Christmas Music

I love Christmas music.  L-O-V-E IT!  I turn it on while we're driving home from Thanksgiving and it stays on through Christmas Day.  I belt out the words to almost every song (except that song Christmas Shoes....the station gets changed immediately.  Way too depressing for Christmas).  I hear the music and my soul fills with JOY!

My love for Christmas music has resulted in a tradition in our little family.  Every year I get a new Christmas music CD in my stocking.  We listen to it as soon as possible and I look forward to adding it to my music for the following year.

I, of course, have my favorites.  My favorite secular song is "All I Want for Christmas is You" by Mariah Carey.  LOVE IT!  My favorite hymns are "Joy to the World" and "Oh Come All Ye Faithful."  I pray that we sing those two some time during the Advent season every year. 

Do you have any favorite Christmas songs?  What are some songs you love?  Any that you can't stand?  I want to hear about your favorites so I can add them to my iPod playlist!

Christmas Tradion #1 - Getting and Decorating our Tree

The Sunday after Thanksgiving is the beginning of our family's Christmas Traditions.  After church we grab lunch and then head over to Gerten's to pick out our Christmas tree.  All the way there today we had the Christmas music cranked and if I wasn't singing along I would hear, "MOM!  SING!" from the backseat.  Mari was really trying to sing along and all three kids were dancing along to the music.  I am teaching them my deep love of Christmas music.

Walking into Gerten's to look for our tree.

Peder watching all the people and waiting for the reindeer to come walking by.

Mari walking through the trees while we look.

Emmy happily looking for trees with Daddy.

Jake with our new tree.

Me in the afterglow of picking out our tree.

All 3 kids putting ornaments on the tree.  This was SO exciting.  And the tree was, "Oooooh, NICE!"

This is how the tree looks when a 4 year old and 2 two year olds choose where the ornaments go.  There are areas covered with ornaments and big blanks spots.  The tree will stay decorated this way, because I think it's super cute and I'll never get my tree decorated like this again.

The kids in front of their beautifully decorated tree.  I love it, they love it, everyone is happy with the final result!

Mari's Stitches

Mari had a little mishap on Friday.  We're not really 100% sure what happened, but we did find a play cooking pan that matches the shape of the injuries on her face.  Grandma Cindi got to take her to the ER and we met them there.  Mari got her three stitches in her chin, a little stuffed puppy from the doctor, some comfort from Mommy and Daddy and then she said she wanted to go see Peder and Emmy and snuggle with Grandpa Warren. 

Here is a picture of her today, 2 days post incident.  She plays with the stitches with her tongue and we're hoping we can get them out Wednesday morning before we go get pictures with Santa.

Black Friday Etsy Sale!

I have decided to participate in the Black Friday promotion on etsy.com and am extending my sale through Monday, November 30th.


My featured promotions:

- All items will on sale! I will be reducing the prices so they will be listed at the reduced price, not the original.

- All custom orders will receive free shipping. Some custom items I offer include: perpetual calendars, annual calendars, Christmas cards, invitations, thank you cards, favor boxes, gift bags and etched glassware. (My favorite idea for etched glassware is a casserole dish with the last name etched into the backside of it. You can read the name properly through the glass and it's a great personalized gift....I'm thinking wedding presents!) Have a different idea? Ask! I will work with you to try to make it work.

Feel free to contact me with any questions. I would love to help in any way I can!

I hope you enjoy your Thanksgiving and the long weekend!  I know I will be loving my mom's turkey dinner...especially the mashed potatoes and gravy.  (My Thanksgiving secret:  Every year, after everyone leaves my parents' house I have another HUGE bowl of mashed potatoes and gravy.  My guilty pleasure.  YUM-O!)

Some big things!

It has been exciting weekend this past weekend and Thursday just happens to be my most favorite holiday of all, so we have a big one coming ahead.

So the three big things happening in our lives right now:

1.  My sister had her baby boy last night!  Elias Warren Stevens (Eli) was born at 9:01p last night.  He weighed 8 lbs 2 oz. and is 20 3/4 inches long.  He is SUPER cute and we are all very excited at his arrival.

2.  I opened my etsy shop Handcrafted by Melissa Kaye over the weekend.  I had a very successful weekend at a Holiday Boutique that my friend Andrea hosted at her house and have now decided to expand to etsy.com and local craft fairs and boutiques.  My etsy site is melissakaye.etsy.com and I will keep you all updated about any craft fairs I decide to participate in.

3.  On the morning of Thanksgiving our little family of 5 will be participating in The Walk to End Hunger at the Mall of America.  All proceeds go towards our local foodshelf, Neighbors, Inc.  Our goal is to raise $250 ($50 each) and right now we have raised $55.  If you would like to sponsor us, click on this link: Our Walk Website.

That's all for now...life is crazy busy around here!

Open House Tonight and Tomorrow!

My friend Andrea is having a Holiday Open House at her house tonight from 3-8p and tomorrow from 10a-3p.  It will feature handcrafted items from several members of our church, special order baked goods and Mary Kay products.  This is the first time I've ever sold anything and I'm pretty excited/nervous to see how it goes.  If you would like more information about the sale or it's location contact me and I'll email it you.  Below are some samples of some of the things I created for the event.  It has also prompted me to open an etsy.com shop.  More about that soon!

A paper Christmas tree.

Gift bags in various sizes with paper filler.

Sets of 6 cards, mostly different styles of holiday cards.

Journals.

Wine wraps and etched glass wine glasses.

The Final Product

Before you see our beautiful pumpkins, I had to share some of my favorite things from today.

First of all, Peder was very scared of a "shadow monster" in his bedroom.  I gave him my teddy bear, Butterscotch, that I had while growing up.  I explained that Butter had a lot of experience from protecting me when I was little and could him feel safe.  He snuggled in and went right to sleep.  It made me so happy.

Secondly, Mari all the sudden started screaming in her bedroom.  I walked in and she wrapped her arms and legs around me and snuggled her head into my shoulder.  I asked her what was wrong, what she needed and she looked at me and said, "I NEED DADDY!" and then went back to crying.  I thought it was so sweet, but also felt bad for her because Jake was at football tonight.

Here are our final products, the ghost was Emmy's, the monster was Peder's and the bat was Mari's.  I hope to get more Halloween pics up in the next few days.

Carving Pumpkins

I'll post the finished products later, I'm suddenly having issues with blogger and our picture program.

The kids with their pumpkins.

Emmy helping me get the top off her pumpkin.

Peder trying to carve out the top of his pumpkin.

Emmy was REALLY unsure about cleaning out the inside of her pumpkin.

Peder thought it was funny.

Mari was all business.

Emmy finally got into it when we showed her how fun it was to get messy with the guts.

Peder starting to carve his pumpkin.

Getting a little help from Daddy.

I poked all the pattern holes in all 3 pumpkins.

Getting some love from my Sweet P.

The reality of pumpkin carving in our household:  as soon as the pumpkins were emptied Jake and I were left to do the hard work.  I poked all the holes and carved the ghost pumpkin, Jake carved the other two.

Picking out Pumpkins

We picked out pumpkins on Tuesday afternoon.  We told Peder he could pick out any pumpking he could carry.  He did it and got a good sized pumpkin too!

Mari carrying her pumpkin....notice Jake's hand holding the pumpking up for her?

Emmy with her pumpkin.  Jake helped her too.

The following are some pictures from the place we got our pumpkins.  Definitely made me feel like it was fall....which I loved!

Peder's Birthday and Party

It's been awhile since I've posted and a lot has happened since then.  Jake and I celebrated our 7th Anniversary, Peder turned 4 and had his first preschool friends birthday party, and Halloween has come and gone.  I'm going to try to post a bunch of posts in the next couple of days with some of the high points of these events.

We'll start off with Peder's birthday and party.  We had his party at Pump It Up again this year and invited his preschool class.  Everyone seemed to have a good time and when I asked one of his friends if she had fun, she told me, "Yeah!  IT WAS AWESOME!"

This is what our backyard looked like on Peder's birthday.  Who expects snow that sticks on October 12th?  Our camper was still up and all our outdoor stuff was still out.

Peder opening his favorite present (from Emmy) on his birthday.  He got Woody, Buzz Lightyear and RC from Emmy, a craft box from Emmy and an art set from Jake and me.

Cupcakes on his actual birthday.

Daddy and Emmy going down the slide.

Grandpa Warren and Mari after going down the slide.  Grandpa didn't break his toe this year.

Grandma Cindi coming out of the obstacle course.  I love that I got this picture!  :)

Peder's cousin Jenna and Mari coming out of the obstacle course.

Grandpa Warren, Peder's cousin Marissa and Peder bouncing in the basketball court.  Grandpa and Grandma were busy making them FLY in there.  Peder and Marissa were pretty much inseparable the entire party.

Marissa, Peder and one of Peder's classmates holding hands and waiting to go into the party room for cake.

The cupcakes Jake made to make sure we had enough cake for everyone.

The fancy decorated cake that Jake made.  It was a hit!

Peder blowing out his candles.