searching the internet and found a few on ebay but they were way too pricey. I thought about calling the fair organizers and seeing if I could get a hold of the people who ran the booth. Then I had an even more brilliant idea and called the 800 number printed on the bottom of my treasured little coconut!
As it turns out, the monkey coconut can be purchased from Topshelf Marketing, a Drinkware Catalog. But you can't buy just one. Oh no, minimum purchase is 36 MC's for $4.50 each. I tried to think of 36 people in my life who might actually want a Have Fun Monkey Coconut for Christmas. Then I wondered if anyone might want to go in on a purchase with me. Since I had trouble with that, I wondered if I could resell them on ebay for a profit. Honestly, they appear to be a hot ticket item.
So, as I continue to debate the purchase of the monkey coconut, take a gander for yourself - here is the link. And if anyone out there has any other connections to reasonably priced monkey coconuts, I'd be grateful for the info!
How lovely is it that our local Krispy Kreme donut shop is located on Peace Street? Could there be anything more perfect then a fresh, tasty donut and a rich cup of hot coffee early on a sunny morning, placidly placed on a street named Peace? I would say that's just about as peaceful as it gets! Makes me want plop down below the sign amidst the delicious smells of frying dough and meditate.
The neat thing about this particular Krispy Kreme is that it's one of the main distribution sites, so you can watch the donuts being made. 
We love watching them travel on the assembly line, evolving really, from just a piece of blobby dough to its final confection.
I have to say that I've always had a struggle deciding between Krispy Kreme and Dunkin Donuts. KK has the delicious glazed creme filled donut while DD has the scrumptious powdered vanilla creme. Difficult decision. But luckily this is not one of my daily obsessions - yes, so many other things to fill my mind with, but sometimes it's just fun. Especially on a bright sunny morning on Peace Street!
A few weeks ago the North Carolina State Fair came to town! It was so much fun - I absolutely love the fair. There is such an air of excitement and fascination that no matter how crowded or hot it gets, I always find something interesting around every corner.
This year was no different. One of my favorite things were the larger-than-life farm animals that were painted by local high school art classes.
They were really creative, beautifully designed and extremely colorful. They reminded me of the art projects held by large cities like the Cow Parade and our own Raleigh Red Wolf Ramble.
In the agriculture building, we saw the largest pumpkin, a record breaker in NC this year at over 1,100 pounds, which was pretty surprising considering the drought. They also had a booth where you could milk a cow! Quite an experience for my daughter! The most hilarious thing was when a mama pig started to feed her piglets. I heard this squealing and laughing coming from a distant cage. I managed to get a video of one little piggy struggling against his siblings for a little lunch. Too funny!We headed to the Village of Yesteryear and watched a real potter spin the wheel and create a beautiful vase. My daughter also decorated and stuffed her own doll which they sew together 
with a foot-pedal sewing machine (one of our favorite places, she now has three dolls!) I also enjoy wandering through the garden competition booths. This year they had one based on Alice in Wonderland with a purple planter called "Tea Thyme" containing flourishing thyme and teapots, two colorful Mad Hatter chairs on either side and stacks of teacups in the back. So cute!
Another treasure I found was the "Have Fun" monkey coconut. It came with a refreshing pina colada and a straw practically the size of my daughter. The best thing about the monkey coconut is that it can be used as a bank once you're finished. In my office, we decided that the monkey coconut would do better as a shrine to having fun and staying positive. So, the monkey coconut keeps my etsy.com mermaid company.
I also love all the fun food, but I can't have too much. Last year I tried a fried snickers bar and it just about did me in!
Holy heart-attack on a stick, batman! I shied away from the breakfast on a fork and the BBQ sundae and decided on some fresh fried fish, which was scrumptious - along with my monkey coconut pina colada, of course, and we shared a little funnel cake!
And, my absolute favorite thing that I save until just before we leave, a relaxing ride on the ferris wheel! Just delightful!
I don't know about everyone else, but I always feel a bit relieved when the holidays are over. Sometimes there can be much frantic activity, it can really get out of hand. No matter how hard I try, I cannot completely relax during the month of December. Yes, the holidays are fun but what a relief when they are over. No plans, no thoughts of gifts, no cards, no last minute shopping. Shew!
